Whilst looking through my spares box, here in Liberia, I found a Hornby loco crew figure. Given that Phill mentioned that he was considering painting his Hornby figures, I thought I would give it a go and report back on the results. I only have the fireman figure with me so that is the subject I will tackle. Here he is, with an initial coat of dark blue over his jacket and trousers and the flesh areas blocked in:
Looking good Bob, when you use the black for the hat and shoes, will you mix a lighter color with it? I assume you use the grey under the black as a base coat to allow the black to cover better. Is that why?
Great Bob. I have exactly this figure (and the driver) so I will follow this one closely and when I have a moment I'll do it as per your advice. :D :D :D
Looking good Bob, when you use the black for the hat and shoes, will you mix a lighter color with it? I assume you use the grey under the black as a base coat to allow the black to cover better. Is that why?
Wayne
Wayne
No, I will just thin the black paint down with water and wash it over the grey. The grey actually provides the highlight needed to give depth. The black wash will accumulate in all the crevices and when dry will give an effect of shade. If I was to use just plain black, in this scale, objects like the hat would look just like a black blob. The trick is to allow some of the grey to show through giving the effect of worn, dirty items catching the light and the thin black wash does just this - hope I have explained it clearly enough.
Thanks for the explanation Bob, I won't tell you that I thought you were actually going to paint the hat and shoes "Black"! :oops: :oops: :oops: So don't tell anyone! :roll:
So the next stage is to apply a wash of black, over the areas previously painted grey, which are the hat, shovel and shoes. I also added a thinner wash over the white shirt:
The next task is to pick out the highlights on the clothes. Using the same blue as the base colour, add some white and a little of the black wash, just to take the shine off it, and then dry brush over the trousers and jacket. keep doing this until all the raised areas are covered. This should leave the folds nicely dark blue:
Once dry take some flesh colour, add a little white and dry brush this over the hands and face. Next dry brush a tiny amount of white over the shirt to pick up any highlights and then, when dry, pick out the tie with a little black. Finally a bit of brown finishes off the shovel handle and tidy up the base of the figure with a bit of black. And there we have it one hornby loco crew man ready to be fitted into the loco cab: