Why grown men are painting tiny Orcs

There is something objectively ridiculous about miniature painting.

You buy a box containing several sprues of grey plastic. You clip out dozens of tiny pieces. You glue them together to make an Orc, Space Marine, Roman legionary, Napoleonic grenadier or whatever particular corner of miniature warfare has taken hold of you.

Then you paint it.

Not just green.

There will be a darker green underneath. A lighter green on the raised areas. Perhaps a wash in the recesses. The teeth need doing. So do the eyes. The belt buckle. The leather pouch. The tiny scratches on an axe blade approximately the size of your thumbnail.

You can spend two hours on a model that will eventually stand three feet away from you on a table.

This makes complete sense to a surprising number of grown men.

It starts with grey plastic

An unpainted miniature isn't much to look at.

The detail is there, but you have to search for it. A fold in a cloak. Rivets on armour. A tiny dagger hanging from a belt. Someone has sculpted all of this into an object perhaps 30 millimetres tall.

Painting reveals it.

You start with the broad colours. Armour. Cloth. Skin. Leather. Metal.

At this stage your beautifully sculpted warrior will probably look terrible.

Then comes the satisfying bit.

A darker wash settles into the recesses and suddenly the details appear. A lighter colour catches the edges. Metal starts looking worn. Leather gets scratched. Faces acquire expressions.

Eventually the tiny grey object begins to look like a character.

Then you become unreasonable

This is where things can get out of hand.

The Orc is finished.

Obviously.

Except the shoulder pad looks a little flat.

So you add another highlight.

Then perhaps a scratch across the armour would look good. And if there's a scratch, maybe a tiny line of brighter metal underneath would make it look deeper.

Twenty minutes later you are holding the model six inches from your face with a brush containing approximately three molecules of paint.

Nobody will ever notice this detail.

You know it's there.

That's enough.

An hour with one very small problem

There aren't many things left that demand this sort of attention.

Painting a miniature does.

Your hands are occupied. Your eyes are fixed on something directly in front of you. You can't hurry particularly successfully because the brush will punish you for it.

For a while, the problems become wonderfully small.

Does that cloak need another highlight?

Is the paint thin enough?

Why does this man's left eye make him look clinically insane?

There may be considerably more important things happening elsewhere.

They can wait.

The Orc needs eyebrows.

Then you put it on the table

The final pleasure is seeing it among the others.

One painted miniature looks good.

Twenty look better.

An entire army, individually built and painted over months or years, becomes something else entirely. You remember particular models. The one where you tried a different technique. The commander you spent far too long on. The first miniature you painted, which now looks terrible but which you can't quite bring yourself to repaint.

And yes, you might actually play a game with them.

They'll march across a miniature battlefield, roll terrible dice, fail an apparently straightforward charge and get annihilated by something painted considerably better by the man standing opposite you.

But that's almost beside the point.

You made the little army.

There is a temptation to justify hobbies like this by attaching some improving quality to them. Creativity. Patience. Mindfulness. Fine motor skills.

Perhaps.

But a hobby doesn't have to turn you into a better man to deserve an evening.

Sometimes you can paint a tiny Orc simply because you want your tiny Orc to look absolutely bloody magnificent.