Project 20 Marines - Part I

 

Mr Grey

This post is a little bit different and is the start of a log of an attempt at assembly line painting. I'm horribly slow at painting models, but do finally have a solid formula for painting Blood Angels. This helps speed along individual models because I have plenty of references to fall back on when knowing what to do next.

The problem is the backlog of models that need painting. There are a lot. It's enough to keep me painting for a long time, and from a collecting perspective I have some models that are not really available anymore, so I am ok with having collected them. But I still want to do something about the backlog.

Blood Angels, perhaps more than any other army, have models that are all just about unique. Every marine looks quite different, with the multiple combinations options available. Within that, however, there are some similarities I can deal with: rope will all be the same, cloth, icons, blood vials, shoulder pad trim, etc. I don't need to batch paint every detail of every model at the same time, but I can do groups. With a wet palette, I don't even need to sit for long sessions - just a little bit each day will suffice. I'm also improving a lot with the airbrush - painting the basic coat and highlights of red armour isn't such a problem anymore.

Another demotivational point however, is sub-assemblies. I far more enjoy painting fully assembled models, and dislike doing them in parts with assembly only possible at the end. There's no way around that sometimes, so this experiment is as much about figuring out the most I can assemble a model as much as anything else.

And the experiment is: a production line of twenty tactical marines, mixing ten older models with ten Primaris. For me, that's quite a lot, and it will take time - but I'm hoping less than an average of one week per model!

To start with, the above photo is what I think I can get away with for basic assembly. The arms are posed, which was a bit fiddly to work with, but generally gluing the right arm first, then holding the gun in place while gluing and positioning the left arm seems to work best. The glue will take a moment to properly cure, but holds the position and allows for some adjustment so that I can be certain it will be ok when the gun is attached later.

The backpacks are being done entirely separate. Actually they're already a couple of airbrush coats in, and won't be long before they're onto the next steps. Backpacks generally don't get the focus of attention, so they're good to use as a bit of testing.

The bases are all done as well, just because it was easy enough to do. Once the airbrushing is done I can probably start to glue models to bases.

Back to the main model, leaving the guns off allows for easy painting of the chest, not to mention both sides of the gun. I'm sure some areas will be a pain still, but at this point the enticement of knocking 20 models off the backlog is too great.

PVA glue will be used on any area that should be glued later on. This generally means the attachment point for the right hand, backpack, and helmet or head. Using a dot of PVA glue before priming, it can be peeled off later to allow plastic glue to properly bond the surfaces.

Several Primaris still remain to be assembled, and they are a different challenge to the older models. The new designs don't allow the weapons to be so easily separated from the arms, so I'm undecided on if that means using a blade to force it, or to leave the arms off until the main body is painted. This is all exploration and experimentation, and I'm hoping the experience will make the next round of model assembly much quicker, allowing me to start making inroads into my backlog.

-- silly painter.

Lumineth Vanari Auralan Warden - Part II

 

Likes to sing the Blues.

Continuing with the theme of using free models for experimentation, the folds in the clothing worn by this model seemed an ideal place to try make clothing look like clothing rather than plastic. In other words, attempts at painting texture onto the surface. I took this a little further as well, and have used the same basic colours to try make a difference in texture for material, metal, and feathers.

White is planned, but this post will focus on the blue areas.

Firstly, the battle garment / cloak / dress. One of the difficulties in painting these is how to highlight and show folds without making it too smooth. There are a couple of observations that may help here:

Clothing generally doesn't give sharp, bright reflection points. Polished leather might, but even that will have less shine than gleaming metal.

The surface of clothing isn't uniformly smooth. Miniature painting generally needs to exaggerate stitching, fur, holes, etc, to make it visible at that scale, but the point remains that contrast exists even in lighter areas.

Stippling and drybrushing are the immediately choices that come to mind to paint clothing. The former was done here just for the experience. I've tried drybrushing before and while it did work to a degree, I basically wanted to see what I could do with stippling.

