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Just wondering how you did your squad markings for your Space Marines (hurr).

I tried painting the arrow and it looked uggo.

Decals are a fairly simple and very clean looking option.

Cant decal worth a crap

I tend to freehand them where possible, along with other heraldry. Once you get used to it, it's not too hard. Keep your paints thin and practice the design on paper first and you should be ok.

Freehand. Have you tried stencils or paint markers?

Lay out the design in pencil first. What you do is set it up in a series of straight lines. With practice, you can easily draw lines between different predetermined points on the pad. This is how I lay out my tactical arrows (I use the single arrow pointing up, not the <-> design). For Devastators, it's a simple ^ that meets around 3/4 of the way up the pad.

You could also use a 0.3mm black drafting pen (instead of a brush), if you're willing to matte down the result (the ink is a bit shiny), or a sharpie. I used roman numerals instead of fancy arabic because roman numerals are much easier to mark and have look decent.



If you're using decals, here's a few important tips:

1) NEVER NEVER NEVER dunk the decal into water. This tends to wash off all of the adhesive. What you want, instead, is to get some damp paper towels and lay the decal on it to let the backing paper to get damp.
2) If you have a round decal (like the IF icon), helps to to make a cut on it to get it to lay properly on the shoulder pads.

I have no trouble with shiny (check out my gallery lol)

Freehand for the win! Practice definitely makes perfect.

Try this tutorial if you have issues with decals:

http://www.winterdyne.co.uk/maz/winterdyne_tutorial3.pdf

Decals are definitely an easier skill to learn than freehand painting. Of course, GW's inability to make good decals doesn't help any.

1) go Black Templars. No squad markings. Just Templar crosses everywhere.... (but plastic upgrade pack shoulderpads will help.)
2) tactical and squad markings are for fools! don't spoil your tactical deployment ! Let them in the dark...
3) shoulderpads. With those squad markings you desire sculpted on. Easier to paint than freehand.