"Collector quality of Fernando Enterprise painting services" Topic

Hello, I am in the process of putting together a large order of figures to be painted by a painting service. I have heard many good things about Fernando Enterprises. I have seen FE sample pictures of the collector quality (which I am pleased with) on their website for 28mm figures.

I was wondering if someone on the TMP forum could post a picture(s) of any figures you had painted by FE painting service preferably with the collector quality for 28mm. This would help push me over the edge in my decision. Thank you for the help.

Not impressed by Fernando Enterprises.

I don't have any collector range figures handy to post I've always gotten the standard quality for 25 mm as that was plenty good for me on the Wargame table. He once sent me a few samples with another order that I had made and they were gorgeous. Of course he picked just run-of-the-mill figures not the elites which I would've liked :-)

Here are some that he's done for me in the past for my VBCW collection just standard
Women's institute defense company

Militia

Frontier legion

More here
link

Older ones here
link

I have had quite a large number of figures painted by them. All were excellent. Make sure you have good examples of how you want them painted. My figs came back exactly like the examples I sent. Very good!

He did over 300 28 mm AWI Hessians for me and I was satisfied. Cost was less than 2 bucks each including shipping and fees.
You MUST provide specific instructions along with photos or examples. Failure to do this will results in unhappiness on your part.

I did notice a difference in painting skill from one unit to another. A couple of figures were not as well done as the vast majority. That's the worst I can say, which isn't bad.

My experience was excellent and I give him my highest marks.

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More pix on the Photobucket.

Oh! that was the cheapest grade Fernando offered. I've no idea what they call them now. Collector or whatever.

I've always gone with the showcase quality for 25mm and have been pretty happy. The difference is really extra levels of shading. I think you could get standard level and use the dip method to finish them off and they'd look quite well but I'm not a dip person in the majority of cases.

There have been some hiccups but they are the exception not the rule. There are a few things I've encountered that you may want to ask or watch out for.

You can tell that different painters work on different units some times though they've told me they only use one painter on my orders. If it is the same painter then they must've been in a hurry to finish because every once in awhile I've gotten some results that don't meet their showcase level.

I also notice in some cases they don't paint straps all the way to where they end like near the top of the backpack on the shoulders, etc. They "get close" and end there for some reason.

I've also had cases where the sample picture of the figure don't match the rest of the unit.

Overall I have been happy with their work. I'd give them a B. I have used them for at least 10-12 years and have sent several thousand figures through their process, both 15mm and 25mm. I know what to expect and usually get it and will continue to use them in the future unless quality and customer service levels change. In fact I just sent off an order to them three weeks ago.

I think you'll be happy with the results and being a first time customer I would think they would take extra care for your order.

Thanks for the reply this helps.

Im going to revive this old tread to share my own experience with above mentioned painting service.
Last spring I sent them a fair amount of 15mm Napoleonic personality figures (120) mostly AB with some Blue moons also along with clear and good color photo prints (mostly from Eltings wonderful uniforms book) as instructions along with some sample figures for style/highlighting technique and horses to be copied.

I asked for showcase quality, highest quality they could do in 15mm and paid for one-of-a-kind painting since these were personality figures and not units. In other words, I paid as much as you can for this size mini.

What I got back was strange. Some figures decent enough, but most of them looked nothing like what they advertise on the website, and when pointing this out I was told that their best painter had painted them and they were surprised that I was so dissapointed. I was told that they would prefer if I did not send photos in the future but rather only sample figures.
It was like Doctor X mentions in the above post, obvious that there were different painters at work here, with very different levels of skill..
No need to NOT tell your customer that, why not be open about it, "quality might vary"…?

To add to the experience I had no less then 15% of all swords broken/missing when I unpacked them, and the package was unopened by customs, and most of the broken swords were not even in the package.
No discount or compensation or even explanation was offered.

I did order from them once a few years ago and was quite pleased with the result then, so evidently something went really wrong this time, perhaps because it was not the first order this time(?), but I guess you get what you pay for and I write it off as a lesson learned.

Here is a small sample of what most of the minis came back looking like. I might be very critical, but decide for yourselves what you think of "one-of-a-kind SHOWCASE QUALITY" (again, these are painted to a level HIGHER than what you are considering getting):

‌Example of bad painting!😵 by Erik Salvador, on Flickr

Oh, BTW, this is what their website advertise that you will get:

‌Fernando showcase?? by Erik Salvador, on Flickr

I would like to just stress that this is not meant to slander the mentioned firm, but rather to provide future customers with my own personal experience in order to be prepared and to have a balanced view of what to expect. I also will again stress that I did order from them before, and was pleased with the result then, so they CAN do a good job if they want to evidently….
Oh, one more thing, expect a differnt person responding every other email, and dont expect a reply that necessarely corresponds with your last email. Honestly I am not really sure who was in charge of my commission since the emails seemed to come from 3 different people..
Good luck!

Well, why not make Great Britain…great again?

I am ok to pay more for quality work. Cheap never is. You end up stuck with stuff you are not all that happy with.

True.
Like I said, you live and you learn…

I too had the same issue with Fernando just a few months ago and I was told that they painted everything just fine. I was really disappointed and will probably not use them again. I had to repaint almost 200 figures just to get them right.
One thing I did notice is that if they were not sure of which color to select they will default to red.