• Kantor Blue was used as a first step, giving the battle dress and even coat to work from.
• Shyish Purple (Contrast) was then thinned a little and applied over the entire dress. This was intended to give a little more shape and depth, but a normal wash would have sufficed, or even better stippling in a dark purple. Something to remember for next time.
• Teclis Blue was then striped and stippled across raised areas. This was done in multiple thin layer passes, building up a stronger colour on more prominent patches. Takes some time, and was looking a little out of place, but I should have continued.
• Kantor Blue glazed back over areas to bring them together more. This worked, but also muted the contrast severely. A different midtone should have been used, or the prior step given a lot more brightness.
• Lamenter's Yellow glazed onto larger areas just to try bring the ambient level out a bit more. Yellow might seem an odd choice, and it does subtly shift the colour, but that also brings back some contrast and sells the effect a little more.

The last step is worth reiterating: subtle colour shifting and help make cloth look far more interesting, just through the use of colour contrast. I should have remembered that from long ago painting the Cold One cavalry.

The feathers are simple so far:

• Kantor Blue base coat.
• Teclis Blue towards the outer edges.
• Drakenhof Nightshade over the whole area.
• Nuln Oil in the shadowed areas, and towards the base.

In hindsight, maybe some Druchii Violet would have been a more interesting shade than Drakenhof, and I may yet add that.

Blue shiny armour I've tried a little bit of NMM technique with. I'm not very good at that yet, but that's why practice is good.

• Kantor Blue base coat.
• Teclis Blue in selected areas to start showing reflection.
• Celestra Grey (being what I had on the palette from painting the whiter areas) for more extreme reflection points.
• Black from the palette to darken other areas and boost the contrast a little more.
• Glazing back and forth with all off the above to get it showing how I wanted.

Different end results with the same basics of Kantor Blue and Teclis Blue. Limiting to these has really helped think about how I'm going to give texture to the surface, and it's worth looking into limiting the palette further one day to push that even further.

I will probably end up using metallics for some areas, but haven't really decided yet. Going all NMM means more practice with that, but it just depends how motivated I am.

-- silly painter.

Allarus Custodians - Part II

 

This guy means business.

Progress on the Allarus Custodians, with some assembly having taken place. The above photo has the cape and left arm only temporarily held in place just for giving an impression of how the model is turning out, but all other components are glued in.

On the subject of glue, I used superglue for the head. This was a mistake. I should have masked out the attachment point and used plastic cement instead, because superglue can cause frosting in surrounding areas. I don't see it much, and it's probably something to do with the particular metallics used, but it gave the face a hefty amount of white stubble that I had to correct. More on the painting the face in a moment.

The armour was finished mostly as I intended before.

• Thallax Gold / Air Caste Thinner (1:1 ratio) applied through the airbrush. Even thinned, Thallax Gold is quite an intense colour, so I tried to be a little careful about how I applied it.
• Reikland Fleshshade (Gloss) added to recessed areas, and glazed into darker or shadowed areas. The gloss shades can be used as a glaze on metallic paints - they're thinner than normal shades, and are quite well suited to the surface created by metallics.
• Cryptek Armourshade (Gloss) added to deeper recessed, or used to outline details. I considered using Nuln Oil, but instead went for something quite dark without being black just to keep a slightly warmer tone overall.

One of the bonuses from the gloss shades is that they act similar to a varnish. The Thallax Gold was rubbing off rather easily when handling the model, but with the shades applied that seems to have fixed the problem. I was experimenting with varnishes on minor areas, using Stormshield in thin coats to see how much it would dull the look. That's an acceptable, if time consuming, alternative, but no need if the shades protect it enough.

The armour is not yet finished. I intend to keep painting enough until full assembly, and then do edge and spot highlights. It might take a little while before I get to that stage: the cloaks I'm not sure of and will have to experiment on a test model first.

