Painting beautiful models is something we all wish we could do. Regretfully the only models that most of us will ever paint are those in the Games Workshop line up and not the models that strut down the catwalk. The pictures above are compliments of my Wife's favorite show, America's Next Top Model, which airs once a week. Much like the drama that unfolds each episode each new model that I paint leaves me filled with regret and joy. Over the years my skills as a painter have increased and thus the subject matter, the models, become more and more difficult to work with. The attitudes and egos that come to the surface leave me in a constant state of anxiety. Did I paint this to the best of my ability, are the colours balanced, should I try a new technique are but a few of the questions that plague my feeble mind. In the end each model that I finish weather they are 100% to my satisfaction are a testament to my modelling and painting skills. Today I want to have a look back at one of my first models that I painted.
Like most of you I have a plastic crack problem and find it hard to stick to just Chaos models. My now defunct Ork Kult was my first 40k army and it also is the army that introduced me into kit bashing. Big Mek GearGrot, as I call him, was made from a plethora of kits. GearGrot is kitted out with a KFF which is represented through the Eldar command bitz that I found on an Apocalypse Command sprue. The Power Klaw compliments of Ghazskull Thrakka and it also help represents his Cybork Body. The Bosspole owes its linage to a Fantasy Ogre Tyrants gut plate. The 'Eavy Armour is shown through the Fantasy Black Orc Iron skull. In case you are wondering the main body is that of a Fantasy Ogre Tyrant while a fair amount of the gubbings belong to a Ork Loota squad.
Fluff wise GearGrot is one of three BigMeks that presides over THE KULT OF MEQ which is hybrid Death Skull, Blood Axe clan. They pride themselves on being mechanized and owe a great deal of their victories to GearGrot himself. Big Mek GearGrot has grown not only in reputation but in his sheer height and girth. Not one one to be pushed around GearGrot's Warbosses typically end up dead in some sort of bloody accident.Painting wise you can see the lineage to that of the Death Skulls through the extensive use of the colour blue. Using the Blue as the main colour and a stepping off point the remain colours seen in the model, green, red and orange form a Rectangle (tetradic) colour scheme. The rectangle or tetradic colour scheme uses four colors that area arranged into two complementary pairs. This rich color scheme offers plenty of possibilities for variation and work best when you let one colour be dominant. At time I did not follow the final principle which places emphasis on the balance between warm and cool colors in your design. Simply following one aspect of colour theory was enough of a challenge when I painted this model two years ago. To be honest I have a hard time wrapping my head around the whole temperature side of things. The one aspect of the model that falls short is the exposed skin. It simply falls flat in several places. Of course this can be corrected with some help of an additional layer and a slathering from a wash. I am happy with the model though and do not plan to modify or change anything on it.
Overall this model presented me with not only an excellent opportunity to kit bash but it challenged my painting skills at the time. From rust to teeth to stark whites. Each one of them developed my techniques and have turned me into the painter that I am today. I may not be a Golden Daemon winner but in my books I did a hell of job on this Big Mek of an Ork.
