Ice World Basing Experiment #2

XV25 Stealth Suit

This is a bit of a mixture of two painting projects;

1. Painting my Tau XV25 Stealth Suits so that they look 'mid-stealth on' as I like to think of it (think of the illegitimate offspring of the human torch and invisible woman), with part of their suits the same colouring as the background and part still looking like the suits of the rest of my Tau cadre.
2. Experimenting with snow/ice world basing.

This time I used a PVA to lay down a sand base, followed by painting Rhinox Hide  and drybrushing with Skrag Brown. 

I then cut two small pieces of sprue with a scalpel into crystalline shapes and polystyrene cemented them into place (I'd left two gaps for the crystals).
Ceramite White basecoat on the crystals, and Scar White on parts of the ground.
Then Lothern Blue layer on the crystals followed by 50/50 Lothern Blue/Scar White, drybrushed onto the crystals, then adding a tiny amount of Scar White to the mix each time, I then added another 5 layers of drybrushing on the crystals until I was essentially drybrushing pure Scar White only onto the very tips of the crystals.

Finally I dabbed PVA onto the white parts of the ground and small amounts of PVA were added to parts of the Shas'ui's hooves (roughly equivalent to where I find snow kicked up onto my trousers in the winter and sticking), and some PVA onto the top of the XV25 suit, onto the static parts where I imagine snow could pitch and is less likely to be knocked off (unlike the arms and Burst Cannon).

So, what do you think? Does the stealth suit look mid-stealth? (I'm hoping that as part of a unit and army painted with Ice terrain the white will look more like the background.. well fingers crossed!).

How does the base look?

Ice World Basing Experiment #1

Hi there, I have recently begun collecting a Tau army as well as Clan Skitr, now my Tau are from Sept Dal'yth (purple markings) and I've decided on a colour scheme of blue-greys and ice blues as Tau are known to apply camouflage to their armour and I'm envisioning this army on a desolate ice world with solid ice underfoot, drifts of snow and patches of partly-melted slush and slurry.

This blue-white shiny glistening ice is perfect

I love the blue tones to this ice

I've got some Citadel Snow 'flock' and Mourn Mountain terrain paint.

So my first attempt was the paint a bare base with Mourn Mountain, followed by a drakenhof nightshade wash.

Unfortunately the effect was not as blue as I'd hoped.

I then added PVA to all top surfaces and used the snow flock.

I can almost hear the crunch of fresh snow.

I had left a small area behind each hoof  bare of snow to represent hoofprints of crushed/melted snow, I then added a layer of 'ardcoat to give it a wet look.

Unfortunately I also added a Lothern Blue/Lahmian Medium 10/90 to the hoofprints... which failed miserably as it seeped almost instantly into the surrounding snow.

Hmm... more experimentation is called for!

I've seen some snow bases that show more of the earthy ground beneath, that is what I'll work on next.

Painting demo

I've painted a set of five space marines sequentially,  so that each step of th3 painting process can be seen (ish).

Hopefully this will help the kids improve their technique; at the warhammer club I run at school.

Space marines:
1. Primed with Imperial Primer.
2. Basecoated, armour is macragge blue, gunmetal and insignia are Leadbelcher,  gunbody is abaddon black, eye-lenses and wax seal are mephiston red, finally shoulder trim and script are ceramite white. Backpack skull with Balthasar Gold.
3. Washed, armour with blue ink (watered down 50/50), gunmetal and insignia with nuln oil, wax and eye-lenses with carroburg crimson, script with agrax earthshade. Backpack skull washed with nuln oil.
4. Mid lighted, armour Kantor Blue/Calgar Blue (50/50). Highlight gunmetal and insignia with ironbreaker. Backpack skull with gehennas gold.
5. Edge highlighted armour with Teclis blue. 2nd layer of ceramite white on shoulder trim. Base sanded, painted rhinox hide, drybrushed doombull brown with patches of scorched earth static grass. Eye-lenses highlight troll slayer orange, a dot of ceramite  then 'ardcoat for shine.

