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.

Head-first to the Earth! I've just realised that I never posted my most time-consuming painting project here yet and I thought that since I'm posting the work on my humble Land Raider it would only be fair to post the large Marine here as well.
it's actually a project which I started a year and a half ago but it's still not finished (it did have a several month-long hiatus, mind you).

So to summarize, this is the guy who rekindled the flame of miniature painting, starting with this model, buying an airbrush and compressor and tons of material and it's evolving in having bought an almost entire Blood Angles army which is in the process of being assembled.
I wanted to go all-out on the weathering since I drooled many a time over the Forgeworld painting book...

I'll just get stuck in with posting pics and pics and pics as I've posted this project on some other forae as well and it only seems fair that you get the same amount of photo goodness. As this means I'll not be retyping every step of the painting process (some handy copy/pasting aside), don't be afraid if you want some clarification on techniques used, or materials, or whatever. I'd be happy to oblige.

So, here goes, open wide....



PS: Admins, please don't shoot me for this, normal pic posting will resume as the project is now up-to-date



Materials gathered and some first paint and texture testing









First, an undercoat of black was applied. This was first done with a spay can of Tamiya and then touched up with the airbrush.







Then a light coat was applied consisting of boltgun metal, some metallic medium and Klear. This is not meant to cover the metallic parts but rather provide some metallic patches here and there after the salt weathering. The urge to make a Grey Knight is suddenly tempting...









Next a light coat of rust coloured paint, made from mixing various brown paints (GW and Vallejo), inks and Klear. This is also applied irregularly to provide the rust flaking after the salt weathering process.





For some metallic colours (the gold for the helmet and silver detailing to follow) I chose for something of vallejo, they have metalic pigment paints in an alcohol base. but as alcohol is not very friendly to an airbtush I started by of getting rid of the alcohol and using the silver and gold paste with acryllic thinner to airbrush. A little pot filled with the alcohol paint has been sitting on a shelf since yesterday and is reducing nicely.


In the mean time, time for an Austin Powers quote...

'mmMMm Shalty!'





The red basecoat. A mix of various GW red shades, Vallejo red shades, Klear and Vallejo thinner.

Candy anyone?









First highlights. I gently sprayed two separate and gradual highlights on some parts of the model, adding some yellow and a tiny bit of yellow to the red mix. Finally I gave some parts a soft touch with pure white to gain some more contrast. As I thought and anticipated, this made the colour a bit faded and pinkish so I gave the model a sprayed red wash to enhance the depth of the red and then finally a gently yellow wash on white-highlighted parts to transform the pink shine into a soft yellow shine. This is a small shortcut to avoid having to use half a dozen or more red/yellow mixes. Also, because the model is so large it does not need large and harsh highlights. A lot of weathering still to follow.






Highlights on the rest, as you can see, some salt blew away during the airbrushing but this doesn't matter, they give some depth to the red as further highlighting and the washes faded them out a bit.

I'm quite happy with the effect, but I wonder if I might not touch up some areas with red again...












I got a good solution for the perfect gold colour, the idea came from giganticdark over at Coolminiornot.
Vallejo has a gold pigment is an alcohol solution. Alcohol's not too friendly to the airbrush so to be able to use I poured some into a tiny cup so it could settle and let the alcohol evaporate over the course of a day or two.
Then I scooped the gold sludge into an airbrush jar, mixed it with acryllic thinner and voilà, almost true gold colour. I used it for the helmet and will be used for other detailing too. The cool thing is that you can actually polish the stuff by gently rubbing it. One I removed the salt I'll up some more pics.

The gold paint came out a bit too thick though on the first run, hence the odd texture the helmet has now. I'll rub that down and add some more thinned layers of gold to lessen the contrast from the chipped weathering. The shine is also very difficult to capture on camera. It really has a very nice shine and feel to it to see in person.

I'm currently still updating the red a bit too, the top of the shoulder pad was a bit too peppered indeed.
I got a full way ahead of me for weathering. Dry-sponged chips, oil paints for rust, panel lines and oil stains, weathering powders, graphite weathering (pencil)...










The Helmet after some extra sponged on weathering, followed by a misted on, thin coat of gold again and then a prayed on wash of some Burnt Umber-like brown ink wash, heavily thinned with Klear and some light touches of a similarly thinned yellow/brown ink. One this is dry, it's ready for some subtle highlighting and then it'll be time for thinned oil paints and some weathering powder.






