Crimson Paladin - Part IV

 

This ground sure feels weird.

Having recently decided on the general base theme for 30k models, I tried to see if I could make the base for the Crimson Paladin fit.

The base for this model was originally created out of a green-stuff / Milliput mix pressed into a mould of an original resin base topper created by GW (long since out of production). It works well to add height to the model, but there are a good number of details that look, for lack of a better description, melted. I figured I could work with that, however there's also an awful lot of stones, rocks, smaller pieces of debris covering everything. It looks more like a generic dirt wasteland than an Imperial hab block, and therein lies the real problem: it doesn't fit with the other bases.

I attempted to paint it more or less the same as the simple dirt areas on the other models: Thondia Brown, highlight with Dawnstone, shade it back with Basilicanum Grey, and re-highlight with Dawnstone. Now it kind of looks like blasted slurry that's since hardened.

I've tried to paint in some of the details with whatever random colours I could, and that does help - but it's not enough. I will add a skull soon more as visual interest and to distract from everything else because it's obvious that this base is Not Working (tm).

I could try to re-base the model, but it's fairly well glued down. I would try to sand back areas to create flattened street surfaces, add some more scattered rubble, piping, that sort of thing, but that's an awful lot of effort. Instead I'll probably just leave it as a reminder. I guess I could explain it as somewhere that a particularly powerful plasma weapon recently interacted with and was later covered in ash or something. Part of a larger impact creator - which is actually an idea to add to other bases: impact craters. I could (and should) sculpt explosion damage into future bases, bullet holes, etc. So long as I learn something from it, then being dissatisfied with this particular base is well worth it.

-- silly painter.

Sanguinary Guard (Heresy Era) - Part IV

 

Mr Ethereal Eyes

Slowly but surely I'm getting these models done, but I need to take a step back and consider the original intent of trying to paint up models without being too exact. Blends and transitions aren't so exact, or using quite so many colours to build up extreme contrast over a gradient. Simple but effective techniques and colour schemes. Some of this is driven by just wanting to get the models painted, and some by the nature of the sculpts themselves.

The helmet eye lenses are one such detail that encourage painting them different to my usual approach. They're quite sunken into the helmet and so need to be bright to draw attention. I decided to borrow something recently used on the Crimson Paladin:

• White (any) concentrated in the middle, thinned and glazed slightly as edge highlights on the surrounding area.
• Hexwraith Flame across the lens and thinly applied around the surrounding area. The edge highlights make it brighter, but cover more area to let it fade out slightly.
• Coelia Greenshade on the inner lens for definition.

Simple, maybe even too bright, but effective standing out.

Moving on from the lenses I wanted to focus on the bases next. Normally I would leave these to the last, but I wanted to sort them out to make them seem more finished (and hopefully then motivate me to actually complete everything). There are several different materials on these bases, but before I get to that I was noticing damaged pavement in the surrounding area and there are a few noteworthy observations.

• When the surface of pavement is damaged and worn away, the edges of the damage are quite dark. A combination of shadows, possibly water depositing dirt, and the underlying material not being faded from sunlight. It's very noticeable once you look at it. Shades are very good at emulating this, but this can be exaggerated with highlights. The foundations underneath are generally darker and more rocky because it hasn't been purposefully smoothed over, which naturally gives more colour variation. 
• Cracks in pavement in a humid, cool (but not overly cold), diffused sunlight environment are noticeably green. This comes from moss and other plant-life growing in the cracks, and they tend to spread out. The point is that cracks can definitely offer an indication of the general environment: green for humid, red for sunburned dust, ochre for sandy desert, and so on.
• Pavements are often patched. The patches will offer colour variation. Pavement is not uniform grey - water damage, resurfacing, loose stones, general wear & tear, there's quite a lot going on.

All of that in mind, I was trying several approaches but ultimately took inspiration from the bases for Legions Imperialis. The "ferrocrete" ended up as:

• Dawnstone base.
• Grey Seer to add some higlights.
• Mix some random colours from the palette and dab around the area. This is likely too much, but some glazes of Dawnstone or Grey Seer will knock them back and desaturate to tie it all together.
• Basilicanum Grey / Contrast Medium (1:1) and applied over the whole area. Thinner is better if uncertain.
• Use any of the previous steps to add highlights as necessary.

Metal plating was originally going to be shifted towards blue, but that doesn't work for the Sons of Horus, and it wasn't really working for Sanguinary Guard. It works for Blood Angels as a complementary colour, but across multiple colour schemes a more neutral choice is better:

• Iron Warriors base.
• Space Wolves Grey (Contrast). This is a very translucent colour and won't cover well, which is exactly what is wanted here.
• Gore-Grunta Fur (Contrast) very watered down to simulate general rust and dirt.
• Iron Hands Silver as damage, chipping, worn clean raised surfaces, etc.

For dirt underneath I'm going for something very simple:

• Thondia Brown for dirt, then mix with whatever bright colour on the palette to highlight.
• Ratling Grime (Contrast).

Finally the Aquila deserves to stand out and add more visual interest to the base:

• Hashut Copper
• Gauss Blaster Green, mixed with a random blue on the palette for verdigris

That pretty much covers it. The picture above is at a poor angle to show off everything, but that's ok as it's supposed to enhance the model above rather than take the spotlight anyway.

There's both a lot left to do, but equally not much. I know how to finish the models now and basically just need to find time to get on with it. That's not quite as easy as it sounds right now.

-- silly painter

Blood Angels Champion - Part V (Showcase)

 

You're mine.

There's not too much to really say other than this model is now considered complete. I could, as always, do a lot more. Push the highlights more, particularly on the red armour and pauldron gold trimming. The armour, most notably, could be held up to the standard of the right leg but everywhere.

After the matt varnish, the final glazed highlights are, as usual, extremely simple and most effective. It takes me between twenty minutes to half an hour to complete it all, but the result is by far well worth it. It restores vibrancy and really helps to define the model as a whole. Spending more time on this step would no doubt help turn it into a competition winner - but only if I added a couple more colours on the palette to deepen shadows as well. Need to stop somewhere.

The centre chest detailing was highlighted with Castellax Bronze, and then an equal parts mix with Sycorax Bronze. It's a very neutral brown result that keeps the chest from drawing too much attention away from the golden helm, but there's enough value contrast to clearly define the shape. There's still room to push the highlights further if needed, which I can keep in mind when using something similar on other models.

The writing on the scroll (model's right pauldron) is simply a decal, but cut into three pieces and carefully aligned. I possibly could have aligned it better. I also could have painted over the top, but it was already well enough readable that I didn't bother. Look closely and the printing dots are visible, but I simply didn't fancy spending an hour to fix that up - not when I'm happy with the result as it stands, and besides I don't paint over other decals normally. Just as long as I don't pretend it's freehand then it's fine.

Everything else is fairly run of the mill. I think the whole model comes together well enough, and it's certainly unique. A mixture of kitbashing, third party parts, and even a little putty in key places, and there's a distinctly Blood Angel feel coming out of a "Bladeguard" veteran. Only four more of these models to go, but I'll do them one at a time. The next will undoubtedly have a shield handy.

-- silly painter.

Sanguinary Guard (Heresy Era) - Part III

 

You know he wants to play the axe like a guitar.

In the background there is slow progress on the stand-in Sanguinary Guard, but the main colours are at least blocked in and there's at least an idea of what they'll look like.

Ignore the dust on the model. I do have a soft makeup brush to clean that off.

The first thing to note is that if I do these sort of model again, I will leave the shoulder pads unglued until the very end. It would be much easier to paint the red with an airbrush, but I was concerned that this would demotivate me and thus left them on. Too late now I suppose. Glazing the highlights takes a very long time, so as can be seen here I am instead blocking in the main highlight points and I'll glaze the transition areas later. Doing this on five models will probably take me a full week. The airbrush would take half an hour (including cleanup). Next time!

