# Word Bearers Red?



## Words_of_Truth (Sep 20, 2007)

For pre heresy word bearers which red do you think is more suitable, Khorne Red or Wazdakka red? I've read Wazdakka may be to bright, but I'm not sure if Khorne is the right shade either, any suggestions?


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## ntaw (Jul 20, 2012)

Wazdakka is too bright I'd say. Khorne red doesn't really exist in their new paint scheme of things I don't think, and Mephiston Red is just a touch brighter. This picture is one of the better ones I've taken capturing the way the new reds look after I am through with them (focus is on the leg), is it close to what you're going for? I could at least describe how I got to this point if it helps.


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## Deus Mortis (Jun 20, 2009)

I think if you did Wazdakka and then did a wash of Agrax Earthshade it would bring it down to the shade you wanted?


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## Squire (Jan 15, 2013)

Weren't pre heresy WB grey? I can't remember at what point they turned red

Anyway, I'd err on the side of a darker red. I don't think you can go too dark, some of the nicest Word Bearers I've seen have been a really dark red. Pretty much the darkest you could go would look like the terminator on page 75 of the codex (wish I could find a picture) and that guy looks awesome. On the other hand if you went a bit too light they'd look too Blood Angel for my liking

Try a few schemes on the spare parts you get in plastic kits. For my Alpha Legion I tried 6 different blue schemes before trying a really dark one which I settled on


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## Deus Mortis (Jun 20, 2009)

Squire said:


> Weren't pre heresy WB grey? I can't remember at what point they turned red



It was after the Shaming of Monarchia. I think Lorgar meets with Magnus and then the legion undertakes the Pilgrimage and the paint themselves red.


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## DeathKlokk (Jun 9, 2008)

For mine I used Blood Red with two coats of Magenta ink.

Did I mention I painted them in '02?


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## Squire (Jan 15, 2013)

Deus Mortis said:


> It was after the Shaming of Monarchia. I think Lorgar meets with Magnus and then the legion undertakes the Pilgrimage and the paint themselves red.


That makes sense, thanks. I look forward to rereading The First Heretic, it's been by far the best Word Bearers depiction in the HH series



DeathKlokk said:


> For mine I used Blood Red with two coats of Magenta ink.
> 
> Did I mention I painted them in '02?


I did something similar, a couple of years after you (shortly after the IA article for WB came out). Scab red with a coat of magenta ink. Without any highlighting or blending it created a really nice deep red colour that I'd recommend to anyone going for a simple, easy to paint red. Almost a decade later I'm doing a more difficult theme on my power armour with a lot of time consuming edge highlighting, and I'm not convinced it's all that much better than what I did with my WB


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## ntaw (Jul 20, 2012)

DeathKlokk said:


> two coats of Magenta ink


Those dropper bottles, though...real glad they buggered off that idea.


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## Nordicus (May 3, 2013)

ntaw said:


> Khorne red doesn't really exist in their new paint scheme


Khorne Red does exist and personally I think it would be the perfect base. It's a dark and less shiny red than many of the alternatives.

I would go with khorne Red, a shade of Carrobourg Crimson and highlight the tops against with Khorne Red. There you go, blood for the blood god.


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## The Warpsmith (Jun 4, 2014)

Personally i always wanted a Metallic Red for Word Bearers but the Red Glaze doesnt tint Silver well at all so no luck with that. Id recommend Khorne Red, washed, with maybe Mephiston as a Highlight


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## Words_of_Truth (Sep 20, 2007)

I want them to look darker than my blood letters, I'm only doing the terminators and gal vorbak in red, the standard troops are going to be in the traditional grey with silver trims but I'm going to give them all red helms to show their transition into turning red. It's noted they didn't all wear red, that only started with the gal vorbak and serrated sun chapter but it was gradually adopted by the rest of the legion.


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## ntaw (Jul 20, 2012)

Nordicus said:


> Khorne Red does exist and personally I think it would be the perfect base.


