I'm not the best painter at the store. Jim is the best painter at the store, and he's been doing it for about twenty years. But I've painted close to a hundred Orks now, and I've figured out a way that's fast and looks good from three feet away, which is how far away people are when they're playing. This is it.

It takes me about an hour per Boy, start to finish, if I do them five at a time. The Dreadnought took three weekends.

Seven Citadel paints. That's all I use for Orks.

Also: a regular brush, a small detail brush, an old wrecked brush for drybrushing, a jar of water, paper towels, and an old white plate to mix on. Don't use the good plates. I learned that one the hard way.

Cut the models off the plastic frame with clippers, not your teeth. Scrape off the thin seam lines with a hobby knife, carefully, away from your fingers. Glue them together and let them dry overnight. If you paint them while the glue's wet, arms fall off. Ork arms fall off a lot anyway, but you don't want that.

Spray them with black undercoat, outside, on a calm day, on a piece of cardboard. Short bursts from about a foot away. Do one side, wait, flip them, do the other. My mom's rule is that the spray can does not come in the house, and after the time I did it in the garage with the door shut, I agree with her. Black is the best undercoat for Orks because anything you miss just looks like a shadow.

Paint all the skin Snot Green. Use two thin coats instead of one thick one. Thick paint fills in all the details and makes them look like green soap. Leave the black showing in the deepest cracks, like between the fingers and around the eyes.

When that's dry, take Goblin Green and paint just the raised parts: knuckles, the top of the nose, the eyebrow ridge, the cheekbones, the tops of the muscles on the arms. Only the parts the light would hit. This is called highlighting and it's what makes them look 3-D instead of flat.

For the Nobz and the Warboss, I mix a little Skull White into the Goblin Green and do one more tiny highlight on the very top of the knuckles and the nose. It makes the important guys pop.

All the metal gets Boltgun Metal, and I do it by drybrushing. Get a little paint on the old brush, then wipe almost all of it off on a paper towel until the brush looks dry. Then flick it back and forth across the choppa. The paint only catches on the edges and the raised bits and it looks like worn metal. It's the easiest trick there is and it makes everything look better.

Bestial Brown on all the belts, boots, straps, pouches, and the wooden handles of the guns. Be careful next to the skin. If you slip, fix it with green, not by licking your thumb.

Black and white checks are the Ork thing. They go on shoulder pads, banners, armor plates and the front of the Trukk. People think they're hard. They're not, if you do them in this order:

1. Paint the whole area Skull White. It'll take two or three thin coats to cover the black.
2. With the detail brush and Chaos Black, draw the lines of the grid. First the lines one way, then the lines the other way, like a tic-tac-toe board with more lines.
3. Fill in every other square with black.

Like this:

If your lines are a little wobbly, that's fine. Orks paint their own checks, and Orks are not careful. Mine look better from three feet away than up close. Everybody's do.

Teeth get Skull White with the detail brush. Eyes get a dot of Blood Red. Hold your breath for the eyes. Seriously. If the eye dot is too big, they look surprised instead of mean.

The Trukk is Blood Red, because Orks believe red vehicles go faster. Here's the trick: red paint over a black undercoat takes like four coats and still looks dark. Paint it Skull White first, then the red goes on bright in two coats. Then drybrush the edges with Boltgun Metal so it looks beat up. Then add checks on the hood.

Glue a little sand on top of the base and paint it brown when it's dry, then drybrush it lighter. Paint the rim of the base Goblin Green. That's how the models in the store's display case are done, and it makes the whole army look like it goes together, even the Grots I painted in a hurry.

• Thin your paint with a tiny bit of water. Thin paint is always better.
• Rinse your brush all the time, and never leave it standing in the water jar. It bends the bristles forever.
• Close the pots when you're done. A dried-out pot of Snot Green is a sad day.
• Paint in good light. A desk lamp right over your hands is best.
• Finish what you start. A painted army you're proud of is better than a big pile of gray plastic you're going to paint "someday." Fabian has a big pile of gray plastic. Don't be Fabian.