I pondered on the weapon handles whether I should use a greener tone such as with Incubi Darkness, but in the end the Blood Angels are all about: "There is the blood, and there is nothing else." Red, and tones of red, are everything.

The eye lenses are being given a white undercoat and I'll go back in with Hexwraith Flame later to make them stand out. The slits in the helmet are too narrow, and the eye lenses too sunken, for the normal reflection effect to be tried, so I'm going for something which should make them stand out enough to draw attention to the head.

The blades of each weapon use the same effect as on the Champion: black metal, then build up a blue tint to act as the power field glow. Given that any gemstone on the weapons would be lit up from the surrounding energy glimmer, I painted Spiritstone Red over a bright silver and called it a day. This red is very saturated and glossy, so it stands out impressively even amongst the rest of the metallic shine on the model.

I'll keep plugging away at these guys, but the focus for now is on another model. That will be finished very soon, and I might then switch to get these finished next. There's a lot left to do, but none of it is particularly difficult. I just need the time to sit down and get them done.

-- silly painter.

Crimson Paladin - Part III

 

If it gets past that gun, not sure a sword will stop it.

I've finally managed to fully assemble the first of the Crimson Paladins. Still a ways to go to paint him, but at least assembly is done. There isn't a whole lot to say about the painting, so this post will instead focus on putting together the model.

The first thing to note is actually the last piece to be glued in place: the helmet. I really like the style of those helmets, and it really suits the aesthetic, but there's one small problem. The helmet sits too low compared to the arms, and the helmet-less head is larger than the helmets themselves. This gives them some weird proportions and so I made the decision to add some padding and lift the helmet just a little. This probably makes the head look oversized now, but it also makes the model look taller, and so I think on balance it was good enough choice. This wasn't difficult to do; extend under the helmet with green-stuff, pad the round connection point some more, and then file it back if it's too much. 

The arms were positioned almost exactly correctly because of pin holes I had originally drilled. Everything lined up and gluing was simple. I think the right arm was ever so slightly too high, only by about 1/3 of a millimetre, but at this scale that's enough to be noticeable. Not too much I can do about that now.

The pauldrons. They were never going to glue nicely into position with that design. It took a long time for me to think of something to try that might actually work, and the answer was: green-stuff. I tried to sculpt more surface for the pauldrons to sit on, and even in the end added a small blob to hold it in place while the glue dried. I'm still unhappy with the result. I think next time I need to extend the surface out with yet more green-stuff, sculpting it into the proper shape even before the model is primed.

The leather flaps under the pauldrons are painted with the same recipe as for the White Dwarf's gloves. Rhinox Hide and Squig Orange for the most part, some Nuln Oil in recesses. It could be a lighter tone. Maybe I can try that with the next one.

I still need to fill in a few details, and the pauldrons are only base coated (no highlights yet). The base itself is obviously in need of some work. Quite a bit to go. I started off the year strong, but unfortunately the (rather predictable) events of work, house, health, and all of that, is forcing me to slow down these last few weeks. I might need to focus on just one model now and get it done, then move to the next, and the next, and so on. Or just keep painting what I feel like, when I feel like. Let's see.

-- silly painter.

Justaerin - Part II

 

Mr T. Knot

Just a quick post because I wanted to wrap up the sculpting practice for the first of the Justaerin. There's ultimately not a whole lot done, but the small details are enough to shift the outline and bring some more depth to the character of the model.

Starting with the Sons of Horus symbol, that is essentially an embossed decal. I applied a decal first, adding some softener to make sure it was strongly adhered to the plastic, and used that as a guide to sculpt over the top of. This would never be quite so precise as the decal itself, but the intent here is to gain experience with sculpting, not try to be a human 3d-printer. With that in mind I tried to think of what to sculpt first: what is the basic shape to build the rest upon? The central oval shape of the eye, with a small cutout for the "pupil". That was the easy part, and I used straight green-stuff for it. Next I mixed green-stuff and Milliput together for more fine detail work and built up everything else. I've learned that this particular mix can be troublesome when freshly mixed, but given 20 minutes to cure it's more workable to my liking (at least for this scenario) and I managed something passable in the end. It's not quite as clean as I wanted, but with careful painting then it should be more than sufficient.

