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Hello, I am rather new to the table top world of Warhammer 40k even though I have been painting these tiny models for over a year now. Currently I have been working on a Grey Knight mixed army and I would like to see some feed back on my painting skills.

The first set of picks is a terminator from the black reach box set. (my first kit) It was done in colors I picked (teal and gold) As you can see not my best work for what it is but at the same time not to bad. It was my first attempt at painting, learning as I went.

The second set is my Grey knight Terminator. After reading up on these guys I started to like the back story and bought the kit for the painting challenge. Any feed back would be great.

Keep in mind I like simple green bases and Rather not have that discussed.

The progress is pretty impressive between the two Terminators. I might recommend washing the gold with Badab and the book with Devlan to weather it a bit. Maybe some 'low lites' of boltgun as well in the recesses and you could add a ton of depth to the model.

How did you do the purity seals? I have been copying the tutorial in the BA WD.

dont stop, go go go go!!!

What I have found works well for gold, is to paint the area with shining gold, then give it a wash of something, and then drybrush some Burnished Gold as a highlight. I like doing a similar thing with my silvers. Start with something darker, like the gunmetal foundation paint(if you have it, I can't seem to find it anywhere), Boltgun, wash, then mithril silver.

I must say though, nice improvement, keep it up.

Good job.

Suggestions; darker recess, don't be afraid of washes, thin your paint...

One technique I picked up which I'll suggest to you, and that is to not paint every part of the surface of your model in your final coat's color. If you are priming black (which I recommend until you are advanced- but white will brighten your model better, but sometimes too much, with Ultramarines I'd prime black.) Do a base coat with a darkened color of what you'll choose as your final coat. For instance if you are painting ultramarines which it seems that you are, I would completely base coat with 3.1 mordian blue and chaos black. After that, I will use mordian blue over all surfaces, but not painting into recesses. For that terminator, I'd leave recesses along armor and other recesses. Finally I'd do high and bright surfaces (those surfaces hit from an overhead light- shoulders, knees, feet, top of arms, hands etc) in ultramarines blue. Next lightly wash the all blue surfaces in blue wash. Finally, I'd use a fine detail brush with 1.1 ultramarines blue, and space wolves blue and hit high and bright areas and hight line your model. See if you can't practice a thiner line with your fine detail brush. Get a piece of paper and just practice practice... using thinner paint helps keeps that fine brush from drying out, which it does too easily.

You'll undoubtedly stumble over other ideas you like, but if you'll like the difference if you keep your recesses darker as in almost black. The mordian blue and black will make it pop.

Finally your paint is too thick. If you watch football I've always used a quarterback analogy. If you throw it long you're never wrong. If your paint is to thin you'll always go over back over with a thicker coat, but not the other way around.

not a fan of the bright red ammo case, darken that red with a black wash. Your Grey Knight looks a touch better imo..

Personally as they stand i prefer the first one, good highlighting on the head and greaves. Think the grey knight needs a bit of shading, as people have already pointed out.

Thanks all for the tips. I started thinning my paints as suggested. You are all correct, The paint thinning may take several coats but does look a lot better.

The most important thing is that you enjoy painting whatever model you go for, and you'll pick up more techniques and refine the ones you have (like highlighting) pretty quick if your enjoying it
Thinning paint takes a bit more time in the long run but makes the end product much better (y)
Practice is the best advice i think lol

Dan

Yeah I am working on Brother Captain Stern. The pic below is a progress pic. As you can see the cloak in my mind came out a lot better than ones I have attempted in the past and also I started off with a base coat of boltgun for the armor. anyways its just a start and nothing too major.

Front


Back


Side

The first Terminator is a decent tabletop standard so you have nothing to worry about.

My only suggestion would be to drill out the gun barrels. Everything looks better with drilled out barrels.

You might want to try use a thin gryphone sepia wash on the robes will make the highlights seem more gradual and add depth to the recessed


Dan

You might also think about trying a dark grey or black primer.