Legions Imperialis - Sicaran Battle Tanks (Part V - Showcase)

 

Glow-guns

For whatever reason it was an absolute slog to get these four tanks finished. Not much time to paint coupled with indecision over colours and a continual questioning of just how much detail I should go into really took its toll here. In some regards it might have been easier to paint a full sized version (that's for another day - I have a couple of the resin kits from a few years ago). What let me finish them in the end was a change of mindset to just simplify the colours: make the bulk of the weapon covers black and just use edge highlighting to pick out lines. Limit the palette and focus on overall appearance instead of getting lost in the close-up.

The colours work well enough, though I'm not entirely happy with the barrels of the plasma weapons. I'm still not really a fan of blue glowing plasma coils, but that's obviously luminosity from whatever hardened material is used to house all that energy, and it makes it immediately apparent on a tabletop what the weapon is for gameplay purposes. Think I do prefer the look of the other turrets though.

Now that the varnish is dry and the models are done, what would I do if I painted more? The base coats worked well. The main airbrush steps did their job, but I'm still getting used to Contrast paints through an airbrush. I might prefer a standard acrylic paint and multiple passes which will keep the end colour more consistent across each model rather than trying to ensure that last Contrast pass matches for them all. The shading is subtle enough by works, and using Black Legion (Contrast) mixed with flow improver and applied over a gloss varnish continues to provide an excellent way to panel line everything. Selected edge highlights accentuate the armour plates more and the end results is a very readable small scale tank. I also really like how the tracks turned out. Ratling Grime added just the right shading to give the look I was after.

I could do some weathering, battle damage, muzzle burn, etc, but these aren't intended as display pieces (although it's not like I've ever actually played a game with them). The viewports and sensor lenses are far too bright here, I probably could have darkened them with a shade, but again effort and it does give them a sinister look - psychological warfare that this horrifying tank is watching you.

Now I can put these away and see what's next on the list. Probably a dreadnought and devastators.

-- silly painter.

Legions Imperialis - Sicaran Battle Tanks (Part IV)

 

Hold up, how do my pauldrons fit through the hatch?

These models are taking an insanely long time to get finished. This is partially a lack of motivation because they're taking so long (circular reasoning), but also because I just have so little spare time right now. So I've cut a few corners and forced myself to get the Sicaran tanks nearly done - just the other set of turrets to go. I've also not added any decals - I figured paint scheme shows easily enough which army they're part of, and also there's really only one panel to put a decal on. That would require a white transfer, which would stick out like a sore thumb. The alternative is to paint symbols on by hand, which I just frankly can't be bothered with.

I painted the viewports and lenses with a simple mix of Mephiston Red covered in Troll Slayer Orange. Nothing special, no fancy effects, just dots of colour to break up the turquoise. The orange tint is a nod to the Eye of Horus.

Cabling is generically Khorne Red with some Mephiston Red highlighting. This is purely again to break up the monotony and add some visual interest.

Silver metals are Iron Warriors, Nuln Oil, Iron Hands highlights. All of this done before the varnish step. The brass is Balthasar Gold, Seraphim Sepia, Sycorax Bronze highlights. Absolutely nothing special, all of it very simple - just on a small scale and requiring a fine tipped brush that is just now starting to give. It's been an exceptional synthetic brush which I've leaned on heavily recently - I hope future purchases of the same are just as good. Da Vinci size 0, Nova Synthetics range.

Black areas are Corvus Black, Dawnstone (mixed on the palette), and Abaddon Black mixed with water to essentially shade back some areas.

That's pretty much all. The most time taken was in deciding what colours should go where, but once that was sorted then the next steps proceeded smoothly enough. The details make the painting a little slower than I'd like as well, but also because they're so small there is no sense is perfectly smooth blending - you really do want some contrast to pick out edges more than anything else.

And now it's on to the other turrets before I can classify these models as done. Next post however is likely to be about a change in painting approach that I'll be forced to make given the current circumstances - or else I simply won't get anything done all year.

-- silly painter.

