Berlin urban camo - hammerjack

[Vermis]

On Tuffskull's suggestion...

I finally decided to try out a Berlin urban camo scheme, and I've got the base colours on. Before I go on with highlights and/or shading, I thought I'd post pics and gather opinions.

http://www.cheddarmongers.org/prod....pg.html
http://www.cheddarmongers.org/prod....pg.html

The photos came out a little bright. The 'white' and red are GW's new foundation Astronomicon grey and Mechrite red, respectively, and look better IRL. I think I'll shade those two. The black will be highlighted with dark blue, as per the previous scheme.

There's something not quite right, IMO, but I'm not sure what it is - apart from looking like a lego model. After taking another look at RL examples here, I think I might reduce the size of the blocks, make them more 'blocky' (in terms of shape and arrangement), introduce more red (I included a little to have red somewhere, but in hindsight it seems conspicuous by it's... brevity; and Jane's Tank Recognition Guide has pics of a forest-camo Polish tank with a similar red which looks good. But I digress), and just plain plan it a little bit better.

I'm looking for hefty critiques here, so please don't hesitate to be harsh.

[CloudCityGames]

I like the version without the white blocks painted in amongst the camo scheme

It seems to look more natural. Which is, I know, not the point behind this particular camo scheme :-)

[Vermis]

I see what you mean. I may leave out the astro grey, though I planned to shade it down to at least 50:50 shadow grey. I think I'll add quick highlights and shading to see if that improves it any.

[CloudCityGames]

Highlights might help. As would perhaps toning the white down. I don't think that it needs to be that stark. Perhaps an off white or a blue/white?

[Vermis]

I added a little shading to the astro grey and red, and highlights to the grey and black. Results here:

http://www.cheddarmongers.org/prod/p...ack03.jpg.html
http://www.cheddarmongers.org/prod/p...ack04.jpg.html

As you can see, even taking the rough shading into account, the shadow/astro grey looks like arse (though I did appreciate the vague impression of the Union Jack I got, at one point). It looks a tad better with a shadow grey overbrush on the base (as with the previous scheme), but not enough. Also, it's easier for me to highlight a dark colour and make it look good, than to shade a light colour and make it look good. Out that goes, then.
Talking about shading light colours, that's the issue I have with the mechrite red too. Even with red gore it looks too bright in photos and RL. I'll go back to the previous highlighting method (also at L4 and Sgt. Crunch's suggestion). That irritates me a little, since I got the mechrite red specifically to basecoat my admech proxies; but I can probably water it down for highlights.

Over on TacComm there were misgivings about using this camo and messing up how the mini would look on a tabletop. I'm no expert, but I think smaller and more regular blocks of colour might help with that problem; and of course they will be highlighted too. The two photos at the top of the thread were WIPs, not the finished product.

One more grey-based hammerjack left. I hope I get the scheme right on that.

[CloudCityGames]

I like these latest two a lot.