Working on the first two Lances

This week (read: two evenings) has been pretty efficient. Naturally I started by priming the miniatures. At least that Model Air Gray Primer smells a lot less than a sprayable primer. In fact, it doesn't smell. That's a victory in my books.

I attacked my DCMS Lance with great eagerness. Naturally it was a good idea to check at this point if I had any decent red paint in my storage... There were three shades of red, I decided that two would be just fine. As the bottom layer I applied a coat of Game Color -series Gory Red on all four 'Mechs. I thought that they looked a lot better at that point already.

While the red paint was drying on the surfaces of my DCMS tin cans, I went for the Lyran Alliance 'Mechs. Years ago I had bought some Citadel's blue paint for my friend's Ghost Bears and a lot later I had bought some Vallejo's Game Color - Magic Blue that was supposedly the same shade and I thought that's just what I need for my Lyrans. I started with the Right Leg so that I left some space for the white stripe that I'd paint a bit later. The space was chosen so that each leg was about 50/50 white and blue, vertically. After I had finished the last one I took a short break and painted Dead White over the remaining surfaces + Atlas' head.

At this point I returned back to the Combine 'Mechs and washed them all with Badab Black. This way I got the surface details brought out. Maybe that can be seen in that photo, but not necessarily too well because cell phone photos in a suboptimal light... they're just grainy to begin with, as everyone knows.

While I was at it, I repeated the procedure with the blue-white 'Mechs. After considering my approach for a moment I decided to wash the white surfaces as well, even though I had planned on not doing that. Maybe this is better, this way the deeper recesses got their details brought out and the whole area ended up looking less flat.

At this point I think I just called it a day and continued the next day. The first step of said next day was to highlight the joints and other random parts with a bit of Vallejo's Oily Steel. I hadn't done it before applying the black wash for a reason.
The problem with washing is that it, surprise surprise, darkens the painted surface unless you apply it to the recesses and cracks only. So I picked up a Game Color series Bloody Red and drybrushed all the dark red areas of the DCMS miniatures. This way all the panels got a lighter colour and generally a not-so-flat surface. I haven't worked much with red surfaces (I think the only red thing I've painted is an ancient Blood Angels Dreadnought), my red usage has been just for details. Below are some pics first with just the metal highlights and then with red drybrushing. First one in line is...

Catapult:

CPLT-C1 (65 tons)

Jenner:

JR7-D (35 tons)

Assassin:

ASN-21 (40 tons)

Dragon:

DRG-1N (60 tons)

Obviously the metal highlighting was an identical process for the Lyran 'Mechs but because that blue is the only blue paint I have, just like with white, I just drybrushed those to undo some of the darkening effects of the Badab Black wash. Especially the white parts look a lot better.

Banshee:

BNC-3E (95 tons)

Awesome:

AWS-8Q (80 tons)

Zeus:

ZEU-6S (80 tons)

Atlas:

AS7-D (100 tons)

After all this was done I returned to the metal parts and applied some Devlan Mud on them. There's not much to say about this simple step but I at least took photos of the Catapult, Assassin and Dragon. At least they were somehow photographable at this point.

So the next round will consist of painting the viewports of the cockpits. All these red DCMS units will get some sort of green on them. The blue-whites will get an orange effect on them if I manage to mix up a good one. Somehow I don't think I dare to try any sort of jeweling at this point...