The rest of the model received some sponged on weathering with a dull metal mixed colour as well as some Bolt Gun chipping. The paints were put in a very small porcelain tray I use as palette and was only used when decently dried to an almost sticky consistency, then I used some small sponge, actually, just the little sponge/foam thingy you find in each model blister, cut to size a bit. then dip it slightly and dab it off on some cloth until almost fully dry and the I went to work.

Backpack







Torso






Legs








Shoulder Pad







Arms








I especially like this photo, taken with a very short shutter time, looks almost like you might find in a display case in a dark exhibit somewhere...




Here's some progress on the marine. I don't want to take it too fast as I'm waiting for some clear waterslide print paper I've ordered do I can add some custom made decals to the armour so they can get covered by further weathering.

What's happened since last time:
-I highlighted the bottom edge of almost every chip on the armour, adding a very subtle sense of more depth.
-Coated the model with light coat of sating varnish to provide a smooth layer for the oil paints. The coat also helps to tie the highlighting colour graduations together, smoothing the overall effect.
-Then I mixed some black oil paint with a good amount of thinner, in this case modeling odourless turpentine; and I carefully applied it to the armour lines and details. The cool thing with the oil paint is that you can casually and carefully wipe away and smooth and smudges you make. The thinned oil paint is incredible when applied to grooves as the oil/turpentine mix on the varnish undercoat literally draws itself into the grooves like an alien symbiote.
Sadly I overmixed the black with just a little too much turpentine so the pigment is not 100% evenly spread.
That can easily be rectified though with just a second pass with a different mix.
Also, some detailing needs to be smoothed out a bit.(the chest eagle for instance). Luckily oil paint is great at that. I painted the model yesterday evening and now it's been tough-dry since a long while and I can still easily manipulate the paint with some cloth or a dry drybrush. Hard parts can always be softened up by first gently misting on some turpentine with the airbrush.

The use of the oil paint also gave a very soft sheen to the surfaces but that will be gone after the next steps.

Once I receive the decal paper I'll seal the oil paint with another light coat of varnish to be able to work with the decals and water-based materials instead of oil-. After the decals have been placed and sealed I can continue with further weathering, adding rust and oil stains/smears.




















I've done some small paint test on my test-cardboard to try something out for the eyes. On the cardboard the eye is a little under double the size of the actual eye but I think i could pull it off. Next to it is some small screen test to see what might be possible on the little arm monitors on his left arm.

The two pics of the helmet are done with Photoshop, just to try it out how it looks.






The first pic was indeed more the look I want to achieve rather than the first one.

The thing I wanted to convey is that his HUD just visible behind the glass of the lenzes. I think right now it's an OK idea but it's perhaps a tad too busy (the little dots and markings). Perhaps I'll try applying more glazes of green on the test cardboard, building up layer by layer to fade it out and give it more depth. It's still in testing stages and I'm not going to put something so drastic on the miniature before being absolutely sure that it has the desired look. But still it was a good start even if I do say so myself.

In the meantime some slow progress. I received the waterslide inkjet print paper and oh boy, this opens up perspectives. The preliminary results were satisfying, considering my printer is 10 years old... I scanned a decal sheet at high res, blew up a Blood Angels insignia and after two testprints the third one was the right size. The print came out a bit crackled. I don't know if this is due to the age of my printer (but recent cartridges) or just due to the nature of the paper, i'll have to test that on another printer. The best would eb laser printing but I'd need laser-specific waterslide paper then.

After the print, I needed to seal the decal with some satin varnish spray to make it waterproof and then I went to work with Micro Sol and Micro Set and the result is pretty satisfying, considering it's the very first time I'm using home-made decals. Right now some edges are still visible but after some more treatments with Micro Sol will sove this. then i can continue with the weathering.

Oh, and ignore the glossiness of the decal at the moment that will be gone after another coating of satin varnish before doing further weathering.

Also I shot some comparison shots so you can truly appreciate the size of this thing.

Bloody Magnificent! The dark shadowy one looks CGI.

Some slight progress on the shoulder pad. I misted on an extra layer of yellow to strengthen the colour a bit and fade out the cracks slightly. Then I highlighted almost all the cracks by hand, just some of the yellow mix I made for airbrushing, a big drop of Vallejo skull white, a few drops of Vallejo retarder (handy!!) and a few drops of Vallejo thinner. Next up is an oil paint treatment to dirty up the cracks and it'll also deepen and dirty the yellow.




