Crimson Court, Ennias Curse-born - Part II

 

Far too much hair gel.

I have been struggling to get any progress done on this next model in the Crimson Court, mostly because I couldn't decide on how to go about doing....any of it! The trousers, the boots, the armour, all of it was just drawing a blank for a long while. Then I started to think of effects for leather, and lead me down the path of thinking of different base coats for Contrast paints. Normally the Contrast range is applied over something like Grey Seer, Wraithbone, or Corax White. These all end up with very bright edges, and it's not what I wanted - but somewhere along the way I decided to try Zandri Dust, and then I basically hadn't used Snakebite Leather in a while so decided to give that a go. It about here that inspiration started flow for the clothing on this character.

When applying the Snakebite Leather I quickly saw that a light tan on the boots would really fit. Normally I go for darker boots, and it seemed kind of obvious now that in this case they should instead be lighter than the other clothing.

All of the clothing I consider to only be in a foundation stage right now. Contrast gives a good base to work from, but generally I don't use it as the only step. Here it gives good variation across the boots and pants, which I will then later go back in and drybrush or stipple highlight. So with that said, the boots:

• Zandri Dust across all of the boots.
• Snakebite Leather over all of the boots.
• Agrax Earthshade added to really define the shape.
• Gore-Grunta Fur on the straps.

This entire approach, minus the Agrax Earthshade, has been used on all of the armour straps as well. It will mostly definitely need additional highlights later.

The pants are:

• Zandri Dust.
• Snakebite Leather.
• Basilicanum Grey.

I looks a bit messy right now, but that should be fixed later with appropriate highlighting that will hopefully also give it some texture.

The armour I knew was always going to be more of a bronze with brass edging, and it's always fun glaze in highlights with metallics. The downside is that I like the effect too much and did it too soon - I can't really apply a varnish now or else it will all be ruined. I'll have to varnish the non-reflective surfaces by brush later on. At any rate, the armour ended up as:

• Warplock Bronze base coat.
• Brass Scorpion initial highlight. This is a slightly reddish tone, somewhere between bronze and brass.
• Runelord Brass for a further highlight, generally glazed in.
• Skullcrusher Brass as final edge highlights in select areas. Using this paint can seem a little strange as it has a yellow tint rather than the red/brown of previous steps, but using that slight colour shift for edges or long pointed areas (e.g to the left of the head) can really help those parts stand out and give much more interest to the model.

I'm still yet to go back with a shade, which I intend to do in select areas (armoured box, for example). It doesn't really need this step, but I think it might help with brightness contrast to better see some details.

I'm still waiting for inspiration for the wings, but hopefully not too much longer before I can wrap it all up.

-- silly painter.