Warpstone

So, after finishing my clanrats I'm working on the rat Ogres and Master Moulder.  Before attempting the gigantic chunk of warpstone sticking from the shoulder of one of the Rat Ogres I decided to paint the smaller pieces of warpstone on the Master Moulder's prodstick.

Step 1:

Prime the whole model in chaos black.

Step 2:

Basecoat the warpstone in Abaddon Black followed by 33/66 Caliban Green/Abaddon Black. (Not entirely sure the first coat of AB was necessary)

Step 3:

Drybrush with Kabalite Green. A bit heavily. 

Step 4:

Drybrush with Warpstone Glow, more gently.

Step 5:

Edge highlight using a Fine Detail brush and Moot Green.

Glow

Step 6:

After surrounding metal has been layered and highlighted.

Wash closest metal to the warpstone with Biel-Tan Green.

Step 7:

Layer Kabalite Green.

Step 8:

Highlight Warpstone Glow, onto the Kabalite Green but only on the areas closer to the warpstone chunk.

Step 9:

Final highlight Moot Green on spot closest to the warpstone.

I found that after all that the glow looked too stark against the model, so I applied an extra was of Biel-Tan in the (hopefully not so) vain attempt to blend the transitions between greens in a little.

What do you think?

Rat Ogres

Well its time I put Clan Moulder's contribution to better use than in their first encounter with the High Elves! (See post below)

So to mark this new focus and the completion of  the unit of Clanrats with hand weapons I am starting to paint the Rat Ogre pair and their Master Moulder Greil.

Note to self; stop gluing models together before painting. Master Moulder is going to be a pain in the tail to paint with his prod in front of his body...

Well I started by using my new can of chaos black primer over our 2nd story balcony (praying to the horned one that I didn't drop a Rat Ogre!) Which worked nicely.

Basepainting

I followed that by basepainting the structural metals and blades with Leadbelcher and the more mechanical metal pieces with Balthasar Gold. (I figure the plates and blades will be made of steel whereas the canisters etc. would be constructed of the more malleable copper).

Fur: Abaddon Black

Skin: Ratskin Flesh

Cables: Caliban Green

Leather: Rhinox Hide

Teeth/Bandages: Ushabti Bone

Warpstone: 50/50 Abaddon Black/Caliban Green

Washes

Flesh: Agrax Earthshade

Leather: Agrax Earthshade

Bandages: Seraphim Sepia

Warpstone/Cables: Biel Tan Green

Steel/Copper: Nuln Oil

Scars: 25/75 Xereus Purple/Lahmian Medium

Cracks near warpstone: Biel-Tan Green

Layers

Fur: drybrushed Stormvermin Fur then Dawnstone

Leather: Doombull Brown then highlight with Tuskgor Fur

Steel: drybrushed with Ironbreaker

Copper: drybrushed with Gehenna's Gold

Bandages: highlighted with 50/50 Ushabti Bone/Scar White

Eyes: Mephiston red base then Evil Sunz Scarlet

Flesh: Cadian Fleshtone

Warpstone: see my post on painting clanrats, I followed the same process as for the warpstone bell-clapper on the musician.

Cables: same colours as the warpstone, but not drybrushed. (Caliban Green / Biel Tan Green / Warpstone Glow / Moot Green / 50/50 Moot Green/Scar White

Blade: washed with Biel Tan Green, I thought it should have a warpstone-induced glow or sheen as it seems to be powered by warp energies...

Claws: highlighted with 50/50 Ushabti Bone/Scar White

To Do

1. Add rust to the steel and verdigris to the copper.
2. Highlight the stitches with Ironbreaker (Mental Image: Master Moulder with a staple gun - FUN!)
3. Tiny dot of Scar white in the eyes.
4. Paint buckles with Ironbreaker.
5. Bases!

Clanrats - painting log

I started by painting one of the clanrat units.
I'm still trying to think of a clan and location backstory for the army, I know I don't want one of the four great clans, but I've not been able to find much in the way of information for any of the minor clans like Vrrtkin, Skitr, or Skrapp.

I started by super-gluing some neodymium magnets to the bases so that I can store the clanrats in their movement tray without them falling out.

Magnets glued to the bases.