:blush: ....I even own it. It would definitely be the perfect base, for some reason those streams got crossed in my mind.

I have gotten some cool darker reds by using purple and carroburg washes.


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## Words_of_Truth (Sep 20, 2007)

Here's how the model has turned out so far. So far it's been painted khorne red, with a black wash and highlighted with khorne red again. The metal has had leadbelcher with a black wash and a leadbelcher highlight, the black has has a thin layer of mechanicus standard grey followed by a black wash and a edge highlight of mechanicus standard grey.


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## ntaw (Jul 20, 2012)

Looks nice, are you planning on going any lighter with the highlights of the red?


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## Words_of_Truth (Sep 20, 2007)

I'm not sure which to go with, wazdakka or maybe some brown like skrag or something.


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## ntaw (Jul 20, 2012)

I use Wazdakka as my Mephiston red highlight before hitting it with Bloodletter Glaze and it's pretty awesome. I feel like it might look good with a Nuln/Agrax mixed wash afterward to bring it closer to Khorne red, though the reason I don't use the Carroburg wash on my BA is because it's a more purpley (for lack of an appropriate word) look than I want. It might blend the Wazdakka and the Khorne nicely, but I haven't gone the lengths to try it.


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## Words_of_Truth (Sep 20, 2007)

What do you think of the general shade of the red, I didn't want it to be the bright red of blood angels but a darker more menacing colour similar to the scheme from the FW HH books but I'm wondering whether I went to far.


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## ntaw (Jul 20, 2012)

If you're using Khorne as a base, you'll have to get pretty into it with the highlights to hit a Blood Angels kind of red. I'd say you're where you should be for the base of this application. Since I don't have the HH books, are you shooting for a red like the way Kor Phaeron is painted on the FW site?


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## Words_of_Truth (Sep 20, 2007)

I was aiming for something like this.


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## Words_of_Truth (Sep 20, 2007)

ntaw said:


> If you're using Khorne as a base, you'll have to get pretty into it with the highlights to hit a Blood Angels kind of red. I'd say you're where you should be for the base of this application. Since I don't have the HH books, are you shooting for a red like the way Kor Phaeron is painted on the FW site?


Equally if you have the codex chaos space marines, I'm kind of going for something like the word bearer terminator on page 75 in the middle.


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## ntaw (Jul 20, 2012)

To me, that looks like something akin to Bleached Bone (Screaming Skull or the like) or maybe even Kindleflame (or the Lugganath Orange edge paint as it is easier to work with I assume than the silly dry stuff for edge highlights) followed by a heavy Carroburg or Purple wash- maybe even a mix of the two. You definitely have the red going on there, just some extreme highlights of something you can wash after to blend into the Khorne red is what looks like it's missing. You could also do _really_ light-to-the-touch white lines followed by the wash, they will take on whatever hue you use.

Though, when I zoom up to a document it doesn't necessarily make the definition clearer. I'm basing this off a kinda blurry representation. Also, you could try and make your own wash out of Khorne Red to use after the highlights. I've done as much by adding copious amounts of water to a paint, though I'm sure there's a more professional way.


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## Words_of_Truth (Sep 20, 2007)

ntaw said:


> To me, that looks like something akin to Bleached Bone (Screaming Skull or the like) or maybe even Kindleflame (or the Lugganath Orange edge paint as it is easier to work with I assume than the silly dry stuff for edge highlights) followed by a heavy Carroburg or Purple wash- maybe even a mix of the two. You definitely have the red going on there, just some extreme highlights of something you can wash after to blend into the Khorne red is what looks like it's missing. You could also do _really_ light-to-the-touch white lines followed by the wash, they will take on whatever hue you use.
> 
> Though, when I zoom up to a document it doesn't necessarily make the definition clearer. I'm basing this off a kinda blurry representation. Also, you could try and make your own wash out of Khorne Red to use after the highlights. I've done as much by adding copious amounts of water to a paint, though I'm sure there's a more professional way.


