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Hey all, I was looking to paint a single Space Marine biker in Raven Guard colour scheme.

With the majority of the model being black in colour, what technique/colors would you people recommend for bringing out the details in what is basically a black primed model?

Looking for some help with this one as the extent of my Marine model painting has been painting dead Marines for the bases of my Orks and Tyranids.

Thanks in advance for any help you can give me.

I'm in no way an expert, but the general technique...
There is basically one way to deal with it that I know of: Edge highlights as seen here

http://www.awakenrealms.com/gallery/95-gallery/galeria-a/space-marines/dark-angels/199-ravenwing-command-squad

Black relies on sharp, tight highlights. If you want a rich colour, you're running through some VERY subtle blends, very smooth gradients within a reasonably narrow contrast range.

Contrast on black gradients is often 'hot-cold' contrast rather than 'light-dark' - a blue black (contra highlight) blended up through a deep black to a yellowish black-grey.

The quick and easy way is with light grey, tight highlights, only in lightsource directions.

I'm no pro painter, but maybe I can help

If you want an example of a well-painted all-black model that's not too hard to do, look at the GW Ravenwing squad. I'd show you mine, but I decided on blue marines on black bikes (mostly just because it had been eons since I had painted ultramarines).

If all you want is "tabletop quality", the Dark Vengeance how-to has some examples are painting black, but it's very rudimentary. Essentially you edge highlight with dawnstone and do corners with administratum grey, and judiciously use red, silver, and a dab of gold or copper on the weapons and doo-dads.

If you want to do black properly, it's very difficult for two reasons. First, for miniatures to look good, you need do accentuate both shadows and highlights. With black, you can't go any darker (as with white, there are no highlight colors). Second, if you look at a photograph of an object which is black -- whether it's a black car, cat, or coat -- there is actually very little that is actually 100% BLACK (just like there isn't much that's 100% white if you photograph a white porcelain cup). Even a photo of a matte black stealth bomber is different shades of grey.

For these two reasons, if you really want an award-winning black model, you'll have to inject some other color onto the model's base color, like brown or blue. You then have to blend shadows and highlights based on how light would fall on the model. The black on the model is even more believable and appealing if you can use object source lighting -- for example, if a power weapon that glows blue lights up a spherical area of a space marine. These are not easy techniques though!

You could give this a try: http://flameonminiatures.blogspot.com/2014/01/black-color-painting-tutorial.html

Like Winterdyne explained, painting a convincing black can often prove tricky.

Thanks all for the ideas and tips, I appreciate it. 8)

Either very dark green (Tie into the rest of the Dark Angles Scheme) or dark grey (for general black) edge highlights. YOU can also use a slightly Brighter grey if you end up washing with Nuln oil, or use grey and wash with a green wash to give it a bit of a green tinge.

If this is destined for the table top, a convincing enough black can be done by base coating with a medium grey, like codex grey, and washing with black. You may need to hit it a second time with the wash to bring it down a bit more. Highlight with codex grey, and add some hot spots with fortress grey.

 ScootyPuffJunior wrote:
You could give this a try: http://flameonminiatures.blogspot.com/2014/01/black-color-painting-tutorial.html

Like Winterdyne explained, painting a convincing black can often prove tricky.

That looks friggin' fantastic. Thanks for posting it.

A less involved technique I've seen done quite well for black is to use about a 50/50 mix of grey and black for the base colour. This makes pure black suitable for shaded areas while still giving an overall black look to the base coat, and makes grey highlights a little less stark.