Intergalactic Empire Productions

Belated merry Christmas everyone! Hope you had a good holiday season with good friends, family, and food. Today we are doing the TIE Advanced.

There are a few schemes to go with here. Canonically, Vader’s TIE Advanced is the first one shown on screen in the light grey due to the special effect restrictions on coloring in A New Hope. Later, the Advanced took on the traditional blue grey that dominates imperial TIE designs.

Options you can consider to help special squadrons stand out are out there. They are not canon that I know of, but do follow the trend X Wing Miniatures was going with some that were. I will bring these options up as we go!

Today we will be using Games Workshop paints. This is not a sponsorship or promotion, it is just a product I like immensely. Layer Ulthuan Grey, Dry Stormfang, Base Mephiston Red (optional), Base Abaddon Black, and Shade Nuln Oil will be used.

First, we want to do all of the cockpits in Base Abaddon Black. Cover everything, including the pane supports.

Next, paint the whole thing in Layer Ulthuan Grey. When you get to the cockpit, dry brush it by wiping the excess paint off your brush and lightly go over it in every direction. If you have the paint light enough on your brush, it will just do the pane supports! For my collection, I left Vader in this color. It will be color corrected shortly.

Optional: Use Base Mephiston Red if you want to keep the trend going with red aces and heroes.

For the blue grey color, now paint over the whole TIE Advanced with Dry Stormfang. Once again, go light and dry brush the cockpit. The color correction will come around shortly. I did all of my Advanced craft in this color with the exception of Darth Vader’s.

Optional: Following another trend of imperial TIE craft, I did red stripes on Vader’s escort Advanced TIEs. Just to help them stand out more. You could always use 2 TIE/ln superiority fighters instead as another option.

Next, go back to Base Abaddon Black and fill in the solar panels. I drew in the inner panels by hand. The model does not have it detailed, but I think it helps with the immersion. It does not have to be perfect, we just want it to look good from 3 feet away.

You should have the following TIE Advanced base schemes, with possibly red as well. Cover them all in Shade Nuln Oil. Test on the bottom first to make sure it is not too thick. Water down your brush as needed. Nuln Oil will tint the grey and blue grey exactly where we want it to go and help details pop, but as the paint pot gets lower it becomes more concentrated. In this case, we just want a light application.

How did you do? For those of you who have been following along in order of publishing, you will have noticed this is more or less the default TIE configuration. Good news, the Empire is easy to do! We still have some bounty hunters and the legendary VT-49 Decimator to do, as well as many capital ships, so stay tuned loyal imperial citizens!