Whilst I would never be arrogant enough to consider myself an expert level painter and hobbyist, I feel I am starting to climb into the "advanced" section of the community. I can provide guidance on colours and techniques, and whilst I definitely have blind spots (wet blending and drybrushing as examples), I'm not a novice anymore.

However, there is one type of hobby product I am slowly coming around to after more than a decade of solidly ignoring – decals.

Long-suffering readers will know that I used decals on my Clan Ghost Bear miniatures, and that in a particularly clever application (in my mind, anyway), I used a cut down Salamanders decal on my Primaris Librarian.

Indeed, if I had my time over, I have caught myself wondering if I would not be better off using Salamanders decals and not 3D printed shoulder pad icons. Then I remember my painted collection of miniatures includes 60-70 Green Marines with 3D printed icons, which makes going back and replacing them all a big hassle.

No thanks.

So having converted to the way of the decal, comes the final frontier – using decals to make up for the fact I cannot write using a brush for shit.

I scoured the web, and found ImpatientTabletop, who was selling a set of latin script decals in various sizes, and I thought it was worth a punt.

Two weeks later, and they rocked up on my doorstep:

Now, to be clear, Micro Set and Micro Sol are non-negotiable when applying decals. Of any kind. If you want them to adhere and look nice, you will varnish, soften, set, and varnish, and you will be rewarded with a good result.

One of the things I had to learn was to bend these decals, as the shields were curved. I found some decals just didn't take to being curved, owing to the space between the characters, which made them look weird when I pushed them around the curve of the Deathwing Knight shields I experimented on.

Others, however, looked elite:

I also found the seller to be particularly receptive on Etsy and Instagram, and so immediately set out hassling him about quality of life improvements for his next sheet of decals. My next test will be a custom order full of Salamander names, which may mean that some of my captains, librarians, and other characters of import will no longer be faceless goons.

Maybe.

I also had mixed results with my librarian – the bigger font size (not biggest, which I have yet to find a use for) and the smaller font size both had upside and drawbacks.

The bigger font size had to be curved around the scroll, squashing the letters together, turning "Ultima" into "Ultmma"

Whilst the smaller font size looks nice but doesn't quite fill out the scroll in a way that looks satisfying.

Unfortunately, these sorts of things tend to bring out my perfectionism, and I had somewhat of a crisis about how the decal(s) looked. In the end, the only way I could soothe my troubled brain was to promise to engage the seller to try and make a size that splits the difference.

So overall, a worthy purchase, but watch this space – there may be a worthier purchase down the line.

Catch you next time,
Vulkan

Did you like this article? Did you hate it? Go over and keep the discussion going on the official Vulkan's Corner facebook page! - whilst you're at it, leave a like!