Well I suppose it's time ATT, time I showed that I do actually paint figures instead of just talk about it.

I started with Tau back in early 2006. Actually that's not quite true, I started with Tau back in 2000, when I obtained one of the original concept pathfinders (complete with textured trousers) and knew immediately that this was the army for me. There now began a series of false starts. I just couldn't get a colour scheme I was happy with, or upon finding one on a completed fire warrior, I'd look at the clock and see it had taken 9 hours to do.

Perfectionism is a dangerous thing, and it's taken a decade of painting figures to get to a point where I'm partially over it. It was Tau that got me to that state. I forced myself to cut corners on the main stuff and make the details nice and hope people didn't notice. Of course there's an endless nagging voice saying: "Could have done that better!"

I placate it by telling it I'd have a combat patrol after 3 years if I'd done it "better". That said, I really am pretty happy with them, people don't generally point and laugh so I must be doing something right. There's a lot better stuff produced by the fine denizens of this forum but I shall add my efforts to the multitude for the Greater Good.



My Commander Shas'el Y'ol Soo Mont'yr and his trusty 'vre bodyguard. Head a bit of a nod to Masamune Shirow's Appleseed (Manga of course, not the deeply upsetting films). Unfortunately, though pleased with it initially, I have grown to hate it.



Basic Firewarriors and the first things I painted. Illustrates well my "Skip the hard stuff" ethos though. The green is simply shaded and highlights only applied to the cloth and metal. I usually go all out on the lenses as they're the focal point of the miniature.



With the kroot, I tried to keep the colour scheme as far away from the rest of the force as possible but still be demonstrably green. Possibly the only drybrushed models I've ever been satisfied with!



These Gue'vesa are pretty much Tael rip-offs. In my defence I did come upon the Cadian foot / Tau leg combination independently, got stuck with the heads, found Tael's on his website and decided I'd steal more ideas. Didn't have the guts to combine the Cadian helm with the Tau one though.



Not much to say here, they're Stealth Suits. Going to add some customised "Stealth" Marker drones once I get my tools out of storage.



Plastic pathfinders. Was never happy leaving them without the Tau backpacks, as the mounting point just looks too angular, so I de-imperialed some Guard backpacks and added them on. Gives them some entrenching tools to dig observation hides.



Gun Drones... Nope, there really isn't -anything- interesting to say about these.



Plastic Stealth Sniper Drone Team As you can see, I avoid metal models like the plague. Quite pleased with the "Heavy Marker Drone", I always feel the metal guy's equipment looks far too bulky to ever move. Like trying to shift a hopping wheelbarrow. My Sniper Drones however, show something of an imagination breakdown.



My Hammerhead. Despite all my plans for this being an easy paint army, I struggle most with the tanks. So many coats of green are needed that i can spend an entire days painting just on that. Plus they're so big that they have to receive at least some highlighting. I've added Disruption Pod "emitters" since 5th edition by lensing the "blisters" our tanks are covered in.



Last but not least, one of my two Devilfish. Same deal as the Hammerhead really, if a bit dingier.

Right, now to hit submit and find it's ruined the forum page format or all my pictures have been replaced with the visage of Brian Dennehy...

[Edited to add Devilfish Picture]

Great models. I like the SDT and what I imagine is a AFP on the crisis suit. I don't like the head on that model though. I never understood people who swapped it to a MT as it looks like a bug. Good idea on the DP. Quick and easy and if I hadn't sealed my minis I'd have stolen your idea and applied it to my fleet.

Keep it up.

I'd sealed mine when I added the DP too. As it's a smooth surface, the paint went on easy (also no detail to lose), then I re-sealed them with some paint on gloss varnish appropriate to their lens like nature.

I think that these models are beautifully painted, the colour scheme works very well even though I'ts not my favorite. It reminds me of an actual army, in real life, right here on earth. I like my figures to look alien and fantastical. Once again though, I love the paintwork!

Also I really like your lenses. What colour combination do you use to achieve that?

The Hammerhead... its... its... awesome...

I believe if you offered some variant color to break up the monotony on each model it would help greatly(particularly on firewarriors and the crisis suits)

I have found that adding a bit of white to my green tau(the shoulder pad, half of helmet, top section of gun) can help greatly.

