Painting Horse Miniatures

Every opportunity for improvement is found in each horse.

Apply that idea to any miniature I paint, horse, pirate, or trooper and I have a winning attitude even if my aptitude suffers.

This is an essay on process painting 25mm metal or plastic horse figures for table top gaming purposes. The particular game will be a set of rules published by Studio Tomahawk, SAGA. The subjects of this essay are Saracen mounts for the Crescent and Cross expansion game.

Find Studio Tomahawk here: http://www.studio-tomahawk.com/. Choose français-anglais or some of both.

First Paint Step
After the horses are cleaned and air dried they go for a bit of primer. This group was spray primed with matte black and allowed to dry for about 24 hours.

Second Paint Step
To turn up the flow of the painting process I dry brushed a medium gray acrylic over the black primer if I anticipate a brown horse. I go to the burnt umber and again dry brush with a round #5. I stay loose with the brush held, for me, overly long from the ferrule closer to the brush end.

I am beginning to see the value in using larger brushes on miniatures at the base coat phase.

For a ‘gray horse’ I go again with a medium gray over the black primer. Then a wetted course of lighter layers of dun gray (low yellow 1% to 5% tan and the previous gray tone).

For a ‘chestnut horse’ I use a medium bright red over the black primer. The wetted course of lighter layers follow and are allowed to dry.

When I anticipate a ‘bay horse’ I experimented with a Payne’s gray dry brushing over the primer.

My plan for a ‘black horse’ included a shot of darkest blue (Payne’s gray mixed with phthalo blue red shade)dry brushed with a 1/4″ shader, of course, minding to leave some shadows.

The under painted miniatures dried for about an hour. This will vary depending on the local humidity and air temperature.

Third Paint Step
I followed the under painting with a acrylic medium wetted coat and avoided the nice shadows created earlier. This added a bit of emphasis on the higher regions of the horse, at least temporarily. In any event the shadows remained.

This is a trial run so I expect some errors. These so-called ‘mistakes’ will be noted and shot at sunrise, or at least banished temporarily to the re-paint shelf. Yes, I have an entire shelf dedicated to my lovely errors. The ‘no-vacancy’ sign is rarely lit.

I feel if I keep at this hobby, painting miniatures, I may one day get remarkable better at it. Being Good will probably have to be reserved for the Angels.