Firstly, welcome to the dark world of figure modeling. I transfered
over from armor around 1992 and within two years was almost exclusively
a figure modeler. I haven't really looked back.
Oils are probably the easiest to work with and get professional
results, but if they scare you that much, or you don't like the added
drying time, enamals and acrylics are your next options. I'd recomend
acrylics, Vellejo specifically. Vellejo were made for figure painting
and are designed for use with a brush. They are water based and flow
very nicely. I use them mainly for my base coats, to paint my oils
over, and they work very well in that capacity as well, but in trained
hands, Vellejo can produce staggering results all by themselves. The
technique that is seen at the big shows is known as the "Spanish"
technique, and it is truly fine art.
There are two books I highly recomend to new modelers. First is
Sheppard Paine's book Building and Painting Scale Figures, which I
believe is out of print, but check Amazon and ebay, I'm sure a used
copy is floating around somewhere. It covers all aspects of figure
modeling, from assembly, to painting, to displaying, to scratch
building and modifying. Shep has always been a great teacher for new
modelers and the info in his books are always very accessible to new
modelers, while also very accessable to experience modelers as well
(Side note - His books on building dioramas and military models are
also worth having for a number of reasons, particualrly if dioramas are
your thing. But most of the figure related info is covered in the
figure book).
The second book is The System, by Verlinden. Verlinden's
technique with oils is extremely easy to learn and you should be
getting good results from it almost immediately. He has a very basic
color pallete, which I feel is a tad on the dark side, but it always
works, and it will break your fear of oils. He also uses Humbrol.
My method started from Verlinden's, but has evolved as I've
picked up techniques here and there. I've switched from Humbrol to
Vellejo for base coats, and have been trying very hard to master
Vellejo as a technique unto itself. I find it to be the most difficult
method (if you're shooting for International show quality, as I am) of
all methods. There are several here who have got the technique down,
who can shed better light on that than I can though.
You can also get very nice results with enamals, employing simple
washes and dry brushing. That's covered in the Shep Paine books too.
It's by far the easiest to do. Just base coat the figure, lay in some
heavily thinned shadow tone, most likely black, and then mix up a
highlight and dry brush over the high points. You might then also mix
up a high highlight and drybrush that lightly over the very high
points. Faces, I find, don't come out so well this way, but if you're
just starting, the results are good enough to feel like you've
accomplished something. I painted that way for many years, and while
those figures don't stack up to my current work, they were pretty darn
good for where I was at the time.
It bears mention that Bill Horan uses Humbrols almost exclusively, with
some oils for deep shadow, and his technique is very similar to the
Spanish technique, yielding similar results. It's pretty much exclusive
to him though, as most have had trouble figuring out how to master it,
and those who have, did it with Vellejo.
Regarding patches and such. I always have painted them, even in
1/35th and 54mm. However, the Archer transfers you refer to are nice.
They aren't decals, as you're familiar with them. They are called Dry
Transfers. They are rub-on letters. You cut them out, lay the plastic
carrier over the area you want to plant the image, and then rub the
image with a pencil, or a burnishing tool, or similar tool, until it
sticks to the area. Then peal the plastic off carefully. They can be
tricky to work with though. Sometimes the image doesn't stick, or only
part of the image sticks, while the rest stays on the carrier. It takes
a little practice, and you'll want to have a few coppies of the various
images in case you scrap a few. Honestly, I'd just try and get a handle
on painting them. It's cheaper, and if you screw it up, you can always
paint over it and start over. I'd be happy to illustrate how to paint
patches and rank emblems if you'd like.