Blog Aginor's Painting Blog

Also finished this weekend: Skaven Deathrunner.

I tried to be a bit more aggressive with the shading and especially the highlighting here. I am pretty happy although some of the highlights look a bit painted on if you look at them very closely (like in these pictures). I will probably add a bit of blood or a skull to the bases to make them a bit more interesting but otherwise I am happy how my very first Skaven models turned out.
I painted them as identically as possible to have that illusion thing they mention in the rules. I call them "Das doppelte Rattchen" (a small play of words with the original German title of the book that is called "Lottie and Lisa" in English.)

 

@Aginor

They look really good, I still think you can go more extreme with your highlights especially on the knuckles, toes, ears, claws and teeth but that's just me and how I paint.

But they do look great and I think your right a skull and some blood drops on the bases will add depth.

 

Ok guys and gals, I've got a problem.

I started painting the Ogroid Thaumaturge and everything went fine for the first few steps, but then I started working on the sigils and things went first to bad, then to worse.

The plan is to paint them pure white and then glaze over them with a tiny amount of GW's Guilliman Blue glaze.

However, it seems I am unable to paint those small lines. I tried it on a part of the Ogre, using different brushes, differently thinned paint, different angles of holding the brush, but I always overspilled onto the skin.
In the end I just overpainted everything again with the base color because it looked dire.

Now I wonder which technique is easiest to use for a not too precise painter such as I happen to be, and what kind of brush to use. I normally use a pretty short brush for small details but that doesn't work well for painting into crevices it seems.


Options I thought about:

A. Paint the lines white and overspill, then correct by

1. painting along the edges with the original color, using a small brush.
   
2. trying to drybrush over the crevices with the original color

B. Using very thin white paint and doing a LOT of layers, letting it flow into the crevices like a wash

Option A2 has the problem that those crevices are neither going into the same direction (curved lines) nor have a uniform depth. I think I am going to rule that one out.
Option A1 seems viable to me, it just has one drawback which is shading. I would apply the base tone of course, and I wouldn't be able to shade those corrections again because the shade would flow into the white lines, ruining them

Option B.... I think it may be possible but it would take me ages.


My other problem is that I fear the corrections will in some parts mess up my color gradients that I worked on and - IMO - look pretty cool already.

I will post WIP pics in a few minutes. Standby.

 

Three base colors, loosely following the YouTube painting guide by TWG, but since I am not that good with blending by shades I blended together the colors by drybrushing.
I like the results so far.
I did some highlighting on the muscles and the face already.
Next step is the hands, hooves, hair, and of course the sigils mentioned above.

 

@Aginor questions,

1. What brush are you using and what size, for something like that I would use the best quality brush I have and size "0"

2. What are you mixing your paint with? water will dilute but it won't stop it drying, try flow retarder or a wet pallete, the paint drys fast on a small brush.

3. Have a clean wet brush ready so if you mess up you can wash it off instantly.

4. Only way is practice.

I know I bang on about W&N Series 7 brushes but it is for a reason, the key is keeping the paint flowing and that is just keeping it wet the rest is just practice I'm afraid.

 

Thank you!

1. I use one that is actually smaller than 0, the Army Painter "Insane Detail" brush, which is a 5/0 or so. It is a bit worn and thus has shortened quite a bit, but I normally feel very comfortable with it. Not the case here.

2. I normally use water but I'm planning on trying out a bit of that Revell acryllic thinner I have for my airbrush (that I never use because I suck with it). I have a wet palette in use.

3. Definitely. I have one ready all the time because I need it often. Very often.

4. I feared so. For me it is also extremely dependent on my mental and physical state of the day. Yesterday I skipped painting alltogether because I quivered like an alcoholic that ran out of Whiskey.


I think my immediate action will be to push the Ogre back a bit and only continue working on it when I feel very good, and start the last ST model in the meantime (the Gaunt Summoner)

 

@Aginor have you watched this

 

Yeah. He makes it look really easy. Which it isn't. Even using a brush that is, like, DOUBLE the size I am using without spilling over.
I think he is mocking me with his stellar skills. Grrrr......

 

Sigh.
Looks like my pride got the better of me.
I couldn't start something else, I had to try the sigils again.

The results are.... mediocre at best.
The good news is that my technique for correcting works up yo a certain point. I used another brush, a very new 3/0 I had lying around. Much better but still very hard for me.

I painted a few of the lines in the blue part and one on the black part to see how it looks. White base then corrected with the base color, then blue glaze.
If I don't look too closely I somewhat like the result. Up close it is pretty dire.

But to be honest I don't think I can do it better and I don't want to keep him unfinished until I can. So I am probably going to continue that way to the end. Here are two WIP pics. Just don't zoom in.

 

@Aginor nothing wrong with them sigils, what you can do is apply a very thin blue glaze over the skin and sigils it should help define the edges, by painting the skin and sigils together it will flow and help unify them.

Pro Tip: In your glaze mix add a tiny drop of pva glue it will stop it pooling on the skin, have a clean brush at hand if you need to clean up.

 

Thank you!
Both interesting sugestions, I will try that!

 

I spent two evenings now doing the sigils, white and corrections. Pics soon.

In other news: I am pretty sure this is the Internet forum in which I was quickest to reach 1000 posts, which either means I am a huge spammer or that I am really into this hobby. Or both. Either way: A very nice community, I like it here.
Thanks to y'all!

 

Since I primed white that would have been the cleaner option, yes. Probably.