Tutorial - Empire Pistoliers + Army Painter by: Pr3dator

How I paint my Empire figures. By: Pr3dator @ http://admachina.wordpress.com/
I was asked if I could make a tutorial of how I use Army Painter on my figures. Here it is:

(Press the pictures to watch ‘em in bigger size!)

First of I give the figures a undercoat. On the horse I used GW’s Foundation, Calthan Brown, and the Pistolier I just sprayed black.

Now I paint all the colors that works well with a Army Painter wash, in my color scheme it is mainly brown, skin tones and warm grey, but it would also work well together with green and red colors. Notice that only one foot on the horse has been painted black, I will make the other one’s white as many horses have this together with the white marking on their muzzles.

With a brush I wash the colored areas with Army Painter. Make sure that there is the right amount of varnish, too much varnish, in the face for example and it will look like a very heavy sun tan, too little and the effect won’t show. Work fast as it gets quit sticky after a while.

The day after it looks like this.

Now it is time for armor and weapons. I paint iron with GW’s Chainmail and Brass stuff with GW’s Dwarf Bronze. Then I give it a wash with GW’s Badab Black. I don’t think that the GW Washes works very well on anything else than on metal colors – but here they are quit outstanding. Not shown on this picture, but after the wash has dried I highlight with GW’s Mithril Silver and Shining Gold.

If all colors on your figures are someones that work together with Army Painter, then there’s nothing left than to give it a Dull Coat. But I’m using Light Blue on some places, so there is nothing to do but to paint it the ordinary way. I paint the blue in three stages. This is Vallejo’s 70841 Andrea Blue.

Next step… a little bit ligther… Vallejo’s 70844 Deep Sky Blue.

And the last one is 70961 Sky Blue. If I didn’t have to paint an entire army with Light Blue on every single figure I would never buy three shades of Blue. I would rather just make the blue lighter by mixing with white…


After fixing all the last small details I varnish it all with a Dull Cote. Don’t forget to do this… It looks nice with the Army Painter varnish, but after adding a truly matt varnish it looks much better. By the way… The feather and the horse’s hoofs are painted white and then giving it a wash of thinned Army Painter (50% thinner – 50% Army Painter).