Space Wolves WIP

[austinio]

OK, so I had some great support on improving the paint job on my last mini and someone suggested I try a WIP to detail my technique so people can offer hints on improving it. Hopefully some might also find some useful beginner tips that I have already picked up along the way.

I used to play Space Wolves and Eldar 40k when I was at school in the early 90s, but I stumbled across them in a cupboard in my parents house last year, damaged and scratched and decided to clean them up a little and replace the missing parts.

I painted a couple of replacement minis I bought on E-bay and found myself loving the painting much more than I used to. I'm now a good 6 months in and starting to see some real improvements in results. I've around 100 metal eldar and 100 metal space wolves, all from the 90s, most that were really badly painted by me back then ( see http://www.coolminiornot.com/357692 ). I have stripped most of them and painted about 20 so far.

Here a few of my latest favourites:

View attachment 28225

For the WIP, I've picked a fairly simple special character - a Wolf Guard (here is the Eavy Metal version: http://wh40k.lexicanum.com/mediawiki/images/d/d0/Wolfguard1.jpg ). It should allow me to document my technique without it being too long or detailed a project. I'll be able to show some blending on the armour panels, skin tones, sword blending, gold, bone, gems and fur:


I'm going to post step by step - so here is step 1 - preparation:

I have stripped the mini, using brown Dettol (http://www.amazon.co.uk/Dettol-Brown-Liquid-250-Pack/dp/B00D42ZN30). You just leave the mini (metal strips really well, but plastic can work if you don't leave it too long) for 24 hours or more in the stuff neat, then scrub off the paint with a toothbrush. Then I douse in fairy liquid, scrub again, then continue scrubbing under a hot tap. The fairy liquid helps to remove the painty gunge before the water causes it to re-solidify. This sometimes leaves some tiny bits of paint which I pick out with a toothbrush, or a pin for the really stubborn bits - taking care not to scratch any surfaces.

Final preparation is a spray with citadel white undercoat:
View attachment 28226

I'll continue to update this step-by-step as I paint this guy. Next post should be after base-coating - I'll also describe my brushes, paints and wet-palette set-up and all of my roughly planned steps - subject to change:

Step 2 - Base-coating

Step 3 - Inking for shadows

Step 4 - Mid-tones armour

Step 5 - Highlight armour (2-brush blending on larger areas) - line-highlights on top

Step 6 - Highlights on skin, gold, silver, yellows, reds etc.

Step 7 - Blending sword

Step 8 - Ink fur

Step 9 - Final highlights, eyes and gems

Step 10 - Base with green paint and flock

 

[Dragonsreach]

Step 9 shouldn't be eyes they should be done first so you don't screw up the face at the last minute.
Step 10 Green base? Have a look in the galleries and think about how your Ulrik looked better with a thematic base not the 90's "Flock & Snot".

 

[Canny]

The previous minis came out great.
Im basing mad, I love the scenes that some people make. Just to give you an insight to neat basing here is a video I found handy.

paint the face 1st it sets the mood for the whole mini.

 

[austinio]

Step 2 - basecoating

OK - thanks for the ideas. I know I need to improve my bases if I am going to advance much further. I have to be honest though - I am an engineer and software developer, not an artist - I think I rely pretty heavily on the quality of the sculpts from GW to get the results I do - it is more a case of a sensible method and a steady hand than an artist's touch. I have been experimenting with a bit of free hand though such as the Ulrik kneepads. I will try to do the face as early as I can when I know the risk of messing it up has reduced.

As I said, I'll start with my set-up:

Brushes:

View attachment 28283
I have a cheap art-brush - the daler rowney - for blobbing paint from pot to palette and for mixing and thinning. I then do most of my work with the Series 7 W&N 00 and 000. Since I got those, my painting has become much cleaner - they really are a lot better than the cheaper brushes. I know there are others that have been recommended on these forums too that I might try one day. All of these brushes hold a reasonable point:

View attachment 28284

Paints:

I keep to a fairly limited palette - mixing colours where required and mixing gradients on a wet palette for layering and blending. For space wolves, these are the key colours:

View attachment 28285
I use a wet palette built from a take-away box, with a sponge cloth pad soaked in my thinning fluid and covered in Tesco greaseproof paper. I have a couple of small pots, one with plain water and one with my thinning fluid. The thinning fluid is 10 parts water to 1 part W&N Flow Improver (very roughly measured). This wet palette keeps things from drying during a painting session and once the lid is on will keep it wet for many days - even seeming to re-dissolve dried paint sometimes. Over time the pigment does come out of solution a little, but a quick mix with a brush brings it back. This has saved me a huge amount of paint, but best of all means I can mix gradients and keep them for the life of a project and that the paint stays consistently wet without constantly needing to thin it leaving you to focus on the painting rather than the paint. I can also take this palette anywhere I want to paint:
View attachment 28286