Next is the top-knot. I spent some time thinking that one over, looking at tutorials on hair, trying to figure out where exactly it should go, and how to anchor it to the model. I couldn't place it on the helmet directly: there's just not enough space. The top of the armour seemed too far back, leaving the arch above the head as the only real solution. I needed to carve a little away to flatten an area, before drilling a small hole with a 0.4mm drill bit and gradually increasing size to 0.8mm to fit the paperclips I use. The reason for multiple drill bit sizes is just to make it easier to centre the hole. A touch of superglue to place a piece of paperclip, with green-stuff to blend it into the model, and the shaft to attach hair to was done.

The hair itself I might have tried to put a blob in place and then carve into, but I took a far more painstaking route to rolling out multiple, thin lengths of green-stuff and wrapping them together. I did try to taper one end more to give natural bulk when it would attach to the shaft, then simply stuck it on and shifted it around to a pose I liked. In hindsight I should've used a dot of superglue when initially sticking it to the shaft, but here I needed dab the glue into place after the fact in order to hold it down. Wrapping a small amount of green-stuff around the join and blending it together works to hide all of that.

Not a very colourful fellow.

Priming the model brings it all together and gives a clearer view of what the end result will be. I was worried the hair might just look like tentacles, but it seems alright here.

I have made a mould of the Sons of Horus symbol and might see how well I can cast it onto a fresh shoulder pad, but equally repeating the same again would be good practice. Perhaps I can do both: there are, after all, five more in the squad to go.

-- silly painter.

Blood Angels Champion - Part IV

 

Champion and Dedork.

Progress. Very slow, but progress.

The base has been done and now has an Ork skull with grass growing next to it. A special character model such as this probably deserves a more blinged-out base, but fitting him in with the rest of the models means I'm going for something a bit simpler. The skull rather than freshly hewn head means it wasn't this champion's work, but it seemed appropriate given the swords.

I'm trying something new with the swords here, and have actually already changed it up a bit, but the basic idea is: dark metal sword to make a blue metal "glow" appear brighter by contrast. I still don't like the look of generic everything-blue power swords, and so I keep experimenting. The tips being blue help define shape, but that's the part already adjusted in other models: using silvers instead. Steel swords in good condition should be very well polished and reflective, which works nicely with NMM techniques, but I figure power swords need different materials to help them work and so the darker metal colour of Doom Metal (TTC) shouldn't be too out of place but really makes the Omega Blue (TTC) seem that much more vibrant.

In this case the blue tips of the swords unbalanced everything too much and I need to draw attention back towards the torso and helmet. The small accents of green in the eye lenses isn't large enough to do that on its own, so I needed something close enough to blue to balance out the swords and lead the viewer on a path there. It's subtle, but the purple gems on the pauldrons is what I ended up going with. Just that little bit of colour variety that doesn't make the swords stand out quite so much, and draws a line towards the helmet. This also means the details on the shins shouldn't stand out too much, which is what lead me to using Grey Knight's Steel on the central blood drop symbol. It's not quite blue (actually more purple I think), but happened to be on my palette at the time. The symbol to the sides I'll paint up as red - it will add visual interest, but shouldn't draw attention away from the rest of the model.

I might try mixing Castellax Bronze with Sycorax Bronze to highlight the chest detailing. I haven't tried it yet but I'm hoping it'll be enough to highlight without going too bright - and I might need to leave it until after the matt varnish anyway.

I'll definitely try to get the smaller details filled in soon so that I might get to the final stages of this model. It's about time I finished it really. I have plenty of other models that have been painted in the background too, however keeping momentum up is difficult and actually finishing a project always helps.

-- silly painter.