Shining some light into Darkest Africa

This was the starting point, Black spraycan undercoat with Leather Brown zenithed over the top.

The first stage is a bit hard to see much difference but is vital in getting the level of contrast needed for the final finish.  Vallejo Game Earth was heavily drybrushed onto the base.  When the brush was almost out of paint I then ran it between the support struts on the shield, front and back.  I’d picked a brush that just fit between the struts which thankfully are evenly spaced.  Thus:

Now onto weapons.  Most of the warriors have spears.  The art shows long slender shafts so I went for wire spears that I cut to length with tin snips.  For a bit of visual variety on axeman is in each unit.  Vallejo Earth on the haft and Gunmetal for the head.

Now Vallejo Bonewhite on a very dry drybrush and highlight the shield – same one as before that just fit between the support struts.  This means the struts catch a fortuitous edge highlight but stay the basic undercoat colour.

Staying with the Bonewhite change brush and put a layer onto the loincloth and head scarf.  This will look a little patchy but that helps us with depth in the final finish so no second layer or touch ups required.

Finishing touches now.  White is generously overbrushed (like dry brushing but with a wet brush) onto the cloth areas.  Any final details also picked out – this one has a necklace but there are arm bands too, most probably they were made of ivory.  The shield is finished with some basic designs inspired by the artwork – crosses (even ones, like a plus sign) seemed quite important so most shields got these.  I used Black Speedpaint but ink would have been fine too, anything thin so you get good flow whilst using a very fine brush, mine’s 0000.  The lines are thicker than in the art but they don’t take long to do and look fine en masse.

That’s it.  On to basing using the scheme I detailed earlier.