What do you think of Skrag Brown? I've seen it mentioned in an article elsewhere, where the same principles were used but he used an agrax earthshade wash instead of a nuln black wash.


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## ntaw (Jul 20, 2012)

I'm sure it could work just fine, ultimately as long as you paint with diligence I'm sure whatever you choose will come out nicely. Do you have pictures of the finished product using more browns? I'm having a hard time picturing it, I don't own that particular brown paint.

Also, were you to go for that first picture you posted back a page I'd say stop now and do a bit of silver battle damage, use that as a form of highlighting. The edges are where the paint would chip away anyway, right? :laugh:


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## Nordicus (May 3, 2013)

Hmmif you want another highlight, maybe a light grey mixed with Khorne Red could be a idea. The big thing about Wordbearers (in my opinion) is that they have a very cold and dark red, as opposed to other themes (Blood Angels, Crimson Slaughter, etc.) who have a bright and warm red.

If you wish to have a more cold red, grey is a good color to blend it with. Something akin to Administratum grey could be fun to try out.


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## Words_of_Truth (Sep 20, 2007)

ntaw said:


> I'm sure it could work just fine, ultimately as long as you paint with diligence I'm sure whatever you choose will come out nicely. Do you have pictures of the finished product using more browns? I'm having a hard time picturing it, I don't own that particular brown paint.
> 
> Also, were you to go for that first picture you posted back a page I'd say stop now and do a bit of silver battle damage, use that as a form of highlighting. The edges are where the paint would chip away anyway, right? :laugh:


The image below is the finished product of the tutorial I replicated but changed the colours.














Nordicus said:


> Hmmif you want another highlight, maybe a light grey mixed with Khorne Red could be a idea. The big thing about Wordbearers (in my opinion) is that they have a very cold and dark red, as opposed to other themes (Blood Angels, Crimson Slaughter, etc.) who have a bright and warm red.
> 
> If you wish to have a more cold red, grey is a good color to blend it with. Something akin to Administratum grey could be fun to try out.


Hmm grey mixed with red, I'll give it a try, I'll also try the chipped armour as well, I'm already using metal to try and portray some writing on the armour.


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## ntaw (Jul 20, 2012)

That model looks great man, really smooth. The brown is definitely the right way to go over the purple, forget I ever said anything of the like. I tried putting my money where my mouth is, painted up a part of a jump pack using Screaming Skull as the edge highlight after I got the Khorne Red back up from the Nuln wash. Purple wash was a big old failure, but I liked the way the Baal Red wash I gave it initially looked. If (really big if) you wanted to do an edge highlight on that brown that you achieved in that picture the bone colours would be well suited I think, provided you do it before the Agrax so it doesn't stick out.


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## Words_of_Truth (Sep 20, 2007)

That was someone elses model, it's just I used the steps he used but replaced agrax with nuln black.


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## Words_of_Truth (Sep 20, 2007)

Here's how he's looking now.


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## Nordicus (May 3, 2013)

Personally I think the only thing you need is a slight highlight on the metal - The red is pleasing to my eyes when thinking about Wordbearers.


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## ntaw (Jul 20, 2012)

Looks amazing, did you end up using that brown you were talking about as the edge highlight? I agree with Nordicus though, even just some edge highlighting top-down style would help pick out a detail here and there....but then again, it may just be the lighting in your picture there.


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## Words_of_Truth (Sep 20, 2007)

I didn't add another highlight to the red, the light is going from left to right in the picture, so it may be causing some problems. I've only highlighted the metal with leadbelcher after doing a black wash over lead belcher, I suppose I could add a chainmail highlight.


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## ntaw (Jul 20, 2012)

Words_of_Truth said:


> I didn't add another highlight to the red


:laugh: and here we see the value of lighting in pictures!


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## Words_of_Truth (Sep 20, 2007)

ntaw said:


> :laugh: and here we see the value of lighting in pictures!


Yeah, I sorted my camera out a bit. Also when I took the original picture it was pretty cloudy outside as well.


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