Multitasking day...
Started working to develop the color palette for the Chess Piece. It took five tries to nail the color of the base's rocky upper surface. It turned out to be a lighten NATO Back with a hint of Khaki… a greenish dark black gray. I started painting color samples on the lower left and went around clockwise to the one that's close enough. I don't know how old these figures are so I don't know how much fading there is. They can't be too old since they were cast resin of some variety or another.
Color matching the base color proved much more elusive. It turns out to be a light gray tan with a hint of red. Luckily I had all of those extra bases upon which to experiment. I masked the upper part of the figure and airbrushed the base color. When it dried I noticed a lot of pin holes (small air bubbles) so I went around and filled all the imperfections with Tamiya Fine Putty. When dry I sanded it with the power mini-sander.
The color appears very light, but it will get treated with an aging wash using Tamiya Accent Liquid. Again, I may add some brown to the black to warm it up a bit. The filler looks bad, but it's not.
After sanding here's what it looks like. Tomorrow, I'll mix another batch of base color and air brush it again. The white balance is way off in this picture. It's sitting on a pure white piece of Bristol Board and I shoved the white balance as far to the blue as possible. My shop light over the work bench is a warm CFL that's very yellow. I'm confident that the base color is going to work.