Legions Imperialis - Sicaran Battle Tanks (Part III)

 

brrrmm brrrmm

I can't seem to find time to get these tanks finished, but there has been some progress.

I'm also incredibly tired right now, so this will almost certainly be brief and to the point.

The metal is mostly Iron Warriors, then Iron Hands over that on the tracks. The tracks had Ratling Grime over the top for a bit of weathering, which is just enough to make the tracks look used without making them look caked in mud while the rest looks suspiciously clean. The weapons are just a base coat right now and need a shade and probably Iron Hands later as well.

Balthasar Gold rounds out the rest of the metallics so far - again, needs a shade and then a highlight with something else. The Omega Destroyer (or whatever it's called) variant has Balthasar Gold on the firing ports, and then Iron Warriors sort of glazed over the top. I intended to go back over that with a thinned black for scorching later on.

Lenses, viewports, and power cables are all base coated with Khorne Red. I'll differentiate viewports from cables with some other colour later on, but the small dots of red accents nicely against the turquoise which otherwise dominates the models.

I was also stalled for quite some time not knowing what colours to use on various components. In the end I'm "cheating" by using the reference photos / box art from GW on the larger version to inform the colours on the smaller scale. Except for the plasma glow - that's purely so the variant is instantly recognisable on the tabletop.

Still a lot of detail left to go, and now that I'm on a roll with them I have to push the pause button and go away for a couple of weeks. Not that I'll have much time when I'm back, but at least the main colours are blocked in - just detailing it (including edge highlights on black areas) and they'll be good enough to call done.

-- silly painter

Legions Imperialis - Sicaran Battle Tanks (Part II)

 

An edgy, colourful variety of tank.

There hasn't been a whole lot of progress on the Sicaran tanks recently, but I did manage to finally get the bulk of the armour finished and an impression of how well the (hopefully) more refined approach would turn out.

Last time it was simply building up Typhon Ash, later mixed with White Scar, to ensure the vibrancy showed through. I think that worked well enough that I'll simply continue with that approach in future. Terradon Turquoise was applied in a couple of coats but managed to maintain some of the shading and highlighting. I could have mixed in slightly more White Scar, but on the other hand the edge highlights here help give the appearance of brighter colours.

After the usual coat of gloss varnish, and before edge highlights, I once again went with Black Legion (Contrast) mixed with acrylic flow improver. I wasn't exactly super careful with it, but neither was I being too messy. I did on occasion (particularly on the top areas of the body near the turret) heaving wash nearly all of it, and then quickly wipe away excess with a cleaned brush. This is much quicker than carefully panel lining, and keeps any staining to a minimum. I wouldn't do this on larger scales, but it worked excellently here.

The main armour highlight colours are Gauss Blaster Green and Sons of Horus Green. Gauss Blaster applied to brighter (normally upward facing) edges, Sons of Horus on others but also layered over Gauss Blaster to pull back some of the brightness and help tie everything together. I also mixed the two colours together basically as I felt like it, wanting edges visible but not trying to cosplay as a Tron character. I think so far it worked, even though I'm aware the matt varnish later will tone it back.

Black Legion (Contrast) was used to cover the tracks and black armour panels because of its good coverage and ability to be applied over gloss varnish. The armour panels still had Eshin Grey and Abaddon Black blended together over them - and none of this has been done on the turrets yet. The tracks I was unsure about. I wanted them darker, metallic, but also dirty and distinct from the armour panels. I also didn't want to spend weeks on them. Ultimately it was as simple as Iron Warriors in a couple of layers (this does not have to be completely smooth, just a couple of rough coats) and then Ratling Grime (Contrast) over the top. The Ratling Grime I researched and bought specifically to try this out with - and I'm intending to use it elsewhere for oil stains, or general...grime.

That brings the tanks to their current state. The weapons need blacking and metallics applied, and the housing on the turrets for the weapons will probably be black as well, which is why I didn't bother to highlight those yet. There are a few viewports that need picking out, lenses, other small details - all over which is going to take time. I'm definitely spending more of that on these particular models compared to the Rhinos, but these are also centrepieces. Also I couldn't decide on the turrets, so I'm painting them all - meaning four tanks, but eight turrets in total.

