Joona
New member
After getting the urge to buy an airbrush (Badger 105 Patriot), seeing various articles, pictures and videos from scale modelers, I decided to try something new. I've been painting for three years now (iirc) and though I'm a gamer I tend to like painting more and more as time passes by. I've always liked the looks of Eldar, there's just something very nice about them. I started painting these in a green colour theme but didn't get too far, some basecoats and a couple of finished models. Then I got bored and left them alone in a box for a while. Now I took 'em out again...
These would probably be considered Exodites, the more nomadic Eldar that left their Craftworlds and settled on actual planets before bad things happened to the lazy bastards (bad things may contain nuts and chaos). There are some Eldar that have battle damage painted on them but most them are rather clean and pure, quite many are brightly colored too. I wanted something different so I decided to do some good old-fashioned weathering. I imagine these Eldar might have survived for a long time on a planet that has a really acidic atmosphere with all kinds of nasty poisons.
This is the first time ever I've used an airbrush I spent a whole few minutes experimenting on paper, then grabbed some paints and started painting the Wave Serpent. It was easier than I thought it would be, though I didn't paint anything too complex. Controlling the amount of paint isn't as hard as it sounds. The colours are rather similar to the ones used in the Miniature Mentor Dreadnought tutorial. I really liked that look.
I grabbed some W&N Artisan Oils, they aren't real oil paints, they can be mixed and cleaned with water. They take a couple of hours to a day or two to dry depending on the thickness of the paint. They can be diluted with pretty much everything that people usually use with paints. I'll be doing most of the weathering with these and Pigments. I'll have to get some flow improver, add a bit of soap or get some turpentine to get rid of the surface tension of the water though. It sometimes leaves marks of pooling when well diluted. This doesn't happen with turpentine that seems to seep everywhere on a model if you're not careful. A good and a bad thing.
I'll do some experiments on battle damage too, probably something with my trusty Dremel copy, plastic putty and some careful application of fire.
The army (if it ever becomes one, I have most of the models ready to paint though) will probably consist of a few Wave Serpents, Wraithlords, Wraithguard, Dire Avengers and maybe a Seer Council. We'll see...
To the pictures:
This is the Wave Serpent with the base coat applied. Some Vallejo Model Air Radome Tan, Dark Earth and a mix of some green, blue and white paints. I'll have to get a light greyish blue for that though so I don't have to mix it every time I want to paint something.
Some greenish weathering applied. This is something along the lines of some of the poisons and acid in the atmosphere affecting the wraithbone and other fine materials that Eldar usually build their machines out of. It could also be some algae growing on the craft as these might even work under water.
I applied a lot of small dots of paint to the model, green, yellow, blue and red, then started smearing them all over in a downward motion and applied more and more water to the model. Then I washed some of the paint of in proper places to create the streaks. This part is now actually finished on the whole model.
This is the first experiment on a more rust-like weathering, I mixed up some browns and orange and then started applying them in small streaks which I then washed and scrubbed away with a wet brush. Once the first layer of weathering dries a little bit more, I'll continue with this for the rest of the model, I'll add some more colour to the brown too with something else, maybe a little blue or something along those lines.
Then I'll try to finish the rest of the model, some small details, guns, gems, vents and stuff like that. After that it'll get a thin layer of matt varnish, and then some reddish pigments on the largest rusty parts. And some browns for mud where it might pile up. Pigments create a little more texture to the model and make it look like it was even more corroded.
After this is finished I'll probably try to paint some Avengers or Guardians. I probably will only use normal acrylics on those, the details will be so much smaller that the use of oils probably won't be that beneficial. I really hope that this project will hold my interest until it's finished. It might turn into a really cool looking army.
These would probably be considered Exodites, the more nomadic Eldar that left their Craftworlds and settled on actual planets before bad things happened to the lazy bastards (bad things may contain nuts and chaos). There are some Eldar that have battle damage painted on them but most them are rather clean and pure, quite many are brightly colored too. I wanted something different so I decided to do some good old-fashioned weathering. I imagine these Eldar might have survived for a long time on a planet that has a really acidic atmosphere with all kinds of nasty poisons.
This is the first time ever I've used an airbrush I spent a whole few minutes experimenting on paper, then grabbed some paints and started painting the Wave Serpent. It was easier than I thought it would be, though I didn't paint anything too complex. Controlling the amount of paint isn't as hard as it sounds. The colours are rather similar to the ones used in the Miniature Mentor Dreadnought tutorial. I really liked that look.
I grabbed some W&N Artisan Oils, they aren't real oil paints, they can be mixed and cleaned with water. They take a couple of hours to a day or two to dry depending on the thickness of the paint. They can be diluted with pretty much everything that people usually use with paints. I'll be doing most of the weathering with these and Pigments. I'll have to get some flow improver, add a bit of soap or get some turpentine to get rid of the surface tension of the water though. It sometimes leaves marks of pooling when well diluted. This doesn't happen with turpentine that seems to seep everywhere on a model if you're not careful. A good and a bad thing.
I'll do some experiments on battle damage too, probably something with my trusty Dremel copy, plastic putty and some careful application of fire.
The army (if it ever becomes one, I have most of the models ready to paint though) will probably consist of a few Wave Serpents, Wraithlords, Wraithguard, Dire Avengers and maybe a Seer Council. We'll see...
To the pictures:
This is the Wave Serpent with the base coat applied. Some Vallejo Model Air Radome Tan, Dark Earth and a mix of some green, blue and white paints. I'll have to get a light greyish blue for that though so I don't have to mix it every time I want to paint something.
Some greenish weathering applied. This is something along the lines of some of the poisons and acid in the atmosphere affecting the wraithbone and other fine materials that Eldar usually build their machines out of. It could also be some algae growing on the craft as these might even work under water.
I applied a lot of small dots of paint to the model, green, yellow, blue and red, then started smearing them all over in a downward motion and applied more and more water to the model. Then I washed some of the paint of in proper places to create the streaks. This part is now actually finished on the whole model.
This is the first experiment on a more rust-like weathering, I mixed up some browns and orange and then started applying them in small streaks which I then washed and scrubbed away with a wet brush. Once the first layer of weathering dries a little bit more, I'll continue with this for the rest of the model, I'll add some more colour to the brown too with something else, maybe a little blue or something along those lines.
Then I'll try to finish the rest of the model, some small details, guns, gems, vents and stuff like that. After that it'll get a thin layer of matt varnish, and then some reddish pigments on the largest rusty parts. And some browns for mud where it might pile up. Pigments create a little more texture to the model and make it look like it was even more corroded.
After this is finished I'll probably try to paint some Avengers or Guardians. I probably will only use normal acrylics on those, the details will be so much smaller that the use of oils probably won't be that beneficial. I really hope that this project will hold my interest until it's finished. It might turn into a really cool looking army.
Last edited: