Hey all, I've been slowly painting my first Tau cadre, and just thought I would post some pictures in the search for comments and criticism. And apologies in advance, but my camera's macro is apparently bipolar, so some images may not be as clear as they could be. Regardless, let's look at some pictures!

First off, my current project, a hammerhead:


And from the side:



Here's my commander and one of my two crisis suits. The other is currently up in the lab, on a slab. We'll see how those modding attempts turn out later..





And now one of my favorite looking units, the sniper drone team. The spotter was one of my the most enjoyable models to paint.







Oh, this unit has drones in it too?



If I get more teams, the spotters will have differently colored ribbons, which will correspond to the colors on the drones' fins.

And here's a few of my intrepid Fire Warriors!



Last but not least, some Stealth suits. Notice the blurring caused by their stealth fields.







Finally, I have a conundrum. I'm unable to decide what to do with these nobby things on the chassis of the hammerhead.



What do you advise I do with them, and do you even know what they are?

Well I've seen the bulb on the right done as a hinge and my guess is the one on top is a sensor.
Of course it be a bulge for the firewarriors antenna.

Hey Geoffles,

A nice looking cadre, I especially like the ribbon/drone fin team ID idea. The little bits on the hammerhead chassis I think are some kind of sensor nodes or the like, though they could be anything really. I would recommend painting the small one the same colour as the cockpit area (cream) and the other either cream or green, I wouldn't make them a separate colour from the main body, but of course it's entirely up to you.

Yeah, I'll probably go with that. It beats all the ideas I had, anyways.

And a second question: What colors do you guys paint your Fire Warriors' hooves? Do they have a canon shade? In the codex they seem almost ignored and just left primer black.

Just looked here from your member profile, can't believe it's taken this long for anyone to reply to your question! To answer, from what i've seen in pictures and models, tau hooves are most often dark colours; usually black, dark grey, or dark brown. Of course it's up to you, there isn't really any canon colour for any element of the tau anatomy (I seem to remember somewhere that tau skin is often a shade of blue-green or aqua coloured rather than the plain blue that's most often portrayed on models).

P.S. There's a bit of lateral scrolling because of your pictures, any chance you could downsize them a bit? (my laptop is rather small )

Fixed, my good man. Sorry about that, but sometimes I forget that not everyone has a 15.6 inch laptop screen.

An amazingly painted army, a nice combo of dark green and a vivid red!

We The TT (Tau Team, a group who all have Tau and compete in apocalypse together) all love it.

Out of curiosity's sake do you know any other good colour combos for my unpainted cadre

From what I can see this is a very impressive army and you should be proud of it.
The only thing I can suggest is give highlighting a go. Also I'm sensing inspiration from the dark angels?
Can't wait to see more of this

Personally, I've always been a big fan of urban camo patterns, such as Firestorm's Urban Assault Cadre, though I would go with a flat grey for the armor, and put all the camo patterns on the cloth. And you can never go wrong with the traditional Tau scheme.



Believe it or not, I came up with this scheme on my own. I wanted something that would look right in chaparral, and this was the combination that really caught my eye. As for highlighting, I've experimented with it a little but such attempts have ended... poorly... I'll certainly give it another go though!

Thanks for the help

Let me start off by saying that everything looks great. You've got a solid palette of colours your working from, and they seems to work really well together. The red is a nice contrast to the dark green and the cream colours. And the camo scheme on the guns works well, maybe you could transfer that to some pathfinders if you get your hands on some.
I do agree with space pope though, highlighting adds a whole new level of depth, as well as getting in some shading as well. Usually for a highlight, see if you can get a colour that closely matches that which you already have, and if you cant find one, you can always mix one up. The same goes with the shades, do keep in mind though that mixing with black isn't always the best option, try to go for a dark brown, scorched brown works rather well. Another suggestion that I would have is to thin down your paints a bit, I noticed some brush strokes on the hammerhead, as well as your sniper team spotter. You should invest in some washes, they make quick work of shading the fatigues of tau.

...oh, and I forgot that basing also helps to add major appeal to your miniatures as well. Sorry if I'm slamming you with a bunch of stuff. I will definitely be watching this thread for some more updates, so keep 'em coming, and good luck on the modelling of the xv8s.

Yeah, washes and basings come next. I'm trying to at least get paint on everything first. And I'll definitely go back and touch up the other models, to try and hide the strokes. Thanks for the C&C.

Alright, time for some updates! First, I'm almost done with the hammerhead. I got the undercarriage, burst cannons, and doors finally painted. I'm still debating what to do with with those weird X things on the back, and the tail lights need to be painted as well. And then of course it'll be time for the endless touchups.







I've also been working on my Shas'o R'alai model. He's been sitting around since October as my birthday gift to me. Despite his propensity for getting one-shotted by stompas, I must say I'm fond of the model. Just like everything else in my army, he's eternally WIP. But enough chattering. Pics!

Very nice color scheme! I have always liked that look since I saw the Tau cadre in the Cities of Death book. As has been said, you really need to highlight those guys. It would make the models look so good!

A very clean scheme! I quite enjoy the colors and the application is not bad. I would suggest a slight thinning of the paint as a few models do look as if they have some thick application (most notable on the stealths and the fire warriors)
I wish I had seen this topic sooner, as I love to do the sensor nodes on the hammerheads as gem effects. I feel like that truly gives a sensor feeling like the various nodes on things such as the Multi-tracker.

I'm not entirely certain I understand you here. Where exactly does it look thick?




Thanks, I started off painting them just scab red with gloss, but saw someone at my local GW who paints them this way. (Credit to that nice old lady at the Thousand Oaks GW) I feel that the gem effect gives it a lot more depth, if you know what I mean.

Perhaps it's too much of a nitpick, but I noticed these areas as appearing a bit thick

I hear yah bond-brother. Solid cadre you've built so far and Ra'lai.. lucky man.

Remedies everything, cures any modellers malaise!

- Tael.

Thanks man, it makes me feel all warm and bubbly when one of the O's deigns to drop in on my humble little thread. Anyways, I got these two little guys painted today, so... more pix! Huzzah!

For some reason, my camera refused to focus at any point other than when the computer was in the background. Infernal machine spirit...







"Howdy Earl"
"Hey Phil"
"Seen any good movies lately?""
"Nah, man, everything I look at these days just seems to explode a few minutes later."
"Ouch, sounds like you've got nasty a case of marker-eye. It's been going 'round lately."

Hey Geoffles! Nice pics you've got there. Also, its nice to see another Mass Effect Fan (I like your desktop image ) Keep up the good work.

Czar Ziggy