Blood Angels, Orks and other 40k

[wilsongrahams]

Group shots of same termies again, in particular a side view of the pads.

Also some group shots of my finished Escher (bases not finished) and current progress on the next two to be done. I'm still deciding how to do the coat on the other leader hence why I took a pic to look at. There are just seven more plus Mad Donna and a Wyrd before these are all finished and ready to face battle once again. It's been years since they were last in action, and were in bad need of repainting, so it's about time they got done. First up will be a zombie campaign to encourage me to paint some warhammer zombies.

[wilsongrahams]

Some individual shots of a few of the gang. These models are a joy to paint and are possible Jes Goodwin's best ever work in my opinion.

[hobodog]

Its great some Escher models, especially painted so nicely! They truly are great sculpts

[Inandantia]

Agree with you on the quality of these sculpts, Necromunda had some fantastic minis in it's range and it still amazes me that GW doesn't give it's so called "specialist range" more attention.

Great work on the terminators, I'm a big fan of the idea that each guy is an idividual with their own little theme going on; the space hulk minis are really inspiring on that front. The eschar are well done, the yellow is especially good! The first thing that came to mind with the leader was a cyan but looking at the rest of the gang all together I'm not sure that fit in. Perhaps a leopard skin design would be good? Would stick with the colour theme, make the leader stand out from the grunts and, let's be honest, it would be tres eschar!

Looking forward to seeing the wyrd, could never quite make my mind up if I liked those minis or not so will be interesting to see your take on them.

[wilsongrahams]

I'm afraid I've already finished the model now!

I opted for a dark brownish sheepskin leather colour with a light beige inside fur, so that it kinda looks like the british WW2 pilot jackets. I'll post pics of the lady up tomorrow. I didn't want anything unrealistic, and black would have clashed with the leggings.

As for cyan - the power sword used blue tones so I couldn't use anything that clashed with that or made the sword disappear. I hope you all approve.

Originally the yellow had more orange in it but I repainted over the darkest areas with golden yellow and it looks much better now - more like proper shading than multicoloured bras. One thing I've tried to do is to avoid sexing them up or pimping them too much. You may not get what I mean but I see so many that look like BDSM characters rather than gangsters with a minimalist clothing style.

[andyg2006]

These are really well painted; great work!
I always struggle with banners as well, so your advice is really valuable -many thanks. I'll definitely try to keep up to date with this log.

[wilsongrahams]

Glad any tips are of value. I've always enjoyed asking others about how they paint to achieve different results to me etc. Usually it's a simple shortcut or something so obvious that makes it all a lot easier to do rather than being down to skill.

Well here's the finished Leader. Just the sword and coat finished since the previous picture. Oh, anyone notice the blue eyeshadow for a change? The rest of the gang will have different eye shadow too so that I can split the whole lot into two gangs for use in 40k as seperate militia units. I didn't want to have anything major showing the difference so eye shadow it was!

The hair looks a little bland in the pics though is quite well shaded and highlighted in reality. The inspiration for the colour was from Phoenix from X-men 3. I just liked the dark red colour rather than bright colours all the time. Other members will have darker dyes too (though all of them dyed still) as if they were brunette under the dye and didn't bleach it first.

Always interested in feedback.

[Inandantia]

Looks good, the only thing I would do is make the fur lining whiter; with the coat being quite a dull colour (not meant in a critical way!) I think it needs to pop a bit more.

By the by, gald you haven't gone down the bdsm route on these! Too often is that seen as the only way to do female minis and probably explains the lack of decent female sculpts. Eschar are more punk anyway, possibly the reason they are so good is that the designer didn't decide to have them all wearing things

[wilsongrahams]

No advice is ever taken badly even when critical.

It may be the pictures, but the fur lining is already highlighted up to white with most of it being a tad lighter than kommando khaki. Photos showing colours different has been a bane of mine since I first decided to start my logs!

[Inandantia]

In that case then I like it

What colours did you use to achieve the sword?

[Lowmans]

I'll second what Inandantia says on your terminators - I fell into the trap many years ago with my Space Wolves - they looked too identikit. Yours do look like individual veterans yet hang together really nicely!

I like the Escher. Especially the leader! One cheeky question though, have you painted the Eye of Terra/Horus on the hilt gem!?

[wilsongrahams]

Inandantia, the sword was painted Hawk Turqoise over black undercoat. This was then given a coat of Badab Black. I then reapplied Hawk Turquoise and then kept adding white to it until I had pure white. I then mixed a thin white and brushed it over the whole blade, wiping it off a few times leaving a kinda chalky effect. I then reapplied it one last time to blur the edge of the whitest areas and apply the flecks. I also thinned some black and applied this (just once) to the darkest areas because I wanted a stronger contrast than with my Blood Angels Captain in order to get a more crystalline effect. I did this more as a practise because I may soon be painting a lot of grey knights and the force weapons are done the same way.

Lowmans, the Eye of Horus is part of the House Escher symbology and so it is on most of their belts too. The fact that I have used them as genestealer cultists, chaos cultists and militia in the past probably means they deserve the tainting. However I just applied it as the house symbol rather than chaos lineage.

I hope that helps.

[wilsongrahams]

Minor update. Finished the Sanguinor. Was happy with the general outcome but I think it could have been better. The gold looks better than in the photos - a problem with metallics and cameras I think.

The wings and other icons generally look okay but the texture is a touch rough in places. This is due to the model itself not being very smooth and I didn't really notice until I was a fair way through painting him. Still, he's only painted for adding to my gaming army so not a competition model.

Overall he was pretty boring to paint with having few details and being only three major colours, all in large areas, and with mixing paints for large areas you have to work fast so the mix doesn't dry so tend to get sloppy results.

