Customer Reviews

Painting Ancient and Medieval Warriors (Schiffer Book for Hobbyists)

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The author does a great job in showing detailed instructions on painting with oils miniatures of ancient military subjects. Of all the military figure painting manuals I have read, this is the best. It does a great job in showing intermediate steps along the way.

My only complaint is that I wished he showed more examples. In particular, in the last chapter he shows a beautifully finished templar Knight finished in a white sur coat. However, there is no discussion on how the normally difficult to apply white color was painted.

His color mixing diagrams are useful for a new painter.

Note that there is no discussion on painting with acrylics or enamels.

This book contains lots of pictures, and very little text - it's all in the (shortish) captions. Although I think textual description can only get you so far in modeling, this approach seems a bit extreme. To make matter worse, some photographs are underexposed or taken from too far away, which somewhat dampens their usefulness.

The book seems to be addressed to a beginner. It quickly goes over construction and priming, covers in depth painting various types of materials, and shows few simple ways of using commercial products to liven up display bases.

Painting is done exclusively with oil paints, which is the greatest factor limiting the book's usefulness. For those who are not avert to using oils, and prefer being shown from being told, this can be still a very good book from which to learn.