Fighting the Gray Tide (Miniature Painting)

The vest laid plans of mice and men oft go awry. My original plan was to put Chewbacca in the hatch and maybe add some Ewoks to the base. This is a captured AT-ST used against the Empire. But given the cost of Legion Ewoks, I decided against it. Instead, I will be able to switch our Chewbacca or General Weiss depending on whether I’m playing Rebels or Empire.



The base is a little busy, but I don’t mind.

MGibster said:

The vest laid plans of mice and men oft go awry. My original plan was to put Chewbacca in the hatch and maybe add some Ewoks to the base. This is a captured AT-ST used against the Empire. But given the cost of Legion Ewoks, I decided against it. Instead, I will be able to switch our Chewbacca or General Weiss depending on whether I’m playing Rebels or Empire.

View attachment 422845

The base is a little busy, but I don’t mind.

View attachment 422846

Click to expand...

Love the rust and damage! Brilliant work!

The model on the left is almost completely painted as of 11/22/25 and the one on the right is from 2018. On the left, I applied a very dark base coat, used liquid masking for chipping effects, and airbrushed Tamiya grey. I used some panel liner and then some rust and streaking effects.


I didn’t own an airbrush back in 2018, so I used Citadel paints. I used a sponge to add the weathering effects.

This miniature is The Crone made by Monument Hobbies and sold as a texture trainer. It’s a larger than average mini designed specifically for painters to “test your skills and try new techniques.” It retails for about $26 and I think it’s worth it.

My biggest criticism is there are some hard to reach areas of the model. I want to refine my techniques or try something new, and I’d rather I didn’t have to fight against the mini itself.



As you can see, so far I’ve just worked on the wings and the face. For the face, I did some under painting in dark green, red, and a very pale, almost white before glazing a Caucasian flesh color over that. For reddish nose and cheeks, I glazed on the color over the flesh.

I think most of us have parts of a project that gives us trouble more often than others. For me, it’s when a project is nearing completion. I have a tendency to rush to the end for no good reason. I’m not on a schedule, so there’s no external pressure to finish.

Just take a deep breath and walk away for a little while.

And I’ve finished my witch. It was a nice change of pace from regular minis.

I haven’t painted in years but I’m getting hints that might be changing soon. After some poking around I learned about slap chop. Seems interesting, but seems almost backwards and time consuming.

I don’t remember dry brushing being quick and easy…especially not to take a black-based mini up to white at the top.

Wouldn’t it be easier and quicker to white base the mini and selectively black wash it? Stand it upright, assembled, and gravity will take care of the darker at the bottom bit. You might need a little white dry brushing in places, but not the majority of the mini. And then only from a dirty white or grey.

So for those with more and more recent experience, what am I missing?

overgeeked said:

I haven’t painted in years but I’m getting hints that might be changing soon. After some poking around I learned about slap chop. Seems interesting, but seems almost backwards and time consuming.

Click to expand...

One of us! One of us!

I have mixed feelings about slapchop, but it's definitely quick.

While I have mixed feelings about slapchop, it's quick. I have mixed feelings because my success rate with slapchop hasn't been great. I painted a lot of my Fallout miniatures using slapchop and I don't really like them. But then I've seen some other people posting here with their slapchop triumphs which make me wonder what the heck I was doing wrong. This Cthulhu bust is one of my first real successes with slapchop and I just painted it last October.


I started with a light grey over the whole model from which I applied my base colors using Army Painter Speed Paints. I even did a bit of wet blending on the tentacles and other areas. Once the base colors were dry (wait at least 30 minutes), I dry brushed the entire model with light grey again and reapplied the the original base colors to the same areas.

This particular model is highly textured which made it ideal for slapchop. Models with a lot of flat or curving areas aren't particularly suited to the slapchop method.

overgeeked said:

Wouldn’t it be easier and quicker to white base the mini and selectively black wash it? Stand it upright, assembled, and gravity will take care of the darker at the bottom bit. You might need a little white dry brushing in places, but not the majority of the mini. And then only from a dirty white or grey.

Click to expand...

Selective washing is not conducive to saving time. Within the next few weeks, I'll paint a Beholder and I intend to use slapchop on it. I just want to get it done. I'll post some pictures of the process.

overgeeked said:

I haven’t painted in years but I’m getting hints that might be changing soon.

Click to expand...

Yeah I've delved into the slapchop method and it's pretty fast, but yeah sometimes the mini's look dull. These days I just start with a white mini and use contrast/speed paints and then add after highlights or dark areas instead of mucking about with various zenithal methods.