Above. The finished unit of speed painted Crusader BROOd.

WHY? Following that I went on YouTube and watched their vid and
then searched out more vids on the use of the Speedpaints. I
I was inspired to have a go at the new The Army Painter
spoke to Nick about his experience of them any gleaned any
Speedpaints after seeing Nick’s work on a batch of Crusader
tips he had. Nick also pointed out that Speedpaints have no
Miniatures Brood. I thought they looked fun and wanted to
metallic paint so those areas need to be dealt with in a more
see if I could achieve a similar result. Also the Brood are
traditional way.
quite nice and simple for a first run out with a new set of
paints that I had not even tried before. UNIT
UNPAINTED So I set out to complete a whole unit in a shorter space of
time as I could. I didn’t have time to do it all in one sitting as I
Another thing that has been growing on my mind recently the
was fitting it in around my proper job and other painting
amount of undercoated but wholly unpainted figures I have
commitments. Luckily most of the cleaning up was done and
around the place. There are also all the models from North
they were primed grey, as these were models I had already
Star that I prime up grey for my photography and thinking
photographed for North Star web images. As it turned out I
(wrongly) one day I’ll have time paint, and further added to by
reckon the painting took about half an hour per model when
a number of complete armies which need painting that haven’t
doing a whole unit, which for me ranks as very speedy. The
even got out of the box yet! So Speedpaints I hoped might be
observant will have noticed that I did some conversions of the
an answer to some of it at least.
Brood adding the odd extra weapon culled form my spares
ODD draw and making them a banner, this however did not save
me any time...
It might seem odd that I wanted to dabble with Speedpaints,
but as those of you who are regular readers of some of my TIME
painting guides will know I am no stranger to fast painting (in
Where these paints aren’t much help is speeding up the
spite of my reputation), in fact I have just (possibly) completed
preparation and finishing time of the models. You will still need
a series of articles on fast painting armies for Oathmark using
to spend as much time cleaning up and/or assembling your
the previous iteration of The Army Painter fast painting
models and the same sort of time varnishing and basing them
method using their Quickshade washes and Quickshade
up, although I did find a Speedpaint assist in the basing. Now
Varnish, CLICK HERE. However I was keen to see if the
some people just love the prep and finishing and hate
Speedpaints offer something different and they did.
painting, Speedpaints are made for them.
GRAIL ZENITHAL
First thing to say is that these paints are not the Holy Grail;
From the recommendations from those that know, and as the
they will not “do it all for you”, and they will not win you the
models were already primed grey, I went for a white zenithal
painting competition at Salute. They are another useful tool in
undercoat applied from above over the grey. If you search on
the painting arsenal and used correctly, on the right models
YouTube for zenithal undercoat you will see what it is. I
will give a very pleasing result. To get the best out of them
applied it with my very elderly airbrush, but a spray can of
they need to be used on a good well sculpted model, they
white primer would do just as well. The idea is not to obliterate
won’t do well on a model without much detail. Like all paints
all the darker primer but leaving it underneath, creating a
they require thought and handling in the correct way to get the
best out of them and this does extend to the choice of model
they are used upon. I am still getting to grips with them and
I’m sure I have more to learn.
FIRST
So the first thing I did was to read the article about them in
Wargames Illustrated by their very talented painting team.
shadow effect and thus some shading for free, so a light touch
is needed. You can also spray apply the zenithal white over a
black undercoat too. I will try a straight flat white undercoat at
some point to see how it fairs, but I do have a lot figures
languishing in black undercoat to get through first. I stuck the
boys to a piece of wood and sprayed white along the line.

Above. I went for a white zenithal undercoat applied from above over the grey. I stuck the boys to a piece of wood and
sprayed white along the line.