For instance I think your gun drones are great and your hammerhead is simply magnificent. The erm... "tannish" color would be a great secondary to use for this purpose, though since you used it for the cloth it might not work out as well, but I think it will be fine. To me, the pathfinders also look good, though they're essentially the same thing as the firewarriors color application wise.

I just noticed you don't have shoulder pads on your firewarriors(thinks back to a forum of someone talking about not using shoulder pads) Hmm, maybe a small armor plate on the rifle or a section of the leg armor painted differently would make them "pop" more... then again, I perfectly understand if you don't want to repaint your dudes. *Looks down at the 12 firewarriors currently painting.*

I like the military feel to your tau, reminds me of what tau should look like, or at least in my mind...

This is a really great looking army! I really like the Gue'Vesa; they have a lot of character to them! The Stealth Suits are my second favorite. I'm not sure why, but they look so crisp!

Great job! You should be very proud.

You sly dog Morat! I didn't think I'd catch you on here and look you've posted your models to boot... not only that but you've been lurking for years. I'd say welcome but I'm sure you're more than comfortable by now. Naturally I love the models. Simple can often be best IMO, many's the time I've struggled with an overly complicated colour scheme only to wish I'd gone for a simpler one. As evidenced, you'll no doubt remember, by my glorious 'fruit salad' Tau and to a lesser extent the badly thought out triple layer, then wash Orcs and Goblins I'm currently grinding away at.

I like the clean nature of your work and simple but effective conversions. And while you admit that you've nicked most of the idea for your Gue'la conversion from Tael I still think they're a stand out unit and TBH I may even be tempted to knock one out having seen them... but ho what's this your Kroot look eerily similar to my own. What are they scaly green skin and hawk turquoise quills? I must say I've always found Kroot a dream to paint and I find it to be no surprise that you've been happy with a simple dry brush. I say keep up the good work old boy.

Thanks for the input guys! Let's address a few points:



Black basecoat on the lens, then paint it midnight blue. Progressivly highlight the bottom left of the lens, through midnight blue to ice blue in as many stages as I can stand. Then a final white dot at the top right corner. Usually only about 4 stages of blue on a fire warrior lens, 10 or more on a really big one.



The slightly monotonous nature is actually kind of what I was aiming for. To my mind, the Tau take war (and most things) pretty seriously. If you look at British army kit pretty much -everything's- olive drab with not much thought to "break it up". Doesn't make for dazzliing figures but does represent how I feel futuristic alien mole men should look. Plus the cloth bits are more visible from the rear which does make them more interesting looking when they're moving away from you. So possibly they only bore my opponent into not seeing them.



Yup, as they're always deployed in a devilfish I left them off. The shields look like they'd catch on a tank hatch rather too easily to me. Notably my Stealth Sniper Drone operator has one as does my still incomplete EMP commando team.



Aye, been about since I was mid way through the initial Tau batch on and off. More time to post at the minute while I wait for lawyers and landlords to actually allow me to give the latter some money on a regular basis.



I seem to remember discussing the scaly green with yourself in "meatspace" before I started the squad and it turned out you liked Scaly Green too. Quills are done with the same colours I use for the Tau lenses, tying 'em together with spot colour see?

Having said that, I do rather regret the scheme now, asi it uses scaly green (no longer available) along with old style blue and green washes (no longer available) Not sure what I'll do when I want to paint more. I did see a hugely complex online guide for mixing old games workshop paints from others a couple of years back, maybe that would help if it's still about...

Ahhhh I do remember now, except I think I used your advice to make some of my nearly unseen Vespid and I decided that I liked the colours so much I would use them on my Kroot. Good times, I've gotta get a pic of my Kroot on here though because aside from the bleach bone(?) bellies they look almost exactly the same.

Morat :
Excellent work on all of your models, and I'm glad that you finally found a color scheme that works for you. It definitely looks great! The various conversions across the army are also very interesting, especially the Sniper Drone Team. I do like that I'm not the only one who didn't include the aerials on the plastic Stealthsuits; they just look so much better without them.

I think this is worthy of relocation to the Galleries, don't you? Keep up the great work!

Great job there, very clean, very tidy...I think I will be looking back here for ideas

This is one hell of a cadre. Very nice paint job and I like the small but clever conversions. My favorite is your sniper drone team. I myself try to avoid metal parts and building on my customized team at the moment. I hope it will be nearly as good as yours.

Again: very great job.