Now, for Step 2 - Base-coating:

This is pretty straightfoward, I use my 00 brush mostly with thinned paint - the only mixed colour here is the gold base which is 1:1 flash gitz yellow to tallern sand. Bone colour is used for fur, bones and the face, black as a base for silver. I also used a bit of blue and orange in the final step outside my usual palette for the hair and sword - I decided to try a nicely blended blue power sword for this one:

View attachment 28287

I try to start from the most inset parts of the model, pushing the brush into the corners of raised surfaces and finish with the raised areas. It doesn't have to be perfect as the next step will neaten boundaries a little and there is lots of chance to tidy up later. Notice the purple on the base on the 3rd stage - that was from helping my daughters with their watercolours as we painted together on the kitchen table.

 

[austinio]

Step 3 - Inking

Step 3 - Inking

OK, so this step I think is worth looking at in detail. I'm sure this is not the way the pros do it, but it does seem to help me keep things neat and increase contrast. I apply a black ink (Nuln Oil) across the armour - focusing on the shadow areas. The yellow, gold, red and bone areas including the face get a coat of Reikland Fleshshade ink. This step does look a bit messy - especially the flat armour areas (I think my nuln oil has gone a bit thick and grainy - but it will clean up in the next step). The nice thing about this step is it neatens up the details, corrects small errors and brings out the sculped detail nicely - especially on the faces:

View attachment 28292

I suppose I could restrict the ink just to the crevices in the armour rather than dirtying it all, but at least this way I am forced to add some even coats across the plates. With the yellow areas, I try to move around the brown ink to create some blended shades rather than just slap it on as I find it a nice way to work with yellow. I have used some blue ink on the sword for now.

 

[austinio]

Step 4 - Armour mid-tones

OK, now it is time to clean up the armour after the dirty ink stage. I put on a couple of thin coats of the fenrisian grey just on the top surfaces of the plates, leaving the dark shadows in the corners:

View attachment 28293

I take care to paint the individual parts of the fingers/gauntlets. Next up armour highlighting and face (eyes first )...

 

[austinio]

Step 5 - Highlighting armour

Step 5 - Highlighting armour

This is where I really start enjoying the painting as the textures and lighting start to come together and this step has only been possible in this form since I bought my better brushes and set up the wet palette.

I build a gradient of fenrisian grey to white on my palette watered down further than before and slowly build up the highlights in around 3 layers - the first two I use 2 brush blending - using my smaller brush to paint a line around the edges of the plates, then using a second brush part-loaded with my thinning liquid to feather the highlight, pushing it back to the edges a little. The first layer should be slightly wider but closer to the midtone, the second layer quite a bit lighter. I then do a final highlight with an even lighter mix just along the edges, holding the brush at an angle to the edge where possible, but just using the tip elsewhere:

View attachment 28319

I probably should have gone a little more aggressive with the first layer here - perhaps a little lighter and wider, but the final result is quite subtle and I am reasonably happy with it. I try to put a little more highlighting on the top facing parts of the armour to simulate light falling from above - but I don't worry about it too much so the mini looks fairly evenly lit.

 

[Kretcher]

Very nice way too show your step by step. Thanks for sharing it with us.

 

[austinio]

Step 6 - The face and other highlights

Step 6 - The face and other highlights

OK, so I was supposed to to the eyes first, but I was on auto-pilot and did the first layer of facial highlights first. For the face I set up a bone to white gradient fairly watered down and start highlighting the protruding facial features with the bone.
View attachment 28320

I try to take the top-down lighting into account a bit more for the faces to ensure good contrast. For the eyes, I use my smallest brush and put in a white layer across the eye first, trying not to let it sink into the shadows. For this guy, being ginger, I though blue eyes would be best, so went for a rich blue colour. I got one eye about right, but the second spread too much, so I had to touch it up. Then - I was feeling brave, so went for a black pupil - I don't think it went in perfectly, but the effect is quite good:

View attachment 28321

I then highlighted the bone - with the bone to white gradient, picking out the upper and protruding parts, just a couple of layers. For the red on the bolt pistol I used two layers of orange to yellow highlights - mostly just picking out edges.