PAINTS up well when you shake them. Be aware when you are
squirting out some of the Speedpaint that you don’t have a
Speedpaints are not paints. They are transparent. They are
ball bearing lodged in the nozzle as it can make a rather
much more akin to a wash or a stain, but have a more
messy accident if you just keep squeezing… like I did, my
sustained pigment and an interesting way flowing and don’t
bad.
seem to leave tidemarks. These almost unique properties
require some planning as you are less able to hide errors with APPLICATION
subsequent layers or colours as you could with conventional
There is no great secret, but try to be controlled with them,
painting. I planned to use lighter colours first and then go
there is a tendency because of the speed thing to slap them
darker in the hope to minimize any mistakes. Also the peculiar
on any old how, and this will not yield the most satisfactory
properties of the Speedpaints mean that if you have left any
results. Don’t overload your brush. The Speedpaint will flow; I
mould line on the models they will accentuate them, so be
think it must have a low surface tension that allows it to flow
prepared to clean up the models well. They also have another
so successfully. Be careful and apply them only to the areas
unusual property which is, when you paint over the
needed, avoiding slipping into other areas if you can, as you
Speedpaint with normal Army Painter War Paint, the
will see I slipped over a bit but I was thinking they are mostly
Speedpaint has a tendency to bleed into the normal paint as
going to be darker areas so I could get away with it.
stain it slightly, so if you are trying to correct an error by
applying more white undercoat, expect this phenomenon. SPEEDPAINTS
Lastly the watery nature of these paints means that they will
I started with flesh, as that’s what I usually do when using
run up the bristles of the brush into the metal ferrule and are
normal paints and it would be the same colour on all these
the devils own job to completely clean out, so don’t use your
models, so I would get a good run-up at it, so to speak. Also I
best finest brushes.
chose the flesh as it seemed to be amongst the lighter
SHAKE colours. It is really worth planning the order of colours you are
going to use from light to dark. I didn’t use the free (and very
Do shake the bottles up well, really well, as this can make a
nice) brush that is included in the sets, as it was bit too manly,
real difference to how the Speedpaint goes on. Each bottle
I used a smaller, old and a bit knackered Army Painter brush,
has no less than 2 ball bearings in them to ensure they mix
already well broken in from other painting.

FLESH Crusader Skin

Above and below. FLESH Crusader Skin.

PLOT
I then slightly lost the plot about the light colours first, and
went to Hardened Leather as my next choice, in my defence I
thought these would be well away from the lighter colours,
also I decided to do their loincloths in lots of different colours
to try out as many colours as possible. I then used Dark Wood
for well, the woodwork and some other bits and pieces and
these pictures show it thus far with the many colours of
loincloth.

For all of them.

HORNS & HOOVES Hardened Leather
WOOD & WHIP Dark Wood Above. LOINCLOTH in Camo Cloak.

The many colours of loincloth.

LOINCLOTH Camo Cloak
LOINCLOTH Blood Red
LOINCLOTH Plasmatic Bolt
LOINCLOTH Magic Blue
LOINCLOTH Sand Golem
LOINCLOTH Holy White
LOINCLOTH Cloudburst Blue, note the still wet paint on the
drum skin, see what a hurry I was in, which is Pallid Bone!
LOINCLOTH Malignant Green
LOINCLOTH Slaughter Red
LOINCLOTH Orc Skin, Zealot Yellow

Above. LOINCLOTH in Above. LOINCLOTH in

Blood Red. Plasmatic Bolt.

Above. LOINCLOTH in Above. LOINCLOTH in Above. LOINCLOTH in Above. LOINCLOTH in

Magic Blue. Sand Golem. Holy White. Cloudburst Blue.