-- silly painter.

Legions Imperialis - Sicaran Battle Tanks (Part I)

 

Tanks a lot.

Delayed post because of being laid low, but back to things now. I have a few things with slight progress, but these little tanks have been sitting assembled and primed for a long while now and I wanted to start them. I'm hoping to use the airbrush very regularly over the next couple of weeks just because I have an window to do that before certain distractions are restored.

Part of the reason in delaying starting these next models has been in wanting to try and get a better handle on using the airbrush. I've been getting used to thinning paints more, using multiple passes to reduce some of the speckle, and even swapping between airbrushes to see how the higher quality ones compare with my skill level. Hint: thinning paints makes cleaning out an airbrush much, much easier! I've been skipping full tear down and clean outs because it's simply not required, and there's been virtually no nozzle clogging. There is a downside that the with the amount of thinner and flow improver I use, the paint definitely does not adhere as well. It takes quite some time to cure and stick to the model, several hours or even a full day will give better results in this regard.

The multiple coats, multiple sessions airbrushing approach I'm developing works for me because I don't have all day to sit and paint - generally an hour session each day works best right now, so I can line up multiple models and batch as appropriate. The tanks here will have another couple of sessions before the paintbrush comes out: the Contrast paint filter stage, and then later gloss varnish to secure everything.

The initial stage on these tanks was Typhon Ash, roughly one part of that with one part thinner and one part flow improver. I probably need to adjust that mixture in future, make two parts paint to one part each of the thinner and flow improver. I did need to hold back the airbrush further initially, and the first coat was far too watery, but later it mixed better and more to my liking. I used about four passes in the end, rotating through the parts to give each time to dry before the next layer, to build up to full opacity and given even coverage. A little patience is needed, but I think it worked well.

Previous models always suffer from the problem that I don't go bright enough with the initial Zenithal highlights, so this time I then mixed in White Scar to the cup and did another pass. I'm hopeful this is now bright enough that the later Contrast filter won't be too dark. I still have trouble with this: I almost always need to go lighter and brighter than I might think, forgetting that mixing paint decreases both. I'll see how I fare this time.

-- silly painter.

Legions Imperialis - Leviathan Siege Dreadnoughts

 

His name is "Plod".

These had been sitting in the prepared stage for a few weeks, and I finally got around to finishing them off. It didn't take long once I'd decided on a few colour choices.

These models I went with a simple black primer and then built up layers of Typhon Ash for highlights. Instead of immediately going for the next colour step, I decided to edge highlight with white first. The theory was that this would show through more than the Typhon Ash and give proper edge highlights without needing to colour match the Terradon Turquoise. It kind of worked, but I ended up cleaning a few placed with Lupercal Green anyway, so I'm not sure it was worth the effort. Gloss varnish and Black Legion with flow improver worked a treat as always for recess shading. I touched that up very slightly later with thinned black where necessary, but only where it was going to make a strong visual difference.

One of the major changes from previous attempts was to only edge highlight the black, without trying to perform any volumetric highlights. This saved a lot of effort and particularly with black isn't really noticeable compared to more detailed highlighting anyway. I do like how the green turned out, which for these dreadnoughts makes a difference because of the large, flat surfaces of the body - but even on the legs it's not really very noticeable. For "normal" troops, as I've previously considered, it's just not worth such attempts at all.

I am a dreadnought and I'm digging a hole...diggy diggy hole.

likewise with the metallics it's not worth putting in much effort. For this scale, edge highlights are everything - base, wash, maybe additional definition on raised areas if necessary.  I went with darker silvers because of the darker overall palette, and limited Runelord Brass to add variation where I wanted to break things up a bit, such as the hood over the head. A relatively small brush and light touches, and not even a wash is needed afterwards. 

The eyes are Troll Slayer Orange. I did do a very minor amount of volumetric highlights on the helmet simply because it's a focal point and helps to frame the eyes.

