WIP: Dreadknight #8

I can already hear you folks saying “hey look another WIP post!” or “that is taking ages!” but let me tell you I had some really frustrating moments with this step of the model. I ran into some problems on each painting session but in the end I think I pulled this off nicely. Check out my experience with the Nemesis force weapons after the jump.

Following the basecoats I corrected some areas with poor coverage and started shading the hammer. As said before I’m going to portray it inert, so it will mostly be in metallic and gold colors with sharp edge highlights. So far I got the Leadbelcher and the two coats of Nuln Oil on the piece. The skulls, wings and the symbol of the inquisition as well as the pommel ornament will all be in gold, with the three-color-up model GW likes.

While that piece was drying I started with the sword. I decided to apply a base of Naggaroth Night for the darkest color, then build up the blend through some blues all the way up to white. Of course, all of this would have to be with brush, so I must say this was a little intimidating for me to begin with. I applied the base coat (had to use it twice, one of the worst Base colors by GW I used with poor coverage) and somewhere during painting I got my fingernail on the blade.

Yeah, you usually don’t expect to see this anytime after primer! My reaction after this debacle was something like this:

Had to do most of the work from scratch. Stripped the entire blade of colors and reapplied the primer, then the base color. Scratch resistant this time.

After some work on the blade I was done with the NMM effect:

All kidding aside, this step is really helpful in determining where you want to have your blends start and stop. For the first session I had absolutely no clue how to control the paint, started working between blue and white (very difficult without medium-tone colors) so I ended up messing everything up. Sorry, no WIP pictures there. For the second session however I started with the darker blend between Naggaroth Night and Ultramarine Blue and things started to shape up. The technique I used here is wet blending, so lots of thinning paints, washing off, readjusting pigments. Leads to a lot of unused paint drying on the palette.

Here’s the result at the end of the hour-long session. All done except for the bottom white and the 2 whites on the left of the blade. I think I’m off to a good start here, considering I am doing this for the very first time, both NMM painting and wet blending!

Looks pretty good from a distance, but close up I don’t like how I can see the streaks. The paint certainly doesn’t dry the way it looks during painting.

Here’s what I can suggest to people trying out NMM with a brush:

• Try using more intermediary colors. I used Naggaroth Night, Ultramarine Blue and Ceramite White. The Naggaroth Night and UM Blue are easier to blend but it was an absolute nightmare to try to create mid colors on a small area between the blue and the white. Something like Fenrisian Grey should do the job.
• Use a drying retarder. You have seconds to work on the colors while wet and it can be very disappointing to try moving pigments while paint is dry!
• White paint has terrible coverage. Use a greyish base to work with and build up from there.
• Have a clean workspace. I got all kinds of dust on my model from past mold line removals, don’t repeat my mistake. Be neat and you’ll be rewarded.
• Be patient. Seriously, this pissed me off at times and I’m considered a saint by people around me when it comes to patience. Work fast during blends but watch what you’re doing closely.

That’s all for now. The holiday went well in the end, with nice progress along the way. Could be better, but such is life. I hope I’ll be able to wrap this bad boy by next time now that I got the flow going. Until then, have a great week folks!

Filed under: Grey Knights, WIP Tagged: dreadknight, grey knights, miniature hobby, painting, solo figure, space marines, tips, warhammer40k, wet blending, WIP