Squat Exo-Armour Complete

I finished the first of the 4 squats, 3 more to go. With a model this old, it really did feel like it was fighting me sometimes; about half way through I did catch myself shouting "she can't take the pressure captain!" and spraying paint up the wall.

Seriously though these are hard to paint; they weigh a ton, and the centre of gravity is really weird. It makes them a little tough to handle.

Painting Squats!

Well hello Ho Ho there prospective readers.

I've got a fairly odd Christmas treat today. I was recently approached by the owner of a local games store and asked if I was interested in painting some squats for him. Without thinking too hard, I said yes as it sounded like a bit of a laugh.

The only question is ... Can I make these ancient models look good?

So far, I've given them a bit of a basecoat with the airbrush (and don't think the irony of using such an advanced piece of kit on such old models was lost to me either). As they're just a bit of fun, I'm trying to go for a nice bright red/orange for the armour plates to catch people's eyes. We'll see how they look with a few more colours on them later. So far I haven't worked out the rest of the scheme, but I'm thinking maybe a blue accent and black/grey?

For the moment I'm just gonna sit back and bask in the old-hammeryness of it all.

Mortarion Primarch of the Death Guard Painted

Well, I finished painting Mortarion. I'm happy with the results, although I have to admit that I found the whole process rather difficult. It was mostly just getting the colours to look good that I struggled with. My own style tends to be quite vivid, I like bright reds, blues and purples, but Mortarion is a sort of creamy off-white. It wasn't difficult as such, but more that I found it difficult to think it looked "good" as it isn't a colour I would personally choose. To compensate for this and to make him look a bit more interesting I used the full range of Death Guard Colours (adding in green and red compared to the Forgeworld one). I'm particularly happy with the freehand numerals on his armour.

On the subject of his armour, it was also difficult to match the colour of his armour with a good colour for the base - too light and he'd just blend straight in. Equally though it had to be muted so that your eye would be drawn to the model and not the rock he was standing on. In the end I went with a stone effect for the top and just tried to keep the rest fairly dark.

For those who missed it, I also painted Roboute Guilliman (Primarch of the Ultramarines). You can read all about it here:

Painting Guilliman 

That article contains a fairly comprehensive painting guide for him too if you're interested in the kind of techniques I use.

Mortarion Commission Part 2

Work is well underway now. I've gone ahead as planned and changed around one or two colours to get more contrast going on. So far things seem to be going well.

I snapped off a few pictures earlier today that I'll add below. The armour was airbrushed in a graduating shade off creamy off-white that I mixed myself and highlighted with pure white. When I'm airbrushing I almost exclusively use Vallejo products as they just flow a lot better in the machine. For brush work I'm using good old citadel paints.

I always begin a new project by running a test for the colour scheme - even when I'm only painting one model. In this picture you can see I've finished his leg (seen bottom right) to completion, while the rest is mostly still just base coated.

You can see in the picture above that I've taken the scheme and run with it following the successful test. I'm using red as a bright contrast to breathe some life into him compared to the nice, but very mono tonal Forgeworld one.

Still a long way to go on this one though...

Mortarion Commission Part 1

Well work is now well underway on my latest commission. This time I'm tasked with building and painting Mortarion, primarch of the Death Guard.

I've completed the build and at the moment the greenstuff is drying. The natural break has given me some time to consider the colour scheme. Obviously there isn't much leeway, as he will have to be presented in full Death Guard finery, but at the same time I would like to make a few adjustments. The Forgeworld version is too mono tonal for my tastes and I know I can make the model look better, so I plan to introduce a bit more contrast into the scheme. An obvious change will be to switch the cloak to black so that it is visually distinguished from the armour. I will also introduce some green details in keeping with the traditional scheme, but that seem to be missing on the Forgeworld model. To finish things up I'll use a red as a contrasting colour for the smaller details.

I'm planning to start with airbrush work to achieve a smooth blend across the armour. At the same time I will use the airbrush to begin a non metallic metal style blend on the scythe blade. We'll see how it goes from there.

As a final step I plan to make a few slight adjustments to the scenic base to ensure that he can be moved in and out of it smoothly.

I'll be posting more as I go, so stay tuned for the next update where we'll be taking a look at how the painting is going (hopefully well!)

How to Paint Age of Sigmar Khorne Bloodbound

I've recently been painting the Age of Sigmar starter set for my local games store. I designed this method to get the best results with the minimum amount of effort, as the models aren't mine to keep, but I still wanted the forces to look good on display. With this in mind I've used a limited number of colours to create a good look without spending too much time on every model.

The Method

1) Build the models and undercoat with Chaos Black Spray. I didn't take a photo of this stage as it seemed a little pointless.

2) Basecoat with a thin and even layer of Khorne Red. Really don't worry too much about where the paint is going at this stage, just get an even coat that won't obscure the details.



Basecoat with a big brush - It'll save you time! (just make sure the paint is still thin and doesn't obscure any detail!)

3) The next step is to add a highlight to the red panels of his armour with Evil Sunz Scarlet (Blood Red). I had some trouble getting a decent picture of this stage, but it is quite obvious if you look at the knee armour. The basic idea is to draw a thin line around the edge of the armour plates where the red will meet the brass details.

4) With the red armour done the next step is to basecoat the rest of the model. I've painted the following colours:

• Silver metals (axe head, chainmail etc.) - Leadbelcher (Boltgun Metal)
• Brass areas (trim) - Brass Scorpion (always give this paint a good shake as it tends to separate out)
• Skin and skulls - Rakarth Flesh
• Black areas (straps, belts, boots, axe haft) - Abaddon Black (Chaos Black)

5) Wash the entire model with Rhinox Hide. I used quite a thick dilution of about one part paint to 3 parts water. At this stage it is important to make sure it doesn't pool on any of the flat areas as it will leave a stain. Most of the wash should go in the recesses. Again I had a bit of trouble getting a good picture of this stage, but it actually makes a lot of difference in terms of making the model look complete. If you're going for a basic table-top standard, you could just base them now and they'd still look good.

6) Now it's time to add the final details that will really make this paint job pop. I did a quick highlight on the model as follows:

• Silver areas - Runefang Steel (Mythril Silver) edge highlight.
• Brass areas - Runefang Steel (Mythril Silver) edge highlight.
• Black areas - Dawnstone (Codex Grey) highlight.
• Skin and skulls - Pallid Wych flesh highlight.
• Eyes - I painted the eyes with Warpstone Glow and highlighted with a dot of Moot Green.

And that really is it. Base to taste and you're done.

For mine I painted their bases in Dawnstone and gave them a wash of 50/50 Rhinox Hide and Abaddon Black. I then drybrushed the sand with Rakarth flesh followed by Ceramite White. I then edged the bases with Dryad Bark before adding a dab or 2 of snow flock to match the rest of the force.

Berserker!





How to Paint Ultramarines Primarch Roboute Guilliman

Painting faces can be difficult, but I'll give you some pointers.

I recently painted Roboute Guilliman - Primarch of the Ultramarines as a commission. I have a few work in progress pictures as well as some of the finished model and in this post I'm going to do a step by step walkthrough of how I painted each colour and also detail some of the techniques used.

In this first picture you can see the finished blue colour of his armour as well as a basecoat on the gold details. I also painted his face. Needless to say the first step was an undercoat with Chaos Black Spray before the painting could begin. 

I'll start with the easy stuff - The armour was basecoated in Macragge blue. I then applied a generous wash of Kantor blue and left it to dry - this gave me some basic definition on the shapes. For these first 2 steps I recommend using a very large brush - no need to worry too much about accuracy as long as the paint is still applied thinly. I then began highlighting the edges of the armour with a small layer brush using a mix of Macragge Blue and an old Ultramarines Blue (Altdorf Guard Blue these days). I then applied a finer highlight of pure Ultramarines Blue and finally a very fine edge highlight of Ultramaries blue mixed with White Scar. With those steps the Blue armour was complete.

After the blue was complete I began the painstaking process of picking out all of the Gold detail with Brass Scorpion. This brings me to my number 1 tip for painting gold - never actually paint gold, use brass scorpion and then highlight up! Anyway, I applied a coat of brass scorpion and then when it had dried I washed all of the gold areas with Rhinox Hide to define the detail and provide a nice tonal variation when it was finished. In this stage I was careful not to get the brown wash on my finished blue armour.

For the face I used a mix of Rakarth Flesh and Bestial Brown, washed with Rhinox hide and then highlighted successively with a mix of Rakarth Flesh, Bestial Brown and white. Unfortunately I didn't do step by step pictures, but if I had it would've looked like a mess for most of the process. The most important thing with faces is to keep going till you're happy with the result and to keep the paint thin. As long as the paint is thin you can always adjust the tones and keep going without losing detail!

