Lovely little jeep

Finally the Coat d'Arms paintset I ordered from Maelstrom Games arrived, so I could continue painting the LRDG vehicles. I ordered the WW2 British set, along with a box of Plastic Soldier Company brits, since I will be returning to Normandy after this project. By pure chance it contained a Desert Yellow that nearly matches the Vallejo paint I needed, but couldn't find. Close enough!

So I started to paint the jeep to try out the paints and a suitable method. It is nearly finished now.

The jeep was basecoated with Khemri Brown

This method emulates the way you paint bigger scale models. It starts with a darker basecoat, and then you add thin layers of the main colour, gradually building up to the desired shade. This is normally done with an airbrush though, and I must have been mad trying it out with a brush on such a small model. But then you have to try new stuff in order to learn.

"Dessert yellow" -- does that mean it's custard?

This method of painting also leaves corners and areas of wear and tear with the darker basecoat showing through, to represent scratched paint with the primer or bare metal revealed. Classic figure painting accentuates the edges, while classic model painting usually accentuates the middle of areas which would reflect more light in reality.

Desert Yellow was painted leaving the basecoat showing around the edges.

It looks rough and ugly, but the final effect will be better.

I did the same with the jerrycans on the side of the jeep, but with Slate Grey as a basecoat. I was thinking they were german originally and thus the basecoat would be panzer grey. I did some extra highlighting with metal, but the effect isn't convincing so I will be redoing them.

Almost ready, now with driver installed.

I painted the packs with Catachan Green, shading them with Gryphonne Sepia and highlighting with Foundry Raw Linen shade. The rolls were painted Khemri Brown at the same time as the rest of the jeep, but then washed with Devlan Mud and highlighted with Vallejo Khaki.

"What seems to be the problem officer? Surely I was only doing 40 mph."

The stowage in the back was painted in a similar way to the rolls and packs on the jeep. The jerry cans though was painted with Khemri Brown and Desert Yellow, and then drybrushed with Foundry Slate Grey. They turned out better than the two on the jeep, I think.

A better shot of the stowage. Note the gun holster on the boxes. There's a Tommy gun in there too.

I haven't done much about the wheel as of now. I painted the hubcaps and rims quite sloppily, as I will be weathering them with dust later when I base the jeep. Not sure how much I will dust the spares though, so I may need some highlighting on them I think.

I did some chipping in the back as well, in case I want to put a gunner in there later.

Since the driver was ready painted I decided to fit him and the steering wheel. I mounted all six figures on a stick, and by luck the jeep driver was the only figure I had finished so far.

The stowage, with tommy gun visible.

I think the method and the paint scheme works in this scale, even though it was a bit tricky. I suppose you could do the edges afterwards with a darker paint, but I think it's easier to leave a fine line when painting up to an edge, than to paint a fine line afterwards. Also you can feather the lighter colour more than the dark. I will definitely use the same method for the other two vehicles.

Depending on your screen resolution, the jeep is approximatively this big in real life.

So, what's left to do? I need to paint the gunner, obviously, and I need to do something about the jerry cans. I will do a base for the jeep, and then dust it and the base together with pigments. Hopefully that will be enough to finish the wheels.