Raise high the black flags, my Goblins, and ride with fury!

As I mentioned quite some time ago, I like big banners (and I cannot lie). One of my biggest pet peeves with Age of Sigmar (and by extension modern GW fantasy miniatures) is the absence of banners in the units. With my recent Goblin projects I had a chance to rebase one of my older, more ostentatious banners and to try a by now ancient technique on another banner. Here's the result.

Raise your banners, Goblins of the Night!

The big banner on the right is painted on (printer) paper, covered in a bit of PVA beforehand, and globs of it after painting. As I had the model out and close to the paint station anyway, I finally got around to adding an extra layer of mat varnish to take the shine off. The model on the left took a bit more work. I had just finished his paint job and needed to add a banner to the pole. As I couldn't decide on a proper old school 'photocopy and paint' design, I decided to try a real classic: freehand painting on wine bottle lead.

In vino banneritas.

I've been perusing venerable issues of White Dwarf lately (a little more than usual), and I keep reading the tip to use wine bottle lead to make banners. In the past I've used sheets of similar material, but I had never used actual bottle lead (I hope I've gotten the name of this right). First up was the hard task of enjoying wine, a task I've trained for for many years (cough, cough). 

Step 1: apply sandpaper.

When the wine is in the man, the wisdom is in the can (with apologies for this terrible one on one translation of a Dutch proverb). More importantly, the bottle lead is available for use as banner material. After slashing and flattening the tubular shape, apply a rigorous scrubbing with sanding paper.

Step 2: Measure once, cut twice (or was that the other way around?)

 Using the banner bearer as a guide, draw the size of the banner with a technical pencil.

Step 3: Hack, slash and despoil (with care).

Use scissors and a scalpel to cut the banner out. Don't forget to leave extra room on top for the loops with which you'll attach the banner to the pole.

Step 4: Dry fit your banner, don't stop here and call it a day, for maximum effect you should paint it.

 Fit the banner to the model. Use your technical pencil to mark where the loops will go.

Step 5: make the loops.

Cut the loops using your scalpel and scissors. Try to keep both of them more or less the same size and be careful not to snap them off while cutting. Dry fit the banner to your model to get the size right.

Step 6: Apply primer (and allow it to dry and cure).

 Apply your favorite primer and allow it to dry and cure.

Step 7: Paint a design.

Outline your scheme with a light grey paint. I used an older Orcs & Goblins Army Book (but it checked out) for inspiration. 

Step 8: Color the design.

Apply color to the sketch. Ignore the nagging voice complaining it should look better (or give in and try harder, it's your hobby time ;). When finished cover your banner with a serious splash of varnish (preferably gloss first, or even a coat of PVA) to protect the banner.

Step 9: Stick the banner to the pole.

Attach the banner with PVA. Do not give in to temptation and use superglue, it will damage the paint. Do not look at the damage on the banner above. You might see what superglue can do to, say, the left top loop (for us viewers at home).

Step 10: Make the banner a bit wavy.

You can fold wine bottle lead to make your banner a bit more wavy. Don't forget to apply this effect. It'll give you an answer when people wonder why you didn't just use paper.

Step 11: Celebrate your old school greatness by painting a shield in the classic style.

Celebrate your old school glory by following up with a classic arcane armorial shield. Use this tutorial on the awesome Realm of Chaos 80's blog to get started.

Step 12: Bask in your own glory, then start running, those Goblins look frightfully fierce.

And with that I'll wish you all happy bannering. I'll be back with more Goblins next weekend (and I won't have to type blogs about those on a virtual keyboard as I'll be back home from vacation by then).