# A rookies Daemon painting log.



## Hewbear (Jun 29, 2012)

**Disclaimer this is my painting and i suck i know, but im only just starting to paint and im desperately in need of brushes haha**

I have a large and ever growing Daemon army which been neglected so i thought i probably should make a start so yea heres my start on a squad of bloodletters (which is about 6 hours of painting)

The first 5, based with Valejo Black then dry brushed with dark red then lighter red. Then touched up with black 









3 Finished Bloodletters, fully painted 









So yea thats what i got so far, any constructive critisim would be nice


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## fatmantis (Jun 26, 2009)

well not a bad start bud...a few things the white is very overpowering..maybe use a dark yellow base and work up to a bleached bone.
as for the skin its a bit blochy...try doing and all red base coat then use a wash then just apply the highlights. takes a bit longer but the overall look is better.
im no expert painting but im my humble opinion dry brushing works better with things like cloth and fur..on Armour and skin it makes it look chalky.
but keep up the good work...there are fantastic painters here who will give you some great advice.


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## Hewbear (Jun 29, 2012)

Right so update. Not done any painting over christmas, so its took like a month to finish 5 bloodletters and start Skulltaker. Heres the finished Bloodletters, following the advice i received i painted the metal solid and made the horns a lil darker:









And then Skulltaker, primed black then messy first coat on skin, gonna try not dry brush this. 1 coat dark red on skin. The details eill need touching up black but im guarenteed to slip up so ill finish skin then touch up:


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## Deus Mortis (Jun 20, 2009)

Again, not a bad start. A small tip on the gold; if you wash it with Druchii Violet, it helps to bring out the recesses just a little bit more.

On the horns, again I would recommend a wash with something like Agrax Earthshade, because at the moment it looks a bit flat. The wash would bring out the recesses of the horns and make them look a bit more realistic I feel.

Other than that, all I have to say is I was much worse when I first started painting and keep up the good work!


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## torealis (Dec 27, 2006)

Painting wise, you're off to an awesome start.

My main advice would be to rebase on circular bases, square looks so out of place in 40k


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## Loki1416 (Apr 20, 2010)

Don't knock your painting, those really arn't that bad imo. I've certainly seen worse! Just look at ebay and "pro painted" lol. I'm liking what your doing and think that if you keep going at the pace your doing that your skills will be awesome.


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## Varakir (Sep 2, 2009)

You've got a nice jump in quality from the first to the second pictures - your colour choices are solid too.

Your base coat on the skulltaker looks good and is another improvement over the bloodletters. There's hundreds of great, fancy techniques out there but the base coat is the most important to getting a nice looking model.

Try base coating the bone parts with a dark brown, then use bone over the top and wash with a light brown wash.

Use the same technique with the gold too (replace bone with gold).

I'd also advise keeping the yellow for the eyes or going for a brighter green - the face should be the focal point of your miniature and the yellow draws attention far better.

Don't forget to do your bases too. Some drybrushing over sand & grit gives a huge boost to aesthetics.

Will look forward to more pics - keep it up :victory:


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## Nordicus (May 3, 2013)

fatmantis said:


> my humble opinion dry brushing works better with things like cloth and fur..on Armour and skin it makes it look chalky.


I thoroughly agree with this. Usually I use drybrushing on bone, metal and cloth - But never flesh. It's a technique that is good for a matt surface shade, but when doing it with flesh it does appear dry and chalky. In terms of how to paint flesh via layers, I have described how I do it in my tutorial of Pink Horrors. I would gladly give you the color combination I use for bloodletters if you want to give it a shot  You can see my colortheme in my project log, on the very first page - The link is in m signature.

Beyond that, shades would be a natural next stage for your painting skills. Aggrax earthshade for bones, Nuln Oil for metals etc. It's a fast and effective way of giving your models more depth. 

If you are in doubt of what a shade actually does, here's a quick comparison shot for you:








The guy on the left is simply painted and the guy on the right has been painted in the same color and given a red shade. Personally I would recommend doing this on flesh and skin instead of drybrushing, as you still get those nice shadows going, but the effect is more fluent and flesh-like.