The cracking was done with this crackle medium I found in a local arts store, it's a cool thing to work with. It's a one-layer application so you paint your undercoat, let dry, paint on a layer of the crackle medium and let dry. and then between 0.5 and 3 hours you paint on the top layer. the thicker the layer, the bigger and larger the cracks, the thinner the layer, the smaller and more numerous they are. But one the crackling starts, which is very fast, if you paint on more paint, that does nothing and even stops the crackling process that was going on. So the coat hàs to be applied in one solid go...
Therein lies the difficulty with airbrushing yellow over a dark undercoat. (Damn the universe for making yellow translucent!) I was forced to layer on the paint relatively thickly in order to have a covering coat of yellow but thinly enough to have an interesting crackling pattern. It's quite exciting to have such a random process taking place in front of your eyes. You lay on the paint and then within a minute you see this little cracks starting to open and spread over the surface like a virus and the final result is out of you control really...
^_^










And as of those who are curious how I take the pictures. Here's are some declassified photo's of my highly advanced and professional light box and camera studio. ^_^





But now that you've seen it, I'll have to, of course, kill you. To prevent the technology from spreading, you know how that goes...


The yellow pad received a treatment with unthinned Burnt Umber oil paint. I just painted it on thickly so it covered the entire surface, let it rest for a few minutes and then start gently wiping it off using some soft paper towel and finally some soft cloth, gently bringing out the yellow again, almost polishing it but never applying firm pressure. The goal was to leave the brown in the cracks as well as enhance the yellow subtly. The large cracks came out a bit bare here and there so I touched that up with some burnt umber, thinned to the consistency of an ink. I let it set for a while and finally I took a small flat brush, slightly damp with turpentine and one by one cleaned up the edges of all the cracks.







The left pad received a light coating of satin varnish. Then a very light sponging treatment of red and one of boltgun metal. The crackling on the icon is actually just from the printing (old printer) but I like the effect, it suits it.








The helmet received a light dry-sponging of boltgun metal and a very, very light one with some black here and there. I've also started painting out the ear pieces, mouth piece and 'cheek-tubing' or whatever that is.









Next up is fixating the lot with some satin varnish and then the blackening of the detailing where needed. I'll fixate the shoulder pads at this stage too and then switch the masking to I can start work on the shoulder pad rims, they're going to both black I think. Also his left knee will be black and the skulls I'll make copper.


Gooo Mono-thread! lol :vryhppy:

All parts received a light coat of satin varnish and then detail parts were painted. The coat of varnish is necessary because of the oil paint. If I painted on directly, the acryllic paint wouldn't hold neatly on the oily surface.
Metallic parts and details were given a slightly thinned black undercoat and will be drybrushed later on or left black. The tubing and joint parts received a coat of Vallejo 'Dark Rubber' paint (from their Panzer Aces range), which provides a nice undercoat for some inks, to slowly build up the colour to a dark, rubber-like effect. Some parts are not a full 100% covered as i didn't want to risk touching the red parts, but in this case a full 100% covering into every nook and cranny of this tubing wasn't necessary. Some parts won't even be visible on the finished model and in general all details will receive several layers of inks and weathering anyway.























The shoulder pads and legs received masking. I used Tamiya masking tape and plain common low-tack masking tape you'd use when painting rooms and such. These are now ready to receive basically the same buildup as the red parts. This means; metallic & rust undercoats, salt treatment, black coat+highlights and manual paint weathering.






Cheers guys! Yeah, I'm really treating this thing with care. It's a bit too cool and expensive just to 'wing it'. The main ingredients are actually just patience and persistence as none of the used techniques are actually that difficult. :vryhppy:
Just a bit different from 'normal' 28mm painting tht one would use on prepping armies and such but they can very will be applied to 'presentation' models or just to add some extra character to special units.

As for the salt, yeah that was a bit of a 'safety thickness'. On the trials on the piece of cardboard (first post) I used a more varied mic, but the too fine bits were creating a sort of permanent texture and I wanted to avoid that at all costs on the Marine. For the shoulder pads I've already grounded some new rock salt down to good consistency in a pestle.

Which brings me to the pics, I gave them a metallic undercoat and then a rough rust coloured covering here and there. ready to receive the hair spray and salt...











Onwards & upwards!

The salt is on, so is the black paint.
I already washed it off, but as I suspected the bared metal/rust of the chips has too much contrast with the black. A light layer of misted on black will be needed. it's pretty amazing how well the masking tape holds up to being held under streaming cold water for several minutes while being brushed upon...
I'll post some pics tomorrow.

