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This is a very interesting log - thank you for posting the links to tutorials that have helped you develope your painting style so far. Strange - I tried some blending last night on an SM's shoulder pad purity seals and quite enjoyed it. Evidently this thread was subconsciously asking me to read it!

Your latest Imperial Fist work is really nice, I think you should be very proud of it. The Ultras are impressive too - I will definitely be trying to work more with blending. Incidentally I had my first try with blacklining the other day too!

Great work, mate - I'm subscribing now.

Ragsta

Wahoooo 3 pages big, I'm gaining on Gitsplitta

Thanks for the comments, very kind, I think I've focused so much on blending and the like that I have completely forsaken techniques such as weathering, damage, blood, gore etc etc. I've not based this one because my basing materials are abit on the thin side, next pay day should see my getting some basing material and some scenery stuff for gaming with. Anyway thanks again for the feedback Neil and making me read up on damage. I went with grey_death's tutorial for battle damage except I used a tatty old brush which i splayed out a bit http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/224015.page I used VGC black grey, then mixed some yellow and white for the bottom highlights. Once that was done I added some black grey to my yellow mix for the top highlights.

I first I thought oh what have I done, but once I'd highlighted it I thought it looked better and then I gave the whole thing a sepia wash - man that is one useful paint to have.

@Ragsta - thanks for the comments mate, look forward to seeing your work, have you discovered the merits of a wet pallet? If not I can't recommend one enough. I made one out of the plastic from a boxset and chopped up a dish sponge.

Well I'm back on with the Eldar now, going with a different theme altogether, not sure where my tastes will take me, but I'm going for a more realistic look as opposed to the bright colours i've been using so far....here goes nothing.

Thanks for the link matey that will def come in handy over the next few days, i researched weathering with powders earlier ,
http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/307631.page#1875708

i found it quite useful especially the forgeworld tutorial link http://www.forgeworld.co.uk/Downloads/Product/PDF//w/weathering-powders.pdf

look forward to seeing the eldar again.

Evening dakka,

It's been a while, I have been doing a lot of painting but haven't really finished anything, so there's a lot of half finished models floating around the house at the moment.
I've also ventured down to my FLGS and played a few games, I have to say despite some bad press GW get, I have been genuinely impressed with how I've been treated by the staff - Thanks Poole GW.

Anyway I've made myself finish a warlock, one of 6 and as always i'd appreciate any C&C. Personally, trying to look at the model objectively I think I went too light on the black highlights and possibly too dark on the brown. As always I've struggled to get the definition I want, I think the feet are a good example. They're two tone - black and bone and yet somehow the line between the two colours is kinda fuzzy.







Oh yeah, I haven't based it yet because I want to base the whole squad together.

I like it, my first attempt at a Eldar army was black and bone for higher up models (warlocks, wraithlords, phoenix lords) and black and white for the lowly models and your model look exactly how I wanted mine to look like I believe I went for blue eyes though

Is the whole army going to be a similar scheme?

Hi Knightley,
I get bored real easy, so at the moment my plan is to paint the whole army the same way, but who knows what i'll actually end up with. I take ages and ages to paint a single mini, which doesn't help.

Here's my WIP jet bikes, do you think they go with the warlock or have I have changed it too much?

The reason these guys are WIPs and I haven't completed them, is because I got really annoyed after applying a Devlan Mud wash over the main carapace.
I had the black to blue transition going on, it wasn't amazing but it was okay, but I thought a wash would help with the gradation lines and I wanted to darken the whole effect, but as you can see from the photos the wash wasn't smooth and now they look blotchy.

I'm currently thinking of ways to fix it, but stripping and starting again seems to be the answer, just not sure if I can face it!

Tell me about it, I once spent 2 weeks on a model from conception to build to paint I never wanted to see another marine in my life. Yet here we are, pursuing a fantastic hobby.

With your jetbikes, it comes down to are you happy with them? personally I believe you have changed the scheme a bit to much going from black to aqua/teal (that's the colour I get from the picture) but the top down shot looks pretty good from a distance.

Hindsight is a superpower we all share I think, the devlan mud wash was perhaps not the best finisher to your scheme. However did you blend/layer normally paint the change from black to blue? you could try a badab black wash then just reapply the major colours to the raised surfaces. Black and blue/teal/aqua and see if that fixes it.

While I'm not proud of my attempts at an Eldar force I figure I'd post a pic of mine so that at least you wont feel so bad about the state of your bikes. This wraithlord was painted by me around 2004 I think and was about the 4th or 5th model I did (you can see Maugan Ra in the background who was the first) so it could get so much worse

So I simplified the paint scheme on this fella which I think helped.
I also went back to using washes, for the shading, which is a little haphazard.

