Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

Thank you Brian. Not too far to go before it's time for the chipping and weathering.

Kinda reminds me of that robot from wallece and grommit when they go to the moon... and yeah it looks really good as well, liking the green banner

Another quality checked up mini. Can't wait to see the weathering!

Very nice.

Thank you gentlemen.

@bigfish: The green section of the boss pole was actually made from two different ork glyphs that come in the FW ork glyph set. Ones was a square with the fist on it, the other a square with the wrench. I just "liberated" the two design elements with a jeweler's saw and combined them.

I still need to do the row of glyphs below the eye slot and some more detail on the engine... a bit of dark (black or brown) lined into the recesses... then it's on to the chipping! Yippie!

Looking really good so far Gits, still very impressed by the checkers.

Ace job on the Tank Korpse man! Love the weathering you gave them.

Liking the kan so far too.

Beautyfull execution on the checkerd pattern mate

Looks tremendous mate. Great use of the micron pen, they are cracking but I'd honestly never thought of doing checks that way. Also, your 6th breakdown is most illuminating, as was the v ig list! Generally you are a most helpful chap!

@GiraffeX: Thanks Gir. Easier to do that you'd think. I took all the pictures for a tutorial. Not that I'm an expert... this is only my second attempt.

@mt: Thanks man, I really love those little guys! Can't wait to start on the other three!

@Selv: Easy as pie... just time consuming.

@graven: Glad I can be of use. Don't put too much stock in my tactical assessment... I suck pretty bad at playing the game for all I paint. Brian has much more military acumen than I do. My IG oppenent did mention that one of the issues with my list is that there were just so many things to deal with, and they all had the KFF or smoke cloud (bikes) invul going on. I think he was expecting my battlewagon list, so he had the two vendettas with tripple, twin-linked las cannons to pop the battlewagons and the rest to clean up the orks inside. Instead I gave him a trukk, 5 kans and 3 warbuggies, all with a 4+ invul, 8 bikes with a 4+ invul and 4 deff koptas that outflanked and were on him before he could shoot them (they took out a vendetta as well as a troop squad and something else before finally getting blown away). So instead of 3 hard targets (which for 5/6 las cannon hits per turn isn't that big a deal), he had 21 soft ones.

I do wish that I could give a runt herd something... ANYTHING that would be useful in assault with a vehicle.


Well, the basic painting is done. Going to take a break and actually start reading the new rule book. Chipping is next, as well as starting to work on the base. Pic's pretty big so you can zoom in if you want. Like the tanks... I'm really happy where this is right now and it takes a serious extension of will to start beating the heck out of it. But if the tanks are any indication... it's worth it.

I really like the way you go no holds barred with your weathering, even though the model looks perfect now. Thats what makes them so good!

This is you starting painting... Irritatingly talented man!

I love the cherkers Gits!!! I'm needing to get some of these do for my ork boyz, do you have any tips please?

Looks great, Gits! The checkers are awesome. Looking forward to your thoughts on 6th.

Thanks tipios... it takes some nerve to get rolling, but once you take the plunge everything goes into "automatic" mode & it's OK.

@graven: ? Second time with checkers you mean? It's just not that difficult. Honest.

@Haz: tutorial forthcoming.

@YB: Well, there's one in your inbox (or the Adepticon blog)... and it's not fit to re-print here. Generally though, I like it a lot. Going to shake things up quite a bit. Games will be zany again. If only they'd bring back the squats... all would be right with the world.

Gitsplitta wrote:If only they'd bring back the squats... all would be right with the world.

Squats are in the rulebook. I kid you not. SQUATS. IN BLACK AND WHITE. IN THE RULEBOOK.

Oh my lord... YES!

That's the only army I don't have that I'd be willing to collect!

I need to sell something quick in preparation for the $$ I'll need. (looks around)... YOU! Over there! Playing the video game! Come here little one... your mummy won't miss you at all..... *evil chuckle*

Gitsplitta wrote:Oh my lord... YES!

That's the only army I don't have that I'd be willing to collect!

