More painting

Trying out a new posting interface here that claimed to be better with large numbers of pictures, something which interests me.  Unfortunately it's not working out so far, and with only 3 pictures, but maybe I'll get the hang of it in the future.  As mentioned last post, I'm trying out a palette.  I've been using a piece of plasticard to mix my paints on for years.  It's worked well enough, but I always wanted to actually use a palette.  I thought at the very least it'd help with inks as I mix brown and black ink to wash my Dwarves with.  While my experience is limited thus far, having only used the palette for two sessions, I'm already very pleased.  My paints would dry out fairly quickly before.  I'd often find myself constantly adding water just to keep paint from coagulating on the card.  Large scale painting, say of a squad of infantry, would require multiple paint doses as one batch would dry up completely before the job was done.  So far the palette hasn't had that problem.  Colors have stayed moist with a bare minimum of additional water.  I've also been cleaning it after painting sessions, so it doesn't look like mess that is my plasticard palette.  After two uses, it still looks fresh as the day I got it.  And all for a buck.  Trying out a second new function, putting in post breaks.  That in mind, pictures and more rambling after the break.

Painting has actually occurred as well.  Over the past couple of days I've been working on my heavy cruisers.  Here's what they looked like after last night, when I put down the base red.

Not the best quality ever, but it is what it is.  On a side note, I figured out the photo interface and it should be very nice to use.  I'm also looking at getting a camera for my birthday, hopefully one that does close-up shots like this passably well.  We'll see how that goes.  Because I have a final paper due on Friday, I decided to keep painting this morning (and then to blog about it as well).  I got the black and white done on the cruisers, and here is where I stand currently.

Left to do is highlighting, metals, squad markings, general clean-up, and then the final wash.  Since the heavy cruisers have a Red Ram, they will have a red ram.  I'm going to paint the rams in a brighter shade of red than the rest of the fleet so they pop a little more.  I've been using a rather dark shade of red so far, more the base shade that I would use for my Khador or Blood Angels than the final red for either of those.  For the rams I'll be going back to that brighter red, so it'll be a nice little change as well as a chance to use the orange paint I got a little while ago.

Having this paper due on Friday is throwing a bit of a wrench into my scheduling.  Normally I'd wait until I was done with the paper before getting a game in, but since I want to get at least one US game in per week and because the paper is due Friday instead of Wednesday as has been the case until now, a bit of a compromise is needed.  I want to finish off the heavies before then, mostly so I can get them varnished before they go back in the case and get handled in a game situation.  Wednesday would be optimal for gaming, but that'll be a tight fit to finish the ships and get them sealed (and dry) by tomorrow.  We'll see how it goes.