Hi, I have a small (1/100th scale) science fiction tank kit, about 3" long at the hull, that I'd like to get painted up as expeditiously as possible. I don't want it to look out of the factory, but I also don't want to slap lots of weathering on it, as I need to show off what all the components of the kit actually look like.

I am fine with a monotone colour scheme, or I can do two tone -- as it's sci fi there are no gudelines except the imagination.

So, would really appreciate advice on the simplest and most straightforward way to finish the kit, to give it a nice look that makes the kit come alive, but without undue weathering. Cutting out any steps that you might call master class, it's just getting it painted to a fairly nice standard. I have an airbrush and access to all sorts of paints.

Thanks in advance for any assistance!

By the way, I should clarify that I don't mean specific colours necessarily, although inspired suggestions on that are fine! I mean the most expeditious finishing technique that will still produce a nice buildup.

I know boards like this are for the opposite -- to take it further and get more and richer realism out of the models -- but then again trying to reduce it to absolute essentials might also be an interesting exercise.

Simplest possible with best appearance I can think of:
Sand or Tan one color basecoat.
Raw Umber oil wash.
Lightened Yellow Ochre drybrush.

That's bottom line simplest. You could add a green pattern to the sand base, then continue.
Hand paint the tracks a dark grey and drybrush gunmetal on them.
You could go from there, but you'd be straying from the most expedient.

That's certainly straightforward! Would that be over a black coat, or on the bare resin?

Thanks for that.

There used to be a little five-step method for painting one-colour afvs on the internet, but it seems to have disappeared.

I would think that depends on how well your base coat adheres to the bare resin. If you spray the base coat on to the resin and it coats it well then why bother with a primer? If you end up needing to do two base coats to get good coverage then it might depend on which paint is the cheapest for your primer... Using a black or a white (or any other colour) as a primer may affect the look of the base coat colour, depending on how thick a coat is applied.
One comment on Matt's method, if using oil for a wash, you'd need to wait for it to dry before doing the drybrushing, and that might take a while.
I wonder - are you just doing one of these models, or are you planning to paint, like, hundreds of them?

If you spray the model down with Windex, then rinse with water and dry, the paint will adhere fine without a primer.

Yep, understood on the cleaning. I was thinking more in terms of how the paint might look over black as opposed to over the creamy resin that makes up most of the kit.

Also the kit is mixed media -- the gun barrel and the four rows of close-in defense mortars are white metal, all else is resin. My thought was that a primer coat might help bring the underlying colours together for when the base coat goes on.

firstcircle, yes it's just this one kit. The oil wash, and then the oil drybrush, will take a fair amount of time to dry, it's true, but I'm ok with that.

Thanks guys, I'll probably do this just as you said. It's a robot tank, quite similar in format to today's tanks but the turret is pared down because of the lack of a crew (the gun system is a bit like that on the Stryker MGS). There is a little gunner robot turret on top of the gun system, then the robot driver's head pokes out of the hull sort of like R2D2 in the X wing.

You could also use the black "primer" as pre-shade for the color coat.

A medium brown could also work (instead of black) for a pre-shade under either a dark yellow or olive green monotone finish.

Spray the darker color over all, then spray the lighter finish color in a circular pattern downward leaving the darker color as shadows (a zenithal lighting effect).

The umber general wash and oil dry-brushing still work on this method, but you'll get more "depth" and contrast for no more work or time (assuming that you were going to use a primer coat anyways).

Since your model sounds so small, what ever color you go for, I'd also suggest that you go a bit lighter in the mix than you might otherwise.

The lighter color will help with the "scale lighting effect" and also provide more contrast to make the details stand out better after the wash and dry-brush in normal lighting conditions.

HTH,

Thanks Mike!