what are the best colors for a axis urban army

ellobo said:

Easiest : Base Primer + Light Grey and Dark Grey for a three color pattern

For a more distinct look you could add a burgandy or maroon red to the mix, or even a light brown. 

The Germans really experimented with camo patterns and tried a large array of different patterns. I would say almost anything goes.

Here a couple examples of some camo I did, click on them to blow up the images:

Here's my urban camo.

Used the primer gray as a base, then applied blotches of light gray, white and black.

Something I haven't seen anyone mention are Camouflage Decal sheets. There are several sources online for 1/35 and 1/48 scale decal sheets in most recognizable German patterns as well as the U.S. Army frog skin pattern.

Has anyone tried these?

The reviews I have seen seemed favorable, with patience and decal set solution.

ItsUncertainWho said:

Even if applying the decals isn't ten times harder than just painting, they would still have that age old problem of sheen you get with decals. I just did my first camouflage painting the other day and not only was it easier than I expected, but it was kind of fun.

Indeed, painting camouflage just takes patience. It's not really hard, because you'll be hard-pressed to make a mistake when drawing amorphous blobs.

Loophole Master said:

In my opinion it's difficult not only paint camo, but highlighting and washing, a nightmare!

After I did Manfred I decided that camo can only receive the faintest of highlights, otherwise you'll bury your painstaking pattern. And I'm not going to highlight in 4 different colours, doing each bit of highlight…

I agree with Loophole. If  you look at the minis above, the highlights are a single colour and pretty much just limited to edges.

I'm not sure how camouflage would make washing a nightmare?

As for the difficulty, I suppose it's different for everyone but I only started painting minis a few months ago and kept putting off doing any camouflage and then found it really, really easy. I suppose if you just started adding camo to the primer, that would be difficult but I'm not sure why you'd do that.

washing could cover any spot and ruin camo effect, in my opinion

I'm just old and don't have the patience for painting that I did twenty years ago.  

ItsUncertainWho said:

Ah ah ah you're right! it's the same for me!

The easiest way to handle the wash/highlight conundrum is to apply the base color, then wash, then camo scheme and then a light, very light dry brush of say bleached bone depending on the base color. That is why my oak leaf  and pea dot camo minis look better than the rest i did. I was out of order with the wash.