For the metals, I use the silver direct from the pot, just brushing off most of it with my 00 brush and just over-brush the black base layer. I then put some edge highlights with a slightly fuller brush where appropriate. The gold gets a similar treatment with a silver highlight, but I did put on an extra layer of ink - otherwise the gold can be a bit flat:

View attachment 28322

 

[austinio]

Step 7 - Blending the sword

Step 7 - Blending the sword

OK, so this is my first time blending a sword/blade since I have started trying a 2-brush blend of sorts. I created a blue to white gradient fairly watered down on my palette, then put on a blue mid-tone layer across the blade in all but the very corners to the hilt. Then I started to blend in 3 areas of lighter blue asymmetrically, putting a line in first, then blending in with a second brush loaded with thinning mixture each time. I did about 4 layers of this - then put a very light blue edge highlight around the whole sword. I finished off the sword with the gem. For gems I first paint them black, then add a curve of the main gem colour around the left and base, covering just under half the gem, then a smaller lighter "highlight" round the base - for large gems more layers could go in. Then I get a fairly diluted white on my smallest brush and add a small dot in the top right. I'm quite please with how the gem on the sword came out here:

View attachment 28323

 

[austinio]

Step 8/9 : Fur and final highlights

For fur, I like to use a second layer of reikland fleshshade on around the top 2/3rds of a tail (for pelts I put this down the middle 2/3rds ish of the wolves back) - then a black layer in the final 3rd - for larger pelts I do an extra black layer whilst the brown is still wet. I then touched up a few other highlights and finished off the remaining gems/glass bits

View attachment 28324

Now I have to decide whether to do some free-hand on the kneecaps - I think perhaps zig-zag on the right and some sort of wolf bones/skull/teeth on the left. Then I have to decide whether or not to try some fancy basing. I think I will probably stick with my boring one for this as he is part of a wolf-guard squad and I have already completed one other.

Overall I am pretty pleased with this one - probably not my best so far but given it is not the best mini I have and I was stopping for photos every 5 minutes I am happy.

Hope this was useful for someone and please do let me know where you think I can improve.

Thanks

 

[austinio]

Animated gif

Just a bit of fun - I do image registration for a living:

View attachment 28330

 

[austinio]

Does anyone have any thoughts on how to get smoother blending on swords? What do people think of the face? I would like to get a bit more ruddy colour into skin tones for future faces. Am I missing any key techniques - or is it simply a matter of practice and putting a bit more careful time and effort into each step?

 

[Zab]

The answer to both is glazes. With the face some purple or red or blue in the deepest shadows mixed with your skin tones. Take a very very very thin glaze and pull it towards the shadows, no pooling just a damp brush so you have lots of control. For the blade same deal lots of thin glazes pull you darkest colors towards the darkest areas and your lighter ones towards the lightest areas. Let each layer dry fully between each coat so you don't add any chalky texture AND because the thinner the glaze the less effective it looks while wet so you need to gauge how far to take each layer and you can't tell that until it's dry. Sounds so simple and yet...

 

[austinio]

Thanks - sounds like it is worth a try. In an ideal world would this have replaced some of the other blending steps, or just be used to clean up the final look? I would imagine it takes a bit of time to get the consistency right so that it doesn't just slip off the brush and in to the cracks whilst still being thin enough.

 

[TomasP]

I would imagine it takes a bit of time to get the consistency right so that it doesn't just slip off the brush and in to the cracks whilst still being thin enough.

Not with Vallejo glaze medium - it works a treat...

 

[Zab]

A medium will help, but yeah it takes quite a bit of time, That said the layers are very thin so they dry quickly. You don't want to drag the loaded brush across the surface though, it's a glaze not a wash. So what you do its load your brush and then unload most of the thinned paint onto a towel or your hand so that when you put the brush to mini it's just damp not wet and then pooling won't be an issue. I believe in military modelling they call it a filter.

 

[TomasP]

Get yourself a little hair dryer...

 

[austinio]

I've ordered some Vallejo glaze medium - so I'll give that a try next time.

I finished the final free-hand decals and put on my standard base, so here is the final result:

View attachment 28387

http://www.coolminiornot.com/359197

 

[Zab]

That's just crazy talk, then you'll have to get a little comb, a little brush and a teeny tiny tube of hair gel! Where does the madness stop?! Oh wait, you meant like a travel sized on to help the drying process along. Heh, right. Who styles their minis hair...