d/b's Don't Be Afriad to Finish a Miniature - Simple Sunday

I am guilty of not painting my models.  I am very fortunate that Endalyon has the time, inclination and satisfaction of painting so I tend to sling them towards him. The topic actually got pretty heated in the Infinity Forums.  Personally, I prefer facing painted armies because it makes it easier for me to identify a model which is why I try to have my guys painted. I don't paint because it doesn't interest me, only the game does - it's gotten to the point that I get teased with "Tevesh would love to play with grey cubes." We shouldn't forget that part of wargaming is the Hobby aspect which a lot of players gripe about lack of time or the quality of their paint job. The thing is, you can't improve if you don't try, and it's something I know for certain when I compared my first painted miniatures to my last.  I found a gem on the Infinity forums regarding and it reminded me of two phrases a friend of mine liked to say: "The best time to start was 10 years ago and now" and "Mastery is possible, it merely takes years." I present d/b's The Uglier the Better: Don't Be Afraid to Finish a Miniature."

We all like to play with painted armies. So I try as best as I can to encourage my friends to paint, and help them paint better.

But often I hear cries like "I would never paint that good", "My painting is horrible", "It takes me forever to paint one miniature" and so on from novices.

One of my friends is just stuck with painting "armor on this model, hands on that model", trying to master techniques and never finishing a miniature. Because "he doesn't yet know how to do it right". But the point is — you'll never know before you finish a model and say "It is done". Which means you would probably mess up sometimes.

The recipe that worked for me in a last decade: just finish the job as good as you can, and move on. I found that my skills improve faster if I just paint more minis to a finished state in a reasonable amount of time (gradually learning with every new miniature), than if I try to paint one miniature perfectly.

Such approach led to some progress from my first WHFB mini to current level:

The guy on the left is not an old PanO Fusilier :) Its an Empire Musketeer from Warhammer Fantasy 4 ed starter box, hope you like him ;)

And what do you guys think? What is your approach to painting?

It would be great if you'll drop some of your "before and after" pics! I believe it could help novice painters to finally paint something, or to start a new mini, or to find motivation to improve painting skills.

[Ed.: Forum thread here to see other people's first and latest paint jobs for inspiration.]