Painting Late War German Cavalry

By Chris Hindmarsh
In this guide we will tackle German In this guide you'll notice I mix a lot
cavalry for late World War 2, focusing of colours. Often this is simply
on some of the more intimidating because I'm trying to achieve a
aspects of such a project such as certain shade but I don't have the
camouflage and horses. perfect paint on hand. Don't worry if
you don't have the same paints as
me. There are usually many different
The method outlined here uses ways to achieve the same colour, so
translucent paints and glazes applied I encourage you to experiment with
over a zenithal undercoat to provide a what you already have to get a
base layer from which we can apply similar shade.
further shading, highlighting, and other
details. With this technique we're Our subjects for this guide will be
hoping to get a sense of light falling on some 3D printed German cavalry
the miniature to create contrast that figures from Just Some Miniatures.
will make our cavalry pop on the
gaming table, without having to spend In this guide I will abbreviate the
hours and hours on every model. following miniature paint brands:
●
AP = The Army Painter
●
AK = AK Interactive Acrylics
 Undercoating
The first step after cleaning your miniature is to prime it. I use a dark
brown primer through the airbrush, but a rattle can will work just as well.

We’ll follow that up with a zenithal highlight of white acrylic ink (I use
Liquitex Titanium White) through the airbrush. This highlight is delivered
mostly from above the model, aiming to simulate the way sunlight falls
on the upper surfaces of the model and leaves shadows in other areas.
We’ll take our time with this, building up the ink layer slowly, so the
surfaces that would reflect the most sunlight are more intensely white.

After the initial zenithal highlight is complete (and after the fragile ink
layers have had a couple of hours to fully cure) we thin down a pure
white paint with water and apply it to the parts of the miniature that we
want to be the brightest.
 Preparing to Paint Oak Leaf Camouflage
Now that we have our light volumes sketched in, it's time to add some
colour! For most of the basecoats I use translucent paints to allow some
of our light sketch to show through. I mostly use AP Speedpaints, but feel
free to experiment with other brands like Citadel Contrast and Vallejo
Xpress Paints.

Our figures from Just Some Miniatures are wearing reversible winter
parkas that are white on one side and camouflage on the other side.
Some are also wearing helmet covers which could be white or
camouflage.

When painting camouflage patterns for the tabletop, we usually want to

give the impression of the pattern, rather than trying to accurately
replicate it in scale. That means that we will likely have to increase the
size of the pattern's elements, as well as increasing the contrast between
those elements.

To paint our oak leaf camouflage, we'll start by applying a base coat
mixed from the following AP Speedpaint colours: 4 parts Pallid Bone, 1
part Dark Wood, 1 part Burnished Red, 1 part Speedpaint Medium.

From here we can create either an autumn or spring camouflage.

Autumn Oak Leaf
Taking our time, we’ll use use Dark Wood
Speedpaint to create "amoeba" shapes on
the parka. We’ll vary the size and placement,
making sure to leave enough of the base
colour showing. Remember that the shapes
will cross under webbing and straps, but they
will not cross seam lines where the different
parts of the parka are sewn together.

Inside the brown patches we add some

orange. I mix mine from AK Deep Orange
and AK Ochre. This can also be applied to
form larger patches of the orange over the
basecoat that butt up against the brown
patches. You may need a couple of coats to
achieve full coverage.

We can then highlight the orange by adding

more Ochre into our orange mix. I like to
focus the highlight toward the top part of
each orange shape, or over any edges of the
model.

Using our original Dark Wood Speedpaint,

we can then add a few more dots inside
some of the orange patches.

Spring Oak Leaf

The same process can be followed for Spring
Oakleaf (as seen on the helmet cover in our
example) by swapping out the colours. For
the first amoeba shapes, we use a 1:1 mix of
Dark Wood and Absolution Green
Speedpaints.

The brighter green patches are painted with

an appropriate grass green, such as Golden
Olive from Vallejo. These green spots can
then be highlighted with a mix of this green
and some Ochre, or even a pure Ochre.
Highlighting and Shading the Camouflage
The light brown base colour can now be
highlighted in places where it is still visible,
especially at edges, around the shoulders
and collar, and any other part of the uniform
that might catch the light. We'll use a mix of
AK Light Earth and Ice Yellow, with some
pure Ice Yellow for a few extreme point
highlights.

Finally, to deepen the contrast across the

parka and help blend the camouflage
patterns in, we need to darken the shadows,
for example under the armpits and on the
underside of folds in the fabric.

To do this we selectively apply a thin brown

glaze to these areas. For the glaze we can
use our original base colour, perhaps
darkened further with additional Dark Wood
Speedpaint, and thinned as necessary with
Speedpaint Medium and/or water. It's best to
keep this glaze thin and transparent,
applying two or three coats as needed to the
deepest shadows.

And with that, our camouflage parka is

complete!
Painting a White Parka
As mentioned, the camouflage parkas our
figures our wearing were reversible, with a
winter white on the other side. The reference
images I've seen suggest they often became a
warm, dirty off-white with use, so that's what
we'll go for.

When we're spraying on our white zenithal layer

during the undercoating step, it pays to apply the
white ink a bit more liberally for these figures
than we would for those wearing oakleaf. This
will give us a brighter undercoat to work from.

