Finished Ultra Modern Soviet vehicles

I have finished the Soviet Ultra Modern 15mm Command Decision vehicles. Once again I 'dusted' the vehicles by over spraying them on the sides, and slightly on the front, with a light mist of vallejo pale sand. The effect was wiped out by matt varnish the last time I did this. So I will dust at the end.

I am not sure that the painting is reflected in these images. I will have to look at my camera setting after this weekend (which is Friday in Bangladesh.)

Ultra modern Soviet vehicles - after 'dusting' and matt varnish

Here are the same vehicles after they have been 'dusted' (sprayed with pale sand to simulate dust) and then matt varnished, with Vallejo varnish. The effects of the dusting were wiped out by the matt varnish, as was a lot of the contrast. I planned for some of the contrast to go at this stage. The models have turned out as I wanted, but I think that I should dust them after varnishing, so that this effect can be seen.

The colouring is now quite subtle. The vehicles attract the eye; I find myself trying to work out what colour they are. I don't know if I have expressed that very well. They look more interesting than an object which is flat.

When I have a chance to 'dust' the vehicles again I will take a few more photos from a slightly higher angle. I hope that will give you more of an idea what they look like from a gamers eye view.

Command Decision Modern Soviet vehicles

This is a work in progress. Inspired by the excellent work of "Troop of Shewe" I bought an IWATA airbrush (my third airbrush, since the other two didn't work out for me.) Over the past months, on and off, I have been putting together WW2 and modern vehicles. These soviet vehicles are my first trial. They are not finished. I still have to 'dust' the vehicles with my airbrush. Since that could trash my work I decided to take some interim photos.

What I like about Troop of Shewe's work is that his vehicles seem to 'glow'. I tried to recreate this by painting the vehicles dark green, over a black undercoat, and then 'high lighting' with successively lighter colours, but only in some spots of the vehicle. After this was done I used heavily diluted black ink wash to 'blend' everything together. It was nerve wracking to coat the vehicles with black ink! I think it worked out OK (so far.) I applied some dental cement to the vehicles in places to simulate dirt, and then brushed this with an earth tone, when the model was painted. I am not sure if I will do this for other models (although I have a few dozen undercoated models which have this dental cement in place, so I am stuck with the system for the next batches of vehicles.)

It is difficult to get the contrast on the vehicles right. The black ink wash toned everything down. Now I will 'dust' the vehicles by spraying Vallejo pale sand onto them from a distance. That is going to tone down the contrast again. Finally I will varnish with vallejo matt varnish, which does take some of the contrast out of any subject.

I am painting 12 BTR60s, 3 BRDM2 scout cars, 3 BRDM2 command variants and 3 BRDM2 with Spandrel A/T vehicles in this batch. I photographed the lot. A bit boring, but otherwise one vehicle may not be representative of my system. If I now find I trash the vehicles with 'dusting' and varnish, I will know roughly where I got to.
This white background, for the photos, is something new. It is actually a silk 'Panjabi' with an interesting weave (that doesn't show up in these photos.) I was concerned that my previous use of a static grass background, with some buildings, wasn't showing up the figures themselves.