Building the Martain set... The Real Deal! Part 2

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Now that the set is all dry I can begin painting, this is more to my strength as I have been painting real rock textures on my fossil magnets via my etsy shop, even if the paint materials are different, the texchiques are more or less the same.

It was quite tricky to try and find a good reference for how to paint my martian surface, I couldn't
use photos from Mars expositions as this wouldn't reflect a true "earth like" planet. so I turned to looking for desert terrain on earth that might be considered to be martian like. Luckily I found one such photo and it was a great reference for both smooth hills and gravel flat surfaces.
 


First off I had to get a base coat of Burnt Umber down, to give a reddish brown and then I could apply lighter colours and build those up to give the illusion of age and weathering. in the photo on the left, I experimented with dry brushing in a small area to see if the textures I had would have been useful for highlighting spots.


Once the base coat dried I started to apply other layers of colour, I asked one of my friends to come in and help with painting the set, due to the size of the room and the size of the table it was difficult to work around the set applying paints to various areas




After a series of dark washes and highlight dry brushing, the set is starting to come together. At this point I should start to make the set dressing before I finalize the set, I don't want to start applying texture to the base if I need to secure a tree or a bush in place.

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