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Hello everyone!
I have recently come into some Eldar models and I am wondering what is the best course of action regarding assembling and painting. For those that have, do you paint them up prior to assembling or do you assemble and paint to the best of your abilities/what you can access to paint?

Ill normally mostly assemble a model and leave off the arms to make painting around those areas easier.

For the wraithguard Im currently working on Im leaving off the head, arms and 1 leg just to make it easier to paint different areas.

these days I try to assemble a bit, paint and then finish off assembly, just so I can get in all the nooks and crannies. Depends what the model is though really.

 finnan wrote:
these days I try to assemble a bit, paint and then finish off assembly, just so I can get in all the nooks and crannies. Depends what the model is though really.

For me, I am working in Dire Avengers.

Base them in the sprues. Don't put arms on until the chest is painted.

Also , do you all prime Eldar with white or black?

Depends on what you want the colour to be. Usually white imo.

 Aeroroot wrote:
Depends on what you want the colour to be. Usually white imo.

I want to keep the avengers blue. I am ok with the guardians being red too.

typically, I've found the following to be very true (not my own words)

Black basing is that friend at the bar who's your wingman, helps you hide the bits of yourself you're not too proud of behind the bits of yourself you're confident about. He's got your back if you slip up, because he's just that kind of friend.

White basing is that socially awkward individual that has the opportunity to make you look good and will either a) compliment your efforts during the evening very well if you take the time and focus necessary to make his eccentricities work in your favor, or b) loudly point out that embarrassing series of mistakes you made right at the point where the music is switching between songs so the whole bar hears about that one time you fell face first into something unpleasant.

White makes bright colors POP and show detail.

Black will make bright colors darker and offer more room for error.

I started doing most of my painting using white as the base coat. I play and paint Eldar as well, but not in any of the known craft world colors. White primer can also make some modles almost feel cartoony with some colors. I noticed this on some orks i painted. I would try white and use black as you fall back.

I like Deathmagiks explanation best.

Grey is the neutral color and should work well for blues or reds.

 Aeroroot wrote:
Base them in the sprues. Don't put arms on until the chest is painted.

Surely this would make mold line removal annoying?

I used to paint my models(I dont have any eldar though..) in separate parts and them glue them together, but there are a number of reasons I stop.

For one, I would never know where to highlight the areas that would be hit by light as I would sometimes lose track of the pose the model was going to be in and/or changing my mind about the pose. Second, I could never get a wash to be quite thin enough but instead they would always end up pooling or being to thick. And third, models dont stick together as well when there is primer or paint on the plastic pieces that are being pressed against each other, they are more likely to fall apart or become loosely glued once dried.

gretar wrote:
I used to paint my models(I dont have any eldar though..) in separate parts and them glue them together, but there are a number of reasons I stop.

For one, I would never know where to highlight the areas that would be hit by light as I would sometimes lose track of the pose the model was going to be in and/or changing my mind about the pose. Second, I could never get a wash to be quite thin enough but instead they would always end up pooling or being to thick. And third, models dont stick together as well when there is primer or paint on the plastic pieces that are being pressed against each other, they are more likely to fall apart or become loosely glued once dried.

That was my initial fear. Once something was painted, it would not glue as securely as plastic on plastic would. Has anyone else had the same problem?

You can always scrape some of the paint of join a join with a knife. Then it will still glue fine.

Do people look down on painted armies that were painted fully assembled (such as criticizing the parts you could not get to)? In the group I play with, only 1 person has a fully painted army and does not look down at anyone's paint jobs.