In the mean time, gone be the salt!









And some work on the metallics on the helmet, just some drybrushed Boltgun Metal.








In the meantime, the tape got stripped after some light misting on of black.
Next up will be the copper, gold, and silver details (some more tapin' and sprayin') and then it's on with the weathering.

I've posted a few pics with different lighting. Sunlight was fading outside and it weren't the best of conditions...












I finished prepping the parts for the next fase, the large golden details.

I've used masking tape and even tried some aluminium foil. The purplish stuff is Humbrol masking fluid, which I used for the fine edges.

I've prepped some paint for the airbrush. Two tints of gold, the Vallejo Green Gold and - Old Gold. I let the alcohol evaporate in a small smooth bottle cap, scooped the paste into a paintbrush jar and added acryllic Vallejo thinner. It produces a good sprayable paint like this.

The details that are still red will first receive a thin rusty undercoat before I apply the gold.






I actually sprayed on the 'Green Gold' yesterday, looking spiffy I must say but it needs a second layer as I had a serious case of airbrush clogging... One little lump of gold paste that didn't dissolve well in the thinner blocked the paint flow at the airbrush's needle head halfway though the spraying. Took me frickin' 20 minutes to clean, which basically means partially disassembling the airbrush and trying to get a miniscule lump of paint out of a nozzle that's even tinier and finer than àny household item you can think of (yes even those ultra-fine pins used for cloth and clothing). So basically I made sure the airbrush was as clean as possible, reassembled it and then spent 10 minutes of continually spraying with a little pot of water attached, continually moving the needle/valve open and closed, with the airbrush's needle pushing out the tiniest amount of the tiny paint lump through the valve, wipe, repeat... until after 10 minutes water started spraying again. Victory!

I then boldly continued only to be clogged again within a minute... Less severe this time so I was able to finish, albeit with about a half-power spray due to partial blockage. The little pot of green gold I bought apparently is a lot older than the 'Old Gold' I used for the helmet, so the pigment paste is a lot lumpier. Very tiny lumps that don't easily dissolve while shaking the paint pot. They're barely noricable but that airbrush needle is incredibly tiny as well...

Due to these issues the first layer is not that solid at the moment. But as I also seemed to have forgotten the salt weathering (Curse you unbridled enthusiasm!). So the lumpy fumble actually gave me the opportunity to be able to lightly sponge on some weathering before I'll apply the second layer today. It should produce a similar weathering effect as the salt technique.

By the time I was finished yesterday it was already getting dark so I took the pics today.

I've also remasked the lower right leg today as that brass detailing almost slipped my mind.









First off, some dry-sponging of a mix of vallejo paints
1 part Tinny Tin (I kid you not) (Like GWTin Bits, but better consistency)
2: Yellowish Rust (GW, dunno, some dark flesh, leathery colour)
2: Track Primer (GW dunno, some very dark stony grey, almost black)
1: Smokey Ink (GW dunno, blackish ink with a subtle brown shine)





Another layer of the Green gold misted on, juggling the spray consistency like juggling wet cats because of the sticky paint consistency; Turned out ok though, the paint seems to be lying on thicker in the pics due to the lighting.
After that I airbrushed on a layer of thinned GW yellow was, thinned with some Vallejo thinner and Johnson Klear.
After that a thin misted wash of the leftovers of the yellow ink with some more GW Rust brown ink to an almost 1/1/1 mix of the previous yellow mix/rust brown/Klear. Again, the effect is a lot more subtle and playful on the real model than photo.

Aaaaand I stripped it and oh boy, spending hours of meticulously applying tiny bits of masking tape with tweezers sure pays off.
Also, masking fluid is one kickass substance, with a toothpick you can carefully apply it in every nook and cranny and it comes off so cleanly it can make grown men cry...
I can only detect two microscopic spots on the whole of the thing that need a tiny touchup...














Now all the big stuff is done, the small metallic details are going to be painted in by hand and then they'll receive an oil paint wash. After that I can go to work with the weathering powders, which will be a first for me...
I'll also use the masking fluid to outline the razor wire line around the red shoulder pad before carefully painting it golden bronze.


On a whim



It's been kinda slow but...

Here goes, the sun finally came out and the rain stopped so I could take some decent pics.

Never mind the light dust here and there, the parts get a regular cleanup, especially before painting.

















