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Thursday, July 15, 2010

Almost there

I've gotten a couple of great weeks of painting in on my Elysians after getting the tank painting bug out of my system.
I finished a trio of Multi-melta toting Sentinels and a HWS with missile launchers.  I've just got a few vehicles (8) to do and I'm pretty much done with my Elysians.  You can check out some finished pics of them here.  Unlike the rest of the world right now, I can't afford a lightbox- or maybe I just have no interest in getting one- so you'll have to deal with the pic quality I've got.  Needless to say, in going for a paint scheme with 5 or 6 different shades of gray, it's quite difficult to capture the subtle nuances in the tones, but if you want to come over and see them, you're welcome to drop by.  Or failing that, come join the Chamber Militant forum.  You know you want to.  I'm a mod there and I'm shamelessly trying to increase the size of the "community."  I think you'll find that most of the recent activity is almost entirely free of the retardation you're liable to find on other forums.  Plus we don't filter language and there's lots of great Star Wars jokes.

I also just started on a Valkyrie test model to go with the Elysians or my other guard force.  You can check out some early WIP pics here.  I'm fretting a little bit on how to do the cockpit and the engines, so if you've got suggestions let me know.  I haven't painted a model airplane in probably 24 years, so I'm a little off my game when it comes to realistic colors for the engine, but I'm thinking that black is the way to go.

As far as the cockpit goes, some dipshit posted a bunch of incredibad pictures of his chunk style Valkyrie highlighting on BoLS recently.*  While the model looks like ass, I really like the cockpit interior he did.  Unfortunately, he's not trolling his own post, so didn't respond to my questions about how he did it.  I've never worked with the whole directional lighting/glowing effects before, but I'm thinking that starting with a mix of scab red: chaos black will get me going.  from there I would highlight up a few shades starkly just where the control panel glow would be present.  Polish it off with a red glaze of some sort, pop the glass back on, and call it a day.  Anybody think this would work or have a better suggestion? 

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*Yes, I'm well aware that my painting skills are mediocre at best, but I'm not posting on a "well respected" huge blog.  Seriously with the painting I've seen come from Goatboy or Bushido, I don't know why they would bother posting that bullshit.

11 comments:

DFM said...

I got a cheap POS lightbox at the parents garage in chicago if you want it.

It's about 12" too big for me(it's 2' cubed) but it works, and all you have to do is supply the table lamps.

OR, you could make your own for about $10.

Unknown said...

Dethron the Sentinel is looking cool. I guess multi meltas are for Elysian only?

I also noticed no link in your blog roll to www.imperiusdominatus.com I've got yours up, shameless self plug here and puppy dog eyes! lol.

Oh I select the Dethtron = A-Hole option just because I can! :P

Brent said...

Holy Shit, an article on Dick Move with a model!

You're pretty much got it, re: Directional Lighting. Mostly it's an effect thing; as long as you don't overdo it, the person looking at the model will understand what you were going for and fill in the blanks in his mind.

Wow. That was a clunky sentence... I just don't feel like fixing it.

Aventine usually does great work. All the Lamenters stuff they post is his, and I really dig that. I agree re: the Valkyrie though, he could have taken a bit more time with the highlights. I think it would have greatly affected the final look.

Chumbalaya said...

Models look great dude, very beat up and weathered {^}

Is anybody else reminded of ODSTs when they see Elysians?

Dethtron said...

DFM: let me know the next time you're in town. I may liberate that lightbox :)

Mercer: Yeah Elysians get H. Bolter, H. Flamer, or MMeltas on their Sentinels rather than any other options. Plus they deep-strike and don't take up FA slots. They can be in troops or Elite, depending on your build. I did a review of the IA8 Elysian list a while back that I don't think anybody read. If you click the "codex and dance revue" tag it'll pull up all the parts.

If you're not on my roll what's that say about your blog? :p
I kid, I kid; I've been really crappy about seeking out new stuff lately, so I'll check your site out and throw up a link later today or tomorrow. Side note to everybody: I'm thinking about ptting up one of those blog rolls that just posts recent stuff from my own subscription list, so we'll see.

Brent: do you think that red will be too strong a color for the gray scheme I've got going? I could see blue or green working as well given the context.

Anonymous said...

Hey, I like the beat up urban camo look... Nice work...

Papa JJ said...

Really nice weathering on the sentinels, did you use a sponge for some of that? The bases for your missile launcher teams look great as well. Good work on all of them.

It sounds like you have a good approach for trying out the cockpit lighting. I'm not even sure the example valkyrie you referenced was done with as much care as you are proposing to do. I think it just looks like a rough drybrush of scab red leaving a lot of the black undercoat showing, followed by a highlight of red gore on some of the edges.

I hope it all works out well for you, good luck finishing up your army.

Dethtron said...

JJ: thanks for the compliments. RE: weathering the sentinels, most of it was done with a sponge. I use formula P3 Umbral Umber for a base color for the paint chips. then I do a very light sponging of boltgun metal or any other metalic I feel like using. the one extra special step I did on some of the hard edges, though, was to actually rub a pencil against the edges. It creates one of the best "worn metal" looks you can get (thanks FW modeling masterclass). thing is w/ that trick, you have to make sure you seal your model after that, cuz it rubs off...

DFM said...

Odds are, I won't be able to hit the Chi till september at the earliest.

Why wait? Just gimme a call whenever you wanna pick it up, and I'll give you the addy and call my little sister and have her meet you outside with it. Drive by lightbox pickup.

Unknown said...

Deathtron I'll take a look though I'm not into Forge World stuff TBH. It's only for the rich and daft with more money then sense, I guess that's you then :P ?

DFM said...

@mercer Lol, you should have seen him at gamesday. Some of us got nothing at GD(besides creepy memories of stunty fingered woman asking us to fondle her resin bits), but he walks out with a big ass baggie of elysians.