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I am going for a Stalingrad-esq urban warfare theme with my Astra Militarum army. Lots of concrete rubble, lots of bricks and many shades of gray all around. I'd like to stick with this theme for my armor as well, so I'm looking for sort of a "lighter" dried mud and concrete dust type of weathering effect that makes my tanks look like they have been operating within a ruined cityscape.

So far its been surprisingly difficult to find good reference photos or other material to use that is both in color and reflects the type of field weathering I want to go with on the tank. The first thing I thought of trying to emulate was the Tiger scene at the end of Saving Private Ryan, but I can't seem to really get a good, complete look at the tank unfortunately. Almost all of the weathering tutorials I've found online give results that look like the tank is operating in deep mud in fields and trenches.

Anyone have any tips/techniques to share or even just good points of reference for what I am looking for?

It is hard difficult to find a comprehensive list of techniques for weathering. It's mostly stumbling across new ideas, experimenting, and keeping your own mental collection. And buying too many technical paints and using half of them.

I like the videos on youtube by Night Shift. It's mostly tank diorama's and they're a bit larger in scale so of the ideas the a little difficult when miniaturized; but overall I've gained a few tidbits of information.

https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLdMxG_XHdQUax4m4hj9tGpiOLTuK1PUY7

I find that watering down regular acrylic paint and then drybrushing with it achieves a nice dusty weathering effect that’s really easy.


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I don't have as much experience with the concrete dust, but this is the sort of baseline I would experiment on if I was going for it.

So this was using just castellax bronze to put a thin coat over leadbelcher on treads, and light highlight on edges, a bit of iron warriors for other damage.

If I were to try to get crushed concrete dust I'd probably see what I can do with the lightest dry brushing in targeted areas where dust would build up with seer gray first. Key thing to think about is where the tank would scrape against blocks, and what dust would collect either on contact points, or settle as a cloud and not quickly fall off or wear off

If I'm going to go for rustier settings I start with Mournfang brown on treads, dry with ryza rust, then tone down with typhus often using sponges and retouches, light highlight with iron warriors after, but to me, urbanised might inolve less mud/rust so I'd probably stick with base tread color (e.g. color/metal with castellax/metal dry brush). At a local tank museum many tracks still have good paint matching hull.





Some images to consider