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.
So for a D&D game i'm making myself a miniature of my character, i've gotten a few different options put together but for each of them I would like the sort of "standard" lighter alligator belly. compared to the darker green/black/brown of the upperside
So for GW paints the whole body will be painted in "Death world forest", the thicker scales across the back and shoulders being in "Caliban Green", with individual scales randomly painted in "rhinox hide" and "Elysian green". Using a combination of "Athonian Camoshade" and "Agrax earthshade" as a wash. I'm undecided on whether to drybrush or highlight with these so any suggestions would be welcome.
The meat of my problem is that I would like a smooth transition between the underbelly colour and the "Deathworld forest", but all the techniques on feathering, layering, wetblending, and whatnot are between similar colours rather than between something as different as an ivory colour and green. Will these techniques work, or work as well in this situation with the two dissimilar colours?
As an additional aside, which would work best as the underbelly colour, i have a small list but can't work out which one.
*Rakarth Flesh
*Zhandri Dust
*Karak Stone
*Baneblade Brown
*Ushabti Bone
Apologies for the disorganised nature of the post, i'm just trying to get all my thoughts out into a single block of text
Unless you're looking at a REALLY big mini, blending the edges into a smooth transition isn't a big deal. Scale a picture of an alligator to the same size as the mini, and you'll see that at that scale the transition is pretty abrupt.
I'm doing something similar for my lizarman army. I actually use shades of dark to medium grey for the back, with a thin green glaze to finish. The belly is (old GW colors) snakebite leather, highlighted with bubonic brown and golden yellow, then a carefully thinned brown wash. The trick is to use a brown that's not too red...
This Drakespawn tutorial from Duncan may give you a few ideas...
'It is a source of constant consternation that my opponents cannot correlate their innate inferiority with their inevitable defeat. It would seem that stupidity is as eternal as war.'
- Nemesor Zahndrekh of the Sautekh Dynasty Overlord of the Crownworld of Gidrim
Vulcan wrote:Unless you're looking at a REALLY big mini, blending the edges into a smooth transition isn't a big deal. Scale a picture of an alligator to the same size as the mini, and you'll see that at that scale the transition is pretty abrupt.
I'm doing something similar for my lizarman army. I actually use shades of dark to medium grey for the back, with a thin green glaze to finish. The belly is (old GW colors) snakebite leather, highlighted with bubonic brown and golden yellow, then a carefully thinned brown wash. The trick is to use a brown that's not too red...
So what you're saying is that i'm worrying too much over it, that sounds exactly like me. These are regular sized 28mm scale models, so i'm sure what you're saying is correct. I do have a bigger one inbound but that's a personal project rather than anything else.
And I should avoid terracotta or brown-red, and lean towards ivory, brown-yellow.
Ghaz wrote:This Drakespawn tutorial from Duncan may give you a few ideas...
Indeed it has, i may need to do some rethinking. I definitely like that subtle blue pattern running down the body. Many thanks
Another alternative might be to greyscale the whole model, with paler greys on the belly, and add color with glazes and/or washes.
It's also a lot easier to paint dark colors over light ones. Do the yellow first, and then paint the green over it.
One more thing to bear in mind. Actual alligators have stripes on the lower flanks, where the grey-green reaches down in broad stripes toward the belly, with the pale-yellow in narrow stripes between. There's also a little yellow rim along the upper jaw as well. It really pays to look at pictures of actual alligators and see what's going on.
Sometimes it helps to paint up a cheap, expendable model in the paint scheme you want to try. I use cheap dollar-store armymen for that purpose. It shows you exactly how the final colors will turn out, and gives you a good idea of how colors look together, without the bother of having to strip the mini and repaint it later. Best of all, since it's expendable you can do a quick and dirty job of it. It's not like the detailing will really matter; it's main purpose is as a testbed for the colors.
This message was edited 2 times. Last update was at 2018/07/28 23:58:21
Vulcan wrote: Another alternative might be to greyscale the whole model, with paler greys on the belly, and add color with glazes and/or washes.
It's also a lot easier to paint dark colors over light ones. Do the yellow first, and then paint the green over it.
One more thing to bear in mind. Actual alligators have stripes on the lower flanks, where the grey-green reaches down in broad stripes toward the belly, with the pale-yellow in narrow stripes between. There's also a little yellow rim along the upper jaw as well. It really pays to look at pictures of actual alligators and see what's going on.
Sometimes it helps to paint up a cheap, expendable model in the paint scheme you want to try. I use cheap dollar-store armymen for that purpose. It shows you exactly how the final colors will turn out, and gives you a good idea of how colors look together, without the bother of having to strip the mini and repaint it later. Best of all, since it's expendable you can do a quick and dirty job of it. It's not like the detailing will really matter; it's main purpose is as a testbed for the colors.
Oh, I think we still have some army men around somewhere from childhood. I normally do this sort of thing on cardboard but that lacks the 3d element.
I have a lot of reference pictures of lizardmen, but relatively few of alligators and crocodiles, i should definitely rectify that before starting proper.
My brief search of the forums to see if this had been posted before showed one where a guy had done his lizardmen in white but with a brown/sepia wash and it seemed to turn out pretty good. I wonder if it will work well with the green
.
