"Painting preference: uniformed or non-uniformed." Topic

Personally, I get bored painting a unit of figures that are all wearing the same uniform. To me it becomes a real chore. I much prefer painting "rabble," although it does take a little longer. Give me Vikings, Alamo Texans or AWI militia any time. Which do you most enjoy painting, uniformed or non-uniformed figures?

Gonna be wishy-washy here and say I prefer a semi-uniformed unit. A WotR retinue in livery jackets but mixed hose & accoutrements; a French Revolutionary infantry demi-brigade in blue coats but mish-mash of patched trousers and hodgepodge of headgear; a Confederate regiment with depot-issued grey jackets but hats and britches of all descriptions – these are the lads for me.

I'm with Eumelus

Uniformed is easier (and regulars should be uniformed (more or less)), but it's usually more fun to paint the irregulars/ barbarians.

I'll go one up on this. My WWII Russian and American forces are anything but uniform. Same with my late war Germans. My British, Italian and early war Germans are all very uniform.

It is more fun to paint non-uniform forces. Just ask anyone who painted up ACW armies.

The non-uniformity is what holds back completion of my Jacobites. And it's because of my "If it's Tuesday, I'm painting red!" method.
Uniformed troops get painted faster.
So it's a problematic poll choice. I'll have to wait until the poll comes up.

I agree with Eumelus and others on semi-uniformed units also being fun. At the moment I'm finishing my 25mm English Civil War armies. In my foot regiments, one in every five or six figures has a coat color different from the issue color, and the trousers are even more varied. I have three or four different shades of tan for the buff coats and a variety of browns for leather equipment. It would be simpler to standardize, but I like the variety.

Mostly uniform works fine for me in 6mmACW. The Confederates take longer to paint, but I don't strain too much, looking for that 6mm mass of troops.. For 15mm, I try to make at least some different feature on nearly every figure to give them more character. So scale matters for this question.

I am with the uniformed brigade, it just seems faster to me!

Uniformed for me whenever I can get away with it--a huge savings in painting time.

Uniformed troops are much faster to paint. I had to paint 280 28mm Successor phalangites and I'm of the firm belief that they did not have uniforms back in that era, so that definitely took some time!

I like both but on balance prefer uniformed. I do spend a little more effort on having command figures that stand out. That being said, uniformed is a relative thing – I do a lot of SYW, notably Austrians, and when you paint up Austrian dragoons you need to have red, green, blue and white – because there were regiments with each of those coat colours – not to mention the grenzers

I have gradually come to appreciate the mixed uniform/position point of view for units. However I still dislike painting non- uniformed/civilian gaggles.

Depends on my mood, I guess. Sometimes I feel like working on individual figures, and sometimes I feel like getting into the rhythm of doing a unit.

My uniformed units are non-uniform.

In between. I like variation in uniform colours. But I also pick a "consistent palette" for irregular troops.

I like the variety of many ancient or medieval armies. Putting out an army of hoplites with all different shields is my definition of a good time.

And don't get me started on my Moors…

When actually painting, non-uniform. But in the slightly longer term uniformed figures are more rewarding because you finish things faster.

I've painted my share of uniformed units: ACW, AWI, ECW & Republican Romans; now I much prefer playing skirmish games with each figure an individual with it's own characteristics. My friends who still prefer historical big battle gaming blame my apostasy on my embracing "D&D", "Boothill", "Mordheim" and "All Things Zombie" rules as soon as they were available. I'm happy to play Ancients or Napoleonics with my friends or at a con but I doubt that I'll ever stage such an event again or paint any new units for them.

I vastly prefer uniformed armies. So much faster and easier to paint. I just want to get the guys on the table.

I nearly lost the will to live painting Gauls.

They are called 'uniforms' for a reason.

Uniformed, it's why my barbarians are sitting lonely and unpainted – the Romans are not getting painted until I do the barbarians first or they will be taunting them.