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Hi Folks,
I wanted to pick people's brains concerning an orange colour scheme for my Sister's army. I've tried a couple of tests, and seeing and hearing how hard orange is to paint, I was hoping for some advice, mainly on the following:

1) I've sprayed about 1000 odd points of my Sisters with Mechanicus Standard Grey. Is this an acceptable base for Citadel Orange colours, or do I have to go Wraithbone (I'm never using Corax White again)? Fearing both a second spray clogging details, and despising Iso baths, I'm hoping grey will be ok.

2) What shade should I put over orange cloth? Do you think Agrax Earthshade, Nuln Oil, Seraphim Sepia, Fuegen Orange, or Gryph-Hound Contrast (+ contrast medium) would be best?

I of course know that thin coats are important, and all the more so for Orange, so not afraid to build some colours up.

Thanks in advance!

Hmmmmmm what kind of finish are you after? I have never painted orange but I I feel
Like I would start with a base of either red or brown depending on the finish I was after


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This might be a good time to call in the contrast paints

Personally for something like orange I would maybe try something like mournfang brown, which is an orangey brown, then mix in some dark blue like Kantor blue or incubi darkness for the deepest shadows.

Best undercoat for yellow or orange is pink.

Depending on how transparent your orange is - and most of them tend to be quite transparent, as both yellow and red pigments are - putting it directly over grey will make the orange dull looking. That may or may not be what you're after. A highly pigmented reddish-brown will make for a good shade colour, but a black or dull brown will just make orange look dirty.

No to Agrax Earthshade & Nuln Oil unless aiming for grimdark. Seraphim Sepia is going in the right direction but might not be dark enough, depending on your midtone orange. Contrast paints aren't a bad pick either, again as long as there's enough difference between the midtone and shadow hue.

Hi! As a fellow orange lover, I can give you a few tips:

Always have a warm undercoat: depending on your style you may want something light like Wraithbone or darker like P3s Bloodstone brown.

You can also paint it directly onto white primer, but avoid grey as it is cold, and will destroy the vibrancy of any orange built up on it.

Which paint you use will again depend on your style, I'm big buddies with Scale 75s Kalahari (sp?) orange as a darker base, and their Tiamat orange to build up the brightness. GW Trollslayer is a great, vibrant orange too.

Use turquoise (or very light blue) for small detail work as these are on the opposite side of the colour wheel and will make your models pop like a mother fether

Edit: don't use Nuln Oil over orange. Ever. Fuegan Orange is great, and will darken the colour without making it look dirty. If you must use Agrax, target only the recesses, don't apply it all over. It won't look great.

Hi Folks,
Thanks for all the suggestions! I took all your advice, and also looked up all of the painting recipes for orange on Youtube. Surprisingly few videos for orange, but got a few different combos, which I decided to try out on some poxwalkers I had hanging around, all sprayed Wraithbone..

Here's a terrible photo of the results!




The recipes:
Top row (left to right):
1) Base: Jakaero Orange / Shade: Agrax Earthshade / Layers: Jakaero + Fire Dragon Bright
2) Base: Jakaero Orange / Shade: Nuln Oil / Layers: Jakaero + Fire Dragon Bright
3) Base: Jakaero Orange / Shade: Seraphim Sepia / Layers: Jakaero + Fire Dragon Bright
4) Base: Jakaero Orange / Shade: Fuegan Orange / Layers: Jakaero + Fire Dragon Bright
5) Base: Jakaero Orange / Shade: Gryph-Hound Orange (1:1 Contrast Medium) / Layers: Jakaero + Fire Dragon Bright

Bottom row (left to right)
6) Base: Gryph-Hound Orange (1:1 Contrast Medium) / Layer: Fire Dragon Bright
7) Base: Bugman's Glow -> Jakaero Orange / Shade: Agrax / Layers: Jakaero + Fire Dragon Bright
8) Base: Jakaero Orange / Shade: Agrax / Layer: Tau Light Ochre / Edge: Ungor Flesh
9) Base: Mephiston Red -> Wild Rider Red / Shade: Fuegan Orange / Layer: Fire Dragon Bright

I note that for my Sisters I will basically following Martyred Lady: black armour, replacing the red cloaks with orange.

A few thoughts:
-I tried recipes 1) and 7) because I've already sprayed a lot of my Sisters in Mechanicus Standard Grey, and I dread either an Iso bath or clogging up details by re-spraying Wraithbone. The Bugmans -> Jakaero Orange was a trick I saw on Youtube to get orange in one coat, that could also perhaps get around Undead_Love-Machine's concern re: orange on Grey (I'd be interested to hear your thoughts)!

-I liked 9) a surprising amount, but I tend avoid such cartoonishness in 40k. It perhaps works for Eldar (got the recipe from a Fired Dragon tutorial!), but not Sisters.

-I liked 8) with the Tau Light Ochre; it's a nice effect, but not the orange I'm looking for here.

-I'll obviously add an edge highlight for all of them, but only did for 8, with the Tau Light Ochre, just to see if it made it look more orange afterwards. The rest were already orange enough

-Of the 'big three' shades (1-3), Agrax is easily the best.

-Regarding 1) vs the orange shades (4 and 5), I like the grittier look of 1), but feel that, against mostly black armour for the Sisters there is a strong argument for 4 and 5.

-Regarding the orange shades, I prefer 5 (w/ contrast as shade) to 4 (Fuegan orange as shade). I also prefer the straight contrast of 6 to 4.


Final Thoughts:
So, to me, it comes down to 1, 5, or 6.

Let's break this down:

1: Grittier, but less vibrant orange. More grimdark, but the orange does not pop, perhaps coming across more as orangey-brown.
5: More vibrant orange, but perhaps less grimdark. However, this might balance out with the black armour. Also, looks like it will work readily over Mechanicus Standard Grey.
6: Basically the same finish as 5, but with the benefit of fewer steps. The issue is that I would have to either strip or re-spray about 1000pts, which I really don't fancy doing. Stripping is a horrible, messy experience. Re-spraying risks clogging details, particularly for such delicate (and expensive!) models as Sisters.


I'd still be interested to hear people's thoughts, and otherwise I hope that other people in the future can profit form this test!

1 or 6 is probably best for your goals, but I personally adore the cell-shaded look you created with 7. I'll definitely be using that for my own projects in the future.

Well folks, with all your advice in hand, looks like I'm going for 6!

Hoping I can get away with a double spray for those three odd squads, otherwise: to the Iso!

I really like 6, but feel that it would be improved with a middle step of a Fuegan orange wash to create more depth and shade.

Also, it might not be the style that you are after, but a final, brighter highlight in a few selected raised areas would take it to the next level.

If it helps, I painted these Elves with Gryph-Hound Orange over Wraithbone base spray:



I'm quite fond of the color, and I only added a few highlights here and there to make details pop a little more.

They look beautiful, the turquoise really makes them pop. The “orange” looks very red on my screen though, so I wonder if that’s an issue with my monitor or the white balance on your camera

Thanks! The problem might be on my end, though, as my monitor is fairly bright and I tend to adjust pics to match what I see IRL. If it looks right on my monitor, it might just be a tad too dark on someone else's.

Point being, Gryph-Hound Orange is definitely an orange, not a red color, and I recommend it wholeheartedly.

 Undead_Love-Machine wrote:
I really like 6, but feel that it would be improved with a middle step of a Fuegan orange wash to create more depth and shade.

Also, it might not be the style that you are after, but a final, brighter highlight in a few selected raised areas would take it to the next level.

Oh, I absolute intend to. It's just that, given I'm about to paint over these tests, I couldn't be bothered. Any suggestions on what the final highlight should be? I was originally going to do a final highlight of Troll Slayer Orange, but it's very similar to Fire Dragon Bright. Lugganath Orange is GW's own choice, but I'm worried it's a bit dull. I'm thinking the Ungor Flesh I did for 8) might be better.