Not much else to say on these. Very quick to paint, mostly because I'm only aiming for a tabletop standard, but the end result is still rather solid and they look impressive enough when grouped together. Next are some more tanks, which I hope to have done by the end of the year - if I get time enough with the airbrush.

-- silly painter.

Legions Imperialis - Deredeo Dreadnoughts

 

Oreo Dreadnought

(Warning: long day, a lot of spelling and grammar mistakes below no doubt, and I can't be bothered to proof read and find them.)

Pursuing more testing of small scale Legions Imperialis, I've managed to work on some Deredeo Dreadnoughts. They're honestly not my favourite design, just personal preference, but do provide some interesting shapes to serve as a test platform.

For these I opted to try a base coat of Night Lords Blue with Typhon Ash kind of Zenithal'd over the top. I put some extra emphasis on the upper body area, the upper missile racks, and the base of the legs. I also drybrushed Wraithbone over the top because I felt like I hadn't gone bright enough and wanted to try and catch some edges - but edge highlighting on models this size are rather pointless to do everywhere. A gloss varnished followed by flow improver mixed with Black Legion sorted out the shading, which actually isn't too visible aside from around the legs. It's still easy enough to do that I think I'll keep this step.

Black Legion was again used to base all of the black areas, and I still prefer that paint over anything else when doing this. The pigment count is very high and the paint consistency works well even over the gloss varnish. Troll Slayer Orange for the eyes to try and make them stand out, but they're barely visible at any sort of distance.

I did try some fluro acrylic paint, but that was a complete mess. The consistency was wrong, opacity was wrong, everything about it was just wrong for this usage - but that's what you get for using canvas paints on little models. It was worth the experimentation to see if it might be useful in future, but I think I'll stick to dedicated miniature paints for now.

Back to the black details and initially I was trying to do some volumetric highlights, but my patience was wearing thin. Lack of time to paint coupled with not really liking the model, and eventually I just stopped and instead only went with edge highlighting. Here's the biggest takeaway from this test: other than boxy tanks, and perhaps even not then, it's simply not worth trying to do volumetric highlights on this sort of scale. Save it for the Titans and larger vehicles. Anything smaller than a tank, just use a solid base coat and edge highlights to make it readable. It will give a cleaner look, take less time, and be far more impressive on the tabletop.

When Rifleman from Battletech goes grimdark.

The other major mistake on these was just a little playing about with Runelord Brass. I put Spiritstone Red over the top of that for the missile rack sensor array. It's a nice colour, it works well standalone, but it's far too bright here and attracts all the attention even with a matt varnish.

Lastly, I still need some practice with the airbrush. I suspect I didn't leave enough time between coats of Terradon Turquoise, which resulted in a grainy appearance instead of the smooth finish that I'd like. Practice will help I'm sure. The next models on my list (more dreadnoughts) I'm going to try give white edge highlights before that step, just to see if it will show through.

And no, I'm not drilling out those gun barrels.

-- silly painter.

Legion Imperialis - Tarantulas

 

Turret Defense!

For these weapon platforms, sentry guns, whatever, there's not a whole lot different from before. Certainly nothing revolutionary, just trying to fix some mistakes and add a whole bunch of new ones.

The starting point with these weapons (four in total, just double up on what's shown) was Typhon Ash to serve as an undercoat, and Terradon Turquoise over that. The Typhon Ash seems to have some kind of grainy problem: I checked airflow, checked it was properly thinned and mixed, enough flow improver, but somehow it was hitting the model like flecks of sand. I don't mean it was dry when it came out the airbrush, I mean it was like adding small flecks of sand to a thinner medium and airbrushing that, with the result being a very grainy appearance across the surface. Spray primers have a more even coverage. Next time I'm going to add a drop of white ink to see if that will smooth things out. As it is I needed a couple of passes with Terradon Turquoise, which in turn darkened the base colour more than I'd have liked.

I also worked with the edge highlighting using Gauss Blaster Green again, but I think I can do better. I'll try to edge highlight with white before the turquoise and see if that makes any difference. I can always go back over them again if not.

