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So, it's exactly as the title says. Now, before I get an influx of sardonic 'Here, let me Google that for you' comments - I have Googled it, but I came up with nothing satisfactory. Hence, I'm putting it to you Dakkanoughts for your own methods, tutorials etc. regarding painting power swords.

Currently, I'm sat staring at a plain Boltgun metal painted sword with a wash of Badab black over it - which, as you'll gather, is rather dull. Now, I had found, in ages past, a rather epic thread here on Dakka detailing how to apply a lightning pattern in white, and then a coloured wash over the top to get an excellent effect. Unfortunately, I didn't bookmark it at the time, so I can't find it again. However, I hope that's an indication of the effect I'd like to achieve.

Any help would be most appreciated.

I'm not much for blending and my brush control wasn't good enough for lightning when I started my army so I started doing layered highlights and that got me this result:






Pick a base colour, wash it black and re-apply the base colour. add a little white to the base colour until you build to an almost pure white final highlight.

@sockwithaticket - They look great! It's not the specific effect I was going for, as I've already got a silver basecoat down, but I can easily paint over in black and start again with this method. Many thanks for the input!

I think you could combine the above effect with the lightning to create a very awsome effect

I.e start from black and go to a dark green around the edges and the bright green lightning ??

Painting the lightning white then washing it wouldn't give the same effect and frankly look rubbish


Also the grey knight and necron power weapons are relatively easy to do once you learn to keep your pallete wet either with a medium or water and make sure your blends are smooth

Sockwithaticket - I'm stealing your idea. I can't paint power weapons, or OSL, to save my life. All of my plasma- and power weapon-armed miniatures looks like they're covered in, well, blue paint.

Sorry, Warpig1815, didn't mean to jack the thread. I've always wondered how to paint 'em too.

The problem you will have is alot of the tutorials are airbrushing for what is called "crystal" effect

Lighting is easy just use a small brush and the brightest shade of the colour your using or white

I like the coloured nmm / blended effect ones

My Dark Angel successors have yellow/black ones like this;



Havent done very many of them yet, but I did use an airbrush for it.

I tend to vary mine, but here are a few favourite tricks;

Energy Field: Fairly simple, this, just paint metal and wash in a colour of choice. Quick and easy, and gets the impression across.

Bright Edges: This one is just layering, starting darkest near the haft (axes) or middle (swords) and getting lighter towards the edges. Takes a while and a steady hand, but gets good results. I find this one works really nicely for making weapons look like fire. Start with an orange and build up to white. Might be helpful if you're painting Salamanders. If you want the same effect but more in-depth, try wet blending instead of layering.

Lightning: This one is closest to what you're going for. Paint the blade either metallic or in a colour of your choice, and then paint on lightning that stems out from the 'source' of the energy. Start fairly dark and thick near the source (1.5-2mm) and get lighter and thinner as you move away. The lightning is best done in white or a very light shade of your base colour, and having a darker base colour for the weapon helps it stand out more. I sometimes mix a little silver in with the light colour to help it stand out.

Hard Edges: Like lightning, but instead just do a very thin line of the bright colour along the very edge of the weapon. Again, high contrast helps here.

Hope that helps, and of course, any of these techniques can be combined. I've got a few that have bright edges and lightening, it really focuses towards the blade of the weapon.

@brother marcus - I've seen simple white lightning and a coloured wash used in such a way that it really does look outstanding. The problem is that I can't find the article I was looking at that detailed this :( I'll possibly try to combine the two, but in my experience over-complicating things produces the worst results. That said, I'll take you suggestion into account and see how I go.

@Tower75 - How dare you!?! Just kidding - hijack away!

@HairySticks - They're looking ace mate! Pity I haven't got round to getting my airbrush yet, so unfortunately I can't mimic these. (I know, I know - the shame of it! )

@Paradigm - Thanks for the numerous helpful suggestions. I rather like your second method, simply because I can envisage it having the same effect as the Salamander Sergeant's sword on the back of the new Tactical box:



I think the key thing to do, would be to get myself a bunch of new paints (mostly blues as I've never had much of a call for them so far) and see how I go from there. Once again, thanks to all contributors, and feel free to contribute some more!

You dont have to use an airbrush to do the blended ones.. admittedly it makes it easier and faster though

Yellow to black would be especially tricky with wet blends, the trick would probably be to fade black to white and then use actual glaze colours over it in layers.

I never was much good at wet blending at this kind of scale though... airbrush for the win!


@sockwithaticket; that black blade with a purple edge glow is sexy I might steal that oneday when a model calls for it

@ HairySticks, it's actually really, really, really dark purple rather than black, but thank you!

@ Warpig - if it helps, I use Vallejo Game Colour Imperial Blue as the base for my blue weapons and VGC Glacier Blue for the final almost white highlight.

sockwithaticket wrote:
@ HairySticks, it's actually really, really, really dark purple rather than black, but thank you!

@ Warpig - if it helps, I use Vallejo Game Colour Imperial Blue as the base for my blue weapons and VGC Glacier Blue for the final almost white highlight.

Good to know I might actually use it for my Azrael figure to make it different to all the 'just power swords'...(I already used black-->purple blend for the Librarians force weapon) it is supposed to be some relic called 'the sword of secrets' afterall Can you recall what paints you used?

I'm the same, blue for power weapons and purple for force weapons. The paints used for it were: Citadel Xereus Purple, Army Painter Dark Tone, Vallejo Model Colour White and Citadel Druchii Violet. That;s more or less the order to use them in too.

I imagine an effect like that sallies power sword would be pretty easy to achieve, just by reversing my method and going yellow>orange>black rather than the other way round.

I did a simple effect on stormblades by applying inks/glazes to the metal base.

I used a sponge with varying shades of blue. Apply some paint and draw from the edge of the blade back towards the hilt at a 45 degree angle. As you draw your sponge towards the center of the blade, reduce the pressure. This will result in some nice blue streaking.