Taking this photo has made me see a few bits that need tidying up, but you can't really see them in real life.

feels like a slightly dumb thing to say, but the gems are really standing out - lovely!

I think going to the school of finnan helped


Thanks for you advice buddy. Next time i'm in Gw I'm going to pick up a purple ink and see what effect that has on the bone.

ooh, purple on bone could be cool. (is now thinking of magnolia flowers: pale cream with a purple centre... hmmm, nice and elfy!)

You're welcome, just glad I could help in an tiny way

So, mostly I've been assembling my army and here it is as things currently stand.

To do
- I've magnetised the weapons on the Wave serpents, but need to magnetise the armour cowling that go around them.

- Finish filling the gaps in the wraithlord's knee and wrist, then add robes.

- Add Armour to first (boring) wraithlord

- Make base for second waveserpent

- Complete Dire avengers (targetters and stuff)

Painting wise, I've stripped the scorpions, again! I'm going to do them Dark grey, nearly black, with the odd orange element.

The warlocks are from when I was going through an Ulthwe phase, to strip or not to strip that is the question...I'm thinking just finish them in the colours I've chosen, as they have no place in my army in the future.

Jet bikes are a bit rough and ready, I just wanted to get those things done. I didn't do a great job of stripping the ones I got off eBay so there's area of roughness, but they're fine for tabletop standard.

My big expense this month was a carry case for these guys - £80 from Kaiser - lots of purpose made waveserpent shapped foam inserts! mmmmmmm

For the wraithlords, I want the one I've converted to have a feminine quality and the other one to be more masculine. I'm going for robes for the girl and armour for the boy, but I need to try and reflect it in the paint job as well, so any ideas are appreciated.

It's nice to finally have a decent sized army to play with - now to find an opponent!

Doh, just realised I didn't attach the photo!

For the wraithlords, I want the one I've converted to have a feminine quality and the other one to be more masculine. I'm going for robes for the girl and armour for the boy, but I need to try and reflect it in the paint job as well, so any ideas are appreciated.

the easiest way to do that is to give the suggestion of breasts under the robes. the hard way would be to paint a very faint image of a female and male face on the head plates.

How goes the painting of your force? or have you been gaming instead?

Greaat work!

So, I finally got a mini finished. I've got plenty of mostly painted mini's lying around but am lacking the motivation to get them finished.
When I have been painting/modelling it's mostly been modelling, building warwalkers and magnetising weapons. After chatting to Nerdfest (thanks for all the advice and encouragement Damo I got my inspiration on and turned my hand to the dire avenger exarch.

Here he is





I'm quite happy with the gems and I quite like the definition i managed to keep, which has been a sticking point for me in the past. I'm not sure about the scheme though, it's a little bit fussy and once again I kinda rushed things at the end, so now I tend to focus on those bits. As always I appreciate any feedback on how I can improve.

Next up a wraithlord. I think it's time I tried something a little different.

After an awesome game against Incurus on sunday - which ended in a draw thanks to my fast moving wave serpent grabbing the objective - i'm feeling motivated to paint so without further ado I gave my wraithlord a pedicure...1.5 hours damn i'm slow.

good to see you back 'fire

Lovely stuff - the Exarch is fantastic. Loving the grey and the orange, really unusual choice of colours, and they work so well together. The spots of blue from the gems give it nice little push as well and add a bit of balance between warm and cold.

again with my semi-stupid compliments, but the knife is really well done (it's all in the details)

I'm not sure you could possibly be slower than me when it comes to painting! lol Liking the feet so far - nice and smooth. Lots of thin layers?

You may be slow - but you are good. I haven't dared pait my eldar yet for fear of all those smooth armour plates and pretty gems

@finnan - The feet are right out of the finnan handbook to painting - lol. I actually had them painted and highlighted but there wasn't enough shade so I re-inked (probably too much) and re-highlighted. Probably why it took me so long to do.

@Weety - awwww thanks man, I still haven't done some backgrounds for taking photos and I always think that I should follow your advice and then I forget - oh and work took photoshop away from me - booo.

Only a little progress last night, got the calves done. I find that this paint is really grainy. I spend most of the time trying to wipe the grains away so I keep wondering if i'm doing anything wrong. I've ordered a bottle of vallejo thinner so when that arrives in a month or 2's time i'll try that to see if it stops the graining. I've noticed it's especially bad when I mix colours. Also it's so streaky when I apply it, but I think that's noticable because I make too big a colour jump. Oh yeah and I got bored painting grey so I did some orange.

At the moment my biggest concern is that i'm going to end up with a really boring model. I'm going to need something to jazz it up, stripes, flames, celtic knots, runes, dare I say battle damage...I'd appreciate some ideas and thought. I've done lots of googling re wraithlords and trawled CMON, every time I see something that looks good I think "Why didn't I think of that?"

