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Hey Guys and Gals,

ive just begun a new project eldar army, ive built up a few concept and test models for how I want to mdel them but im struggling with finding some help with how I want to paint them.

I bought an airbrush last year and have mostly been using it for vehicles, larger models and base coats. I have been starting to work it into smaller models and I want to create a fade effect on my Eldar. They will be taking up a slaanesh colour scheme (pink/purples - light blues and greys). Here is an image of roughly the sort of style im aiming for:


id like to blend my models a bit like this, but with more whiter/grey areas:



I would very much like to try and use a decent amount of airbrushing with these models (for both practice and the fact I really enjoy airbrushing techniques), I would like to create a blend/fade across the models, but im a little unsure how I should aim to achieve this. Should I?

Prime white -> pre-shadow with a grey/black -> then apply my blues and purples over the top? using the pre-shade to help give the fade?

Prime white -> blend in to a light blue -> blend lower with a darker shade -> repeat?

Any other ideas?

Basically im not fantastic at blending as of yet, and still little unsure im getting the right technique down. What do you airbrushers do when blending?
Also, I can't find a decent airbrush purple, ive typically always used vallejo model air, but I cant find a purple, are there any other companies who do a nice pink/purple? Im not too well accustomed to other companies products.

Thanks in advance, Solar

Hello Solar.

Purple is a great color to understand color theory . (use the wheel on this free site http://colorschemedesigner.com/ )

What actually makes purple darker is yellow (depending on the hue of purple it can be a kind of greenish yellow).

Of course you can use black but black de saturates other colors so they loose they vibrancy.

I recently did the following for an Emperor's children noise marine. I primed black, hit with white all raised areas and then sprayed multiple layers of thin magenta (from winsor and newton acrylics) on top. It creates a nice purple that can be further highlighted with pink. The color scheme is rather dark but it looks nice on chaos.

If I was to follow the white primer root then I would use the second option. Prime white blend light blues and then go for the shadows with darker blues. It is much more difficult to get the right depth when using white primer thought thats why I prefer to prime black and hit lighted areas with white, before I paint over the main color and the highlights. (I think you saw the crimson hunter thread ).

 Capamaru wrote:
Hello Solar.

Purple is a great color to understand color theory . (use the wheel on this free site http://colorschemedesigner.com/ )

What actually makes purple darker is yellow (depending on the hue of purple it can be a kind of greenish yellow).

Of course you can use black but black de saturates other colors so they loose they vibrancy.

I recently did the following for an Emperor's children noise marine. I primed black, hit with white all raised areas and then sprayed multiple layers of thin magenta (from winsor and newton acrylics) on top. It creates a nice purple that can be further highlighted with pink. The color scheme is rather dark but it looks nice on chaos.

If I was to follow the white primer root then I would use the second option. Prime white blend light blues and then go for the shadows with darker blues. It is much more difficult to get the right depth when using white primer thought thats why I prefer to prime black and hit lighted areas with white, before I paint over the main color and the highlights. (I think you saw the crimson hunter thread ).

Its yellow?! oh god thats odd, I would have thought red, or blue would have been used to make a purple darker (but obviously that would then make them more red or blue) Il have a look at yellow then I normally try to avoid black to darken stuff ever since someone once explained that if you think about it shadows aren't actually ever black, as black is an absence of colour/light and therefore shaodws are actually made of other colours. So since then ive always tried to darken with colour. And your definitely right, it helps keep the vibrancy.

Yes, I did in fact see it! Ah ok, Il try that then, il prime black and hit the high lights with a white. Out of interest, how would you suggest I achieve this on a man sized model? Spray from a little further away? or just attempt to be close and precise with each raised area?


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Oh another quick question:
So for example, lets say im airbrushing, I am finding that I spend quite a lot of time when changing colour.

So im airbrushing a nice pale pink and I want to blend it up to a purple. What do you typically do? I would, use the pale until I am happy, Il then get rid of what was left in the cup (which id hope was not a lot!) Then id clean out the brush with water and cleaner and then il break out my purple.

Is that what I should do? or should I simply add the purple into the cup after the pale pink? as id want to blend it anyway, so the effect of the pale pink on the purple isnt really an issue?

Or should I wash it out with water anyway inbetween?

Basically, how can i minimise time during a blend? as if i want to use 3-4 colours il be spending lots of time changing colour?

On the site I gave you (with the color finder) colors on the opposite side of the wheel are complementary so they make each other darker without loosing some much in vibrancy.

If you notice in the crimson hunter thread the green looks really washed out when I first applied it over the greyish model. On the next pictures after I start applying highlights color vibrancy came back.

When you are doing zenithal highlighting with an airbrush you have two options like you said. Either stay back and spray from the 45 degree angle or get close and personal and focus on the areas you want to focus more. Please post a picture of the model you intend to ruin under my advice so I can give you my opinion on what will look best .

Color change on the airbrush is a pain.. I use color caps (they are actually shot glasses) to mix the paint when working on smaller needle airbrushes (especially the sotar 20/20) and so if I have paint left I just poor it back to cap. Mixing in the cap helps a lot with clogging because you are able to achieve a better color consistency.

If you leave left over paint inside the cap and then add the next color you are practically mixing inside the cap creating a mid tone. The thing is that you only have a rough idea of the proportions so if you need to replicate the mixed color it's not that easy. I try to avoid that as much as I can cause when I pull the trigger I wanna be sure about the color I am going to spray. Create the mid tone outside of the airbrush cap using the left over paint shoot some water through the airbrush and then add the color back in.

PS: You have some pretty neat conversions in your gallery

Ah i haven't had chance to get it open, the link was failing, but that may be something to do with my work place.

Il grab a pic, they are blurry as was on a phone to post to a friend just what i was working on. And thanks for the compliment I love the modelling side and i am a bit of a big dreamer, I like to make wacky stuff (espcially when with orks). I actually had a dream where I was modelling an avatar on a ork warboss bike. When I woke up I was so gutted, as the model i dreamed up was so bloody cool!

These are the models il be ruining:


with my orks I was building the whole model and then painting. But now with my eldar ive decided that im gona keep the heads off and probably the arms too, so I can get to the chest pieces.

So what i want is basically to fade across the model, so maybe one fade across the legs, one across the chest and so forth. I think for that Il probably want focused area highlights rather than zenethial?

I originally had an airbrush that had the pot below, where I could change the pot with ease, but that had issues at low pressure. Il think about pre mixing colours that might be a good idea

Hey guys,

I am going to be practicing tonight trying to get some good fades done, and id like to achieve something like the wraithy essence here:



How would I best achieve this?

Start with a white primer, pink base and then work in more and more white? or the other way? Im having trouble achieving such a natural fade, mine often turn out being a little obvious :/