Why would you freehand when transfers exist?

Well the simple answer is why wouldn’t you. I know that we all start out as miniatures painters with an abject fear of fluffing a straight line, or a perfect curve or ruining an otherwise adequate paint job by trying to be too fancy. I don’t think that transfers stifle a budding painters progress or are lazy in any way. I just speak for myself when I say that not using transfers and painting shields, like the freehand in the pic above, have bought me great pleasure and much needed confidence. If it hadn’t been for Saga and shield design painting I would not have tried OSL, tartan and experimented with other techniques by now. I soon allowed myself to make mistakes on the shields and remind myself that if all else fails I can just paint it in halves or quarters and it will look perfectly historically accurate and adequate.

I love the look of a crisp transfer as much as the next fella. The guys and gals at http://www.littlebigmenstudios.com are creating beautiful work, to sizes that suit specific shields from particular companies and selected ranges, to provide transfers that fits almost every shield in our hobby. The transfers can have wonderful patterns that would be almost unachievable by paint brush.

I have used transfers – pic in the link below – to speed up the completion of a unit, to see the quality of the designs and as an experiment to see if they were worth the expense in my eyes. I sadly thought that a tan colour rather than the advised white undercoat on the shield before placing the transfer would give me a better finish. All this did was wash out some of the detail. I didn’t need to worry that the white would be too bright and there were better ways to weather a shield if that was my concern.

https://scontent-lhr8-1.xx.fbcdn.net/v/t1.0-9/24301297_10155927979033255_8362665126477055312_n.jpg?_nc_cat=110&ccb=3&_nc_sid=b9115d&_nc_eui2=AeGMjv-4CXPy4mvDYMMW6bMw-em8ZySYrfP56bxnJJit82e8ckpZEGXPRTNpUYwvZ94&_nc_ohc=YMr-GZOo1jkAX_Pt24G&_nc_ht=scontent-lhr8-1.xx&oh=caf991e8dcaad8ab9b4d93720ff6d3dc&oe=605D76CE

Transfers take some getting used to. They aren’t the easy solution that some people suppose. The Little Big Men transfers are not like the Airfix style waterslide decals of my youth. Some require the shield boss to be punched or cut out before they can be stuck to the shield.

My conclusion would be that just because transfers exist we shouldn’t pass up the freehand opportunity that presents itself on a Dark Age shield. I would never look down on an army with just transfer shields because I understand the appeal and the benefit of speeding up a project and the offer a high standard finish at a reasonable cost. Thing is, as the painting is the majority of my fun in the hobby and there rarely being a harried deadline for my projects, I have the time to waste on mistakes and painting individual designs on an army that I will end up feeling very close to and feel proud of.