"Suggest Vallejo paints for horses please" Topic

Hi guys
I about to order some more Vallejo paints, can you suggest a few Vallejo Model Colour paint (numbers) that you use for horses.
Thanks

I usually use a variety of colors on any given horse unit – German Camoflage Black Brown, Chocolate, Flat Brown, Beige Brown – they look the best heavily drybrushed with a black undercoat. I also use some USA Tan Earth, Flat Earth and sometimes something like a Desert Yellow also. Typically I'll have two or three of each color in a unit of 12 or so horse. The lighter colors don't look as good with a black undercoat unless you really go heavy with them – try a brown primer with those.

Great Question.

I stick to 2 types of horse for most Napoleonic units. I keep the ratio around 2-3 dark brown horses to 1 grey.

Am still experimenting with black horses – very difficult job I think – I will post something on the blog when Im happy with the result.

Lighter brown horses – am experimenting with german WW2 camo light brown, which is another really versatile colour, but not happy with the results yet. Works great for Russian greatcoats, but I dont think its a good horsy colour yet.

So its just dark brown and mid grey for me so far :)

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For browns, I only use Vallejo Flat Brown (over a grey primer base) as a base coat. Just going for a reasonable light layer with good coverage – slightly watered down to ensure all nooks and crannies are covered.

For greys – I base coat in 'Medium Grey' … which is a truly brilliant and versatile colour with a million uses.

In both cases, after the base coat is dry, give them a very heavy glazing with vallejo black glaze, at around 70-30 water to glaze. This gives the undercoat a richer and darker set of shadows, and some random variations.

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Then for the highlights – on the brown horses, watered down flat brown with a touch of white – lightly load the brush and just sort of do random squiggles on the highlight areas using the side of the brush (neck, rump, prominent bits of the leg, etc).

I find this highlight method works best – drawing the brush side to side with a wet mixture rather than stroking length ways … gives an almost dithered effect which looks anything but artificial, even up close.

For greys – since the glaze tends to stain the basecoat a darker shade, I just use medium grey again as the highlight colour. No need to tint the highlight any whiter.

Its also sometimes worth adding a few dapples with a lighter shade, especially on the greys.

Here are some 15s I cooked up earlier :

You see what I mean here by the dappling – looks the part on grey horses, and is super simple to do.

Note that the brown horse has a bit of variation and shading – this is just the glaze coat doing its magic thing. The vallejo glazes are soooo good, that it feels like 'cheating' sometimes, but the results are always worth the guilt.

Here are some 18s I cooked up earlier as well :

Again, single shade of base coat in all cases, with variation in the level of glazing and amount of highlighting … looks almost like totally different mixes of colour in some cases.

Here are some more 18s I did before the Saxons, using a tinted highlight on the grey. As you can see from the shot, its really not too different to using straight grey :

So its just straight grey when highlighting grey horses for me from now on.

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I love painting horses, because the end result usually looks great (and people think you must be a genius), when actually its really super simple.

Having said that, dont pass jusdgement on your own work until the final stage is complete. The horses always look like the worst painted rubbish, right up until that final step, at which point the figure just seems to jump to life !

Hope thats not too much detail for a simple question.

Cheers

Toby of Artmaster Studio has Horse Triads on his Blog artmastertoby.blogspot.co.uk
and a painting Tutorialon You Tube YouTube link
both very good.

I'd add Burnt Umber to the list with Leather Brown, German Cammo Medium Brown, English Uniform (usually mixed with a touch of Burnt Umber for a Dun horse) for more variation.

I do mostly 6mm so lighter browns work better.

I never paint a horse black – dark brown (German Cammo Black) is the darkest I go.

Flat brown with about 20-40% GCB makes a good dark bay colour.

Brown.

A different brown.

Black.

White.

And 70.976 Buff for the hooves. No other colour will do. If you do not heed my portents and try another shade, children within a five-mile radius will wake up screaming from the same nightmare, frogs will rain from the sky, packs of wild dogs will roam the streets, and people will giggle behind your back.

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Warren B.
minisculpture.co.uk

Thanks guys, some great suggestions.

And don't forget those white socks!

And the white face blazes!

Hi Steve, i think you're horses look really good, some of the best i've seen. Do have a link for your blog please so i can have a good look round? Thanks very much.