How to paint a vindicator

Hi everyone. Here is my first article about how to paint a Space Marine vindicator in the colours of the Blood Angels. As I said, it is my first article here, but hopefully it might still be of some use to people. I painted it up before doing the article, so I have some Paint illustrations to help.

Paints required/recommended:

Blood Red
Vomit Brown
Blazing Orange
Flesh (dwarf flesh/elf flesh if you have the man with gun)
Dark Flesh
Skorched Brown
Chaos Black
Boltgun Metal
Mithril Silver
Iyadan Darksun
Sunburst Yellow
Dneb Stone
Bleached Bone
Gryphonne Sepia (Wash)
Ogryn Flesh (Wash)
Baal Red (Wash)
Badab Black/ Black Ink

I very much went for the weathered siege vehicle look with lots of dirt and chippin on the paint. I think it turned out quite well.



There were 3 main parts to this tank: the red, the metal and the weathering


Painting the Red
Because it is a Blood Angels vehicle it is red. I started with mechrite red as a basecoat. I then went over that with mechrite red mixed with blood red (1:1). After that I drybrushed up to the edges with pure blood red. The edges were painted in blazing orange then vomit brown. I also wash all the armour with Baal Red at this point, then re-highlight the vomit brown.



Quite simple, and similar to painting blood angel troops.


Painting the metal
I was going for a very dirty metal look, so lots of washes.
Paint it boltgun metal. Wash badab black or black ink. Wash with gryphonne sepia. Wash with ogryn flesh.Paint on some boltgun metal again, where there would be the most light. Highlight sparingly with mithril silver.



The stripes
The stripes were not too hard. Paint the dozer blade black then paint iaydan darksun stripes onto it. I then highlighted by adding in more and more sunburst yellow.



Weathering
To give it the beaten up and dirty look I weathered it considerably. Drybrush it liberally with black and browns and greys. Avoid getting 'dirt'above the third rung (see photo above).



The other weathering is the chips in the paintjob. In chose to have some really big chips, specifically on the dozer blade. This is done after the rest of it is painted.



First, paint a black spot in a ragged and non-even manner (figure 1).


Figure 1:




Then paint boltgun metal over the black, leaving an outline of black around it (figure 2).


Figure 2: (grey = silver)




At this point you will point wash/ink it as you did the rest of the metal. Experiment with making scar-like scratches on the surface or try to make it look like a shot from a las weapon.


The details
Finish up the rest of the tank's details, like the dude holding the heavy bolter (if you chose that option), the aquilas, lights etc. You might also want to use a transfer. I liked the name Annihilatum which means annihilated or something.

And thats the vindicator done. Have fun bringing the pain onto the enemies of mankind in the form of large blast S10 AP2. Or just enjoy looking at it as part of your collection. Hope the article helped. For more articles and commission painting go to http://flagshipfigures.webs.com


Cheers,


Theo