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Hello everyone here on DakkaDakka, I am AZ, as I'm sure you could tell from the user-name. Anyway, I have recently gotten into the world of Warhammer 40k...well not "recent" persay. I found out about the whole shabang a good 3 years ago and immediately fell in love with it. I already knew the stories and factions due to my addiction of Dawn of War on the computer. I inquired within a Games Workshop and was blessed with the purchase of a large Tyranid box set. I was a little blown away, there were so many pieces, combination's, possibilities in colors, bases, practically everything. I spent a good 2 weeks learning how to put the little buggers together, which isn't very hard, but it was my first time! After most of the figures were done, I had to pack them all up and go back to America. I was visiting London at the time for fa--never mind. I got back to America, but school kicked it...joy, so the figures went unloved for a good while. To hurry the intro along, I got them out 3 weeks ago, fell in love AGAIN, and now I have found my way here.

Now, the actual purpose of this topic is to hear the opinions and helpful criticisms from the users of this site. I have actually started to paint my little Tyranids and was hoping to hear what people think. I chose a color scheme that was out of the codex, a transition from a dark blue to light, almost neon pink on the limbs.

I would like to remind the fellow readers that this is my first painted figure EVER, so be gentle...





Terribly sorry for the poor picture quality, I dont have a nice camera.

After I completed that one, I moved to my current project, a Tyranid Warrior, wanted to do something a bit bigger.





Still have a bit of work to do, but so far I like it.

Anyway, the floor is open. I'd love to hear what you think and some hints or ideas on how to improve. Color, bases, anything really!

for a noob as you practically named yourself you´ve done a pretty good job. you used for my part a good combination of colors and you let them blend softly into each other. the shooty weapons of the warrior i gather you will do in time? they are black and they produce kind of a colorhole against the model^^.
as for the base, well i don´t now where your nids are fluffwise living, this would determine what kind of basejob you might want. and one thing about the scythclaws of the warrior...do something with the pure "whitness" although they are a good counterpart to the darker blue red and purple i recomend to add some darher highlighting... only soe brushstrokes of brown or bleached bone...
also it would be nice if you made up some fluff about your force...always nice to read these things....

good luck and have fun.

p.s. i have ablog of my own but i wont link it as not to hijack the thread^^(SMs and nids)

For a first model that's pretty awesome! your blending is a good start, and the bone provides a great contrast to the dark skin and carapace. But you should get some washes. They provide depth and shading and make the model look more realistic.

I actually really like the approach, I have never seen nids done in this type of scheme. Also love the nod to original stealer colors too.

Your skill will develop, but being creative like this is not something everyone has, pro level or not. I see great things in your hobby future!

For your first model thats great! Some people paint for years and cant do any better.

Its good to paint the base after you put gravel and stuff on them, but before you but the grass on. Dont paint the grass! lol

Yea as munch said, get some washes for the claw bits. Black or brown would be good.

Keep it up! Painting squad by squad is a good way to get things moving.

Good color choices, blending could use some work but what you have would be a step above newcommer standards.

For your pics (and Im not the best person to give advice out on this) maybe try some natural sun light. Might translated for better pics without a reall fancy camera.

Do some researching into wash techniques and it would really bring these bugs to life.

@Viktor-Thanks, compared to some of the stuff I see on this site, I was just shocked that someone actually thinks that these are good to an extent. Yes, the weapon will be done, it's a bit of a wip at the moment. For the claws, it is in Bleached Bone, but perhaps I'll water down some Scorched Brown to give it a more worn look. As for the story, I think I'll get my army up and running before I get into their history.

@Munch-Good to hear that you like them. Sadly, I only have Necron Abyss and Asurmen Blue for washes (dont get me wrong, they work wonderfully for the color scheme), but I suppose I could always water down some Liche Purple for the transition on the arms.

@Major-Always nice to know someone, somewhere, believes you'll make it

@Newt-Yea, I knew that people painted the gravel and bases, but that completely skipped out of my mind until after the model was painted and the gravel glued on. It looks okay though in my opinion. Thanks for the complements.

@1-Not a bad idea, perhaps for the next set I'll see if the sun wont make a better source of light.

Actually, if you can get your hands on an airbrush, your scheme begs for it! after you get the blue and pink down, a purple wash and boom, you are 90% done!

I might need to invest in one, it would be incredible to have!

Wow, that's some really nice colour blending. I remember seeing that scheme, it was in the 4th edition codex, right? I thought it looked good and tried it, but I couldn't pull it off. You seemed very impressed with my conversions on my blog thread, but I can assure you you're my superior at blending paints - that kind of smooth transition is something I've never managed to get right.

I'll be sure to watch this blog with interest, I'm looking forward to seeing what you come up with.

Wow, thank you so much, it's always a pleasure to get a response like that from someone you admire as a fellow artist.

I love the colour sheme you got dude! The dark to lighter colours work really well. It's a great first model, only criticism I can give in this stage is that you build up your bone colours with a few more layers. Try begin layering with some darker brown colours from the "arm" and blending out to more and more bone colour as you get longer out to the tip of the talon.
I hope this helps with something. I'm not the best in the world at explaining though.

Terribly sorry for the lack of updates, school is really killing me. In fact, I've only been able to finish up the Warrior. Enough of my personal life, here are some pictures.



Dear lord I need a better camera...




I tried to give it a more personalized base, all I added was a Ripper, but at least it's different. I'm also painting the trim of all my bases purple.

Focus, its needed.


Again pic taking advice from a bad, but improving pic taker, try a white backdrop to the picture. Its easy, stand a white piece of paper up behind the model.

What your camera has fucused on in these pictures is the paint behind the model, thus leaving the bug fuzzy.