On the subject of faces, here are some hints you can apply to most models:

1. Keep the paint thin, it's going to take a lot of coats!
2. Don't paint the eyes in pure white - it's too stark and often leads to that googly eye effect, use an off white like Pallid Wych Flesh (or just mix white with a speck of brown). 
3. If you're painting pupils in the eyes, make sure they go from the top of the eye to the bottom and don't float in the middle as pinpricks look strange on humans (but may work for aliens etc)
4. Use a wash to gain definition around the eyes and mouth before you start highlighting.
5. If you want to get a stubble effect on the face, or shaved head use a glaze of brown/grey in those areas - keep the glaze thin though as it's easier to do multiple coats if it is too light. A glaze is like a wash, but using medium (like Lahmian Medium from GW) - medium is essentially everything in your paint except for the pigment. By mixing it with regular paints you create a very thin layer of pigment that colours the surface, as opposed to a traditional wash which falls into the recesses and tends to stain blotchily in open areas.
6. For female faces make the highlights smoother and less sharp - this makes the faces softer and more feminine. You can also add glazes to simulate make-up, but go easy on them unless you want her to look like she rolled straight out of a brothel and onto the battlefield!

A few more coats of paint, stone effect looks good!

So I've jumped forward a bit again, but don't despair, most of it is relatively simple and I'll tell you what I did with the stone effect in a minute!

The next step after the armour and the face was to finish off those gold areas I was working on. To do this I highlighted most of the area of the gold with a mix of 50/50 Runefang Steel (Mythril Silver) and Brass Scorpion. I added more Mythril silver to the mix and did a second layer of highlight, but covering a smaller area. Once it was looking good and gold I applied an edge highlight of pure Mythril silver to get a nice shine and really bring out the details.

The white details were basecoated in Rakarth and then washed with Nuln Oil (black wash). This gave me a good base to work over. I then Highlighted about 90% of the surface area with Ulthuan grey before adding a final fine highlight of White Scar.

The laurels and other green details were basecoated in Caliban Green before being highlighted with Warboss Green and finally Moot Green. I then applied a shade with Biel-Tian green, before re-highlighting the edges with moot green.

For the red cloak I used a basecoat of Khorne Red and then highlighted it with a mix of Khorne Red and Evil Sunz Scarlet in layers progressively adding more of the Scarlet until I reached a pure Evil Sunz Scarlet highlight. I then added an edge highlight of Troll Slayer Orange. If you over highlight you can add a glaze of 50/50 Khorne Red and Evil Sunz Scarlet to the offending areas to bring the colours back in line.

The leather details were basecoated in Rhinox hide and then highlighted with Bestial Brown. I then applied a fine highlight of Bestial Brown mixed with Bleached Bone, before washing down again with Rhinox Hide.

With the Primarch himself  taken care of it was time to focus on the display base. I wanted to change the colour from the blue-white one on Forgeworld as I think the light colour draws the eye away from the model itself and my personal painting style is a bit more grizzly looking anyway. That and I wanted to get away from how Roman he looked (hence the stubble)!

With these thoughts in mind I tackled the base. For simplicity I'm going to bullet-point the steps below to show how I painted the stone surface:

• Basecoat with Codex Grey.
• I stippled the surface using a selection of tones, which I will describe in a minute. For this I recommend using a large brush that you don't mind damaging. I used a cheap square ended brush that was about 10 times the size of a Citadel "standard". If you look closely at the pictures you'll see two things in the stone - black veins and beneath them a varying pattern of different grey hues. Well, in this step we're creating those varying grey hues.
• During this technique it's important to consider where your lines are going. If you look closely at the pictures you'll see that those grey shades are all lines going in one direction and that this continues as they go round corners - this makes the effect look a lot more believable and realistic and is something to consider as we go forward.
• For all of these colours I simply took the base colour (Codex Grey) and then mixed in a small amount of another colour before stippling in straight lines across the base, being careful to be consistent around the corners. It is important not to make the colours contrast too starkly, but still enough that it won't make smooth blends - we need it to look textured!
• The colour I mixed with were: Abaddon Black, Mechanicus Standard Grey, Ulthuan Grey and finally some Balor Brown to give the colour a bit more interest.
• After the stippling was finished all that was left was to paint the veins. I ran a fairly thick glaze of Abaddon Black in fine lines across the surface; being careful to follow the grain of the stone that I had established in the previous step. I used a glaze just to make the paint a bit less harsh and slightly transparent in parts so it would blend well with the effect I had already created.
  
  

When painting stone make sure the "grain" flows together

After all of that excitement I finished the gold details on the base the same as earlier and finished off the remaining details. All in all Guilliman probably too between 10 and 15 hours from start to finish.

If anyone has any questions or wants to attempt the same scheme leave a comment below!