Not worrying about volumetric highlights of any kind was a big help to these models. They're so small that they just don't need it: the edge highlights are sufficient to help with definition. A top-down approach with the airbrush will give some gradient in places anyway for next to no effort.

These models were given a gloss varnish and then gently covered with a Black Legion Contrast mixed with acrylic flow improver wash, which really helps with all the definition. It could have been a slightly darker wash so next time I'll try play with the ratio of contrast paint to flow improver.

Lastly, always dry fit to the bases before just blindly gluing these models on. The bases aren't always even, and not all of the feet might make contact with the base properly. Just worth keeping that in mind.

-- silly painter.

Legions Imperialis - Heavy Support Batteries

 

Teeny tiny troops.

Painting Legions Imperialis a certainly different to anything larger scale. The brutal lesson from these is: don't bother much with volumetric highlights on the smaller models. It's simply not worth it, not at this scale, for anything other than competitions or purely display purposes (box art, that kind of thing).

Here I wanted to try not using the airbrush, just because I didn't want to setup and later clean for such a minor amount of use. Instead I used a spray primer (Wraithbone) from the top and then Terradon Turquoise with a brush. It didn't work very nicely at all. The primer was hit & miss, the Contrast paint pooled badly, and I spent a little while fixing it up. In future I might as well just mix up a base coat for troops and evenly cover them with an airbrush - no Zenithal, or volumes, just even coverage. Later I can use thinned Black Legion to help define some of the model.

Most of the the rest is fairly straight forward: I used Sons of Horus and Lupercal Green to tidy up some mistakes, Black Legion for the black areas (it has very nice coverage, so I'm starting to favour it over other blacks for a base coat), and some minor edge highlights with Dawnstone (for black), and Gauss Blaster Green mixed down with Sons of Horus for the green. A little Troll Slayer Orange for lenses, which are barely visible at all, but do add a nice touch.

The metallics are kind of drybrushed in places, using an old an worn out small layer brush. This allows black to remain in the recessed areas, but the brighter silver defines the shape overall. Ironbreaker for select highlights on barrels, and Hashut Copper for a bit of visual interest in places (notably on the weapon platforms and left pauldron studs). 

The treads on the weapon platforms I didn't want to be just black, but neither did brighter dusty tones seem to fit with the bases. Instead I went for a 1:1 mix of Snakebite Leather and Agrax Earthshade and lightly shaded over them. Just enough to dirty them up a little, but not enough to make them look muddy.

Simple is key to these models I think. Basic colour blocks to define shapes, some shading, and minimal edge highlights to help pick out some details. I did try putting a basic Eye of Horus symbol on the shoulder pads, but at this scale it's not really visible. Instead it merely gives the impression of something being there, so I didn't even bother trying to be neat about it. I also clipped the little bump between the feet of the troops because I felt it would look nicer that way.

So that's it. Nice and simple - but sometimes simple can also be very difficult. It's a balancing act to make them look presentable and readable at scale, with too much effort, and focusing on what's important instead of getting lost in the details. I'll see if I can use some of these lessons on the next batch of models, which hopefully won't be too far away.

-- silly painter.

Legions Imperialis Bases

 

Legion stomping grounds.

Just a short, bas(e)ic post on the first attempt at bases for Legions Imperialis. Which is far more difficult to get right than I imagine.

I took some time to consider how I might make the bases look for those units which have them. I very specifically did not want anything fancy as I'd need to do a few, and nothing too colourful as I wanted the attention on what's standing on the bases rather than the bases themselves. No large differences in value or tone, which pretty much ends up as neutral grey. I also didn't want bland single colour grey, which is a little too boring - but also overpowering in its own way. Something to break up the flat surface is still needed.

To start with I used an airbrush across the whole set of bases I currently have (17 in total). I wanted to use Mechanicus Standard Grey, but that's not made as an airbrush paint and so opted for Dawnstone mixed with a little black instead (about a 4:1 ratio). Then I used straight Dawnstone to highlight between the cracks and recesses (which actually might have been the wrong way around). This won't go quite as bright as the layer paint - the previous layers will darken it down, and thinning airbrush paints helps give them more translucency than you might otherwise anticipate.

