To tartan or not to tartan???

[Kisifer]

Hello all fellow PF members,

I'm making this post for all the experts in tartan painting and having seen the new release from Pegaso, I thought that it was time to purchace and paint a tartan myself.
I'm asking for help painting a tartan, general hints and tips, methodology etc, in order to paint a tartan. Any help, would be greatly appreciated, not only from myself of course, but also from all those who want to paint a tartan and do not dare yet.
Thanks all in advance.


Xenofon

 

[Einion]

Hi Xenofon, if you've read any of Bill Horan's articles or his first book that pretty much covers all the basics.

Originally posted by Kisifer+Oct 24 2005, 01:44 PM--></div><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td>QUOTE (Kisifer @ Oct 24 2005, 01:44 PM)</td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'>I'm asking for help painting a tartan, general hints and tips, methodology etc, in order to paint a tartan. Any help, would be greatly appreciated, not only from myself of course, but also from all those who want to paint a tartan and do not dare yet.[/b]

First off use darker colours than you'd think, military tartans are generally less 'bright' than we might imagine today. Start with the green, do the wider stripes, then do the squares where they overlap (which is the pure colour of whatever the stripes are - two blue-green stripes become a blue square if you see what I mean.

Then you do the fine lines; the black ones are the easiest, at this scale you can just use plain black. Any coloured lines will be dark, a good way of getting the colour about right is to mix the basic white, yellow, red etc. with the base green to a point midway between the two (note: not a half-and-half mix of the two paints, they don't necessarily behave that way). If you find the mix looks wrong on the palette don't worry too much, it will usually look okay in context. Then use a small spot of the pure colour where they cross, although you may want to tone this down a small bit, remembering they used vegetable dyes until fairly recently.

You'll need to study reference materials for pleats at the back to be able to get the appearance correct. If you then want to shade the finished piece subtle washes of black overall can work well, particularly at 1/32 scale.

Should you ever want to tackle a tartan or checked fabric at a larger scale, particularly not one with a dark base colour, you might want to approach it as you might camouflage - shade and highlight the base colour before proceeding; then apply the stripes, varying the colour a little as you go, from the upper surfaces, vertical surfaces and undersides.

Practicing off the figure on a scrap of plastic card primed like the figure will be might be an idea, gets you used to how the brush and colours will behave - it is often a mistake to practice while actually doing the work

<!--QuoteBegin-Kisifer@Oct 24 2005, 01:44 PM
Any help, would be greatly appreciated, not only from myself of course, but also from all those who want to paint a tartan and do not dare yet.[/quote]
First thing I'd say is don't be afraid to try - practicing off the figure is a good way to overcome this but there are many painting challenges like this where the nervousness we feel is mostly a matter of a fear of failure. Once you've done tartan or another type of detail painting once it makes it a lot easier to try it the next time for most people. After that it's just a matter of practice, practice, practice to get consistent results.

Einion

 

[Tarok]

There's a great article/SBS on PiLiPiLi about painting tartan... I believe it orginated here on pF... not sure who wrote it...

 

[Blind Pew]

Enion is right on this one (as usual!) I've a couple of 54mm tartans and tend to find that keeping it dark also hides a ultitude of sins as well.

I again recommend Shepherd Paine's book (aka The bible) this has a specific section on tartans - essential reading it is too......

 

[Kisifer]

Thanks a lot for your great help guys. It seems i need to buy a couple of books.
Rudi I can't find the article you are refering to.

Xenofon

 

[Tarok]

Check out PiLiPiLi's "what's new" page HERE

on the right of the page is a header titled "From the vault"... there is a link to painting tartan there...

 

[Kisifer]

Thanks a lot Rudi, greatly appreciated.

Xenofon

 

[quang]

Hello Xenofon,

The PiLiPiLi article was first published on pF.

You can find it HERE.

HTH

Q.

 

[Einion]

Thanks Anthony

Einion