[X-WING] Rebel custom, the E-WING

One of my friends is a true SW fan, and of course he's going crazy with X-WING a board game where the Rebels and the Empire fights with their fleets.

Honestly I don't know nothing more excepting than the game is sold with very nice miniatures of the SW spaceships, like the Millinium Falcon I saw painted by Ben Kornet on Painting Buddha.
I have myself three ships at home in this period delivered by my friend in order to paint some customization. The quality of the minis are very good considering we're talking about prepainted plastic models. Actually, the painting job is also very nice for gaming stuff.

The original starships are nicely prepainted.

But my friend has seen the customization job of Nano Nefasto (an Italian pro painter) and wants the same for his fleet.

Now, I haven't the talent of Nano Nefasto and it's also the first time I paint vehicle, so I've just promised him to make a try with this three ships: x-wing, b-wing and e-wing.

I've decided to start with the E-wing because the model is simplier than the others and the requests of my friend less complicated (black with red stripes).

The good news is that the details of the mini are not filled by the prepainting so I have not to clean it.
Of course, I need to be aware than the details are very tiny, so I might paint with very, very thin layer to avoid to lose them. It's normal process for showcase mini, it could be a problem for gaming model.
So I've decided to apply a first layer of Vallejo surface primer to make the base stronger and have nice surface to work on.



 Then I've applied 3 thin layers of black on all the mini as it will be the main colour of the model. Actually, I haven't used pure black but a mix of dark grey and black. It will make easier the shading and highlight. (and also because my old eyes cannot afford anymore painting on full black). 



Once black painted, I start to paint the stripe parts of the ship. As I want a white base, I've started by a layer of grey to make easier the coverage. As you can see below, I've applied the layers on the wings and the nose for the future stripes meanwhile the layers on the flanks are for the mechanical parts of the ship I want to paint in different colour.  

I continue the process of layering adding some white to the grey and then finally the pure white.

The base layers are now ready, at this point I've added some washes in order to place the first shading, make pop up the details and create a first weathering.

I've used Dark Sepia on the white layers and Armor Wash on the black layers (even it's not visible on the picture).
I admit I've exagerated with the wash of sepia but it's not a big deal, I will clean the nose and the wing during the highlight process. The mechanical parts instead will receive an other wash to increase the dirty effect and contrast with the rest of the ship.

I've started by cleaning the wings and the noise with some highlights of white. In the same time, I've increased the contrast of the mechanical parts with some black washes (Secret Weapon Armor Wash),located around the details.



I've Painted the light and the shades on the black parts, using the cool grey with some white for the higlights and the black washes for the extreme shading. It is not very visible on the pic because I've remained on a very dark hue, I don't want my ship seems grey instead of black. But considering the mini is very small, maybe I will increase the extreme lights at the end of the process.
I've also created some weathering effects on the wings with the base colors (applied with a piece of sponge).



For the cockpit, I've choosen a base of marine blue constrasted with a touch of White and black washes. Nothing too flashy for now, I prefer to place first the red stripes on the wings and the noise and see in a second time if some additional blue would balance the colors or not.

Let's started with the red stripes. I've applied first a base player of red brown from Vallejo because it has a very good coverage and is perfect for a first layer when I paint with red.



Then I've applied a second layer of Red 4 (Warcolours) which is dark red and then a last layer with red 2 (Warcolours) for the highlight and make pop the red.



Once finished with the stripes, I've painted the guns and the afterburners.
I've choosen metals in order to contrast with the rest of the ship. As this parts were already painted with a layer of grey/black , I've directly applied the first metallic color: Metallic black (warcolours).
Then, I've painted a first highlight with a mix of metallic black and silver and finally the extreme highlights with pure Silver.

The last job is the effects on afterbuners. Now, it's quite complicated to obtain a good and easy OSL without airbrush, so I've decided to do it simple without too much effects also because the burners of the E-Wing are very small. I've just painted the inside with pure White to create strong lights then I've applied a glaze of fluo orange and a second glaze of red-orange on the sides of the burners. The OSL is not even visible on the pics but fro my concern works as well considering the scale of the spaceship.

So, here the final result: It looks old and dirty as I wanted, so I'm quite pleased with the result. It's the kind of spaceship I've imagined for the Rebels.

The feature I need to improve for the next ship is the patterns. I should design them first on a White paper and work a little bit more on their placements and aspects. I admit that I didn't work on it for the E-wing, I just try to copy a pattern I saw on an other ship without thinking too much.