As others have said, you're definately not off to a bad start. Don't devaluate your skills, as it can be a tough area to start on if you don't have any tips to go on.


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## Hewbear (Jun 29, 2012)

Thanks guys!! The comments are fantastic! Really, the little tips all really really help. Nordicus, that tutorial is fantastic thanks man! The bases will get sorted at some point aswel, im really unsure about basing my models on either square or circle bases. I really wanna try fantasy but i only ever play 40k  ive done abit on skulltaker, followimg Nordicus' advice in the flesh and Deus Mortis' on the cape i think its coming along nicely, it may need a little more highlighing on the flesh but we shall see:

















Oh and i realised whilst doing the cloak that ive lost the spiney bit >.< any ideas?


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## Varakir (Sep 2, 2009)

Fantastic result on the cape, you are obviously picking this up rather quickly :victory:


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## torealis (Dec 27, 2006)

For the bit you're missing, i'd suggest putting in some spikes (nid bits?) and then giving him a fur mantle sculpted from GS


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## Hewbear (Jun 29, 2012)

Yea soooo almost finished Skulltaker, added a slight highlight layer to the flesh and put a bronze layer on the armour, so pretty productive. Im really unsure about the horns, do i go lile GW stock pic and do them red, or do them horn colour?? 


















The bronze on his armour will have a drybrush of silver? To make it look worn, and then his sword, i dunno. And the skull, jeez leaving all the hard bits till last  
Any advice on how to approach this last step would be nice, you guys are awesome!

Oh and i know i update often, but i get quite hesitant and not wanting to screw up, so i like advice in to how to do bits, cus you guys are awesome and know exactly how to help


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## Nordicus (May 3, 2013)

Allright, lets see if we can help a bit.



Hewbear said:


> The bronze on his armour will have a drybrush of silver?


My recommendation would be to give it a Nuln Oil wash and drybrush it with "Brass Scorpion" instead of silver. Brass Scorpion has the nice effect of a very light bronze, which is almost metal'ish when drybrushed, so it should get the effect your looking for.



Hewbear said:


> Im really unsure about the horns, do i go lile GW stock pic and do them red, or do them horn colour??


It's individual taste in the end, so you can't go wrong. Personally, I don't like bone color on Bloodletters (As you can see on my interpretation of it) both others swear to it. I would say that you should pick a theme for your Bloodletters as a whole and do the same theme with this guy, as he's basically a Bloodletter on steroids.



Hewbear said:


> And the skull


Hehe flames are always fun. I would recommend doing the bone bits first and the try to Google "flames". See how the colors swirl from white to yellow and finally to red. Try to imitate that with your color palette, as it's easier to do with a picture next to you. 



Hewbear said:


> then his sword, i dunno


Well you can either go iron sword or infernal. Iron is much easier to accomplish, where Infernal is harder. What are your thoughts overall?


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## Hewbear (Jun 29, 2012)

Im thinking the Nuln oil and brass scorpion may be a good purchase, but im using *mostly* Vallejo paints, about 15 Vallejo to 7 GW paints, but im in love with the new washes, Reikland fleshshade. Im looking into getting the agrax and the nul oil aswel when i get abit of cash together. Would the Nuln Oil just go ontop of the Bronze, the a very light Brass Scorpion to give thr armour a worn look and break up the solidness of the bronze. Im not a fan of gold, its more of a SM colour personaly and these are dark killy monsters, but im thinking the details on inside of cloak to go gold, maybe.

But in thinking bone colours as my Bloodletters all have bone horns, but looking online they seem to clash with the rest of the model so i dunno, im thinking to try base coat them in maybe dark brown, then a second coat 1:1 bonewhite then a light dusting of bonewhite ontop to brighten them up.

The sword looks badass infernal, but i dont think i could paint that at the mo, i reaply like the simplicity of the GW one the black with grey and white highlights as majoroty of model is red and bronze it would break it up a little?

