Marines (T_T)

[Lazarus]

I am amazed at how you do it Dave, the paint job looks so messy but it looks so good at the same time???

Love the recycling you go going on there.

You sure you are not taking art class at Uni also. Ex work for someone who wants to mess with peoples minds for a living

[NeckFace]

cheers folks, I'm hoping to get a decent sized force of these guys up and running by battlecry next year.  they'll probably play like crap due to my gumby gaming ability, but it'd be nice to see them on the field at a proper event.  well, unless my mate decides to actually participate and plays with them instead.

nah, no art classes at uni Matt, i already have my graphic design degree

and yeah, i wanted to show that there is a bunch of recycling that goes into these models, my friend's army consists of stuff from back in 2nd ed days, and there's a bunch of 2nd hand stuff scattered through there in various states of being painted and munted - in a narcissistic glut i wanted to show that these models actually start off looking pretty damned ugly to work with

[Lazarus]

Good work man, you can join me in the we suck corner at BC next year when i take my eldar.

[Sectiplave]

Good work man, you can join me in the we suck corner at BC next year when i take my eldar.

I'll join you guys with my crummy Necron force, unless they actually get an updated codex by then

Yeah Dave's gritty look is top notch, he claims it's very easy, but I think he underestimates his own skills!

[Lazarus]

2nd that.

[NeckFace]

i don't know if anyone cares, but guys on another forum asked for a breakdown for how i paint these guys so i may as well post it up here too.

i'll re-iterate that i don't have a proper photo-taking setup and i tend to wait for a sunny day to take photos in natural light, so most of the photos are kinda bung having been taken at night and with a flash.  i've tried to colour correct and play around with different lighting to see what would happen, so please bear with me - hopefully this breakdown will still make sense.

i decided i'd kick things off with the sergeant of the next tactical squad, this guy here:


first, is the obligatory chaos black undercoat


then i just bung down the odd base colour, usually the lighter stuff that will benefit from the first wash - bleached bone, sunburst yellow, blood red, boltgun metal, shining gold, goblin green, snakebite leather and bestial brown all make an appearance


which gets applied next, just a liberal coating of devlan mud on the coloured parts, the black doesn't need it obviously


then its working over the main base-colour areas; going over the yellow in this case on the fist, building up the bleached bone on the bone areas, and most importantly painting the blue areas with fenris grey, with some bleached bone mixed in to lighten it and give some preliminary highlights

oh, and at this stage i've washed the base with watered-down black ink.  i mix some blue ink in there, but only because i have it- i don't think it makes any real difference

now the battle damage and iconography - i just tear off a small piece of foam from a blister pack and daub it into some black ink.  i'll wipe it off a bit and then start to just spot random bits of black all over the armour.  for the start of the chevrons on the fist, and the other iconography, i just use a drawing pen to mark out the areas i want to paint black


this is where i thought i'd tried to photograph under a bedside lamp i got.  i since decided i wouldn't any more

then its time to highlight the metal and exposed damage with mithril silver



now the model is close to done;  highlights on the main armour, which for the blue bits is getting a wet bleached bone and feathering it away from the brightest edge of the highlight. the bone parts also take a hit of skull white to further highlight them, as do the yellow chevrons on the power fist


also here, you can see i've gone in and blacked out the areas i marked out with the pen

then its essentially just clean up; all the other areas get touch-ups and highlights, gold parts get a light highlight of mithril silver mixed with shining gold; if its too silver, i just wack some gryphonne sepia on it.  the bone areas get a generous serving of gryphonne too.  the base gets the dry brush treatment with some codex grey, and patches of snakebite leather, which also gets lightly dusted up the leg greaves.


now all that's left to do is to take a proper photo of the finished model



oh, and obviously i've started painting the rims of my bases black now.  i've gone back and done it to all the models in this army so far.  this was due to Luke's criticism that the ground colour i chose was far too similar to that of the model's feet so they tend to get lost in one another - while this doesn't directly remedy the problem i feel it does a lot for making the model look neat at the very least.

[Lazarus]

Black rim on the base always looks better. I have been doing it for a long time with mine.

[nik_]

Step by step is very handy, I'll be applying some of that stuff to my marines when I next get around to putting some paint on them!

[NeckFace]

cheers nick, and i'm keen to see how your marines turn out.  i definitely love what you did with your wood elves

laz, no doubt man. black rims from now on for me.  if i can figure out a quick and easy way to further separate the ground from the marine's feet i'll definitely do it.  maybe a wash of scorched brown or whatever its called

[Lazarus]

Issue is with the dark base with a dark model. You want to try and go light with dark and dark with light to make both the base and model stand out.

Also that step by step is kool i still dont know how they end up so nice. it looks still very messy till the last pic and there we go one kick ass marine.

I will need you to show me how to feather. I need to get some new tricks. Some new Eldar pics will be up 2moro, so you guys can tell me if i have improved still not paint trophy this year i am getting restless running out of ideas to make people go holy shit that's a nice army.

