Painting Space Marines

For some reason, I got an itch to paint some Warhammer 40k figures. I've been slowly assembling them over... I don't know, maybe 2 years. Hey, I have a lot of things that I do in my free time. Anyway, I finally got around to priming them the other day, and I've been painting like a crazy person since then.

Now, I should mention that these aren't the first figures I've painted. I had painted a squad of 5 marines that came in a box along with 6 paints and a brush. Here's one of them.

That was a good learning experience. This time, I have quality glue, basing material, spray primer, a variety of brushes, and lots of paints and inks. I'm posting some photos of various steps of the process. Hopefully, by putting them here, I will actually finish painting them.

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This space marine has been assembled, based, and primed. The basing material is sand and rock, glued into place with regular white glue. The whole model is sprayed with a flat black primer, to help the other paint stick better.

This marine has had his armor painted with Ultramarine Blue. Actually, his feet are missing some paint, but I'll get around to that. Additionally, the black ground cover has been drybrushed to look like sand and rocks. I started with rocky sand, painted it black, then painted it to look like rocky sand again. Crazy? Probably.

This marine has been washed with a blue ink (which I think has been replaced with Asurmen Blue Wash). Ink is used because it settles in the crevasses and provides great depth.

This marine has had his armor panels painted with a 50/50 mix of Regal Blue and Ultramarine Blue. By leaving a slight gap around the edges, the blue wash peeks through the armor panels, and this looks great.

For those who don't know much about 40k, these figures are pretty small. Here's a comparison shot.

Now imagine trying to paint those eye lenses. Yeah, I'm not looking forward to it, either. Besides the eyes, I still have a lot to do. I plan to put another few layers of blue on the armor, paint the shoulder pad edges, drybrush the metal pieces, and so on. If anybody reads this and has feedback or suggestions, I'd love to hear from you!