The face I decided to do in a darker skin tone. There's no particular reason other than I haven't done that before and saw no reason not to try, but I'm very pleased with how it turned out and how much character the face now has. Never having done dark skin tones before, I used mostly what was on the palette:

• Eyes first, with Corax White and Abaddon Black. I find it much easier to paint the eyes before the skin tones, rather than trying to no get white outside the the lines later on.
  
• Rhinox Hide applied across all the face (except the eyes of course!).
• Barak-Nar Burgundy mixed with a little Rhinox Hide, added to the areas I wanted shaded. A little back and forth with the mixing here, just to blend it in, or pull it back if it was a little too purple for my liking.
• Mephiston Red mixed with Rhinox Hide, added along the lips. Using Mephiston Red is difficult - it's a very pure red - so some other colour in future might be a little easier to get the right tone with.
• Rhinox Hide mixed with Abaddon Black (being the black on the palette) and glazed over the top to give the impression of a shaved head. This took a little bit to get the tone just right, but I think it worked out well enough.
• Cadian Fleshtone mixed with Rhinox Hide and used to highlight the nose, cheeks, ears, chin, upper lip, temples, and brows. Glaze consistency and multiple coats worked best rather than trying to go bright all in one go. I could push the contrast a little more, but with decent lighting it's enough that I don't want to mess with it more.

I may have glued the head with a little too much turn to it, but I he is looking where he's pointing (or starting to point) so it's not so bad.

As a final little hidden tip: the cowling was glued in place with PVA glue before the head was done. This allowed priming and airbrushing to be done on it, and for it to be easily popped off and glued properly once the head was then more easily put in place.

 -- silly painter.

Allarus Custodians - Part I

 

Shiny armour to blind the enemy with.

Having multiple projects on the go at once will probably mean it will take some time to get any particular one finished, but it's also an opportunity to play with a lot of different colours. Also, the Allarus Custodians look really nice.

I decided to go for a golden armour, and generally stick to the reference colours, but with my own approach on getting there. Knowing I want golden armour gives me a chance to try out various airbrush paints, but it took a little thought on what I would try; I didn't want to simply repeat the formula I used on various Blood Angels, instead looking for a way to make an older looking armour, something of a burnished, earthen gold.

First step is, as usual, a black primer. Following that, although there's still at least one more airbrush step to go:

• Balthasar Gold (Air). This is an excellent starting colour, and a bit of care was taken to get good coverage. As a darker brown tone it serves well to keep it in the recessed areas.
• Valdor Gold (Air). An interesting colour. It's almost like a very heavily de-saturated version of the previous step. I'm still considering if it might be useful as a final highlight later - it's quite a thin paint naturally, and doesn't give the coverage over black, but is a little too de-saturated to use as a midtone. I intended it to serve as a lighter colour for helping highlight a later step (not yet done).
• Agrax Earthshade. Using an airbrush here because I wanted to put some colour back into shaded areas. This ends up almost a beaten brass in appearance, which is something to remember for future reference. It's this step that makes the photo above look a little strange with the highlighting, but a later step is intended to correct that.
• Nuln Oil (Gloss). By adding some black to deeper recessed areas, or used more for outlining, I'm hoping the later step won't entirely obscure those areas and keep definition and depth. Although I generally don't like gloss in recesses, in this case the paint simply flowed much easier without staining raised surfaces. Some areas may need to outlined again later anyway.

The missing step is a coat of Thallax Gold. This will shift the colour back into more yellow gold, for which reason I intend to thin it slightly before applying through the airbrush.

Paintbrush highlights are almost certainly going to be done with Liberator Gold, and maybe a few edge highlights with Stormhost Silver.

These are really fun models.

-- silly painter.

Lumineth Vanari Auralan Warden - Part I

 

Pointy ears, pointy shields.

One of the great things about free models of the month from Games Workshop is that they can serve as an experiment platform without needing to care if the results really work or not. Trying different techniques, different colours, is always motivational, but when you're looking to create a colour across an entire army then whatever is done first tends to stick just to keep everything cohesive. So this Lumineth model is going to serve as experimentation, mostly for Custodes as it turns out.

