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Operation: Alan

I think Groundhog Day1 is an awesome movie. Much better than all the copycats (especially the action-fury ones like Edge of Tomorrow or Source Code).

Land Commander (brown)

Comparing original (out-of-the-box) with varnished version
Comparing zenithal-primed with varnished version

Finished (brown) land commander
Comparing original vs. finished
Comparing zenithal vs. finished

How did I do this?

So, to rehash, the colors palettes I chose for the Commanders were based on the game and they are as follows.

  • Diplomat: green
  • Land: brown
  • Naval: blue
  • Nuclear: red
  • Space: black

I decided to tackle the Land Commander next. For brownish nature-based color theme I associated to a groundhog2, should be much more interesting than a desert3.

Marmota monax by Cephas (CC BY-SA 3.0)

So yeah... browns, with some blacks and whites added for good measure.

Steps applied on a zenithal primed mini were:

  1. Dry brush guns and breathing apparatus with metallic (AK11210 Natural Steel)
  2. Mix two browns from
    • yellow (AK11045 Deep Yellow)
    • orange (AK11080 Deep Orange)
    • blue (AK11182 Deep Blue)
    • white (AK11001 White)
  3. Apply darker brown on shielding (cuirass, pauldron, cuisses, greaves)
  4. Apply lighter brown everywhere else
  5. Apply black (AK11029 Black) on belt
  6. Apply blue-grey on breathing apparatus and guns, mixed from
    • blue (AK11182 Deep Blue)
    • black (AK11029 Black)
    • white (AK11001 White)
  7. Correct some errors
Base complete

This is a pretty decent base for me as an absolute beginner.

After this, second round (washes are all from The Army Painter: Quickshade Washes Set):

  1. Apply purple tone wash on the light brown areas
  2. Apply light tone wash the dark brown areas
  3. Apply military shader on the guns, breathing apparatus, cuirass and cuisses (although these latter two then have two washed, no problem)
  4. Dry brush metallic (AK11212 Gun Metal) on the guns and breathing apparatus
  5. Apply very light brown (seems grey... meh) as highlight on gloves and legs, mixed from the same as the other browns, just different proportions
  6. Apply white (AK11230 Titanium White) highlight dots on the guns
  7. Dry brush the player color on the left pauldron and cuirass, apply the same color (unthinned) as visor-color
    • Pivot to metallic (AK11194 Brass) for the brown player
  8. Apply red highlight at the end of the guns, hoping that it would look like overheated guns
    • Layers of red (AK11096 Wine Red) then neon orange (AK11081 Fluorescent Orange) and another neon orange (AK11082 Luminous Orange)

Is the troupe ready?

Highlights complete

OK, almost... I did redo the ends of the guns (according to my wife “they look now like toy guns”), and varnish. Results are on top 😀

Afterwards I have cut/chipped away the original bases of the minis and glued them onto standard 25mm bases (there will be a separate blog post about those).

What have I learned from this experience?

... a lot?

  • Have patience. This is a hobby, enjoy it!
  • Contrast matters.
  • Washes are magic.

  1. Groundhog Day on Wikipedia ↩

  2. Groundhog on Wikipedia ↩

  3. Spaceballs: Comb the desert on YouTube (I wonder, whether they have ever found Alan) ↩