The Little One got two base sets and a few extra things for Star Wars Legion this Christmas – a great idea on the surface but it leads to a lot of miniatures needing to get painted.  Friends of this blog knows me foremost as a 6mm army painter doing some ventures into 15mm with some WW2 stuff.  The only thing I do in 28mm is my Mutant 1984 project.  I have neither the patience nor (perhaps more importantly) the skill, to paint 28mm miniatures at any bigger scale.  I suppose it has to do with being restless and untalented or something like that.

I also wanted the Little One to be involved and to feel ownership of the project – Star Wars Legion is his game, it is his miniatures, but I am happy to help him as much at it takes. We went to a few gaming shops before Christmas and he really wanted Star Wars Legion and for us to paint the miniatures and make some terrain together. I figured I had to find a quick and easy way to paint these miniatures – so I could get back to my historical stuff but also so we could get this to the table as soon as possible.

The things we need to paint are:

1. Rebel Soldiers – a total of 4 squads (28 foot soldiers) and 2 AT-RT operators.
2. Storm Troopers (28 No.), Snow Troopers (7 No.) and Scout Speeder Bike Riders (4 No.)
3. Vehicles – AT-RTs (2 No.) and Speeder Bikes (4 No.)
4. Commanders/Special Operatives – Dart Vader, Luke Skywalker, Han Solo, Chewbacca, Boba Fett and the General.

We will discuss 1 and 2 in this post and then in a later 3 and 4 when they are done.

Rebel Soldiers

In searching for a method/style to do the Rebels I stumble upon this YouTube video by Mini Junkie. Very quickly I realised this is what we needed and the approach we take is not identical but very much influenced by this excellent video.

It uses mainly inks to achieve a nice result, we used a desert yellow as a base for our models, then added the inks and some washes (in line with the ones stated in the video, as we did not have all of the exact matches – the inks are the most important bit). Then we dry-brushed the weapons with gun metal, the trousers with some brown and then added just a little bit of highlighting on the shirt and the faces – all stages easily done by the Little One. We did it in a assembly line fashion, colour by colour – I may have been quicker but we both did the work.

Here is the result – good enough for the table (on temporary bases, we will base all of them on transparent acrylic bases at the end of this project).

…and the two riders (vehicles still in progress)

Storm Troopers et al

The other big part is the Storm Troopers (and the Scouts and Snow Troopers) and the Mini Junkie offers another speed paint video on Storm Troopers (there is a part 2 to watch as well).

This is basically a spray white, ink black details, gloss varnish, apply wash and go.  We have started getting through them but they are not yet completed, need to gloss them and then wash them in the next step.

We have both enjoyed this so far and I am actually getting excited about playing a few games, we have started to look at some tutorials on YouTube on how to play the game, and it has attracted some unexpected interest.

The important thing to remember with children is the attention span for things like painting – take it slow and do not do too long sessions. I can sit for hours splashing paint whilst listening to a Podcast with no problem, but the Little One finds this boring.  I have set up the project so he gets an idea how to do each step and feels part of the final product.

I really enjoy doing this project with the Little One and his enthusiasm for the process is growing as he realised that most things can be broken down to simple steps, to produce adequate results without too much effort and difficulty.  My job is not done here but at least I can walk away from this shift with a smile on my face.

Both videos above offer some simple approaches to get tabletop standard results, I told the Little One it is like a colouring picture, just keep within the “lines”. Apply ink on the trousers, then the shirt, then the vest, etc. Any mistakes just add a little bit of the base colour again and ink over.  Do not stress – tabletop standard, his miniatures, if he likes them then they are good enough.

Next we will be doing some Vehicles and start on the terrain stuff we ordered from eBay.

/ Hope that was of some interest and thanks to the Mini Junkie for the excellent stuff he is doing with his Videos.