WWI German Stormtrooper
Andrea Miniatures 1/9th
scale resin bust
Painted 2016 to 2026
Yes, you read that right, it took me ten years to get this finished.
“Why ?” you ask.
“Absolutely no good reason at all,” is the simple answer.
I’ve bought several Young Miniatures kits over the years, and painted one or two of them as well, and I can honestly say they’ve all been superb.
I think the only excuse I have is simply getting sidetracked by other models, an this one getting pushed to one side / the back of the shelf of shame.
Photo #1 shows the box art, superbly painted by Sang Eon Lee. He’s captured the tired appearance of a soldier who’s been on the front line for a while, the tired, resigned face, and the worn helmet in particular give the feeling that hope for this individual has long gone.
Photo #2 shows the separate parts, I’ve drilled into the head, helmet and body castings to accept wire pins that will fasten them to wood painting handles, the parts at the top will be left in the box until needed.
And that’s about as far as I got in 2016.
Photo #3 is a temporary combination of the head and helmet.
The helmet was painted ( possibly ) in 2018, where I’d discovered the Marmite technique – undercoat the primed helmet with a Steel metallic acrylic, and then sponge on some Marmite. Then use and airbrush to spray on the green – a couple of different colours used – allow this to dry for half an hour, and then use a soft toothbrush and some washing up detergent to gently scrub the helmet. This removes the areas covered with the Marmite, and makes the damaged effect seen in this shot.
The face was painted in 2026, and here it is still wet with the oils, hence the shiny finish.
Photo ##4 and things have really progressed with the body.
The jacket has been painted with acrylic colours, and is perhaps a little more of a green shade that is shown here.
I’d mixed GW Moody Blue with MP Olive Green, added a little GW Skull White and some Chaos Black and ended up with a blue / grey that had just a hint of green about it.
This colour was painted over the jacket, and then lightened very slightly with more Skull White, and using a very old synthetic brush that the bristles had splayed apart on, and very lightly stippled the lighter colour over the jacket.
Photos #5 and #6. I lightened the jacket colour several more times, each time adding a little water as well, and using the brush to add two or three layers of each colour.
The result I was trying to get was a thick wool appearance, the wool having become “bobbly” through constant wear.
Close-up, I’m not sure that it works, but the shot shows what I was doing, building up layers of different colour. Viewed normally, the texture does look like I wanted it to, and so I could continue to paint the equipment.
Photo #7 and the helmet receives a freehand skull. I can’t remember where I’d seen this done, but I liked the idea, and so painted the skull, working around the damaged areas where paint had been worn away.
Photos #8 and #9. This model was a joy to paint, I need to note that here simply because in a few of the pictures, the painting has leapt forward a lot.
Here for example the ammunition bags and the grenade holders have been painted in sand colours to represent sacking material, and the cross-belts have been rendered in leather colours, adding a little wear to the edges with pale cream oils.
The epaulettes have had a red edging added and I’ve painted a similar colour to the shirt collar visible at the neck, both areas using MP paints Scarlet.
Photo #10. The eyes have it…. Or in this case, they haven’t.
For a start, the paint on the face in this shot looks quite roughly textured, this is because I want to add some grime and dirt to it later on and need a rough surface for that to grab onto.
The eyes however were a battle. They don’t appear too bad in this picture, but that’s after about an hour of messing about, adjusting the shape and size, the direction they were looking in, the colour of both the iris and the eyeball itself…… To be honest I didn’t mind spending the time, it was just a little frustrating after the ease of painting the rest of the model.
Photos #11 and #12 and the grime I mentioned has been scrubbed onto the face with an old brush and using Vandyke Brown oils.
A tiny, and I so mean a tiny, bit of paint is put on the bristles of a fairly large, old brush, and then using a gentle scrubbing action, the paint is transferred to the area needed.
As I’d used oils for this, I could then use a fine brush, dampened with a little White Spirit, to clean away some vertical lines running from the eyes, to appear as though he’s been crying – from fear, stress, loss of his comrades ?
It could have been any one or all of those, but it gives the bust a more human appearance.
Photo #13 and the section of rifle and club have been added, the colours for the wood areas being various brown oils, and the metallic sections being finished with the excellent Darkstar range of acrylic colours.
Also in this shot and photo #14 I’ve used some more of the Vandyke Brown oils to scrub some ingrained dirt into the uniform and carry sacks. The same method is used as one the face, using a soft brush with a tiny amount of paint on the bristles to apply the colour gently to the surface of the morel.
Final thoughts.
I feel that the experienced painters often underrate offerings from Andrea Miniatures, you don’t often hear of people getting them out and applying colour.
A shame really; because whilst there are one or two howlers within their vast range of miniatures; there are a heck of a lot of absolute gems in there too.
Yes, I know I’ve said that painting the eyes on this bust were a right royal pain, but Perhaps some of that is due to my impatience, because although it spent a lot of time at the back of the bench, in the main, the model painted up quite quickly and efficiently.
There is a haunted look to the pose, I think the sculptor has captured it well, and it leads one to attempt to build on that – hence the tears.
All in all, highly recommended.