Id like to see the color work done but the lack of focus is making it very hard to see.

For makrophotography i recommend this thread here:

http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/317430.page#1993388

should solve any problems at all...

i´m guessing it looks pretty cool, mainly when things get sharper^^ the highlights are pretty cool...

more^^

Yea, the pictures are horrible, but I'll see if I can't get better ones posted later today.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Ha ha! I actually have some good photos now, was able to get a hold of an iPhone for a bit, so here are the improved pictures.







I took them outside, Im sure 1-i will be pleased.
Also, after some thinking, I have ordered some airbrushes for painting, can't wait to see how they come out using them. Thank you MajorTom11 for the suggestion.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Would anyone also have any ideas on how to make the bases more unique?

Well I finished another Tyranid, just trying to try out different units.





Here is my small army as it stands at the moment.

Looking really nice.
While I like the way the light colour of the talons contrasts with the rest of the model, I do think they look like they could use a bit more depth. I'd suggest using a couple of layers of Delvin Mud, or maybe Gryphone Sepia around the tops of the talons, where they join to the hands.

Still in awe of your blending - can't wait to see what you can do once you get a little practice with an airbrush.

As far as bases go, some of the plastic plants you can buy for fish tanks do a great job as weird alien plants, so that might be sometihng worth looking into. and you can get quite a lot of plastic plants for not much money.

Why is the ripper going the wrong way?

Good pics man, really shows the work you put into the paint job.

Yeah, Cod has a point about the talons.

Cod- I did think of that at one point for the talons, and I might go back and do that. Sadly, the only real brown I have at the moment is Scorched Brown (I have a very limited range of paints). I have a Vermin Brown somewhere, but it shows up too metallic and shiny. I'll see how the Scorched works out.
1-i- Aha, the rippers only going that way because I wanted it to seem that the lesser creatures of the swarm seemed to be radiating from a certain point or a place with a stronger Hive Mind. Also, I couldn't fit the damn thing under the Warriors body directly in front of it for some reason XD

AZ2612 wrote:Cod- I did think of that at one point for the talons, and I might go back and do that. Sadly, the only real brown I have at the moment is Scorched Brown (I have a very limited range of paints). I have a Vermin Brown somewhere, but it shows up too metallic and shiny. I'll see how the Scorched works out.
1-i- Aha, the rippers only going that way because I wanted it to seem that the lesser creatures of the swarm seemed to be radiating from a certain point or a place with a stronger Hive Mind. Also, I couldn't fit the damn thing under the Warriors body directly in front of it for some reason XD

Your paint sounds like it's too watery. Watery paint makes things look shiny and glossy. Hae you tried shaking it up for about a minute? And if that doesn't work, scorched brown will do in a pinch.

Munch- I thought it was that at first too, but it just turns out that some of my paints are a tad too old, so Vermin Brown is out, but I'll try the Scorched.

Well, I haven't uploaded anything in a while, so here are some recent figures that I've completed. First up is a Genestealer

Had to change the color scheme a bit, nothing much, just more dark colors/washes



Hehe, I love the little veins they have on their heads.

Also, I finally got off my ass and did a bit of mass production, now I have a little army of Gaunts ready to die for the Hive Minds existence.



It was only until I was finished with this group that I realized a horrible reality. In my youth, I was unaware of my actions which would lead to some hard times in the future. The action that has shown it's ugly head today is that when I made these long ago, I used lot's and lot's of different guns and parts for Genes and guns for Gaunts. Tecnically, I don't even have enough of the same "type" to have a brood. This means I'm either going to have to go back and take apart and cut up all the models I have already made, redoing them with the right equipment, buy more models, or not actually play a game and just paint the little suckers.

On a good note however, I have just received my airbrushes. I'll be learning how to use them and have a practice model hopefully by the end of next week. Not sure if I have all I need to jump right into it, but I might as well try!

Also, as many of you have been suggesting, I will go back to my previous models with large claws and start to gradually use a dark brown to the tip of Bleached Bone.

AZ2612 wrote:Munch- I thought it was that at first too, but it just turns out that some of my paints are a tad too old, so Vermin Brown is out, but I'll try the Scorched.

Well, I haven't uploaded anything in a while, so here are some recent figures that I've completed. First up is a Genestealer

Had to change the color scheme a bit, nothing much, just more dark colors/washes



Hehe, I love the little veins they have on their heads.

Also, I finally got off my ass and did a bit of mass production, now I have a little army of Gaunts ready to die for the Hive Minds existence.



It was only until I was finished with this group that I realized a horrible reality. In my youth, I was unaware of my actions which would lead to some hard times in the future. The action that has shown it's ugly head today is that when I made these long ago, I used lot's and lot's of different guns and parts for Genes and guns for Gaunts. Tecnically, I don't even have enough of the same "type" to have a brood. This means I'm either going to have to go back and take apart and cut up all the models I have already made, redoing them with the right equipment, buy more models, or not actually play a game and just paint the little suckers.

On a good note however, I have just received my airbrushes. I'll be learning how to use them and have a practice model hopefully by the end of next week. Not sure if I have all I need to jump right into it, but I might as well try!

Also, as many of you have been suggesting, I will go back to my previous models with large claws and start to gradually use a dark brown to the tip of Bleached Bone.

First off, those look spectacular! Second, you don't need to cut up your nicely painted models, or buy more just yet. You could proxy them. Just take a peice of paper and write what guns the brood has, so your opponent knows what is what.

Thanks, glad to here you like them. I suppose I could, I'll have a think about it and see where the future takes me.

I like the color scheme, I haven't seen it anywhere else. Good work

Still looking good.