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I posted this on the blog I write for, but I thought I would post it here for more exposure.

A lot of friends of mine have asked for a tutorial on how I do the force weapons on my grey knights, so I thought I would post a quick tutorial. Now this won’t produce Golden Daemon quality weapons, but it doesn’t look half bad on the tabletop.

The first thing to keep in mind, is that this tutorial features a lot of drybrushing, so it’s imperative that you’re painting surface be incredibly smooth since any raised areas will show up when drybrushing.

The first step is to paint the surface black. This will provide a nice dark surface to paint on.


Next, paint Kantor Blue over the black, this is the base color of the force sword.


Next, drybrush Hoeth Blue onto the sword. I like to start at the base of one side of the sword, and at the tip of the other. Drybrush them some ways past a point in the middle.


Then drybrush Skink Blue onto the Hoeth Blue. Layer it so some of the Hoeth Blue shows through. Skink Blue is one of GW’s new dry compound. I’ve found that work really well for drybrushing and the color of the Skink Blue really pops against the rest of the sword.


I then layer Praxeti White onto the Skink Blue, again drybrushing.


Finally, I apply GW’s new Guilliman Blue glaze onto the sword. This helps tone down the white and blend some of the drybrushing.


And that’s it! After you get the technique down, it only takes about 5 minutes a sword. Another thing to remember when drybrushing is that pigment will get everywhere, so be sure you don’t save the swords for last!

Here’s a close up of my justicar using the same technique.


Happy painting! and feel free to check out the blog at http://www.theboatoftomorrow.com
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Ha! I was actually going to repost this here for you, but you beat me to it.

I will give this a shot when my order of Army Painter silver spray comes in.

Looks great, always loved the shiny weapons. Would also work well with daemons swords. Going to find some way to stick that in my guard army, maybe on a plasma coil or something.

This is awesome! I'm glad that someone has managed to find a technique to replicate that style of force sword without resorting to a £100-200 airbrush kit & compressor.

Thank you very much for this, I'll definitely be using it on my Grey Knights.

- Valtyr

Impressive sir!

Really cool!

Ganna see if i can get it to work with red. And suggestions on what reds to use?

Interesting! It looks really similar to the method used by airbrushing it in a similar style. Definitely going to try this one on a spare sword for fun!

Marshall Ragnar wrote:
Really cool!

Ganna see if i can get it to work with red. And suggestions on what reds to use?

For red I would probably go khorne red over a black basecoat, then drybrush up with mephiston, kindleflame, and praxetti white.

Glad people are liking this tut! I've actually stopped glazing them now, I find that I like the contrast more. I'm really like the citadel dry range, and I'm having a ton of fun experimenting with them. They work very similarly to pigment powders, but rather than powder they're a goo with the consistency of marshmallow fluff. I've found that you can actually blend them pretty well without the need of a dry retardant.

So essentially this is blending without the blending? :0

Ooh, I might try this on some of my swords.
How well do you think force lightning would look on it?

I think lightning would look great on it. Unfortunately, my hand just isn't steady enough yet to get it to look right.

 xSPYXEx wrote:
Ooh, I might try this on some of my swords.
How well do you think force lightning would look on it?

Incidentally, lightning is our OTHER GK Adepticon guy: http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/424879.page

He doesn't do the blending on top of it though. I was going to redo my force weapons in this style. Perhaps I'll try lightning over the top of one of them.

Thanks for the tut, it has been a godsend in my draigowing force

I will have to try this out for my paladins. The blades are the one part that I have no confidence in. Looks like I will need new colors though.