Can't decide on an army scheme

So I use black because its an easy color to use so my ogres pants are all black. I play a variation of black Templars in warhammer 40,000 so I'm kind of done with red and white.I see blue too often so that is out too. Any suggestions on what color to use?

It kind of depends on what you want you army to look like and if they have some fluff or a backstory? If you are stuck for a colour theme then often sorting out a bit of fluff for them will help loads.

Are they from the mountains or an ice waste and live primarily on killing beasts, thus wearing lots of furs? Are they from the coast and have pirate leanings? Maybe they come from a wooded area and therefore are more akin to the dress of say wood elves? Have they been tainted by the winds of chaos and are Nurgle esq?

This kind of thing will help allot because it almost dictates what colour to go with. ( Furs; browns/ blacks/ greys. Pirate; stripy pants, headbands, gold jewellery. Woods; greens/ browns etc you get the idea).

Failing that I would say if you don't want to be painting black/ white/ red or blue then I would say you have two distinct choices. You can either go balls-out bright and loud with something like an Orange/ yellow theme or a turquoise or purple theme (think skinks or Dark Elves) or you can keep it tamed down and using the black pants as a basis on which to build; black and yellow go well together, sadly so does black and red, or what about trying 50 shades of grey (not that! the colour) as there are loads of different shades of grey. For me I would suggest the fir thing as it would allow allot of browns and leathers which is pretty far removed from BT, Smurfs and the likes of 40k.

Think fluff though, as I think this will help to light the path for you.

G_H

I don't know why I didn't think about the source material. The tribe fluff I'm going with it that of a plains walking, kind of native American theme, With lots of different war paints and the such. I've painted up a good 12 bulls, 6 ironguts, 4 mournfangs, all with the black pants so I've limited myself there. forethought be damned

In that case you could go with the brown leather and spice it up with different color warpaints on the skin. Could be very nice, although it will be a lot of free handing the warpaint.

If you have just painted the trousers black and used a light grey to highlight them, then wash them with Agrax earthshade or at a push reikland fleshshade. That will give them a brown tint, and that may well be enough to make them look browny.

G_H

I'm not afraid to free hand so that wont be a problem. Now should I use a wide variety of colors for the war paint or stick to one color? I still have the old named ink washes can your remember what the old names for those is?

For warpaint I would pick 3 colours (at the most) unless you intend to paint tattoo style warpaint. If you are thinking native Americans then white, black and red would seem most suitable. (sadly they are all the BT colours!). Though the red is more ocra.
Warpaint can be any colour though. Blue like Mel Gibson in Braveheart, or you could go black and white like a black metal/ goth style.

If it were me I would stick to something simple like a black strip across the eyes/ face. You could go for a full black skeleton (a bit like the tattooed Russell Crow in Romper Stomper). That's what I would be leaning towards doing as it will contrast well against pale flesh.

No idea what the old inks were called...it was years ago. What I mean is a brown wash/ ink or a flesh type one. They should make black browner.

A couple of pictures attached re warpaint.

G_H

you have been super helpful. this is where I'm at before doing any of the suggestions.
https://www.flickr.com/photos/126618885@N05/14818531634/

You've been doing them Templars too long! Highlighting black with blue...ah, I remember when the BT had there own book and everything!

Well, lots of positives can be drawn from this; the shoes/ boots are brown. That's good. Skin looks really solid and makes a great canvas for painting the war paint on. It's a shame that the black is not highlighted with a light colour that can be...corrupted.

None-the-less this guy looks like a solid start. I think if you wanted to go all-ouy for the full Native American feel then the trousers may need to be brown. We can steer away from that though and just go with the war paint. I am sure it will still work.

If you were up for the work, I would be tempted to turn the gutplates into Native American shields by adding feathers or similar to either side (were the belt joins), the imagery would be the same as a dream catcher (if that makes sense).

There were/ are plenty of tribes with a black and white war paint theme so this would still look pretty cool.

Anyway, attached a few more pictures for inspiration.

G_H

You really have gone above and beyond on helping me out with this. I think I'm going to use light blue, black, and red for the war paints. I was going to do something similar with my champions, I was going to put a wolf tail on their gut plates. The dream catcher idea sounds cool but I don't know how I'd go about making or buying feathers.

Cut them off forest goblin spider riderz.

Anyway, no more help! Get on with it now and post up some pictures in a Gnoblog. there is a time for planning and a time for action...the latter has now arrived! 

G_H

Something that helped me was browsing all of the different gnoblogs as well as the pictures section on the main site of the Stronghold.  See what certain combinations look like, should help narrow down what you like

I agree with Havoc. The best way to get some inspiration is to check out what other people are doing. The internet is full of little toy soldier pics, and sometimes the inspiration to paint something comes up when seeing a totally different model with some sort of connection to it

And G_H's pics are a great source for inspiration. The important thing with little toy soldiers (even Ogres) and tattoos is to have a clear idea of the result in mind. And limiting the palette of colours does help, as it brings the tattoo/facepaint to a more pronounced focus. Using too many colours might end up looking messy.

Can't wait to see the first tests of the face paints. Get to it!

- Loran