I need to sell something quick in preparation for the $$ I'll need. (looks around)... YOU! Over there! Playing the video game! Come here little one... your mummy won't miss you at all..... *evil chuckle*

What have I done? WHAT HAVE I DOOOOOOOOOOOOOONE?!?!

I just meant that your basic paintjobs are generally fabulous. Ooh, squats...

Could you give a little tutorial for your checkers? Please? They look phenominal.

Ask and you shall recieve...

First, buy a Micron .05 illustration pen off the web, preferably black. Should cost around $6. I have several in multiple colors, use them for a ton of things.
Second, buy or mix an off-white. Just slightly off-white... can be grey or some super light brown... but it's important that it look white when compared with other colors *except* white.

Step #1: Paint the area you want to put into checkers with your off white. Use multiple coats of thin paint so you have a nice, smooth surface.

Step #2: Use the pen to make your checkerboard guide lines. You can measure and use a bit of masking tape to make sure you get a straight line. I only do this for the largest surfaces. Mostly I free-hand it. I also am not worried about making all the squares on the figure the same size... so I usually measure, or eye-ball the specific area I'm interested in and let that be my guide for determining square size. Things in a single pane should be neat and tidy... but exact is not necessary. It's ok to touch up some wayward lines with your off-white paint and re-draw the lines if you need to.



Step #3: Paint in the black squares. I usually look for the crappiest square & paint it black (and fix it while I'm painting it). You want to use paint that's thinned enough to flow smoothly and not glob up, but thick enough to cover in one coat. You can clean up the white boxes if you want, for grots... I didn't bother. For something Imperial it might be worth your while.



Step #4: Decide where the light is coming from and take *real* white and paint in your highlight lines with a fine brush. This will give the look of the grid being embossed as a simple painted on design would of course... not have any highlights of this type. I excuse this by thinking that the kan boss is trying to be as much of a big shot as he can... so since he doesn't have the wherewithal to actually have 3-d checkers on his kan, he has some artistic underling "fake it" using the clever application of paint. Important! Do not paint your lines at the very edges of the box, nor should they extend to the opposite corners (think of how the keys on a keyboard look, only the top edges of the upper (raised) square catch the light).



Step #5: Do the same thing with a dark grey on the black squares. A good, fine brush and thinned paint helps a lot here, but you still want it thick enough to cover in 1 coat. To be honest I was having major brush issues while painting this, so my lines are a lot sloppier than I intended them to be.



Step #6: Add a second, lighter grey over a smaller area on top of the first. This isn't a great example... I should have picked a lighter grey the second time for more contrast.



Step #7: Go back in with dilute versions of your base colors (off-white and black) and clean up the lines. Generally, the thinner the lines, the better. Come to think of it you could use your black pen to help tighten up the black highlights... hmmmm... I may have to revisit this kan again.



Step #8: If you're super anal... you can put a slightly darker off-white corner opposite your pure white corner for the shadow (I did that on my grot tank). I didn't do it here as I thought it would just make the grids too busy and visually muddled.

Viola! You'll note that even though I didn't really do a neat job with my squares or highlights... the end result is pretty impressive and the sloppiness doesn't show.




That's all there is to it. Easy-peasy.



Here's a second set of pics showing how to do a round area... the only difference is setting up the lines and eventually you lose the side-to-side highlight because the cell is too narrow.

Steps #1 & 2:



Step #3 & 4:



Step #5 & 6:



Step #7:




And... the end result!




Hope that was helpful!



FYI: I put this post verbatim into the P&M Tutorials section. Link is here: How to Paint Checkerboards

Wonderfully helpful! You have just given me an easy way to complete my harlies.

Glad you like it FH, poke me when you finish your harlequins... would love to see the final result!

Great TUT!! Gits, thanks a lot

Great tutorial, Gits! Very helpful. Thanks for posting it.

You read my mind mister: great tut!

Thanks for the tut Git!

That is some bad-assery sir!

Hey Gitsplitta, normally I shy away from yellow, but you did great work with it for your Boyz! Now if you look on my thread, I have a monster of a creashun from me Meks! Bomma dat'll make ya jaw drop!

good checkers tutorial which will come in handy for me because i won an ork stompa... which isnt complete without chekers ofc