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Had these for a while now, finally getting around to painting them! These are the damaged urban tiles, I was originally going to be getting the rolling fields, but I changed to these at the last minute because they're perfect for building an arena for my game Mechadrome. I'll also be using Mantic's ruined battlezones for terrain for that same purpose.

Here's a couple of pics, you can click for the bigger dakka gallery versions.




Here's my recipe:

I started with a generic gray spray primer I got from Home Depot as a base coat. It's almost the same color as the original plastic. I paint in most of the cracks on the street with brown paint, I think it Vallejo Earth or something like that. I used the same color for the base color for the dirt piles.

I was going to mask off the sidewalks and use black spray primer for the streets, but I have a few extra bottles of Vallejo black, since I kept forgetting I bought some and ended up buying a new bottle 2 more times over the last 9 or so months (old age sucks). So I'm just drybrushing the black over the street parts. Since the Vallejo black is kind of glossy, I had to spray it with matte varnish at the end. I'll probably do a 2nd or 3rd coat too since I'll be rolling dice and moving minis on it.

For the sidewalks, I'm just going with the gray prime, which I washed with my own wash that's about 50% water, 25% matte medium (you can get that in any art store) and a mix of black and a little brown mixed in. After the wash dries, I drubrushed vallejo wolf gray over it for the lighter color and to pick out the details better. I also washed the dirt piles and drubrushed those with bleached bone.

For the manhole covers, I did a base coat of a reddish brown mix, then I added blood red splotches and orange splotches, then some gunmetal drybrushing for highlights and a wash with the same wash.

Sounds like a lot of steps, but it's pretty easy and there's lots of detail for drybrushing which is how I paint pretty much everything anyway.

Here's a pic of the next tile still in progress

Good looking work there, mate!

Looks great!
I'm excited to get mine started, once they all arrive (grr...).

The only thing I'd say is that the asphalt looks really clean, it could do with a bit of a fading/weathering transition.

Yeah I was thinking that too actually. I did lightly drybrushed a medium gray color around the cracks and bumps and you can't really see it in the pics. Maybe it'll show up with better lighting. I think I'm gonna go over that with a lightly gray though so they stand out better.

I thought about using some pigment powders to dirty it up more, but i don't have a lot and didn't want to run out and then not be able to get the exact same color again since the powders I have were some cheapy brand I can't find anymore.

Maybe you could hold off using the powder until all your tiles are done, so you can plan to ration it out accordingly? Just a thought. They look good so far.

yeah I think I'm gonna order up a few packs of the same powder so I have a lot of it and that should make everything look a lot grittier.

So can I just kinda brush it in, and then use spray varnish to seal it in? When I use it on models I use rubbing alcohol to get it to flow into the cracks and stuff, but in this case I want the dusty look... but I don't want the air from the spray can to just blow most of it away

More progress, got 4 tiles done now Kinda bummed that they all look a little different, but I think a few light washes can tie together the sidewalks and make them match better. Pics are in the gallery so you can click for bigger ones. Here's all 4:



First tile:


Second tile.. this one I used a darker wash on the sidewalk areas. The first one also had a heavier drybrush so I think I can wash that with a watered down black wash and that should fix it.


third tile.. this is when I switched to pigment powders. Mostly rusty brown colors, I brushed it all over, the slathered alcohol all over, and wiped off the extra from the road surface to get the black top to show up more. I'm gonna do this method for the rest of the tiles. I like the dustier look


last tile.. This one I used a little too much black pigment and it made it all darker. I'm going to try a wash and darken the sidewalks on #3 to match


And here's an action shot


Next I'm gonna do some solid pavement boards instead of roads so I have somewhere to put buildings

The tiles look great, look forward to seeing the pavement tiles with buildings on them. I may have to invest in some of these or the gw ones. They are really starting to appeal.

Looking very nice indeed! I really wanted to pick up some of these tiles but I had nowhere to put them. They're even better with a splash of paint on. Great work so far.

 Necros wrote:
More progress, got 4 tiles done now Kinda bummed that they all look a little different, but I think a few light washes can tie together the sidewalks and make them match better.

Meh, just say the two darker looking ones are in the shadow of a building off board.