I'm about to the last stage of painting a set of men and I don't know how to make them realistic and weathered, If anybody has experience your imput would be greatly appreciated.
thanks
Corey

Corey,
Seal your figures first, and do this well. Depending on the type of paint you painted your figure with can determine a lot of things. If you painted them with acrylics then the sealing isn't that big an issue. However, if you used your standard enamels, then you will need to seal them.
Personally I use acrylics for the base coat and then use oils for highlights and shadow work. An alternate method is to apply washes of raw umber artist oils (Black is too dark for my taste) using a semi small brush to specific areas, ie. belt line, collars, etc... Once these are dry, go back in and drybrush a little lighter shade of the base color. This is a simple solution for the hi's and lows. Once the this is finished apply a flat coat as the next step doesn't work unless there is a good flat finish.
To simulate worn in dirt and such on the uniforms, I use raw umber and burnt umber oil paints. Apply a small dab to areas that would accumulate dirt. The bottoms of the pant legs, the knee area, and the elbows. I generally add a random spot here and there on the thigh portion of some figures to break up the eveness of the appearance. Once the dab has been applied use a clean dry brush and work the paint back and forth to blend it in to the surrounding uniform color. The base color should show through in some areas. The effect you are aiming for is to discolor the fabric, not replace its color with another different color.
Another method is to use pastels. Simply grind some up, different shades of browns usually work best, and apply them in the same areas. Applying pastels though requires a heavier application, for once you try to seal them they will lighten. If there isn't a whole lot applied, you may find that they will disappear when the flat coat is applied. Dig out some old figures and use these as "test beds". Experimentation is how I learned just about everything I do now. Find what works for you and what satisfies your need and go from there. Figures can be a real pain in the you know where, but can also be loads of fun once you find a technique that you can master and enjoy. HTH "Q"

Thanks Red, but what do you use to flat coat them and seal them, I used acrylics on on set of men the "Hobby Colour" brand that marks each bottle "H##" and these were all semi-gloss or gloss except black and when ever I touch up the paint comes off, should I use a enamel seal then flat or just always use aan oil flat coat? Thanks for the help

Red hit the nail on the head. Using Burnt or raw artist oils is a good way to weather scale figures. I personally use both acrylics and enamels to paint my figures. For acrylics I use Vallejo acrylics, and some Poly Scale, and Model Masters acryl. Vallejo makes a very good matt varnish as well as satin varnish. You should apply these to seal the base coats. If you use enamels, sealing the figure is a must if you are to use a thinned down artist oil. You can also use actual dirt mixed with the paint to simulate dirt on the knees and shoes of the figure.

But I still don't know what typr of a flat coat or sealnt to use
Got any exact names?

Sorry guys, is this forum cover the techniques to paint and weather weapons
too? because I eagerly need help on this topic too, usually what I do is to paint it with acrylic gun metal as base coat and than just dry brush with enamel chrome silver as weathering......, I know there should be a better way to do it .

Cory,
For sealing I reccomend the Testors Dullcaot hands down. To speed your drying time you can use a hair dryer, just be careful not to stay in any one spot too long or your figure will be crippled.
The suggestion about using Acrylics from the start is a good one. If you do this you can go right into shading as soon as the paint is dry. Enamels take longer to dry, ie the post in regards to 72 hours. This is why I go with the acrylics as the base color, followed by the oils for hi's and shadows, and then finally shoot a flat coat of Testors dull coat over this. Once ALL of this is complete, is when I go back in and add the grime and dirt, this is usually when I will mount the figure also to reduce handling. This also makes it easier to adjust the amount of color to carry up to the soldiers uniform. Nothing worse than having a patch of ground one color and the figures dirty uniform a totally different color. Don't want to insult your intelligence, but are you using an airbrush? When applying the flat coat(Dullcoat) it is best done with this. When I was younger I tried the paint brush routine with miserable results. Once I got the hang of the airbrush, all was good. Feel free to email me if you got any more q's I can help you with. "Q"

"Don't fear the night. Fear what hunts at night"

Ongjeff,
Sounds like you are attempting to weather tools of some sort. Is this correct? If so, paint them flat black first. Once dry, ever so slightly drybrush them with some basic silver. I use the small bottles that testors put out many years ago. I think it has a shelf life in the millenium range!! Don't apply too much, just enough to get the bare metal effect. Another technique is to mix the same silver with a little artist oils Lamp Black. This produces a nice looking steel effect. This will take a long time to dry though. If I remember right it's in the neighborhood of 48-72 hours!! The rsults are great though. I use this on my German tow hooks on the front part of the Panther and on certain parts of the tow cables.
For weapons you can do the same thing, plus add a hint of blue to the mix to simulate the bluing on the weapons. I don't do this to all, but it helps keep things un balanced if you will. I have a whole arms room of weapons to look at for referrences. Some of them have almost no bluing left on them, yet others look brand new. I try for the same effect when I build my models. Anybody else have some ideas/ suggestions for Ongjeff? HTH "Q"

"ARMY, YOUR DOOR!!!"

Hi Ongjeff -
Red4 has given you some great tips on weathering
weapons & tools. I could not have said it any better.

Red 4, it surprised me that you had problems
when brushing the Testors DC.
I thin it with Testors lacquer thinner:
3 parts DC to 2 parts thinner.
When done like this ( 2-3 thin coats ) I get the same results brushing
then if I had airbrushed it.
I just don't find it neccessary to breakout
the Iwata if I can do it quickly by brush and
it's not to big a job.
REGARDS
- ralph

Red4,
Thanks for sharing your painting techniques with me. By the way , do we need any wash
beside dry brushing? just asking anyway.........

Red4,
Thanks again for another big help! :-) :-)

ok, for example my Germans are in Field Gray, how should I weather their helmets (which are in field gray) and their uniforme (field gray)???

hella yella,
for the helmets add some scrapes along the front rim of the helmet with a flat silver/ steel just add a few use a cocktail stick to do it add some dings/dents to the helmets
with a motor tool at low speed and polish them out with 1000 grit sanding paper or fine steel wool dont go over board on the dents as the helmets were quite thin also dry brush
some dirt colours on them so it looks like they have been hitting the dirt and remember the hanomag as open topped so would be constainly throwing up dust in the dry steppes also to wards the end of the war some helmets were painted in the 3 tone cammo for tanks
you could try the salting tech decribed in the other post if you dont have an air brush just get some mask-all this is a rubber latex stuff which you can paint on or dab on when it drys you can paint over the top of it and once all done rub it off later or one other way to do it is get some paints from the warhammer range most RPG shops will have them get some called chaos black and some other metaillics tear a small piece from a scotch brite pad and apply some paint to it not to much mind you and rub it in a random pattern this should give you some uneven scratches this can be usedfor AFV's too
hope this helps you a bit :-)