Highlighting black?

Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you:

No adverts like this in the forums anymore.
Times and dates in your local timezone.
Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance.
Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely.
Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net.

If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

**romeo.lima**

How would you go about highlighting black power armor, as in the case of Black Templars? I was thinking this: Chaos Black basecoat, first stage of Adeptus Battlegrey, second stage of Codex Grey, final stage of Fortress Grey.

I was also wondering if skull white could be applied onto the top of that for white sections of the armor.

What do you guys think?

**JSK-Fox**

If you want white, do a white basecoat, and add black where it is needed. The highlighting looks good to me though.

**Necros**

I drybrush all my highlights. For black I just use space wolf gray and that's all. I use a teeny bit of paint and grind it into an old brush and rub off as much as I can then I go back and forth over the area real fast so it's like dusting the paint onto the model.. it picks out the highlights and leaves other surfaces near it a dusty & dirty look.

But if I want to paint along the edges for a cleaner look I use shadow gray, then 50/50 shadow gray & space wolf gray, and straight space wolf gray for the brightest spots. I like the slight blue tint that shadow gray and space wolf gray have, they're really the only 2 gray colors I ever use.

**Remjin**

Personally, I add black ink to bleached bone and layer it in real light. Black seems to work best with less highlighting rather than more.

Another method I've seen used well was to gloss varnish on black in thin coats to keep it very smooth, and you get a very neat light effect that way and it keeps that deep black.

Another option is to just highlight the brights, skipping all the layers, since you'll lose most of your black color that way. Just a few edges here and there, that sort of thing.

Black is that odd enigma of painting, in my mind. Its hard to do well, none of the usual methods really apply well, and less is often more. The more you paint on it, the less black it will be.

**romeo.lima**

Hmmm. Very interesting. I'll try them all out and see how each one works. Thanks!

But now for another question. How would you do the "chipped paint" effect on black armor? When my Marines used to be darkish red, this was achieved quite simply by painting small streaks of chaos black and highlighting the bottom edge with lighter reds. The concept remains the same for almost every other color (replacing the highlight color with whatever is appropriate, of course), but considering how you don't get any darker than black, how is this achieved?

**Serj**

romeo.lima wrote:How would you do the "chipped paint" effect on black armor? When my Marines used to be darkish red, this was achieved quite simply by painting small streaks of chaos black and highlighting the bottom edge with lighter reds.

Well, really the streak of black you were doing would represent the primer under the chipped paint. Maybe use codex grey instead as if to represent grey primer. Then, instead of using a lighter version of your armor color, use chainmail.

**Winter**

Use Boltgun metal, and a bit of fortress grey underneath it, and that will simulate chipping back to the bare metal.

Should have the desired effect your after.

**Kroothawk**

For black cloth the following works:
Base colour Charadon Granite, then a strong wash with Badab Black.