That is looking epic Hangy! that's a pedicure I would happily pay and wait for! (well maybe not me but i'd buy it for the gf) what's the plan for decorations then? tough call i'd say as you don't want to cover up or ruin the paintjob you're going to have on the flat panels? maybe give him a tattoo sleeve? of thorns like that other craftworld? or something similar, hmmm the mind ticks!

I was looking in the swap shop today and a guy had a small eldar force for sale pretty cheap but it was too much to send to Australia :-( bugger! but it'd be great to give you more mini's to put aside until you're sixty and can find time to paint them when your daughter leaves home! :-)

any more updates coming soon you think? I finally started painting again this morning but it's taking me a while to get into the swing again and it hasn't even been that long! but I did discover i need new brushes pronto!


Nerdfest09

Runes would look awesome on that model, i don't think stripes would look good though.

The idea of a tatoo sleeve sounds really funky..
Eldar rune tattoo!

As someone who gets mork and mindy to the face on a regular basis -shakes fist at the Wraithlords- I think giving them a bit of individual character would be really good, maybe something 'aspecty' on the helms?

Looks really good though Hang, the legs look great!

Hangfire wrote:Fisting in the name of...

Hello Dakka, it's been a while.

After painting my SS exarch i've been a bit off painting and into learning rules/army lists/tactics and all that good stuff.
I've been really struggling to find my mojo for painting again, so I decided to return to the good ole space crusade minis for some inspiration.
Now the thing I like about the Space Crusade mini is that they're not so detailed, which gives a lot of space to work on blending - take this guys legs as an example.

So here it is, I'd really welcome any feedback on how to improve my highlighting/blending and creating a cleaner look.
I just don't know how I do it, but I always think my painted mini's come out looking not very well defined, which is why i've not yet experimented with any weathering/wear and tear because then my mini's would just turn into blobs of colour and you wouldn't be able to tell if that's an arm, leg, mandible, snotling....

Anyway, as I say I really really appreciate constructive comments, so please if you think "huh he should've done...." then reply

Thanks all

Hangfire

p.s. thanks Neil for the kick up the

hmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm fisties...
Cant be a fisty post with out me saying yummy !!

looking good 'fire

re: jazzing up the Wraithlord... I've kinda had this in the back of my mind for a little while, and I don't know how well it would work due to differences in design, but I like the colour schemes, and the range of colours on them... might be worth a go, or at least having two shades of orange/red on the grey?
(they're from the Anime: Neon Genesis Evagelion in case you're not familiar with them... )

@Nerdfest, new brushes...what you been doing to them? Must be all that extra weight you're pushing, putting too much strain on the brushes perhaps Biel Tan are the thorny ones, Yme-Loc (my guys) like a bit of flame going on. Tatoo sleeve, forgive my ignorance, are they real tatoos or those things you can pull on and off?

@Divine Comedy - by the time i'd walked to work I had pretty much decided glowing runes was the way forward - although that doesn't mean much. As Incurus will tell you I've swapped craftworlds a hundred times on the dreaded walk to work. Although it does help to have someone else suggest it, so it will probably be glowing runes.

@Incurus - I think i'll save the aspect theme for mindy, she's going to get the banshee treatment, although i'm going to need another sword to pull it off. As for individual character - kill marking for the number of defilers it's taken out - oh wait there isn't enough space - lolololololololol lmao

@Tauzor - Noooooooooooo not the overly bright yellow marine...believe or not when I started painting him I wanted it to come out like yours, with a realistic yellow. What colour do you use for your IFs? They look cool as.

@Finnan - Thanks for the picture man, haven't seen any manga since my mate got Guyver on video. That made me think about adding an extra grey or black sooooooooooooo see below.

So to break up the grey I added some black, courtesy of Mr Finnan's piccy. I think the black on the shin is okay, but I think doing it on the thigh was a mistake...what do you think dakka, should I paint over the black or roll with it and get on with highlighting the orange.

Thanks for the comments guys, it's really helping me keep motivated to paint and as Nerdfest points out (a little bit too regularly ) perhaps i'll get this army done before retirement.

It's lookiing great so far.

ooh, I'm liking the black - both on the shins and thighs! It's looking ace.
Any ideas on the colours for the gems? I think I'd be tempted to go for deep reds...
Looking great!

I was thinking of enchanted blue coloured gems...might try a couple and see which I like best.

For now i highlighted some orange. looking back over what I've done so far, i'm not happy with the black, you can see the brush strokes and the gradient layers. I'm not sure how to improve this, am i jumping too quickly between shades? I feel sure i've thinned it enough. Perhaps there's something in my technique that i'm doing wrong.