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So I started a tau army about 3 weeks ago but while I got everything built up within hours Ive been held back by the colour scheme its literally stalled my whole army building process because each test model ends horribly and I'll have to repaint them all. I literally have skittles of tau now, tau power rangers all in different colours and none of the schemes im trying is working I need some advice suggestions anything to get me painting and building my army again.

Heres some examples of my experiments:


I'm really just unhappy with the results.

What don't you like?
What do you like about other schemes you've seen?

The dark brown (?) scheme is too muddy for tabletop. Just won't look good from a few feet.
The red could work but you probably want a sharper/brighter highlight and a better contrast on the markings.
Are you a big fan of the green 'glow' effect? It can be hit or miss. Maybe think about limiting it to more specific weapon parts if you really want it.


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Is that your mouse to the right of the first picture?
Probably the best colour scheme of anything there

What draws you to the Tau army? Use that's as inspiration, for example Orc Clan's always felt like highlanders or vikings to me, so I'm painting them in tartan.

Find inspiration in attraction, failing that steal it from TV, animae, others games, etc etc

This is how i painted mine. I don't really know what you're looking for, I mostly start by what kind of base i want and make it work along the way.

Well I think I suffer from too many ideas not enough practicality lol First I attempted a more covenant scheme from Halo having vehicles purple, troops different color to the vehicles and so on but it didn't mesh together they looked too separate you know and the flat purples didn't look good on suits or anything larger than a drone, worked for the drones though.

Next I tried a few darker schemes dark blues, browns because the yellow one as you can see was too bright looked stupid but those guys were too muted might as well have been base black and nobody would have been able to tell. Then I tried basing on what modern military patterns might be used as you can see with the grey drone which I do like but I couldn't find a way to make it work on the troops. Im really bad with getting complimentary colours matching up to look like they belong together like the cloth and armour.

I wouldn't mind giving them a more worn look like:



Those kinds of suits is what I always imagine when I look at tau but im not the best painter out there....

I didn't want to do any of the existing Tau schemes out of their codex, so I made my own. Here's some examples of it:



I just went with GW's Caledor Sky as the main armor color (looks much better in person than these photos suggest), and used Yriel Yellow over a basecoat of Averland Sunset for the yellow parts. I picked that color combo literally by holding pots of the two colors next to each other at my FLGS way back when I got my first Tau models. Just find some colors that look good together, or do what others have suggested and pick a color scheme that looks like something out of your favorite movie, video game, etc. There's no wrong way to do it, as long as you're happy with it.

I kind of like the first example with the white grey and yellow... I think it works quite nice. Also With grey and white you can almost replace the yellow with any bright colour. I think orange or blue would look great as well. Check out the colour wheel for contrasting/complimentary colours I use it all the time.

Check out Infinity galleries for some 'real' sci fi ideas.
Crazyivan here on Dakka has some great examples:

I wish you good luck. I struggled for quite a while trying to decide on a scheme for mine, and I was hesitant to paint too many test models. With the new dex release I really liked how the dirty vior'la scheme looked, so I've decided to run with that since I always thought the vior'la were cool when I started collecting as a kid, reading through the codex without having any idea how to play the game.

I'll probably try and squeeze a bit more red in than what is standard, though, as I play them as Farsight quite a bit as well now with the new FSE rules, so it'd be nice to have something to reflect that.


And fortunately it's still easy to fit in oddball painted units here and there as Tau do use different colour schemes for different missions. Pretty sure the Vior'la don't run around in white for night missions.

I have to say (and I may be alone in this) that I really like the yellow test model. I think a yellow and grey scheme would look really good on the tabletop!

I started painting my Tau and I too am struggling. I may just go Red and Grey, similar to Farsight Enclave. I tried the white and Grey on the box and at this point I'm disgusted with my attempt at white armor.

My last tau army was Green, and it was okay, but boring. Plus I was a worse painter back then.

I understand about color schemes....I *literally* took over a year to find the right scheme for my marines, but that was not just because of indecisiveness, but that I was looking for a specific "look" that I was not sure what it was.

find some metal minis, paint those until you like the colors.
They strip a lot easier.

Finally, just go with your instinct - instead of your fear of making a bad choice. Heck, I think your first scheme was pretty cool.

Its your army, you don't have to please anyone but yourself.

Ive decided i want to go down an extreme winter snow survival gear scheme



Any advice how to get it right on models (before I ruin more lol ) things like frosting would be useful too.