Evil Joe's Personal Path through Mythic Americas

The Incas: My personal path from nothing to something…

So where did I leave off? Ah yes, before jumping into painting, the plan was to create an army list! Proficiency exemplified! Well like most of my great plans, that went into the crapper. I still maintained the core units I knew I would need, 3 units of archers and two units of combat infantry. Knowing that and feeling that artistic craving to slop paint onto a piece of metal, off I went.

The Approach.

I have a reputation for speed painting armies to a slightly above average standard. As I approach this project with the goal of rapidly achieving mediocrity, I formulated my plan. I have read and watched a lot of information about the best way to get an army completed in the fastest possible way. All good, but I basically stick to my own method mainly because I am comfortable operating this way.

The method, for lack of a better term is to limit my color palette, rely on heavy washes and apply a few layers of highlights. I knew I wanted to use a deep purple, tanned skin, natural browns and something to play off the purple. The bases I will cover in another installment.

Looking at the color wheel I decided on yellow. Not always the easiest color to paint with but the contrast would look decent. The Inca miniature range has a lot of opportunity to use the contrasting colors.

Getting Started

Armed with a can of Grey Seer, I applied my undercoat across the army.

The whole process can take a few hours for everything to dry. I typically paint five miniatures at a time when building my MA units. The process is methodical but I listen to my podcasts and lose myself in the task at hand.

The Painting Process

I apply the paint as you would “get dressed” in the morning. Basically paint the skin first and work your way out on the miniature. Painting five at a time assembly line style seems like a decent appraoch as the first mini is dry by the time I finish the fifth so I keep momentum. I try and be as neat as possible with the base coat of color. Mistakes will be corrected with the heavy wash.

Now it was time to try out the main color scheme…. insert scary music

Not too bad actually. Both the purple and yellow will benefit from the brown wash and once highlighted will pop… from 3 feet away.

Once again I limited my color palette. These figures allow you to get very creative as the detail is pretty good. However, just like there is no crying in baseball, there is no room for fancy decorative painting when you have a deadline!

I applied all the purple before moving to the yellow. To speed up the process I used contrast paints for the grey feathers and wooden weapons and shoes. I used black contrast paint to undercoat the metal, hitting those with a thin coat of retributory armor.

I decided I would get the entire force to the pre-wash phase. These stages can look very discouraging as you may feel you are making little progress. Just stick with it. Once you get through the washing stage you will realize the progress you have made.

The Washing Stage

I apply a heavy wash mixing both the soft and dark tones from Army Painter. I actually started out using agrax earthshade, only remembering that, after I washed the second set of 20. Dammit…oh well push on!