weighs the pros and cons of using a power drill on the minis workbench.
Aeronef from Wessex Games is about flying fleets in a VSF 19th Century. The game has been around since 1999, and I can tell it's the kind of game I'd love to play, but I've never quite gotten started with it. I bought the rules, lost the rules, and bought them again. I bought models. And still I dithered. 
What finally got me started was the purchase of the Wrath of the Syren scenario pack. That gave me a set of scenarios and a small number of models to paint up, and I finally got motivated enough to start letting the models hit my workbench!
With this scenario set, most of the forces are Turkish, so I decided to start with them first. I also decided to start with the smallest ships first, as that always seems easiest (and besides, they were needed in the first scenario).
In the world of Aeronef, the major powers have these flying ships which are called aeronef. Minor powers, such as Turkey, often have to make do with lesser technology – in this case, with digs (slang for dirigibles).
The Keyk-class Patrol Nef model is just a little over an inch long, a dirigible with not much more than a turret on the front, a pilothouse, a funnel, and fins on the tail.
The first thing I did was to drill out the hole in the bottom of the model, so that it would sit on the flight stand later when the paint was drying. (I didn't glue it down yet.)
Then, after minor clean-up of the model, I primed it with flat brown spray.
After viewing photos of game models and period photographs, I decided to go with brown as the main color, grey for superstructure and fins, and a yellow funnel with a dark red ring.
I painted the models brown, drybrushed them with tan on the upper surfaces, then washed them with brown ink to make the highlights blend in better.
The superstructure and fins were painted dark gray, then drybrushed with two lighter shades of gray to bring out the details.
The funnel was painted last.
For national insignia, I wanted to take advantage of the Turkish flag stickers which came with the scenario pack, but I didn't want to add a flagpole to the model. Instead, I chose to attach the flags to the side of the dirigible, as if they were banners. The flags are self-adhesive, so I cut them out and stuck them in place.
Then I realized that the flags weren't conforming to the curves of the models… I should have shaped the flags around a paintbrush ahead of time. I tried to snug them down with patience and glue. The white edges also stood out, so I colored them gray with a marker.
Normally I hate the type of plastic flight stands that come with these models, because in my experience they break so easily. However, since the Aeronef models are generally small, I decided to risk it and glued the models to the flight stands.
Now that I have the first Turkish ships done, I'm hopeful that the rest can follow the same pattern.