Samurai Drum - An experiment in painting lacquered armour

Coming from a WWII painting background I am used to varnish all my figures / models as matt as possible. With regard to samurai armour I was always a bit unsatisfied with the result, it just didnt appear lacquered anymore after the matt varnish treatment, the shine was missing. So I thought about the possible ways and came up with the following three ways:

1. Painting the lacquer effect
Definitely the most difficult method, applying NMM techniques and actually painting all the light reflexes a lacquered armour may have. Most time consuming process and the worst: One small mistake may ruin the whole painting. So I decided that this is not my favourite method :-)

2. Using gloss varnish
Quite simply its about varnishing only the armour parts with gloss varnish whereas all other parts (clothing, skin etc.) remains matt. You achieve quite a contrast - but does it look real? Not sure yet, looks a bit too "wet" for me. I used that method on the 2 guys in black armour.

2. Using gloss medium for the edges
Thats basically the way I paint armour in general, using metal paints on matt varnished metals to get the look of metal reflections. Just a bit modified: Mixing the armour highlight colour with Vallejo gloss medium and applying it on the raised surfaces like edges after having applied a coat of matt varnish before. I used that method on the guy in brown armour.

Pls. let me know what do you think which painting style fits samurai armour best - maybe you know a different way?

Halo Ground Command - Covenant Forces II

Hunters, this time on Spartan bases. I used Scale Color metallics for the first time, they have some nice old school coloured metal paints in their alchemy range, like this emerald green silver.

WIP: Burgundian Horsemen

Perry minis.

Orcs XIX

Yet more Orcs and Warg cavalry.

Halo Ground Command - Covenant Forces I

Recently acquired the starter pack by Spartan Games, so here you go: a few grunts first. I put them on single bases, not sure if the spartan games gameplay and their base configuration work for me.

Not quite happy how the armour turned out, has to look a bit more metallic next time...

Siege of Neuss -Part XXIII

Mounted Burgundian nobleman

The following book with essays not only about the siege itself but also about contemporary Burgundian politics as well as Burgundian arts and music has an interesting chapter about uniforms. I was mostly under the impression before that uniform-like colouring/clothing was not very common in the Holy Roman empire at that time with few notable exceptions like militia of large imperial cities. 

However, according to the author it was not uncommon for the nobility or the towns to equip "their" troops with clothing items in the same colour. For the "Reichsheer", the imperial relief force on its way to Neuss, there are several contemporary examples about the different colours used: The arrival of the force of the Bishop of Strasbourg appeared to a witness in Cologne like "a red cloud" for their uniform red clothing. The troops of the Duke of Saxony were also dressed in red as well as the contingent of the Bishop of Mainz. Heinrich of Schwarzenburg dressed his troops in grey doublets. The troops of Aachen were dressed in blue and red clothing. The "Reichsstadt" Frankfurt tried to impress Friedrich III by sending their men dressed in red completely and having two chevrons stitched to their left arms. 1.500 men sent by the city of Cologne were issued red and white shirts. All in all, it must have been a very colourful sight and the idea of uniform colours to distinguish between friend and foe - the "livree" - might not have been so uncommon during the siege.