Afterwards it was a big mistake: Basilicanum Grey and Contrast Medium (1:2 ratio) and washed all over. It pooled wrong, didn't define things as well as I'd hoped, and just looked far too messy. I needed to drybrush back over everything with Dawnstone to clean up a lot of it, and attempt to edge highlight certain parts (edges of areas, cracks, etc). It's very important to edge highlight around the cracks, or else it ends up looking more like marbling than cracks in the pavement/road/whatever. The sharp highlight gives a much greater 3D impression - the flip side of this of course is that it's another experience to remember for marbling itself (darkened veins, with an extra dark line within, but no edge highlights). Some Nuln Oil to pick out the deeper recesses, and glazing of Agrax Earthshade in random points fills in most of the base.

The metals are a simple Iron Warriors and Skrag Brown (heavily thinned with water, more than a glaze but less than a wash) as some rust. Doesn't really work too well, but I wanted to the slight red / orange hue to break up the grey and it would help accentuate the turquoise of the Sons of Horus.

Not shown here, but I'm painting the rims with Mechanicus Standard Grey to try blend the base into the table some more. It just makes the base look even more flat. Not entirely sure I like it, but I'm sticking with it for now.

Next time I do a batch of bases I'll simply skip the Basilicanum Grey step and move directly on with Nuln Oil. It's easier to glaze that to darken random areas than it is to clean up the mess I'd made.

Of course if there are bases, there are models to put on top as well. More on that very soon!

-- silly painter.

Imperialis Baneblades - Part II (Showcase)

 

11 barrels of bling!

I'm calling the Baneblades here, if for no other reason than I've had enough of painting them. I messed up with them, and simply don't feel like investing the time to redo and recover them.

The main problem is the colour scheme: I don't like it at all. It doesn't work here. The models are simply too dark, which makes the Blingblade trim stick out too much, airbrushing didn't work, recess shading doesn't give enough contrast, the list goes on. The trim on the Blingblade I decided to cover up with Balthasar Gold because it was far too much of an eyesore, and I can tell why they have that trim on the Imperialis models: it outlines the shape. You can instantly see on the table what kind of tank it is, and I think it really works with the right colour scheme. In future I would probably do something like the Solar Auxilia with Contrast paints. I don't always like copying colour schemes, but I'm not sure what else I'd like to do here.

Drive me closer, I want to use flamers!

The second Baneblade I didn't paint the trim, and used Agrax Earthshade to dirty down some of the recesses, and I do like the end result much better, but it's still missing something. The shape isn't as well defined, so perhaps some more tone contrast on the edges could help with that. It's no good collecting more of the Imperial Guard tanks until I know how I want to paint them.

What did work was the barrels on the back. Warplock Bronze, and Screaming Bell over the top. I also mixed in Sycorax Bronze for additional highlights, and it ended up very close to how I wanted. I generally use this kind of look for canisters that might have a flammable liquid, or otherwise might need to deal with intense heat. It also gives much more visual interest to the models.

The viewports are basically Evil Sunz Scarlet. I tried a purple to shade them in places, and Fire Dragon Bright for highlights, but not much of anything other than the red shows up. The front headlights are Dorn Yellow covered with Talassar Blue, which gives a very bright, light, vibrant blue. Such points help to break up the plain colours and gives little hints of visual interest - it's not much, but it's critical to have.

Not much else to say. I should have started with drybrushing, then used contrast paints, and maybe a bit more drybrushing to highlight. Next time.

-- silly painter.

Imperialis Baneblades - Part I

 

Blingblade.

I picked up a couple of Baneblades for Legions Imperialis because tiny tanks. They are not going to plan.

To start with I intended to follow the ideas from the Rhino experimentation. White undercoat, some edge highlighting, and then Space Wolves (Contrast) over the top. The problem really is that the design of the Baneblade doesn't have a whole lot of flat surfaces, even if the basic shape is a box. The detailing doesn't lend itself well to the highlighting I was trying to do, and there was insufficient space to give enough of a gradient. Instead I should've simply stuck with highlighting with a drybrush.

