Civs 6mm Adventures - Ancient Germans
The painting begins and its great fun!
So here’s the first ‘batch’ of my barbarian horde. I thought i would struggle with this scale as there is not much in the way of detail (you simply couldnt see it at this scale!).
However a lack of detail is proving to be very refreshing, painting what you expect to see rather than what is actually there is so different from the usual 28mm painting approach i often take. For example no hand is sculpted on this model but i would expect one to be on the spear shaft so lets paint that bit a flesh colour, step back a pace, i can now see a hand on the spear.
Im also enjoying the vibrant colours, at 6mm i feel you have to go bright and blackline things to really make the detail stick out. Originally i only gave the shields one layer of paint but on my last few strips i highlighted the shields up and added some more extremem highlights on the trousers, hair etc and it makes such a difference.
The only downside is i have to paint up about 10 bases worth (so around 36 models per base) which is a lot of little men!
I have at this point run out of infantry to paint so im ont the skirmishers and cavalry but fear not, i have put in an order for another two packs of infantry so another 192 troops to swell the horde (luckily it doesnt take long to paint these guys!)
They look fantastic
@torros cheers, really enjoyed painting them and have made some improvments on the latest ones.
Got a few bases ready and painted just need some basing tips before i stick them down. Getting up to date on the project.
I use very fine model railway gravel I got off eBay and I mixed it with some courser gravel and that works ok. I think @warzan idea of the bicarb of soda and Superglue might work well with 6mm
Thats what my plan was, using the bicarb and superglue.
Its more the number of models per base im unsure on, i dont think the way i currently have it looks packed enough. We are doing DBMM but on a 60mm frontage so im needing plenty of the little buggers on each base.
I would maybe go 9 or 10 strips per base. I think it would give it a ragged look of non formed troops if you staggered the strips on each base
@torros thats a good idea, i want the mass warband look without them looking to ranked like the romans and without having to seperate to many of the miniatures from the strips.
I need to have a little play with the formation on the base and see what looks good.
@civilcourage I’m having second thoughts about the bicarb idea as I think the bases on the Baccus figures might to too large to give them the look of blending into the base
@torros you are quite right, i gave it a go but the effect was too shallow. Used some pva and sand but getting between the ranks was a royal pain.
Definitley going to need a rethink how i base the guys.
You could try this I haven’t used it myself but it comes from one of the best 6mm painters around
https://cranium27.wordpress.com/2013/04/01/basing-using-mikey-mud-aka-diy-basetex/
Really interesting point about painting in the details. They look fantastic!
@pete with 6mm I find if you paint the main areas in bright colours( In this case the shields and @civilcourage has done s superb job on them) everything comes together really quickly as in this scale the eye will always be drawn to the largest brightest area
Thanks @Pete i’ve refined them a bit since these pics and added some highlighting, need to get them based next along with the skirmishers and cavalry so i can let people see them in their finished state.
No rush… but I can’t wait!