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painting model soldiers
whiteheadalfie


Joined: 24 Oct 2006
Posts: 41
Location: corsham, wilts
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Dear Forum,
After putting it off for months I am about to embark on the painting of my 1:72 scale Zulu War figures (italeri). I have never attempted this sort of thing before and and the eyes are 58 years old!. I would be grateful for any pointers - e.g. where to start. I shall be using Revell enamel paints.

Regards

Paul Whitehead
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Re: painting model soldiers
The Lt.


Joined: 04 Sep 2005
Posts: 634
Location: Kittery, Maine USA
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whiteheadalfie wrote:
Dear Forum,
After putting it off for months I am about to embark on the painting of my 1:72 scale Zulu War figures (italeri). I have never attempted this sort of thing before and and the eyes are 58 years old!. I would be grateful for any pointers - e.g. where to start. I shall be using Revell enamel paints.

Regards

Paul Whitehead


Paul the following site should help. www.hat.com Sorry had to check with friends before getting you an answer. Looking forward to seeing the results....The Lt.
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whiteheadalfie


Joined: 24 Oct 2006
Posts: 41
Location: corsham, wilts
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Dear Lt.

Many thanks for that. I think the eyes will be 59 years old before I've digested all the information on that site.

Thanks again

Paul
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Simon Rosbottom


Joined: 14 Jun 2006
Posts: 287
Location: London, UK
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Paul,

Having once done this about 25 years ago, my memory is as follows:

Note :
If you go for the option of picking them up in your fingers (the way I always did it), always think how you are going to handle them without smudging them or getting paint all over your hands. Otherwise, use blu-tak or use Copydex carpet glue (preferred - as Blu-tak sometimes stops sticking at the critical point) to stick them onto something.

I've heard of pre-treatments to prevent the paint flaking off with handling as the polyethylene is fairly flexible but I was just careful in handling them rather than raking them up by the handful. If displaying rather than using for wargaming, they rarely get touched in any case. Thick coatings of paint of varnish before the finish coats tends to mask a lot of the detail but make them a bit more resistant to damage.

It depends how much detail you want to put into them - they are after all only an inch high.

1. Start with the red jacket.
2. Blue for the pants.
3. Brown for the hair, rifle stocks and water bottle.
4. Black for the bayonet, boots and rifle barrels. (I know it should be gun metal for the rifle barrel but I don't think that it looks right at small scale)
5. Flesh for the hands and face.
6. White for the webbing and helmet (now you have to hold them by the base.) The helmet get grubby anyway but you can tone down the white as well if you want. You need to let the red dry thoroughly and not have too much tinners in the white otherwise you'll end up with pink webbing.
7. Back to red for the trouser stripe.
8. Base, whatever colour you like. I liked emarald green with sawdust sprinkled on the wet paint.

I might still have a box of 6 painted up somewhere in my spare room, I'll see if I can dig them out and post a photo or two.

Reagrds

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painting model soldiers
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