With all those guns, must have a convoy of ammunition behind it.

I've been practising my drybrushing with relatively cheap army painter brushes, and I can see the potential. The trick really is in getting the consistency of the paint just right - not flowing like a wash, but not actually dry either. It will take a lot of practice to get "right", but for a model like this it's an ideal approach.

I'm also attempting a different approach to some of the metallic areas. Instead of base coating and then washing into recesses, using a Contrast to darken and then layer over the top with a metallic. This is basically drybrushing but in a far more controlled fashion.

The other trick I've been trying here involves gloss varnish, Black Templar, and acrylic flow improver (not Lahmian Medium, which has other components that make is unsuitable here). Basically mixing the flow improver with a Contrast paint gives it a similar behaviour to oil washes over a gloss varnish, and I used it to recess shade the model. Using Black Legion would probably work better owing to its more concentrated pigment count, but the idea looks to be sound. The result rubs off quite easily too, so a matt varnish later will almost certainly be required, but mistakes can also be easily corrected. I will be trying this a lot more going forward, but it only looks to work properly with Contrast paints - I couldn't get the same effect with regular acrylics.

Unfortunately I'm not convinced with the golden armour trim look. The gold is too bright in contrast to the rest, so I've not done it on the other model yet. I'm unsure what to do here: go with the trim, or go with a far more unified armour panelling look? There are still plenty of details to fill in, so perhaps I should just do those first and see how I feel at the end. The Blingblade can be some rich aristocrat's personal command vehicle or something.

-- silly painter.

Sons of Horus Rhino Transports - Part II (Showcase)

 

Rhino to war.

I could have posted earlier, but wanted to get the convoy finished up. No pictures of them all in a row because I don't have an appropriate background, but the idea is that two with the gunners and dozer blades are out the front, and the rest follow behind.

Ultimately I put far too much effort into these models, but they do look impressive all lined up. The main thing I would change is more shadow emphasis on the sides, and then recessed shading to give extra definition to the shapes. The models in general are uniformed in the colours, but I would like that to be slightly more the same shade. That's to be expected when using multiple Contrast layers over an uneven pre-highlight, which I'm sure will be improved on with a little more practice.

4 exhausts must mean 4 engines.

The black panelling was close to the usual grey black that I do, with one fewer step:

• Abaddon Black
• Corvus Black to highlight some panels, but mostly keeping it flat across surfaces.
• Dawnstone to edge highlight.

That's really all. The focus is on defining shapes, not smooth blends: the models are far too small for anything else to matter. The front viewports are framed to give some more visual interest and create a slight focal point, but the "glass" is simply black - there was no intention to try make it look anything different. All of the metal parts are also painted black around here, which makes the metallic paint show up better afterwards. The viewport edges themselves were going to be simply Castellax Bronze, but I decided it needed to be brightened up slightly and so Sycorax Bronze was layered over the top.

Most metal was painted in Iron Warriors, with the exception of the tracks which were Iron Hands Steel. The exhaust stacks were very slightly highlighted with a mix of Sycorax Bronze and Iron Warriors, but it's not visually significant.

Caledor Sky for the headlights, some red dots on targeting lenses, and Warpstone Glow on hatch lenses. The latter could've been brighter, but also isn't necessary at all. Again, with the size, no sense in trying to give them a reflective look unless it's being entered into a competition.

Captain Blackdoor.

The final touches were decals of course, although a very (very) thin wash of black was added afterwards to tone down the otherwise bright white of those decals, and Wyldwood thinned with water and washed over the tracks. The intent was simply to muddy the tracks a little, make it seem like they've been driving over a battlefield and have picked up some dirt. I could have added some weathering as well, but it just doesn't seem worthwhile: the oil wash already dirties the tanks somewhat and gives them a used look.

