Ultramarine Legion Herald

Biggus Stickus

So finished the Herald. Mostly stuck to the cover picture from the blister pack, so I didn't go completely overboard with the painting. Mostly it was an excuse to use blue with the airbrush originally, but I also explored some more highlighting beyond just the base armour colour. So most trimming, symbols, etc, has some directional highlighting applied as well.

As far as the model goes, I have a few issues with it. Some of that is down to manufacturing processes: there's excess on the standard that I couldn't trim down without breaking it. Those imperfections are annoying (and are something I would fix on Blood Angels), but I really do want to speed up getting some of my models painted, so it'll have to be classified as battle damage.

Actually the base has some more colour variation to it, but the lighting washed it out. Next time I'll have to remember that and exaggerate the variation more.

Lessons learned will be used on other models, including Horus. A combination of Mournfang Brown, Wazdakka Red, and Agrax Earthshade (or perhaps Carroburg Crimson, or both) I've decided will look good for pteruges. And next time I do eyes, I may well use Celestra Grey instead of white; a solid white can stand out too much on the face sometimes.

-- silly painter.

Cheap Win

Felt like the need for a "cheap win"; wanted a model that could be done quickly instead of spending weeks on it. To that end, the Tomb Banshee looked like it might do the trick.

Somehow reminds me of The I.T Crowd

Really simple model to paint, particularly the flowing dress. Just Hexwraith Flame over white. I did try a thin layer of Hexwraith first, and built it up, but had some trouble with that. It's a paint that would take some getting used to, however would be well worth it for any Undead army. Nighthaunt Gloom was layered over white for the "skin", and worked rather well. Those are very good paints for what they do.

The eyes were simple enough: white, with Carroburg Crimson surrounding them. I figured the red would make her look more malevolent. The hair was built up from Jokaero Orange, Squig Orange, Wild Rider Red, Flash Gitz Yellow, Bloodletter (glaze), and Carroburg Crimson. It might have been better to go for a deeper red for the hair, but basically I paint so much red for Blood Angels that I wanted something subtly different. The vest was a mix of purples: Naggaroth Night, Xereus Purple, and some Warpfiend Grey.

Other than a silver dagger, that's really it. Not much to it, but it still took a full afternoon from sprue to finished model. The white paint (Ceramite White) was, as is typical for that paint, fairly wrecked. So the end base coat was a little tacky, and picked up some dust which is visible on the back of the model. Most annoying. Purity Seal should stop it gathering more so easily, but as far as quick & easy goes, I'll just deal with it. Tabletop quality, finished in a single day, I'll take the cheap win and know that I'm able to do it if I really want.

Before moving back to the Aggressors, a little more of the 30k Ultramarine Standard Bearer.

If taken into battle, one wonders how much damage the highly visible standard normally suffers.

Slowly filling in detail for this model. Just want to get it finished really, so I'll probably keep at it before returning to the Aggressors. Might do the cape (not shown) with the airbrush, just for the fun of it.

-- silly painter.

Blood Angel Aggressors

It's been a while since the last post, mostly because of personal items of interest claiming spare time, but finally a bit more painting done. I do seem to be bunny hopping from project to project, but that's ok - it keeps motivation higher sometimes. I still have Horus as a long standing project, then there's a Ultramarine Legion standard bearer, and now the Aggressors.

The aggros go marching one by one...

These were picked just because large surface areas, which is ideal for some quick airbrush experience. And they have helped in that regard. I'm still getting used to what works best for me, but a three stage approach seems to be working ok so far. After priming, there's a dark base coat, then highlight with the "true" base coat, then finish with a highlight.

Airbrushing is must less precise than a paint brush, so I'm trying to adapt highlighting techniques to match. Directional highlighting is easy, but less interesting sometimes, so I'm going for "patched highlighting". Basically pick an area and highlight as an entire patch, regardless of detail or corners. I'll go back over it later with a shade or some fine-tuned highlights to soften up patch and harmonise everything together. If that makes sense.

Aggressors have the unfortunate attribute of needing to glue the heads in place during torso assembly. So in this case, the heads and inside cowling was painted first and then assembled. Some blu-tac was used to cover up the area prior to priming the (mostly) assembled model and during airbrushing. This seems to have worked rather well, so now it's time to start filling in details and bringing these guys to life.

Oh, and the picture doesn't do them justice as always. Still need to source another proper camera.

-- silly painter.