Karlina von Carstein - Part II

 

The helmet is really just a hair shaper.

With the theme of the year to complete works in progress, I decided to start with Karlina von Carstein. It's a different model to a Space Marine, there's no need to replicate steps across multiple models, and shouldn't take more than a week (hopefully, but been there before!) to finish.

With the basic tones of the cape done, I wanted to turn my attention to the armour, however assembling models is really motivating for painting. Getting the head ready for gluing in place seemed the logical step for this, so I needed to paint the face and enough of the helmet that I could do this step.

The face itself I wanted to give a cold appearance. This isn't anything to do with how soon she has fed, but rather a reflection of what I imagined the personality of this character to be. I wanted an older aristocratic Lady, cruel but not malignant, desiring status over slaughter. For this I went with cooler blue skin, but without purples or reds which might indicate anything more sinister. The face is also barely visible, so I wasn't interested in multiple shadow tones or a bewildering array of paints, just something simple to make it stand out a little.

• Kantor Blue over the entire face.
• Rakarth Flesh, built up or mixed with Kantor Blue to sketch out volumes. Occasionally more of the blue to re-define those shapes where things went too light (e.g under the eyelids).
• Deepkin Flesh, which is a naturally pale blue skin tone anyway, for highlights on the nose, cheeks, chin.
• Screamer Pink mixed with Rakarth Flesh for the lips.
• White (or close to it) for the teeth. Note this is closer to grey, as a pure white is too overpowering - even just straight Deepkin Flesh would be fine here so long as there's contrast to the rest of the mouth.

The eyes I kept black, mostly because they were getting frustrating to deal with and because I actually like the look. It worked with Horus, and works here to give a soulless expression; perhaps her eyes go black when the bloodlust of battle is upon her.

The armour I honestly wasn't sure about and tried a few things before landing on what I think is an acceptable result. The colours are indeed matching the boxart very closely, but the boxart was too light for my taste with this model. I wanted a darker, brown, polished look to the armour. I also tried to paint TMM as though it were NMM for no other reason than practice at how light behaves on reflective surfaces, and the painting lamp provided a good, consistent reference light source.

Originally I tried Warplock Bronze layered over with Screaming Bell. That didn't look right at all, but I mention it here because the result was a kind of orange metal look which is very suitable for steampunk vibes - or the kind of look I prefer for fuel tanks. It doesn't make practical sense, but visually it's immediate obvious what they are.

I next tried looking at some of the brass paints, which also didn't work at first because I'm used to layering and glazing rather than mixing paints. When it comes to repeatability across an army scheme I still find mixing unwelcome because it's difficult to get the ratios correct - but that doesn't matter to a single model like this. So in the end:

• Warplock Bronze base coat.
• Drakenhof Nightshade for recessed shading.
• Brass Scorpion mixed with Runelord Brass for a volumetric highlight.
• Brass Scorpion mixed with Warplock Bronze for volumetric highlights in darker areas.
• Runelord Brass for general edge highlights.

I still intend to apply some Canoptek Alloy along selected edges later, but that will have to be done sparingly because it's a pigment-heavy paint. It's also worth pointing out that the photo above looks odd because the lighting was at a different angle than I used for actually painting the model - so while it's confusing a little to look at, I think the purpose still serves. I could use a thinned varnish to knock back some of the glossy shine, but I'm not going that far with this model - I'll save the competition level finish for something like Horus Ascended.

I've started on some other materials with Barak-Nar Burgundy when it hit me that another feature of cloth material is that sometimes the shading is about saturation over colour shift. This basically means starting from a midtone it might be as simple as mixing in black for shading. Something to explore later as well.

The model is starting to come together now and at first glance there doesn't appear that much left to be done, but experience tells me that it'll still take me a few days at least. The sword and cup are likely to be done next just to round off the metallics, then the folds of the inner robes, the arms, the rose, before finishing off any other details and basing the model.

-- silly painter.