My first army is underway! This was… a process. I learned much about painting armies. I’m very happy with the outcome I got, but I spent about three times as long as I needed to. When I detail my learnings it might sound kind of negative so I’m going to start with the positives. First, these look great. They’re the tabletop quality I’ve been aiming for since I started painting, they’re vibrant, the colours work for me, and my airbrush did a LOT of excellent work on the skin which was my main focus for these models. By the end of the process I was slicing my time up way better, spending more time on more important models and less time on steps I didn’t need for an army.
Speaking of an army, these represent more than half the models in my entire planned army. I’m using OPR, which uses a point system about twice the values you’d see on 40k (I think), so the “small” army is 1000 points and roughly equivalent to the 10th ed Combat Patrol, and the “large” army adds some bigger units for 2000 points. I’ve got three replacement Killa Kans (my scratchbuilds having been immediately destroyed by my cats) and a boss in armor that I’ll be painting soon, and plans to print a couple of trukks, a snazzwagon, and some koptas- or whatever the OPR terms for them are. Meanwhile I’m also starting a Legally Distinct From Tau OPR army because I found PiperMakes’ work and fell in love with the designs. And then my final Bones kickstarter will arrive. hahah I’m in danger
So! Things I learned; there’s a bunch of stuff. Primary among them was Paint A Complete Model First. I knew that in theory, but I had a pretty good idea of where I was going so I just started batching my work. This lead to my needing to carefully wash the too-bright shirts and belts near the end of the project so my saturation came out right, which kinda made some of my highlighting work too muted. On the other hand, like, I knew what saturation was and why I needed to bring it down, which is a huge improvement over a year or two ago. But anyway, if I’d painted a complete model first I could have mixed my paints darker and saved myself one step. And if I’d played around with a complete model first I might have managed to get some painted up nice bases instead of two failed attempts and then going plain black. A mild regret, but I was really emotionally done by that point so I’ll take the trade.
That’s the next thing I learned; Minimize Steps. 20 Ork Boys don’t need to be painted to my usual, let’s call it Hero Unit standard (because I’m so used to painting detailed one-offs for TTRPGs). Quantity has a strong visual impact that doesn’t just make up for quality or make it unnecessary in some ways but actually suppresses it. I stopped myself from highlighting the blue boots and I’m glad I did. I kept my highlights simple; good. But man, I ended up doing like five layers on the belts to get them right and if I’d done the complete model first I probably could have done just one. That was a grind and a half. By the end of the process I was using tips I’d seen on YT for quick effects but understanding why, because a brief quick well-controlled dab for teeth plus a wash is a real time and emotional stability saver compared to the prospect of the detailed teeth I’ve tried on some other models X20. There are some details on these orks that I ran out of patience on. Backpacks, some details I wanted to add to weapons, etc. I’d have had time and energy for them if I hadn’t blown so much on the belts. But they don’t look bad and there’s a lot of things I can sort of ignore or get “good enough” and it doesn’t detract from the army.
Nearly the last thing I figured out was Details That Matter. Most people aren’t gonna look super close at these guys. I don’t need hand-painted graffiti on their armour or the checkmarks I’ve done on other small ork teams. I did exactly one detail to make these “mine” besides, you know, the colour selection and all the work; I added woad. They’re inspired by the Deathskull Orks from 40k, but when I heard “thieves that paint themselves blue and all the yorkshire pub brawlers hate” I couldn’t stop thinking “Irish as seen by English.” Thus, their dark blue body paint became blue in vaguely Celtic patterns. Spirals, bands, circles, nothing that shows up in the 40k examples- but I’m playing OPR, right, so a) who cares and b) even if I wasn’t, who cares? So they’re Irish pub brawlers and happy to loot the battlefield. The woad could use some green sponging for a flaking effect, but see above. Oh, and there were a couple unique model details I couldn’t resist trying; squig on a pole, power axes, etc.
And the last thing I figured out, for armies, at least; Maximize Contrast. I already play with contrast these days and I’m happy with the split complimentary colour selection I used (green, blue, red-orange), but to get the vibrant skin I was so proud of to really show up I needed much darker paints than I first assumed. I don’t mind getting cartoonish contrast with wargaming models. My Dao army is going to be as high contrast as I possibly can; black and neon synthwave is the plan. I could probably go darker than I did with these Orks, but they’re fine as they are. But again, in an army, having that pop of contrast makes them look good on the table, and if there’s a limit to the effect it’s much farther than I’ve gone so far.
So, that’s it, 20 Orks, 2 Nobs, roughly too goddamn many hours (2-3x as much as I want to spend on an army that I just wanna fight with), and lots of learning. I’ll probably spend even more time on my Dao units but that’s because I don’t care about fighting with them, I reeeeeaaally love synthwave and want to paint it pretty bad.