There will probably be quite a few small posts for this model as I want to track how each part is done, if I like it enough to warrant being on the Custodes.

The shield as it turns out has a nice pattern on the back that is perfect for playing with colours that might suit the leather gauntlets and weapon grips that many Custodes tend to have. The robes will also be a good fit for practicing cloth-like appearance, but that's for another post.

The leather patterning shown is:

• Mournfang Brown as a base coat.
• Doombull Brown applied on all raised areas, leaving the deepest grooves alone.
• Mephiston Red glazed onto central edged areas.
• Word Bearer's Red added to  highlight about mid-way along each interlocking piece.
• Mephiston Red glazed again as edge highlighting. I liked how it turned out, so keeping this in two steps will remain - it helps to shift the tone of the previous colour slightly.
• Barak-Nar Burgundy thinned down and added to deeper recessed areas, and glazed into the outer areas of each piece. As a base paint this can be tricky to work with, so it needs to be thinned quite a bit.

The last step can really help to shift from a red into a more purple appearance, and I suspect I'll use that for a bit of contrast on the Custodes. It gives that much extra depth. I might consider a wash of Carroburg Crimson as well, but that might be better suited to something with a little more sculpted texture, like the weapon grips.

The metallics seen on the shield were the result of some playing around with airbrush paints with a normal airbrush, to figure out how the armour on Custodes might be done. More on that soon.

-- silly painter.

Flesh Tearer Reiver - Part III (Showcase)

 

Walking on black...stone.

Done enough on the Reiver for now. The model isn't fully complete, but it was always intended only as an airbrush test to begin with. Just wanted to see how much edge highlighting would show on through. The rest was just playing around for the sake of it.

The helmet eye lenses are done as a glow effect. No white dots to get in the way. I still have Waywatcher Green from the old glaze paints, and used that to put some glow around the "eye sockets", with white and Hexwraith Flame for the lenses themselves. A bit of thinned black around the edges helps with more depth, and while purely by chance of being inspired to try it, I really like that subtle addition.

The NMM on the blade came together ok. It looks far better in the photo than in real life. Need a lot more practice with this technique, as it's something I do want to learn - not for normal models, but if I ever do a diorama where light sources are important, then I want reflections and shine to be based of the light sources in the scene. So I'll keep at it with test models I think.

I could not be bothered with the base. Absolutely nothing was inspiring to me, so in the end I just left it a clean black.

The spray varnish really took away any shine, and there was a little frosting from the humidity in the air. I'm tempted to used a paintbrush and put some Stormshield back over some areas, but I'm unlikely to go that far. At least that varnish really merges the decals onto the model.

-- silly painter.

Flesh Tearer Reiver - Part II

 

Stabby McStabsalot

Still slow going for now, though the pace should pick up again in another week or two. I've managed a little bit more on the Reiver, and have decided that as a test model I'll give NMM another go. I'll mostly focus on the knife for the effect, but the gun will have a little bit added as well.

Although starting to take shape, I can definitely say that sub-assemblies, even just for initial base coat and highlights, are the way to go with an airbrush. I have some plans around that in a couple weeks.

The pouches here are done with a new paint: Thondia Brown. It probably wouldn't be far off from a layer paint really, but gives a nice basic leather colour to work from. I glazed a little Bloodletter over the top, mixed some flesh tones on the wet palette for edge highlights, and added some Agrax Earthshade at the end for a bit more depth. It needs something else perhaps, but that's for experimentation some other time.

On this model I also tried out Vallejo Decal Softener. I wanted to see how much better it might be at moulding decals to the underlying surface. It does a pretty good job actually, even on the circle applied to the left pauldron. The latter was purposefully unprepared (no strategic cuts to help it fold over) and while I had to work at it with a brush, it came out surprisingly well. I fully intend to keep using it in future.

It'll still be a while before I finish this model - probably another week and a half, if I'm lucky.

-- silly painter.