Using Speedpaints, we will mix up a thin dirty

brown wash to apply all over our white parka. I
used about 3 parts Pallid Bone, 1 part Dark
Wood, and 3 parts Speedpaint Medium. Once
this first layer is dry, we can come back in and
selectively apply a second layer as a glaze into
any areas we want to deepen the shadows, for
example under the armpits.

Now we simply need to apply some thin off-white

layers, aiming to create a transition from shadow
to highlight. For this we can use a mix of AK
Grimy Grey and AK Ivory, adding more Ivory for
the higher highlights and perhaps even mixing in
some pure white for the sharpest highlights. We
can keep our paints thin and go pretty quickly
here, not worrying too much about full coverage
at any one step.

For example, we might begin with a layer of

approximately 1:1 Grimy Grey and Ivory, then
1:2 Grimy Grey and Ivory, then pure Ivory or 2:1
Ivory and White. I tend to avoid using pure white
by itself, as I prefer a more weathered look.
 Painting Horses
As before, we start with our zenithal undercoat and then apply translucent
paints as our basecoat. Horse coats can be quite glossy, so it can be
helpful to have quite a lot of contrast between the darkest and lightest
parts of our zenithal undercoat, with some sharp white highlights
selectively placed toward the top of certain muscles to sell that shiny coat.
Before we start applying our basecoats, it can be helpful to have some
reference pictures to work from. In this guide we'll be painting up two
different horses, one a dark chocolate brown and one a chestnut, though
the same basic technique can achieve horses of any colour.

For a brown or chestnut horse, I like to mix

a colour using a combination of
Speedpaints: mostly Dark Wood,
Burnished Red, Hardened Leather, and
Sand Golem. By varying the ratios of
each, we can achieve different tones. Dark
Wood will make the paint more chocolate
brown, Burnished Red more reddish
brown, Hardened Leather more reddish-
orange, and Sand Golem more golden
yellow. It can also be helpful to add in a
little Speedpaint Medium to keep the
colour from being too strong.
Using a large brush and working in
sections, we'll apply the custom
Speedpaint mix all over the horse. It's
usually best to draw the brush downward
and toward crevices, as the brush will
deposit more paint when we lift the brush
away. Over the large areas of horse
musculature, we'll get a better result if we
use long, smooth strokes rather than lots
of little brush movements.
Additional shading can be added using the
original mix or a similar mix with added
Dark Wood, thinned with medium. We'll
apply this to the underside of muscles and
where the tack and harness meet the
horse.
Highlighting
Our highlight colours will depend on the
colour of our main basecoat. AK Ochre is
often a good starting point for any chestnut
or lighter coloured horses, possibly with
some AK Ice Yellow added in. We'll thin
our highlight colour with water and/or
medium and apply it as a glaze toward the
tops of the horse's muscles, remembering
to draw our brush in the direction we want
the highlight colour to be strongest (i.e.
toward the top of the muscle). We can also
use a clean, very slightly damp brush to
feather the bottom edge of the glaze. This
is especially useful when we have large,
exposed sections of musculature.
If you wanted to make the horse's coat
appear very glossy, you could push the
highlights even further than we have here,
with sharp off-white highlights at the very
extreme tips of certain muscles. A good
reference image is invaluable for helping
us find the right places to place the
highlights.

Finishing Touches
Again referring to our reference images,
we can choose to apply some markings to
the horse's head and legs, using an off-
white such as AK Ivory. We'll paint our
hooves with AP Speedpaint Grim Black,
and use a light drybrush of AK Rubber
Black around the muzzle.
For the leather of the saddle and harness
we'll use a mix of AP Speedpaints
Hardened Leather and Burnished Red,
highlighted with AK Ochre.
 Everything Else
This tutorial primarily focuses on camouflage and horses, but for those
interested I'll quickly list example colors for some of the other equipment
on the models. Most follow the general method of a translucent base
layer followed by standard acrylic highlights applied as a glaze.
●
Field Grey: AP Gunner Camo Speedpaint, highlighted with AK
Grey Green and AK Ice Yellow.
●
Gloves: AP Runic Grey Speedpaint (two coats), highlighted with
AP Gorgon Hide
●
Webbing and boots: AP Grim Black Speedpaint, highlighted with
AK Grey Green
●
Helmets: Mix of Speedpaints Grim Black, Gravelord Grey,
Absolution Green, Cloudburst Blue, Speedpaint Medium.
●
Rifle furniture: AP Hardened Leather Speedpaint, highlighted with
AK Ochre
●
Metallics: Vallejo Metal Colour Dark Aluminium, washed with 1:1
mix AP Grim Black and Gravelord Grey Speedpaints, highlighted
with Dark Aluminium.
●
Skin: Base coat of AP Mummy Robes, coat of diluted Citadel
Contrast Guilliman Flesh, selective glaze with Citadel Carroburg
Crimson. Highlight with mix of Mummy Robes and AP Elven Flesh.
Stubble achieved with a glaze of Citadel Contrast Gryphcharger
Grey.
To protect our hard work, we hit the miniature with some varnish (I use
AK Ultra Matte varnish through an airbrush), pop a base on it, and we're
done!