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The new Star Wars trailer has got me in the mood to go back to painting up the rest of my 54mm Star Wars minis. However, within minutes of sitting down I realised why I gave up last time: Stormtrooper armour. As you can imagine, this is a bit of a block when trying to paint an Imperial force!

So, does anyone have any insight on how to achieve the clean, stark white of Stormtrooper/Clone armour, while still looking neat at a larger scale. I've found my traditional layer-from-grey method a bit lacking on these larger minis, and the white-and-wash isn't very effective given the larger armour plates with minimal detail. I'm almost tempted to just do flat white and add squad markings/weathering for detail, but that is better suited to Clones than Stormtroopers.

Any thoughts?

Shade with blue tint, highlight up back through neutral grey toward ivory (warm offwhite). This give a natural sunlight feel (shadows are usually the complementary of the light colour). Use pure white for specular reflections only. Gloss or satin sealer; avoid matt as it can make the surface look chalky.

Take a look at this series.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1ZUsfAtyEM0

winterdyne wrote:Shade with blue tint, highlight up back through neutral grey toward ivory (warm offwhite). This give a natural sunlight feel (shadows are usually the complementary of the light colour). Use pure white for specular reflections only. Gloss or satin sealer; avoid matt as it can make the surface look chalky.

I'd considered a blue wash/tint, I'll certainly give that a try now.

Todosi wrote:Take a look at this series.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1ZUsfAtyEM0

Thanks, some of that is really handy. What I've done so far largely followed those steps, but the problem is that what looks good at 28mm doesn't work so well in the larger scale simply add there's a larger surface area and shallower detail. Still useful, though.

I disagree with using blue for stormtroopers. Their armor is so glossy and shiny, it doesn't really give off a glint of a blue tinge. One of the reason why they look so iconic is they are SO stark white and black.

It's not to say you can't, just that it's a stylistic choice based on what you imagine him being surrounded by. Case in point, the next two images.




Their helmets in the movie scene there kind of have a slight blue to them, because it's so reflective of the light. The fine art piece at the bottom is just ramping that up.

But, typically, it's going to be more stark white with grey/black shadows. Color will happen based on the surroundings once you add a gloss finish.