How To Paint Damascene Steel?

[Laughing Man]

Anybody got a clue? I\'m painting up a model (Vladimir Tzepesci, Dark Champion, by Privateer Press), and the way I\'ve got him painted, he reminds me of a character from Song of Ice and Fire, so I wanted to give him a Valyrian steel (read: damascene steel) blade. Something that looks basically like this.

Anybody got a clue how one would go about painting that, or at least something that looks reasonably like it? It\'s a 30mm based model, so it\'s not too large as well...

 

[angus147258]

So kind of like a liquid look? Like mercury?

You might want to try an extreme lighting efect some what like chrome. A lot of new age artists use effects like that. I sugest black with turquoise highlights straight up to black. Be stark. You want as much contrast as posable.

Jake

 

[No Such Agency]

In case anyone doesn\'t know, Damascus steel was a uniquely forged steel highly prized for its strength in weapons. Originally it came from ore that had a large number of various other metals/minerals in it, which \"doped\"t he steel with unusual additives. That ore supply was exhausted and the secret of the steel was lost for a long time. Recently its composition has been rediscovered but it is still very hard to make.

The weird pattern is due to internal impurities, and the steel being folded many times during forging.

 

[Laughing Man]

That and the acid bath used to bring out the pattern even further. Hooray for History Channel documentaries!

 

[Sand Rat]

Wootz?

Would depend on what was done to the sword after forging - if it was polished or acid etched to bring out the layers.

I would suggest finding some pictures of some old master made samurai swords and see how they look.

 

[XeO3]

Damascus steel should be fairly easy, the pattern is similar to woodgrain.

Just use greys, whites, and maybe a brown or blue to paint a woodgrain type pattern, then use a normal NMM technique over that.

 

[Laughing Man]

Eh, thing is, I dislike NMM. Well, I love the effect, but I really loathe painting it for some odd reason. So perhaps paint the woodgrain-ish pattern over a gunmetal base with a bright silver?

Probably going to try that out soon. Hopefully will have pics of my (probably futile) attempt by tommorrow if not sooner.

 

[demonherald]

be careful on scale. At that kind of scale the lines are going to be absolutely miniscule or it wll spoil the effect..

 

[Laughing Man]

I\'ve noticed. Everything I try is going rather badly...

I\'ve pretty much aborted trying this, but I know some good larger scale models (Inquisitor) that I\'m wanting to try this on. Thanks for all the advice, hopefully I\'ll be able to try it out soon!

 

[penguin]

Do I get a prize?

I just recognised the quote in your signature, it is from Catcher in the Rye Good choice!

 

[matty1001]

....do i get a prize though?

Laughing man\'s quote was used in Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex, as part of the Laughing Man\'s logo.

So now it seems laughing man is a ghost in the shell fan!

 

[MPJ]

Most damascus steel I\'ve seen first hand is a dark brownish-black color with creamy white/grey streaks, I\'d suggest either a dark base color with wisps of the lighter color so imply the damascus or overdo the lighter color for the scale to show the damascus, so many things in 28mm scale are completely out of scale and an out of scale color pattern could look good if not truely authentic.

@steelcult: If you have a katana in damascus steel then its definatlly not authentic.

@penguin: Have seen your penguin video signature many times but just took a good look at it now and nearly wet myself with laughter.

 

[Thecadian]

[
@penguin: Have seen your penguin video signature many times but just took a good look at it now and nearly wet myself with laughter. [/quote]

yeah i wonder how they diddit

 

[Laughing Man]

Originally posted by matty1001
Laughing man\'s quote was used in Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex, as part of the Laughing Man\'s logo.

So now it seems laughing man is a ghost in the shell fan!

More of an anime fan in general. GitS (especially the second season, IMHO) is great, but my current favorites are Gantz and Trinity Blood (which they\'re releasing in English starting Sept. 9th, which sorta pisses me off, as I haven\'t finished watching it in the original Japanese yet). If I had my sig banner (which is too large for these forums at the moment), all of this would have been a lot more obvious.