Lovin Bad-ab

The title may sounds like a Country and Western song about love gone wrong. However, this post is about Games-Workshop's Badab Black wash.

I've used inking techniques over the years that come very close to the results achieved by those who utilize the "dip" technique. I paint my figures up all nice, then brush them all over with thinned down GW Brown Ink. I then highlight the figures back up a bit. This technique gives the figures a nice sense of depth and also satisfies my love for dirty miniatures. I then add mud as needed, and sometimes as not needed, to further enhance the grimy warrior effect.

Yesterday I acquired two new armies for WarMachine, by Privateer Press from two of friends. We accomplished some dark back alley trades, and (I hope!) everyone ended up happier for the deals!

In that trade I acquired an army of Cygnar and an army of Khador. Each of the armies were painted by friends with different painting styles and tastes for light and dark. Each army was at a different level of completion as well. The Cygnar Army was mostly ready for the tabletop, with only a handful of figures requiring paint. The Cygnar army is primed black. The Khador army was a work in progress, with basic colors on many of the figures, with some being completed. The Khador army is primed white.

My new Cygnar army is blue, and has been inked and highlighted, which clearly shows the great detail of these lovely figures. My new Khador army is painted with fairly bright colors, (tis a red army after all!) and to sort of put my personal stamp on the army, I determined that I would darken it up a bit.

I have used the Badab Black wash on smaller models that were painted with military colors, and it has worked very nicely. After all... non-fantasy warrior figures will, in my humble opinion, need to be darker, muddier, more weather worn.

The WarMachine figures are fantasy figures, so a lot of color is the norm rather than out of the ordinary.

I grabbed a couple of Warjacks, a Juggernaut and a Destroyer and began to apply the GW Badab Black Wash. I did not thin the wash at all, but rather used a LARGE brush and simply gave the figures a bath with the Badab Black wash!



Without Ink



With Ink and a few highlights

I must say that I'm quite pleased the the results. So much so that I am going to finish painting the rest of the army using the same style and techniques my friend used, and then bathe them all in Badab Black! The washing of the figures may be followed up with a bit of highlighting, just to bring out the detail of these lovely figures.

So, this is (in case the FCC is watching) a NON-PAID endorsement of a GW product; which, if you know me, I'm not too fond of GW and their business practices - but I do love these washes and highly recommend them.

Game on!