Above. LOINCLOTH in Above. LOINCLOTH in Above. LOINCLOTH in Orc Above. LOINCLOTH in

Malignant Green. Slaughter Red. Skin. Zealot Yellow.
major issue but be aware, I did find a solution but more of that
HOLY at the end. Nick had also forewarned me about the Grim
The only real problem I had was with the Holy White
Speedpaint, which was looking like it was going to be just
grey not white, so I wiped it off with my thumb to reveal the
white undercoat but nothing more sophisticated than that and
no highlighting here. I think I should have thinned it, but even
then the judicial application of the painters thumb might be
needed to get a whiter than white finish.
FOREWARNED
The final bits to do were the belts in Sand Golem and fur Grim
Black and lastly the metal. For the belts I did try touching in
the white undercoat, as I realised I had gone over them a bit
with some of the loincloth colours, and as some were quite
dark so they would show though the Sand Golem and look
messy. I used The Army Painter Warpaints Matt White; this is
when I noticed that Speedpaints slightly bleed into the
Warpaints, when the Warpaints are painted over them, Nick
had mentioned this but I had forgotten. However it’s not a
Above and below. BELTS Sand Golem, FUR Grim Black, METAL Weapon Bronze and Plasmatic Bolt.
Above. I did some more Brood with some conversions, and eventually I made the unit up to fifteen including a banner.
Black, that it was very grim and very black, so I tried some out
and I realised it needed thinning otherwise it risked not
showing up the detail of the fur, especially as the fur is quite
fine on the models. I had read that it was best to use the
actual Speedpaints thinner, so I did. On balance I might have
over thinned it but I could always give it another coat, which I
did to some areas where it looked a bit pale.
METAL
There aren’t any metallic Speedpaints as I said. But I wanted
Bronze metal throughout so I used I used The Army Painter
Warpaints Weapon Bronze, with Plasmatic Bolt Speedpaint
over it to represent verdigris.
For all of them
BELTS Sand Golem
FUR Grim Black
METAL Weapon Bronze and Plasmatic Bolt
Above. I did some more Brood with some conversions, and eventually I made the unit up to fifteen including a banner.

MORE For all of them

I then realised I didn’t have enough for a full Oathmark unit so BELTS Sand Golem
I did some more Brood but this time with some conversions, FUR Grim Black
and eventually I made the unit up to fifteen including a METAL Weapon Bronze and Plasmatic Bolt
banner. The conversion bits are all Oathmark or Frostgrave LOIN CLOTH Zealot Yellow
plastic bits and pieces from my enormous plastic spares draw. LOIN CLOTH Orc Skin
LOIN CLOTH Camo Cloak (again)

Above and below. BELTS Sand Golem, FUR Grim Black, METAL Weapon Bronze and Plasmatic Bolt, LOIN CLOTHS Zealot
Yellow, Orc Skin, Camo Cloak (again).

BASING
I wanted to carry on the Speedpaints to the bases if I could.
I glued on my usual sharp sand and when that had dried I
painted the edges of the base with Hardened Leather. Then
I painted the sand itself with Hardened Leather mixed 60/40
with the thinners. That was left to dry then I stuck on some
Gamers Grass 6mm tufts for a quick finish!
FINISHED
So that’s it, a unit of fifteen of them done in about a day, if I
did it all together, for the painting. This is very quick for me
and I can now visualise doing one or more whole armies using
the Speedpaints and not only that, also combining them with
more conventional painting for particular effects that I have
liked, like flesh and fur.
MORE SPEEDPAINTING Crusader Skin is my favourite of the Speedpaints, and works
very well indeed when combined with a well sculpted model.
These are more conventional figures, ie humans, which were
See what you think.
also lying around waiting to be painted one day. So I primed
them up and got on with them (they hail from the fantasy TIDY
world of Frostgrave Ghost Archipelago). I found similar
I used some Humbrol white enamel paint to repaint and thus
problems and successes with these, with the middle and
tidy some of the areas where I had inadvertently gone over
lighter colours working on the whole better than the darker,
with the Speedpaint like the belts, and it seems to work.
the most pleasing aspect of them I think is their flesh,
Above. These last two groups are conversions on the Frostgrave Ghost Archipelago Crewmen converting them into 18th
Century pirates with Crewmen Pirate Conversion Pack. On all of these I have used a wide variety of the Speedpaints.