[Sectiplave]

Nice write up! It makes it a heck of a lot easier to try something like this, with a clear picture of how it creates the end product.

It takes creative fore-site to piece together this whole look to begin with. I'm interested to see how I can apply this to some Necron's who have been moldering in tombs for millennia untold.

[Simon]

I quite like the "dirty" painting style with your marines... it is "different".. it looks unusual but retains the "cool" factor..

[NeckFace]

with all those quotation marks i don't know if you're serious or not 

but thanks Simon.

two more tactical marines down, and the drop pod's a few codex grey highlights away from being done.  started compiling lists to prepare the stuff i'll want to use and have painted in time for battlecry if i want to use these guys.

[Lazarus]

i say you will be close to wining painting again once all these guys are together. 

[Simon]

Most of the space marine armies in forums, blogs and gw sites are usually spotless clean, without a single scratch on their armor, boots and tracks are clean like brand new out of the factory...  The worst part is their bright colors, bright red, white, blue.. I think they look cartoonly and unrealistic... I can imagine a hilarious ork army with bright colors... But space marines?!!!  If I'm going to do a space marine army , I will probably do one similar  To yours

[NeckFace]

yeah, that's my perspective to marines as well.  like, i understand the idea of strong bold primary colours and patterning; they're meant to be shock troops, they're meant to show up cause a fuss and stir up a bunch of mayhem. but that shouldn't mean spotless, clean and fresh paint jobs.

i'm wondering about going back and redoing all my dark angels now in a similar fashion.

...all 6000pts of them

[Sectiplave]

I guess in defense of the clean paint job, also in the theme that they are shock troops or the spear head of the attack. Isn't it also just as plausible they have been in transit in their battle barge, and have had the time (Or had the spare servitors available) to clean, repair, respray and buff the snot out of their armour.When they come onto the battlefield so to speak, this is the first time they have stepped off the ship/out of the drop pod/rhino etc.

I guess it suits the shock factor they they arrive on a battlefield, and appear to be transcendent of such things as getting dirty like all the common troops.

I'm not trying to advocate, the all too common, dime a dozen, clean space marine armies, but I can see why people envisage them this way.

It's just as easy to change that freshly deployed theme to a filthy look like this that makes them look like they have been fighting for literally months on end, and there is no real dispute as to which one looks cooler! I think the Dark Angels having dirty and ripped cloaks would look 100% boss! Do it Dave!

[NeckFace]

well its a purely aesthetic thing in the end of the day.  you can argue it in fluff terms till the end of days, but you either like your marines dirty or you like them clean

but while i'm indulging in fluff i like, i always loved that old Rogue Trader story where a bunch of blood angel terminators are about to teleport into a space hulk.  one of them has had to keep the old paint job of a suit that was gifted to the chapter by the ultramarines, as every time a wearer tried to repaint the suit the 'machine spirit' got pissy and the bearer would meet a grissly end.

so they just stripped it back to the old paint job, chipped and scarred as it was.  

man there was some cool fluff

[Sectiplave]

Yeah that sort of stuff is cool, gives the armour more character than the wearer.

Dark Angels WIP thread up next eh?

[NeckFace]

already got one bud

[Lezle]

It is plausible that forty thousand years in to the future someone discovered paint that repairs its-self; or unscratchable paint etc... Dupont, I believe, are developing this sort of technology at present.

But, yes, a refreshing change.

Lezle

[juiced]

paint that repairs itself ..........sou nds like chaos to me , medling in the dark powers will get you shot you know

[wouster7]

School holidays for ya Dave, so you should rock up and show off your pimped marines

[Big D]

paint that repairs itself ..........sou nds like chaos to me , medling in the dark powers will get you chicks you know

Fixed that for ya 

[NeckFace]

School holidays for ya Dave, so you should rock up and show off your pimped marines

yeah, this uni thing is totally awesome.  will try to make it to the club soon

[Tuatara]

No, not a necro thread revive.

Saw them in the flesh (as it were) today for the first time. Dude...they are brilliant.

[nik_]

^^^This

[Vaul]

Voted for Dave best painted, of course he won it as well.  Still think he should paint greek tyle mural freehand pottery artwork into the bases though, ochre/black style.

[NeckFace]

thanks for the kind words folks, and thanks to everyone i rubbed elbows with at Battlecry.  This was an army that was supposed to be a labour of love, and i really just wanted to present to my friends and peers at the event that was my first introduction to the tournament scene and many of the great players we have here in Auckland and abroad.

fair call Luke, it'd be neat to put patterning along the edge of the bases, and with Charlie's comments, I'll see if I can't pimp these little fellas out even more.  and next time maybe I'll try to sub out the unit I have that so far seem to only serve as pin cushions for relic blades

[Lazarus]

Dam you Dave i shake my fist at you. That 3 times now 3 times.