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Hey guys! This seems like a really nice community so I thought I'd join and say hello!

About 6 months ago I was painting shields in photoshop for my Roman army in the PC game Total War: Rome 2. I looked around the internet for inspiration and found images of painted Roman miniature armies very helpful. The more I looked at them the more I started getting interested in the idea of collecting and painting an army myself. I was hesitant to get involved in the hobby because I've never really painted anything in my life, I don't have anywhere to keep an army in my house, I don't know a single other soul who shares an interest in the hobby and I thought I'd forget about the whole thing in a couple of weeks anyway.

But here I am about 6 months later and I'm still looking at peoples painted miniature armies online, not just Romans but everything now! I've also started watching painting tutorials on YouTube and reading forums like this one. I finally caved in and my first box of 3 space marines arrived in the post this morning. I unboxed them to find them much smaller than I had imagined, about half the size! As soon as my brushes and tools arrive I'll set about the daunting task of trying to paint the little guys!

I don't really know anything about any of the games, I'm currently most interested in painting, but perhaps one day I will have an army I can field in battle.

Nice to meet you all!

Welcome and have fun!

One of the reasons I got into this hobby was because I could make something real. I had a final product to hold in my hands. Video games couldn't do that for me so they lost favor.

Welcome to the hobby. Post pictures of your first paintjobs. Don't get upset when they say "thin your paints" or to clean mold lines, everyone hears those. You should make a Roman themed space marine army?

Ultramarines have a Greek/Roman theme to them, they could potentially be a good choice!

Thanks for the welcome all!

@Tydil: Yup I'll post a picture, hopefully they won't be too embarassing, lol.

@Crash: I'm painting my marines as Ultramarines.

Just waiting for the primer and brushes to come in the post... Hurry up already!

^Thought you might!
Well a few things:
1) For your modelling stuff, this upgrade pack has some pretty Roman-looking stuff in it, particularly those fancy heads.
2) If you DO start playing the game you can't really go wrong with the "Smurfs" as they're the poster-child army for the game in general and their codex is currently quite powerful.

Hi,

Welcome to Dakka

Good for you taking the plunge. Many out there paint to play and many others paint for the enjoyment of painting. Nothing beats a finished model that you can be proud of. Take your time and enjoy! The great thing about working with paints - if anything goes wrong, it is easy to let it dry and then paint over any mistakes.

If you like, go all out and flock the bases, add decals, or any such customizations you like. And if you do get into the game, take my advice: always keep your first painted models in a place of honor! They deserve the honor - for it was they that were the first.

For glory!!!
Solorg

Hi there,

Welcome to Dakka, 40k and the hobby.

WoodMan wrote:
Thanks for the welcome all!

@Tydil: Yup I'll post a picture, hopefully they won't be too embarassing, lol.

@Crash: I'm painting my marines as Ultramarines.

Just waiting for the primer and brushes to come in the post... Hurry up already!

If you picked Ultramarines for your army, they are almost Roman, anyway. You get both things in one.
Look at Forge World's site for how Roman they get.

The Gallery awaits! [/CueTheMusic]

Welcome to dakka dakka! Good to greet another servant of the emperor ha ha

Welcome to Dakka Dakka man! I'm not sure if your just a painter or if you plan on playing games (casual or competitive), but heres some advice if you do start playing games. After you've gotten your rulebook and codex, building an army can be a daunting task. You have to figure out which models you like, which models are good, which aren't, formations and strategies, all in all a lot of planning goes into building a good, first army. There's an awesome board game simulator you can get called Vassal which runs a W40K module on it. Pretty much, aside a few minor differences, you can play w40k exactly how it is on your computer. Of course, like you said earlier, the cool thing about w40k is the feel of an actual mini in your hand and the custom painting you can do, etc. so Vassal obviously cant do that. What it can do though is give you an exact idea of what models your army will consist of, and teach you how to play the game. You see, you can build random army lists and find people to pls them against, find out which ones work, tweak em until they're perfect and there ya go. You got your self the perfect army and had a whole lotta fun in the process. Then you go out buy your models, primer, paint and work your way forward to dominate the imperium of man!!!! Or well in your case serve it, sorry I'm a Nids player lol.

Hey, thanks for the welcome and the info everyone, I can already see this site has a real nice community!

I finally got around to starting the first marine tonight, really delicate work for really clumsy fingers, ha! I scraped off the mold lines best I could and drilled a little barrel hole in the bolter (off center, typically) and learned the hard way that if you use a little too much glue.... do not, repeat, *do not* try to clear it up with tissue

Regardless, I'm pleased with the result and tomorrow the paint brushes are coming out.

WoodMan wrote:
I scraped off the mold lines best I could and drilled a little barrel hole in the bolter (off center, typically) and learned the hard way that if you use a little too much glue.... do not, repeat, *do not* try to clear it up with tissue

Hah I made that exact same mistake but thats what test models are for, right? Also another mistake I made when I got my first models, was buying primer the exact same color as my models...so don't do that either.

Hello! Welcome to Dakka Dakka!

Thanks Byte!

Hey guys, I'm back again now I have finally finished my first mini! I spent a lot of time on it, I learned from some mistakes and I'm really happy with the outcome of the model, especially the painting (the modelling part didn't go well). I don't have any basing materials yet so I just painted it black.

My main problems after this first round of painting are definately the mold scraping and getting the thing cleanly off of the sprue (it was attached dead in the middle of the shoulder pads, the most prominent part of the model). I also damaged the gun barrel slightly when getting it off of the sprue. The gold paints were difficult, I completely obscured the eagle details on the gun, even though I watered it down. Tthe chapter symbol and arrow were handpainted. I want to learn freehanding so I'm trying to never use transfers, more practice that way!

If I was to do the model again I would paint it before sticking it together... unfortunately I already stuck the other two models from the pack together at the same time as this one. Doh! Anyway, its awesome to finally be a mini painter

I attach the picture to this post, it was taken with mobile phone with flash on. Big thanks to ApatheticFish of Youtube, I followed his tutorial to paint this model!

You might want to get that picture into the Gallery.
Attachments get taken down pretty quickly.
There are links in the gallery page to post into a forum, to show the pic.

Oh, and that's a nice paint-job there

Welcome to the hobby man

That model looks really good, for your first model or paintwork at all the basecoat looks really neat, and you seem to have good control of shades. I see you've even drilled the barrel of the gun, which I didn't even know was a possibility when I did my first model. For next time I would say to focus on the edge highlights more, I see in some places the highlights weren't applied where they were meant to, other than that I would say thin your paints if you haven't already (its normal for everyone here to say this to new hobbyists)

Top work for a first attempt.

Belated welcome!

We should be best friends!

Welcome!

That is a solid first attempt, well done!

There are also some decent tutorials for power armour on the Warhammer TV YouTube channel. Duncan, one of the 'eavy metal painters at GW has done lots of good videos, one of which is on Ultramarines. Worth checking out just to see a different take on doing them. This is the one on doing an Ultramarine tactical marine - https://youtu.be/_odi1c7ErCg

Thanks all!

@Skinnereal: Thanks! Maybe I will put a picture in the gallery when I complete the other two marines from the pack.
@Da Stormlord: Thanks, I saw the barrel drilling on a Youtube video by someone called GirlPainting.
@Slaphead : Cheers for the link, I have already watched some of his videos, I'm taking a look at his Blood Angel one now

I've decided to paint the other two marines in the pack as a Blood Angel and a Dark Angel. Working on the Blood Angel now

I've also decided on my first army to collect, it's going to be Evil Sunz Orks, I just love the trucks, bikes copters etc

Welcome to the hobby Woodman. That's a nice mini for your first attempt, looks like a good tabletop standard to start with.

You should check out the podcast section here on dakka if you're looking for something to listen to while you paint. I only just discovered it yesterday and I've been here ages!

Orks look like one of the most fun armies to collect with loads of opportunities to do conversions and add loads of character. Check out some of the painting and modelling blogs for inspiration and start your own too.

See you on the forums,
Jim

WoodMan wrote:
Thanks all!

@Skinnereal: Thanks! Maybe I will put a picture in the gallery when I complete the other two marines from the pack.
@Da Stormlord: Thanks, I saw the barrel drilling on a Youtube video by someone called GirlPainting.
@Slaphead : Cheers for the link, I have already watched some of his videos, I'm taking a look at his Blood Angel one now

I've decided to paint the other two marines in the pack as a Blood Angel and a Dark Angel. Working on the Blood Angel now

I've also decided on my first army to collect, it's going to be Evil Sunz Orks, I just love the trucks, bikes copters etc

You're welcome with the link. Blood Angels and Dark Angels are awesome, good luck with them. Orks are one of the most fun and charismatic armies in the game, you will have a lot of fun painting and playing them. I also find inspiration from reading/watching battle reports, not only for seeing what a nicely painted army looks like on the table top, but also to get a feel for what a game is like. Seeing what a fully painted army can look like really motivates me to plough on with painting my own stuff.

These are my two favourites, both of which have Orks and Space Marines:

- For reading and pictures (with some pretty good narrative) - http://snbattlereports.com/
These guys have some really lovely painted miniatures and terrain and do a good job of telling a story behind each battle.

- For Battle Report Videos, Painting tutorials and army tactics - https://www.youtube.com/user/StrikingScorpion82?feature=watch
I find StrikingScorpion82's battle reports to be really well put together and edited in a way so they don't drag on too much. He's also got some Ork videos on there too. There are many other battle report videos (The Long War https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC3cEoZV1BsBLeJy5LxGNRtw), Tabletop Tactics https://www.youtube.com/user/tabletoptactics), that are also quite decent but StrikingScorpion82's are by far my favourite. Definitely worth checking out, I often watch them whilst painting

For batreps and stuff, I completely agree with slaphead.

These guys aren't nearly as good as ss82 in my opinion, but I occasionally watch them: http://m.youtube.com/user/miniwargaming

Welcome! Be sure to watch plenty or tutorial, you will learn a lot!

Also make sure to buy shades... new painters disregard it but especially when ur new.. it really cleans up the look of the model, and gives it much more depth then just a base coat.

Edited:(didnt see the post of your mini) it looks fantastic for you first one! Good job!