An Impatient (and Cheap) Idiot's Guide to Assembling and Painting Bugs

Please sign in to your membership account, or, if you are not yet a member, please sign up for your free membership account.

TheMackster writes:

My copy of Starship Troopers finally came in Wednesday afternoon, and I was insanely anxious to get my first "bugs" assembled and see how they looked in person. Normally I could control myself and snip + clean + assemble one day to let the glue set, prime the next day and let dry, and finally paint on the third day.

No way in heck I was waiting that long to see my first painted bug, I had to have it all done in one go so I could see them! I couldn’t wait to "do it properly" this time - so this should be a very rude article that violates nearly every rule in the book for the proper assembly and painting of miniatures.

• I did not wash the sprues first to eliminate the mold release agent coating the plastic.
• I did not let the glue cure before priming the minis.
• I did not let the primer cure or barely dry before painting.
• I didn't quite wet-blend the paints but the black primer wasn't quite dry before the red went on, and the red was still wet when I did the yellow.
• Finally, the yellow was still damp when I did the final wash/seal of Future Wax mixed with red paint to complete my very quick-and-dirty paint job.

No, I didn't skip any steps. I only did a single, thin primer coat and single coats of details over top of it. No shading, no dry-brushing, nothing except the final wash-sealer.

I used cheap "dollar store" craft paints and ratty brushes, and used bucket'o Future Wax for my sealer to protect the paint job.

And...

I'm very happy with the results, and consider them fine for tabletop use.

I honestly don’t think there is any way to screw up painting these minis, as even the lazy-and-fast method I used above looks pretty good. Hopefully, none of the fine professional painters that frequent TMP will have a heart-attack after reading the horrific intro to my guide. Apologies to all of you, and I would love to see some pix of a really well-painted bug to see how good they look when it's done right.

And, a final apology for the crappy pix from my $99 USD digital camera. I said I was cheap.

Now, on to the guide...