Automatically Appended Next Post:

So what's been done in the mean time:

Gold Detailing

-The gold detailing received a wash of heavily thinned black oil paint.
-The wash turned out a tad too dark for my liking so after it dried I 'polished' the metalic detailing using a soft cloth damp with odourless turpentine to brighten it up a bit.
-Then I gently rubbed on some gold paint again with my finger.
-The effect being a bit too subtle and not applicable on the small detailing I went to work with a small drybrush.
-After that I took a very fine brush and applied some thinned smoke/black ink in the detailing to bring out small elements.
-Then I gently blend-highlighted the details with some more gold paint.

Boot Rims
-I dry-sponged on some Boltgun Metal but the combination with the red produced a bit of a too faded effect.
-So I applied a wash of the same smoke/black thinned ink.
-After that some more dry-sponging of Boltgun Metal.

So now I guess that all that needs to be done is to apply some weathering powders here and there and use some soft graphite (4B pencil) to accentuate the metalic edges.

Whaddayathink guys?













I just couldn't resist...










Here are some more decent pics, made in daylight, in my high-tech photo studio.












Wehey! The promised progress. I airbrushed some Graveyard Earth and some Vallejo green, followed by a brown and a black wash, both heavily thinned down with Klear.

Oh, and I see i still have to replace all the old broken pic links, consider that to be done over the following days.






And also two shots of a side projects I'm working on. ^^
The second pic is on a 15 second shutter time to try and capture the glow-in-the-dark paint. But of course this makes the image of rather poor quality. in real life it's a lot more impressive.







And as Jack Bauer would say, from now on: "Events occur in Real-Time"

wow...I got nothin...wow

Ok I have had a few seconds to get over being dumb founded, and your work deserves more than wow. Very nice work all the way through. It very different to paint stuff on the larger scale when you have been doing the smaller figs for so long ( at least for me any way) stuff you can get away with on the small guys sticks out like a turd in a punch bowl on big stuff and the other way round. I really like all the maskin and steps you put in so we can see the process, thank you very much for sharing this. Crazy cool stuff there man.


ok back to being dumb founded...wow

Epic. Thats all I can think of at the moment

Major props on this thing!

That is truly epic. You have really done that model justice

wow, didnt expect so many pics! I think you could do without most of them but still thumbs up for your efforts.

You actually airbrush in the house? You must be single.

Speechless. The individual parts look stunning in and of themselves, but when I saw the dry-fit of the whole Marine my jaw just dropped!

Wonderful, wonderful work!

L. Wrex

I think I just wet myself :(

Oh my lord. I must see this when it's done.

Incredible. Simply Incredible.

I am not worthy / drops to knees

I'm speechless, it's amazing. You have considerable self control and great self control when it comes to planning out each step. I'd have the idea for each color scheme, but end up skipping one or two to get things done.

Ok, wow. Just wow. Thanks for the in depth painting tutorial and WIP shots. Great stuff.

My pants. They need changing.

Holy Carp.

Pardon my language.






HOLY fething gak ON A BISCUIT.

+1

Very nice. LOVE the salt-weathering.

Thanks for all the great responses guys! But it's not finished yet!

I'm planning to get some more done on the last bits today or in the weekend at the latest. Starting on the base really spurred me on to get him finsished. I just have to be careful not too rush the base and details to much so they don't stick out too much when I put everything together.

Oh, and I don't exactly airbrush ín the house, I have a rather large door that opens up to the terrace, I direct the spray outside. Of course this means no airbrushing during the dead of winter. ^^ And the airbrush was bought as a therapeutic tool àfter the divorce, not before. Life takes weird twists and turns...

Are you planning on entering this into any contests?

This is inspiring and informative. Wonderful work!

Mind = blown.

Cheers guys! I'm glad you're liking it, it makes the effort worthwhile.

skbak wrote:Are you planning on entering this into any contests?

Well, I thought about it but the scene is not thàt big here in Belgium and I'm clueless about the timeframes of competitions abroad to be honest...

Holy good God Meph!!! That is one hell of an impressive Marine you have there!

Speechless...

I think, you just, removed my will to paint ever again!

So good, just so, so good.

That is a massively impressive piece, well done. However I can't stop thinking that the pose he is in is much more suited to playing a guitar rather than a bolter

Flinty my boy, I do believe you're onto something!

OP: This is just jaw-dropping awesome, I wish I had one of these guys!

Flinty wrote:That is a massively impressive piece, well done. However I can't stop thinking that the pose he is in is much more suited to playing a guitar rather than a bolter

POWER STANCE!!!

Also fantastic work, has been bookmarked now for future reference with salt weathering and cracking medium.