I've considered trying to add magnets or cut small trenches in the tracks to put metal strips into, but ultimately I'll probably just make some kind of small boxes or sectioned tray to store them in. Varnish should protect the paint for a long while. A couple of Baneblades are next up for tanks, but there are many other works in progress that I'd like to finish off as well - guess I'll see what inspires me next.

-- silly painter.

Sons of Horus Rhino Transports - Part I

 

Tiny Tanks.

Naturally I have something from Legions Imperialis. The full release box I couldn't justify, but a squadron of Rhino transports? Now that's something to play with.

I've decided to paint up the Epic models as Sons of Horus, simply to avoid the truly massive amount of red that I already have for 40K models. It does mean that some of the titans might have to be alternative colours to what I've already been dealing with, but there's time enough to ponder on that.

One of the driving goals here is to not care quite so much about the details on these models. There's no way I'm going to ever finish them if I try to paint them to the standard of their larger counterparts, but equally I didn't want them to be too bland. I'm trying for a basic colour, simple highlights, then fill in basic details. Keep the colours to a minimum, keep edge highlights to a minimum - if they're going to be done at all. Recess shading can serve just as well to help define shapes, and it's here that oil washes can be useful.

Turret gunner has eye lenses on the helmet.

Of course there are some mold lines that exist when pictured up close, but they're almost invisible when first priming the models. I'll have to keep an eye out for a few usual suspects later - for now almost all the troublesome areas will be painted black which should hide them again. And naturally I need to paint in eye lenses, because I can.

To start with on these models I used a thinned white (White Scar) to sketch out the basic highlight areas. This doesn't impact the end result, but it does make the model easier to see. I may well avoid this step in future now that I know what I'm doing. After this I coated the entire model with Sons of Horus Green. This serves as the mid-tone, and a follow-up Lupercal Green (which is a darker colour) in shaded areas. The trick behind this with an airbrush is to really thin the paints with flow improver and thinner. It's almost wash or glaze consistency, just enough to tint the existing colours more than anything else.

Once here I wanted to try something else and used Typhon Ash (thinned of course) to apply a pre-highlight. This should serve to keep the next step brighter in highlighted areas, but not substantially change anything darker. Terradon Turquoise through the airbrush using either thinning, or preferably just a smaller nozzle. The smaller nozzle means a finer spray of the Contrast paint, which should stop it from overpowering the pre-highlight like happened that last time I tried this. And it mostly worked quite well this time around, although I needed to apply two coats in places when I'd thinned it too much as well. Not every single rhino looks exactly the same when doing it this way - there is some slight variation in tone, saturation, etc, but it's close enough and practice will improve on it more.

While I'm happy with how this turned out, it's also far too many steps. In future I intend to give a darker blue base coat, sketch highlights with Typhon Ash again, and then directly to Terradon Turquoise. The result should be very similar, but with 3 fewer steps - and possibly something that could be done in a single sitting. I'll eager to try that out, but don't have any spare models to test it on just yet.

Oil washes are still annoying for me. Mixing up the wash, keeping a mask on because the "odourless" spirits still smell, and dealing with drying time are all very frustrating. I pin washed a couple of Rhinos, then got annoyed at how long that was taking and drenched most of the rest. Wiping away the excess also took a while, but unfortunately the cotton pads I was using caught on edges far too easily and put small fibres everywhere. I am not taking that approach again. I had forgotten a single Rhino, and so I tried a different approach with that one: black acrylic with water and dish washing liquid to help break surface tension. That works almost as well as the oil wash, but only across a gloss surface. So I'll need to gloss varnish before that, but I think it will be the approach I use in future.

Acrylic pin washed.

The oils still give sharper definition, but I think with a bit of practice and experimentation (perhaps with a Contrast paint, which might need less dilution with water) then I can improve on things more, even if it's good enough already.

Next step is going to be blocking in metal areas in black, adding some basic hull stripes or patterns, and decals. The decals are a problem though: putting them on hatches is problematic because of the centre line, which will obscure the decal, but also be troublesome for a decal to kind of fold into. I may need to resort to getting very good at free-handing the Eye of Horus.

-- silly painter.