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I traded for a soulgrinder the other day. I am starting to pull together models for a Daemon army now that it's out. I don't think I'll use the Soulgrinder in the list, but wanted to paint it because it is such a cool looking model.

I just have it primed with the body painted so far. It's taken me about an hour to get this far so the rest should be a breeze. It is painted with Vallejo and P3 paints mainly. I gotta say that the P3 paint is rather nice!

I started out by priming it with Rustoleum Dark Grey Automobile Primer. For the body I first basecoated with Sanguine Base (P3 Paint) then added 50/50 Sanguine Base and Cavalry Brown (Vallejo Model Color). More Cav Brown was mixed until it was straight Cav Brown then I mixed Skorne Red(P3 Paint) in and went to straight Skorne Red. I did a few highlights with Khador Base (P3 Paint) and then did some Khador Red Highlight (P3 Paint). I then mixed a little yellow in to give it a brighter kind of fiery look and did a few highlights in Menoth White Highlight (P3 Paint). It sounds like a lot of work, but as I said before... this only took about an hour. Maybe another 2 or 3 hours and the rest will be finished.


I really appreciate criticism....just don't be mean

I am loving your flesh tones on him.

So... looks great. Keep us posted, and do the same level of pretty with his metals.

so far it looks a little like some cheezy late 80's death metal cover.
which is to say that it looks suitably demonic and... i think 'righteous' is what the kids these days say.

its good but different to how i painted it

I have nothing bad to say about him, looking great so far. Keep it up and you'll have a hell of a good lookin model on your hands.

Very striking skin tones. Can't wait to see the finished product.

That flesh is looking delicious! good stuff!! you may be asked for a tutorial by the time you are done

wow great job on the skin so far, please finish the rest asap!

Better pictures, I guess, but what I see looks very successful.

great looking skin but the mechanical parts of him are a bit dull

I don't think that is criticisable! looks ACE

not sure if it's un-neatness from drybrushing or something, but in the 4th photo it's looks like there's a red glow on the claw. Would add something to the end result if you could do this around all the flesh, it would lok like the flesh really was hot/firey/from the warp.

I'll second the request for a tutorial: how did you do those skin tones? They look really good.

edit: maybe this

I started out by priming it with Rustoleum Dark Grey Automobile Primer. For the body I first basecoated with Sanguine Base (P3 Paint) then added 50/50 Sanguine Base and Cavalry Brown (Vallejo Model Color). More Cav Brown was mixed until it was straight Cav Brown then I mixed Skorne Red(P3 Paint) in and went to straight Skorne Red. I did a few highlights with Khador Base (P3 Paint) and then did some Khador Red Highlight (P3 Paint). I then mixed a little yellow in to give it a brighter kind of fiery look and did a few highlights in Menoth White Highlight (P3 Paint). It sounds like a lot of work, but as I said before... this only took about an hour. Maybe another 2 or 3 hours and the rest will be finished.

is the skin technique? I'm surprised, because the recipe sounds so brown.

I appreciate all the kind comments. I've gotten the model finished. Not totally happy with the end result of the metallics, but it is definitely tabletop level, I think.

Here's a compilation picture of the finished model. Tutorial is below the picture for those that want it. It took about 5 hours total to go from start to finish (not including the cleaning and assembly).







I started off by priming the model with Rustoleum Dark Grey Primer. You can pick this up at any Wal-Mart for around $4. This is the BEST primer I've used in a long time. It goes on real smooth and is almost impossible to get that pebbling that a lot of us have had in the past. I gave it about a day to fully dry then went to work.

I've gotten into mainly Privateer Press P3 Paint and Vallejo Model Color and Game Color recently. I have almost stopped using citadel colors entirely.

For the base coat of the flesh, I used Sanguine base and covered it completely.

From there I mixed 1:3 Cavalry Brown (VMC) & Sanguine Base. I thinned out the paint with water to about 50/50 water and paint. I removed a good portion of the paint off my brush so I wouldn't make it look too sloppy. I then used the side of the brush to run over the body. This left the recesses dark but lighter areas up top. I did this instead of the normal dry-brush method because I wanted it to look a little smoother and what not.

After that, I mixed a bit more Cav Brown into the Sanguine Base... this time about 50/50. I again watered it down as before and went on with the next highlight leaving a little of the previous color showing through.

Next, was pure Cav Brown that was watered down 50/50. Same method as before, but leaving a little of the previous color showing.

Next, I mixed in 50/50 Skorne Red (P3) and Cav Brown and watered it down as before.

Next was straight Skorne red that had been watered down.

When I started getting to the lighter colors, I started randomising where I was putting the highlights so it wouldn't look too uniform (it isn't cloth after all).

After the straight Skorne Red, I mixed in some Khador Red Base (P3) and did the same random highlighting as before.

Next was straight Khador Red Base, then Khador Red Highlight (P3). The Khador Red Highlight is orange, so I used it pretty sparingly so it wouldn't look too cartoony.

To brighten it up a little after that, I mixed in some Cygnus Yellow (P3) and Khador Red Highlight about 50/50 and highlighted the tips of things and a few streaks here and there.

I then went to 3:1 mix of Cygnus Yellow and Khador Red Highlight and did a few more.

This was starting to take some time, so I decided to cut it a bit short so the next was about 50/50 Menoth White Highlight (P3) and the 3:1 mix of Cygnus Yellow and Khador Red Highlight. Next, I used a really watered down Menoth White Highlight. This was probably 5:1 water to paint. I did a few marks here and there on top of the really light colors and voila! You're done! The eyes were just Iosan Green (P3) then Wurm Green (P3) then Necrotite Green (P3) then a small dot of Menoth White HighlightIf done with just using the previous color and just mixing in the next paint, the flesh can be painted in about an hour.

The rest of the model is pretty straightforward, but I used Cold Steal (P3) for the metallics with a drybrush of Old Gold (VMC) then a black wash. The Sword was painted with Coal Black (P3) and the highlights were done by adding more and more Menoth White Highlight to the paint and then a black wash over if to darken the recesses a bit.

Sorry if my tutorial is a bit confusing. My painting style is a bit random and sometimes it is hard to remember exactly how everything went. I could match anything I've painted, but describing it to someone else is another thing entirely!



I'll probably be throwing this guy up on eBay in the next few days, but I'm willing to part with it now if anyone is interested (I'm looking for some more Necrons *hint hint hint*. You can view more pictures at my website at www.battlefieldscenics.com/content/soulgrinder-01

Great stuff. I can see why you're dissatisfied with the metallics; they're well done, but they just pale in comparison to the amazing flesh work you've done. It really captures that flayed look.

I may go back and do some more work on the metallics, but probably not a lot. I thought about doing some kind of effects on the black areas, but haven't decided what to do just yet. I was going to start a Chaos Daemons army, but I've decided to just bulk out my Necrons for now. Apocalypse games have become fairly popular here and there just aren't any cool Necron Apoc armies around here....

My next models to paint will be Epidemius, Skulltaker and a Nurgle Daemon Prince and the Harry the Hammer model. Lots of fun...now time to go back to work and paint more stuff