The flames i think your right, i looked online, ill need a few more paints, (yellow and orange and grey but not for the flames) but once i have the paints the flames shouldnt be too difficult *famous last words* and then ill need purple for his tounge, and then ill have to decide what to do for his spines.

Again thanks Nordicus, your advice is second to none, it really helps. Next update will have a nearly if not fully finished skulltaker then maybe something new, maybe not so khorne ill see how i feel once this guys done.


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## SwedeMarine (Jun 3, 2013)

I will admit when i saw the first pics I was a little skeptical butive got to hand it to you. youre coming along very nicely. The effect on the cape is exellent. Noridcus is definetly your man when it comes to taking ideas and Painting tips from (especially deamons) as he has a rether impressive collection himself.


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## Hewbear (Jun 29, 2012)

Update time. ive not done huge amounts, but yea i made a start on other things now and also counted up how many models i actually have. So updates first heres Skulltaker, alsmot complete, just needing a few paints for tounge and fire, then maybe somehting for his spines. 

**update and the handle of his sword, dammit i knew i forgot something**



























Now some new stuff:

A pile of Plaguebearers, only primed atm








And two Pleaguebearers ive attempted at doing flesh, first layer on and im unsure about the green, perhaps DA Green is too light :/ im quite liking the Rakarth Flesh one though, but ill see how they compare with a few more coats and detailing. I may have to Paint a third test PB a little later on with a darker green base.









Then somehting a little more OTT and awesome:










This pic does not do the models justice, thats 2 of my 3 DP the third is the same model as the left DP i got pre painted and will eventually strip and paint up.

So yea thats all i has on my update, but a quick model count ended up around:

1 Great Unclean One
2 Old Winged Deamon Princes
1 Metal Nurgle Daemon Prince
1 Skull Taker
22 Bloodletters
14 Plague Bearers
about 20 Bases of nurglings
3 Flamers
1 Soul Grinder, which im thinking of getting rid of in exchange for more troops or something as its plastic, and in an all Metal army is sorta wierd.

Im sure i have more somewhere :S haha, im wiating on another cartload of models from a friend which will increase my Daemon army to over 4k points :3 hopefully finger crossed  ima update my first post with a complete partially done and a to do list eat some point aswel.

Oh and quick note the large majority of models will be based on Fantasy bases. But some models (Nurgle Prince and Skulltaker) are on 40k bases as the dont fit very well on fantasy bases. And all models will be based aswel, im just unsure what would look best on a daemon army yet.


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## torealis (Dec 27, 2006)

What did you end up doing with the gap in skulltakers cloak?


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## Hewbear (Jun 29, 2012)

So far its still a gap, im tempted to greenstuff the gap and stick a few skulls to cover it. Possibly.


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## torealis (Dec 27, 2006)

Spiiiiiikes


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## Nordicus (May 3, 2013)

Hewbear said:


> And two Pleaguebearers ive attempted at doing flesh, first layer on and im unsure about the green, perhaps DA Green is too light :/ im quite liking the Rakarth Flesh one though, but ill see how they compare with a few more coats and detailing. I may have to Paint a third test PB a little later on with a darker green base.


Doing great progress I see - Way to go! :good:

If you need any inspiration for those Plaguebearers, you can also check out the tutorial I did on the Great Unclean One. I did the same steps on my Plaguebearers and you can find it here.


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## Hewbear (Jun 29, 2012)

Nordicus said:


> Doing great progress I see - Way to go! :good:
> 
> If you need any inspiration for those Plaguebearers, you can also check out the tutorial I did on the Great Unclean One. I did the same steps on my Plaguebearers and you can find it here.


Yea im going to follow your guide, im thinking of using very similar colours to yours if you dont mind. Ill have to buy a few new paints, mainly the darker greens and agrax earthshade. The ill finish off these two and do one using your colours and decide for there 

Anyone wanting to paint daemons use Nordicus' guides they are fantastic!


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## Nordicus (May 3, 2013)

Aaw thanks man - Really appreciated! :grin:

If you have any questions along the way, just ping me and I'll clarify as best I can.


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