Painting Recce Vehicles for the Portuguese Colonial War

I’ve had a busy week. At work and at home. But I found few hours to paint some Portuguese vehicles, mostly reconnaissance scout cars and armoured cars. All for the Portuguese Colonial War. With so many to paint I got into a bit of a production line. Here’s how I did it.

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Step 1: Assemble model

First put together the kit. In this case a Dingo scout car with a crewman converted from British to Portuguese and another hacked to fit the vehicle.

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Step 2: Undercoat in black

Hey come on, I undercoat everything in black. I use a black spray from Halfords (a British retailer of car parts).

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Step 3: Paint olive

I used to paint the sections of the vehicle carefully to leave black showing on every edge. Now I slop it on.

Paint: Vallejo (096) Camouflage Olive Green [Coat D’Arms 226 Olive]

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Step 4: Dry brush faded olive

Then I dry brush on a faded olive coat of paint. I guess I’m fairly generous with this.

Paint: Vallejo (082) Olive Green [Coat D’arms 513 Faded Olive]

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Step 5: Repaint tyres black

I’m not a careful painter so after the faded olive dry brush I repaint any bits that need to be black. Starting with the tyres. I guess the crew could do with a touch up too.

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Step 6: Dry brush pale sand

I normally Flock Wargaming Figures with Flat Earth and Dry Brushing. In particular I dry brush a pale sand as the top coat. Well, I now find that a convenient final coat for structures as well. And vehicles.

Paint: Vallejo 70837 Pale Sand

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Step 7: Paint crew

Paint the crew as per the Painting Guide for the Portuguese Colonial War. That means ‘French’ camo.

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Step 8: Dust

Africa is dusty or wet so I thought I should grunge up the vehicles. I went with dust but mud uses the same technique. Take a big fat brush, collect a wodge of dust pigment on the brush. Dab the dust liberally around the wheels and bottom of the chassis. Dab a bit of dust on the top of the chassis and on the turret (if any).

Dust: MIG-PIG-P028 MIG Pigment – Europe Dust

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Step 9: Spray matt varnish

Lastly varnish the model. The dust means you pretty much have to use a spray. No problem for me as I normally use a spray. As you can see from the photo above and the next one, the dust kind of settles down once sprayed with varnish.

Varnish: Army Painter Anti-shine Matt Varnish

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Step 10: Paint another one

Now go do another one. Or have a few on the go at the same time.