Then I primed the whole unit with Imperial Black (unfortunately no spray can yet, so hand-painted -.-)

Primed and ready!

I wanted a very earthy tone to the units rags, my clanrats are far too low on the ol' totempole to warrant anything but scraps and rags for clothing - all my clan's funds are spent straight on warpfire throwers!

So the first step was to basecoat the units clothing in Rhinox Brown.

Rhinox Brown rags.

Fur and metal basecoated with Steel Legion Drab and Leadbelcher. 

Standard Bearer with Caliban Green and Mephiston Red standards. I decided to paint all the small pieces of cloth with Caliban green, in an attempt to tie the unit together (other than the abundance of leather).

Clawleader (almost) completely basecoated.

Clawleader with Agrax Earthshade wash on the fur and leather, Nuln Oil wash on metal and the tail painted Cadian Fleshtone.

Tail washed with Agrax Earthshade, leather has a layer of Doombull Brown. Metal edges have been highlighted with Ironbreaker.

The standard bearer with washes, wood and brass pieces painted. Bell with Balthasar Gold and a wash of Nuln Oil, green standards washed with Biel-Tan Green and red standard with Nuln Oil.

Finished clanrat pack, with final highlights and complete with rust.

Green standards highlighted with Warpstone Glow, and a little Moot Green.

The wooden shaft was basecoated with XV88 and highlighted with lines of Tallarn Sand to give the appearance of a grain to the wood.

The leather was highlighted along the edges with Tuskgor Fur (which looks suspiciously pink in the pot!)

The clapper of the musicrat's bell was painted with a 50/50 Abaddon Black/Caliban Green basecoat. Washed with Biel Tan Green. Drybrushed gently (aiming for the edges) with Caliban Green. Then with increasingly lighter drybrushes of Warpstone Glow, then Moot Green, then 50/50 Moot Green/Scar White, then 25/75 Moot Green/Scar White and finally the tiniest specks of Scar White on the four front corners of the warpstone clapper.

The rat on the bell, which I can only assume is a campanology enthusiast, I painted to have grey fur like the mysterious Grey Seers as I thought that only the best of rats would avoid being a hot-dog-esque snack long enough to skitter onto the battlefield with skaven.

Perhaps a miniature, red eyed incomprehensible grey seer will bring these ragged clanrats luck in the carnage to come...

First Sortie

The Chittering (mini)Horde of Clan Skitr approached a small expeditionary force of High Elves from Ulthuan in the dead of night, using the darkest hours before dawn to creep and skitter into the elvish camp and slit some disgustingly pale elven throats.
Ack!
The smart-git elf-water-guard spotted snit-craw as he crept behind it and let out a loud shout even as snit-craw slipped his sharp between the guard's platemail and into the elf-squish! Snit-craw will be cast into the clanslave pits upon our inevitably victorious return...

 - Warlord Skitr-Kwai-Le

Pity that this beautiful, almost ethereal, moonlit landscape houses the lowest form of life. The rats have scarred the land and it is our job, our responsibility and our honor to reclaim it. Light-of-foot, we will speed towards the rabble gathering of the unwashed and we will fertilise the scorched, ravaged land with the blood of those that have plundered it to near barrenness. The greater race will always be victorious.

- Prince Altheran Stormrider

The Chittering Horde Battleplan

Hey there,
I'm using this blog to keep a record of the painting and development of my warhammer Skaven army.

I started with the Island of Blood starter set, (my fiance claimed the austere High Elves and I was more than happy to claim those two rat ogres and warpfire thrower!).

I started by gluing together all the units in the starter army (ready to start playing ASAP) which includes;

2x clanrat regiments (20 models with clawleader, musician and standard bearer)
1x warpfire thrower weapon team (to be attached to a clanrat regiment)
1x poisoned wind mortar weapon team (attached to the other clanrat regiment)
1x warlock engineer with warplock pistol
1x skaven warlord with halberd
2x rat ogre and 1x master moulder (to keep 'em in line!)

I'm aiming to play with the army as is whilst painting up all the units, hopefully to a good quality.
Then by the time I've painted the army I'll have enough experience fielding a skaven army to make good choices for the next few units... but definitely including some stormvermin!