Space Marine Painting Questions?

[tylertt]

Hey Hive,

So I got my Marine army on the go, however I still have a bit of Tyranids to finish up before I move onto painting my Space Marines. However I still am wanting to play with my Marines with my gaming group also.

Now my question to you all who have painted and worked on Marines, how much assembly should I perform? What assembly will make things difficult?

I was going to just do torso, lefts, backback, and the head, and leave arms and should pads off for later. Are there any reccomendations of this being a good plan of action? Or should I leave backpacks and heads off as well?

Thanks guys

[WestRider]

I find that on basic Imperial Marine Models, anything I can't get a brush to after full assembly, you can't really see on the tabletop anyhow. Chaos Marines and some of the SW Models are different, but for basic Tac Marines, I assemble fully before painting.

The one exception was my old Fleshtearers Army, because I used white primer for all the red, but the shoulderpads and backpacks were mostly black, so I left them separate and sprayed them black while priming the rest of the Models white.

[tylertt]

Awesome thanks Westrider.

I got a unit of Sternguard I was concered about assembly, but I think I'll just do everything except the Weapons for the time being.

Appreciate the advice man

[WestRider]

Leaving the bolters off should be enough even for Sternguard. Actually, you might want to find some sort of way to make those swappable anyhow, whether with pins or magnets or whatever. They're one of those Units that has a lot of worthwhile options, and you could save yourself a lot of cash by making them changeable.

[tylertt]

One more quick question to you all. Been doing some research on painting Ultramarines, and I was wondering what set of paints were used to achieve the color seen below.

Being unfamiliar with the blue paints available, I am unsure what to start planning on purchasing in the future.

I like the Darker toned blue of these Ultramarines as compared to the brighter older schemes I have sometimes seen.

[Deleted]

I recently painted a couple ultramarines and used the following (old paints, dont know new equvilants, sorry)

Base: 1:2 Regal blue, Ultramarines blue
Blue wash
sloppy, loose highlight ultramarines blue
Extreme highlight 1:1 ultramarine and space wolves grey
Extreme extreme highlight (Opt) space wolves grey

should put you pretty close to the last picture with litte effort

Alternatively, for a more detailed version, this is straight from the old GW How to Paint Citadel Miniatures book

Base: Ultramarines Blue
1:1 Blue and Black wash to recesses in armor
70:30 ultramarines, space wolves grey to edges of armor
Fine layer of Space Wolves grey to edges of armor

This should put you close to the first picture, but may be a bit too light for your taste

OR, if neither of those float your boat, here's a couple of other Tutorials from around the web

    taleofpainters.blogspot.com/2013/10/tutorial-how-to-paint-ultramarines-as.html

    www.warseer.com/forums/showthread.php?325158-Tutorial-How-to-paint-Ultramarines-to-a-high-gaming-level

A two part tutorial that i liked cause of his battle damaged look. Looks like a match to the second picture

    www.coloureddust.com.pl/2012/06/how-to-paint-space-marines-tactical.html
    www.coloureddust.com.pl/2012/06/how-to-paint-space-marines-tactical_07.html

Below is my personal favorite - VERY dark and Bad*ss looking, though painted with an airbrush (Im sure you can just carefully drybrush, however:

    arsiesweb.com/2012/09/ultramarines-sternguard-step-by-step.html

Anyways, that may have been more info than you wanted/needed, but hope you find something that works for you. Good luck with your army