I liked the sword - choosing Scaly Green rather than Hawk Turquoise to get a different tone - and it works really well. I will probably do other power weapons using different colours in future.

I'm going to be doing some Fantasy stuff next so it may be a short while before I get another update on here.

[wilsongrahams]

With Stern finished I was itching to get Kaldor painted, but he was unavailable for ages. Having finally got him, I've finished him. I've used similar tones to Stern so he fits - the wine red cloak for example. With these models, due to the limited palette, I used different methods on areas of the same colour - so the banner got an orangey-red tone and the cloak a wine red tone. Has it helped?

I decided to do the sword in my usual method but usin purple, and then with some blue in the lightning effect. It doesn't show up well on the pics but it looks like a menacing weapon with the tones used so it fits well for the Titan Sword.

The eyes are actually very small so though neat don't show up well - I know why GW do lighting effects now to show them off more. I personally don't like lighting effects much as unless perfect it ruins a model. Maybe one day I'll practise and start! I did another little flurry with the gold and silver on the banner using browns and greys - whilst not true nmm it was nice to get the effect I wanted and all good practise for getting onto proper nmm.

In general, as with Stern it's a very unoriginal scheme but I like the scheme so don't care if you disagree. He's awaiting rocks on his base til I have an Ork mob finished to do them all together.

[wilsongrahams]

Speaking of Orks, I'm currently working on my second Warboss and Captain Badrukk. Badrukk has skin finished and some yellow base just like the warboss, but with no conversion I thought it best not to bother with pictures til he's finished. To match my Flash Gitz he's having all his armour and metal plates yellow however.

As for the warboss, I'm showing him before I progree and further to get some advice - it any arrives in time. I added a new head, shoulder plates, gun and power klaw. I also added two bandoliers which I think look great - but not very clear in either of these pics. Getting them to hang right took a lot of cutting and bending of individual rounds to get it - and there's no dodgy gravity defying bits either which I am pleased with.

Anyway, it's the gun and claw I wanted to ask about. I changed the claw to look different to my other warboss, but does it look too small and simple, or is it even at the right angle. I like it, but there's something nagging me that it isn't right somehow, yet can't place my finger on it. Also, with the combi-rokkits, does the gun look out of place being so tall or is that offset with the banner (Of a FULL MOON not Evil sun!) pole? I think some white and black tips to the rokkits will reduce the imposing presence a little and balance it out without altering the gun at all - does anyone agree?

[Dreffbuilder]

ORKS!!!! What a awesome bossie 'ya hav there!

And sanguinor looks particularly good at least to me.

Great, keep up the good work! (speaking of that, I should pick up the brush soon o.O)

[Lowmans]

Hi Wilsongrahams, beautiful Grey Knights their.
Very nice skin on the Ork too
IMHO the gun and banner on your Nazdreg look fine.
I think maybe the thing on the Klaw might be the Klaw perhaps rotates (appears to rotate) at the arm/Klaw joint and not at the elbow. Though, it's hard to exactly say from the piccies. I hope that's helpful.
Thanks for posting more great stuff, time to dig my brushes out!

[wilsongrahams]

Yes, you should both get brushes out and paint. It's rewarding even if it is hard work to carry on sometimes.

Lowmans, you'll probably laugh but to test the pose, I stood up and waved my arms about etc to find the angle and pose that seemed most natural - what I found was that the hand would be most comfortable on the side, and bent slightly forwards at the elbow.

What you describe was a thought I have, though if you rotate your hand your elbow stays still, and if the claw is attached on the hand end and can rotate near the elbow, then my model should be okay, though I had the same doubts. I guess it's a case of convincing myself not to alter it any more. Another thing that may affect the look (as well as the angle of the pics) is the fact that the yellow is flat and large and undetailed. As painting progresses this should hopefully change. Either way, the bandage between the claw and skin will be painted last allowing me to slice the arm off and reposition (or transplant another) right up until the model is almost finished.

Whatever my rambling means, I will take a rear shot of the model after painting tomorrow to show the elbow itself. Another thought has occured to me that the issue could be that the claw appears too short to have an arm inside so would actually be a replacement arm instead, with the wrist at the finger joints. This may become apparent with clearer photos so await tomorrow evening!

I'm pleased you like the skin too - I chose a lighter colour cos it fitted better with the reddish yellow tones after the dark flesh washes are added to the golden yellow.
In case anyone wonders, the yellow is Iyandun Darksun x2 coats, golden yellow, dark flesh wash, golden yellow and white highlight, golden yellow and more white than before highlight!

The skin on the warbosses has started at orchide shade and gone through dark angels green to goblin green, but infantry started at goblin green. After the goblin green, a thraka green wash is applied, then goblin green reapplied, before beleached bone and goblin green mixes are used to highlight up in two or three stages. Characters get extra so three mixed highlights, nobs a little more at two, and boyz so far have one highlight mix. It's a similar story with the yellow - less levels of shading and highlighting the more common the troop.

[Mathean]

some really nice stuff in here,

I especially like the Waagboss in the first posting

[wilsongrahams]

Thank you. I like him too! In fact I bought him off ebay and enjoyed painting him so much I bought AOBR and lots more Orks to have a small army!

Speaking of Orks, here's my current Warboss (Nicknamed Nazdreg hence why other pics were labelled that!). You can see the angle of his claw arm better here, and see the creases for his elbow in the rear shot to see that the elbow does actually line up with the claw. I'm starting to think it is because the arm is slightly short, and that the claw is small for a model as large as a warboss, but then I didn't want to use the original again as it's already on warboss 1 (he has no name). I think I'll leave it as is - it's growing on me now some more painting has been added.