Necron painting for the non-painter
As some of our loyal readers may remember, I got a Necron army at last year’s ‘Ard Boys regionals. Now that the newness of the ork codex is starting to wear off, I decided to put some effort into the Necrons and I stumbled upon a bit of a discovery. This may be obvious to some of you, but Necrons are extremely easy to paint!
If you are looking to get into warhammer 40k, but have serious doubts about your ability to paint an army, then have no fear. Necrons are the army for you. Seriously, I spent probably three times more time assembling the models then painting them. As long as you know which end of the brush to hold, you can follow these steps to have a nice looking Necron army in no time.
Step 2a) Go to Home Depot and pick up some silver spray-paint. There are many different types out there. Rust-oleum even makes three different ones. I use the Rust-oleum Specialty Metallic; it adheres better to the plastic, it gives a stronger coat, and the silver is a few shades lighter than the others. The down side is that it takes a longer to dry.
Step 2b) Take your models outside and give them a good coat of silver spray.
Step 2c) Let them dry overnight. You have to let them dry completely or they will pick up finger print marks, even two or three hours after painting.
Step 3a) Mix up a batch of “Magic Wash”: 1 part water, 1 part Future brand floor Polish (not floor wax) and stir in some black paint.
Step 3b) Give them models a good coat of the magic wash. This will dull the silver a bit, but fill in all the details and really make your model pop. It also has the added benefit of adding a durable clear coat to the model.
Step 4) Optional: Choose an accent color (red, blue, green, whatever) and paint the shoulder pads. You certainly don’t need to do this step, but it does make them look better. I found that not all paints stick well to the silver or washed surface. You may have to brush on a base coat before the colors go on.
And that’s it. Excluding the drying time, it should take you about a minute or two per model to paint. No blending, dry brushing or highlighting required. You can use this same technique on all your Necrons, except perhaps the Monolith. The silver on a model that large may look bad.