 AceXT wrote:
If it helps, I painted these Elves with Gryph-Hound Orange over Wraithbone base spray:



I'm quite fond of the color, and I only added a few highlights here and there to make details pop a little more.

Yeah, looking fly, my dude! May I ask three questions:
1) Do you mix up the Gryph-Hound right on the Wraithbone, or over another base, like Jakaero?
2) Do you dilute the Gryph-Hound with contrast medium, and, if so, what ratio?
3) What's the subsequent layer/highlight you're using there? It really does look great.

And perhaps a sideways question, if I may, regarding tanks. My tanks will be mostly black, but the door seals I hope to do orange. around the fleur-de-lis. It's far from a huge flat surface, but it is a large-ish flat surface. Any tips for getting a smooth coat of the contrast there?

Sure thing!
1) Right onto Wraithbone.
2) No dilution, just one layer straight from the pot.
3) I mixed some old Coat d'Arms orange and light yellow to get a brighter orange. It's just in a few spots, the pointy knees and belts, collars, the top right spot on the ball.

For me, it's one of the Contrast paints that really delivered on the promise: good coverage with one layer, and no ungainly pooling or spots.

The Rhino door might be a tricky one. I guess I'd leave them off for painting, prime Wraithbone, lay them flat on the table, and hope for the best. If it ends up spotty, you can get even coverage with more layers, but you'll also get a darker color than on your infantry. Sorry I can't offer better advice!

 TonyH122 wrote:

 Undead_Love-Machine wrote:
I really like 6, but feel that it would be improved with a middle step of a Fuegan orange wash to create more depth and shade.

Also, it might not be the style that you are after, but a final, brighter highlight in a few selected raised areas would take it to the next level.

Oh, I absolute intend to. It's just that, given I'm about to paint over these tests, I couldn't be bothered. Any suggestions on what the final highlight should be? I was originally going to do a final highlight of Troll Slayer Orange, but it's very similar to Fire Dragon Bright. Lugganath Orange is GW's own choice, but I'm worried it's a bit dull. I'm thinking the Ungor Flesh I did for 8) might be better.

I like Lugganath Orange (and all of the old "edge" paints for that matter), but it's one of those paints that is a bugger to maintain, everytime i open the lid I have to add some more medium and give it a shake to let the glass agitator do its job.

If you are not a fan then I would recommend mixing either Troll Slayer or Fire Dragon with Wraithbone (or any other warm, off-white ivory type colour) until you are happy with the result. Get a spare pot, insert your choice of orange and add wraithbone until you are happy with the tone.


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 AceXT wrote:
Sure thing!
1) Right onto Wraithbone.
2) No dilution, just one layer straight from the pot.

I'm genuinely amazed that you acheived such smooth results with one undiluted coat of contrast, for me to get that kind of result I would defo have to thin it down and apply a couple of layers at least!

Regarding Rhino doors, or any large flat areas, I would go out of my way to not use contrast. I would much rather mix regular paints to get a colour match.

For a highlight, I'd grab whatever golden or primary yellow is available to you and mix that 50/50 with your Fire Dragon Bright. Adding white to orange makes it go chalky looking, while a yellow will brighten it but keep the vibrancy. Looking like a great base to work from already!

Well, Fire Dragon + Yriel Yellow it is for the highlight!

As for the contrast straight on, I'm also surprised. A few months ago I tried the straight Gryph-Hound right onto one of these poxwalkers, again for a test, and I thought that it looked terrible; way too dark in the recesses. I'll have to do more tests!

Not sure if I have a superior technique or stumbled across the perfect pot of Contrast. I take care not to use a wet brush, because Contrast hates water. I just take a dry 2 sable brush, soak it with Contrast, and apply straight on, one thick coat. It doesn't work that way for all colors, in my experience - Gryph-Hound Orange and Blood Angels Red are pretty smooth, while Militarum Green's always spotty.

That's interesting, as I never use a completely dry brush. I'll give it a try!