# Ultramarine color scheme help.



## Dalamarth (May 26, 2009)

Hey guys.

Thinking of painting me up a set of good old fashioned smurfs.

My problem is, I've been generally dissatisfied with nearly every UM paint job I've ever come across. The blue looks too bright, and cartoonish IMO.

What I need? I need you paint guru's out there to help me find something more akin to my profile picture, and the UM's seen in similar artwork. That darker, richer blue just looks gorgeous. Any tips in replicating that feel?

Thanks in advance!


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## bitsandkits (Mar 18, 2008)

you need to find a base colour that is close to prussian blue,but i dont think its a colour thats in the citadel range but vallejo magic blue is a close match i think. Prussian blue is normally available as a tube acrylic too or may be try this link
http://www.warweb.com/blue-p-19056.html


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## jpunk (Feb 8, 2009)

Looking at the pic in your avatar you should notice how the majority of the pad doesn't actually appear blue. From about half way down it is practically black, and the top half is a mid blue highlighted up to a very very pale blue. It is the blue in relation to the black (and the golden yellow of the trim) that makes the colour as vibrant as it is. There is a very strong light source in the avatar which creates this shadow / highlight effect that is easy to do in a 2d painting, but quite difficult to replicate on a 3d mini.

In order to achieve the same effect on a shoulder pad, I would base coat the mini a very, very dark blue (as close to black as possible, but not actually neat black as it will suck in both light and your eye). Keep the bottom third of the armour plate this colour and blend up towards ultramarine blue, aiming to be using neat UM about two thirds of the way up. Then highlight the top of the plate using a very pale blue.

There's probably a better technique to doing this (anybody?), but it will still be a pretty tricky effect to pull off. I'd love to see an army like that though, so go for it, and good luck!


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## Mud213 (Nov 20, 2008)

One idea I have is to paint it the standard Ultramarine Blue, but just use the black wash over all the metal to darken it up. As you dab it on, make sure the bottom parts have more black to get that same effect. I was thinking about doing a similar thing for some Black Legion Thousand Sons only so dark that it is pretty much black at the bottom. That might be what you're going for.

Just test it out on one model first to get a feel for what you want the whole army to eventually look like. It's best to have a good image in your mind before you really go to town on all of them.


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