Hi guys, I am back.

[HsojVvad]

Hey all, I use to come here everyday and participate on the forums. I lost interest in DA because when I tried to paint mine, I suck at it and lost interest in it. I tried with Tyranids, but same thing. I don't game much since there is no one around in my area that plays so it's more of a modeling collecting thing. I have gone through depression, so I basically quit everything I did. I have all the time in the world to paint and model, and I just don't do it, so it makes me even more depressed.

 

Well now I think it's time I try to get out of this depression, and the funny thing is, I have a DA burning inside me. So I slowly started coming back just reading a bit and then leave. Well now I am back, and want to say hi again. I still suck at painting, but who cares. At least I am doing something right? I just find it funny how I am depressed and I a burning desire for DA, who many people say are depressed SM. :)

 

I am still out of work, so I can't buy anything new. I took out my 40K stuff and sadly I see lots of broken stuff. I will see if I can fix what I can and start over again. I guess this would be a good time to start over again.

 

Just a few question to get me started again.

 

1) How do I paint? By that, I mean, my paint looks so thick. My paints are old and getting new paints is not an option. So how do you guys go watering your paints, and then apply them to your minis? I want my DA more black than DA green. What I did was on a few DA SM, I paint them Dark Angels Green, and then use a black ink over it to give it a blackish greenish looking DA, and the others, I paint them black with Dark Angels Green Ink over it. Sadly I am almost out of DA ink, so I guess I will not be able to to this since I don't see DA ink anymore for sale.

 

What I would love to do, is you know the recesses or lines in the SM minis. How do I get them to stand out? I prime them with GW black spray paint. But when I try to paint it and leave the black lines, either my paint is too thick and goes over it, or it's to wet and it runs into it. Should I be dry brushing the armour over and over again so the black lines will stick out?

 

Since my colours are dark, I want to try something different. What colour should I use to make the lines stand out?

 

2) Since the only gaming I get is with my 8 year old son, and we don't have a legal army yet, can you guys help me make some scenarios like they use to have in the Battle for Macragge box set. I would love to have some DAish scenarios.

 

What I have is SM that I use as DA. I have Space Hulk, I got 3 bikes, and 2 speeders not put toeghter yet, I have the Blackreach boxset, I have the Ork battleforce box set and I got lots of tyranids, about 1000 pointish with no models for HQ yet.

 

So with what I have, what scenarios would be fun to play with? I really can't think of anything right now, and maybe once I read some ideas, my motivation will come back and I can think of more things then.

 

3) I would like to personalize all my DA with names, but I lost the name genrator site, anyone know where it is.

 

4) I would love to make a new DA army but I forget about the fluff abit. By that I mean can anyone explain to me how chapters are organized again in simple terms. I know we have the DW, RW, and GW right now. But how many men are in DW, how many would be in RW. I thought it was a total of 100, but now I see I read something wrong, and I am wundering if a whole chatper is suppose to be 1000 SM total.

 

So can someone explain to me, how many SM are in DW. Is it 100 Terminators? For RW is it 100 bikes? GW is 100 SM per company? When I read page 15 of the DA codex, it says 20 terminators in DW. I thought each comapny had 100 SM for a total of 1000.

 

I was able to look through the IA 5, and in there it said there was like 25 for 1st company 30 SM for 2nd company with 15 landspeeders, for 3rd company Master Orias Chaplain Apothecary 20 Tacticals 20 Assault 20 devestators, then for 5th company it has 60 tacticals 20 assault 20 devastator etc for the other companies that were in the book.

 

So how come one chapter has 20 tacticals and another has 60? Does this mean that is all that showed up for the combat but in total it's 100 in each company? So does that mean DA have 100 or more Tactical Dreadnaught armour or more?

 

5) If you have any pics of your armies, I would love to see them for inspiration. I have looked through a few on this site and my god you guys are great and modelling and painting. I would like to see more but don't know where to look.

 

6) Any tips for me and my son to continue with DA and have fun that I might not have asked.

 

Any help you guys can give me would be greatly appreciated. It's nice to be back.

[Plastic Rat]

Heya HsojVvad and welcome back.

 

This is some of the stuff I've learned over the years about paint thickness and dark lines in armor. Maybe it helps you. Hopefully if anything is glaringly wrong somebody else will correct me.

 

1) Paint and thinning.

 

Rescuing old paint

As someone who's had paint for years, it can pretty much be rescued at most points before it's as hard and dry as a stone. Add a drop of water at a time to the pot of paint. Basically I just dip a brush into some clean drinking water and let a drop fall in, then stir the paint well, preferably with a broad flat object. (I have some metal Tamiya paint stirrers which are extremely cheap but you can use anything. Toothpicks and brass rod don't work well, they're not broad enough to stir properly.

 

Keep mixing and adding water till the paint is smooth and thinned down close to how you bought it. Be careful not to over thin it. It's better to have it a tiny bit thicker than too watery. You can always water it down a bit more before you paint.

 

Also have a look around for alternatives to GW paint. Formula P3 (Made by Privateer Press) is excellent paint with better coverage than a lot of Citadel paints and it seems to last longer. You can sometimes get it cheaper as well. Their blacks and whites I find are stronger than the GW colors and cover far more easily.

 

Valejo Game Color is also sometimes cheaper and is again extremely high quality paint. I believe their metallics are the best, especially Brassy Brass. Great stuff.

 

I tend to use a combination of all 3 paints and a few other types as well. See what you can get hold of locally or cheaply on the net. Don't limit yourself just to GW paints.

 

Painting

Use a palette, especially a wet palette. An easy and cheap way to make one is to get a small dishwashing sponge about one inch thick and roughly the size of your hand. Stick it in a tupperware container of about the same size and fill the container with water to just below the top of the sponge. Now put a piece of baking paper on top of the sponge.

 

When you take a brushfull of paint out of the bottle, put it onto the baking paper and work from there. The palette will keep the paint wet for far longer as you work. If you need to mix colors to form transitions in blends, this will really help.

 

Thin your paint down on the palette before painting with some clean drinking water. Some people say it needs to be about the consistency of milk and I find this a fairly good gauge. I say experiment, but the rule of thumb is multiple thin coats are always better than fewer thick clogging coats. Thinner coats give a deeper, smoother and more rich coat.

 

The new GW Foundation paints are awesome for basecoats. One thinned down coat now does what many, many coats before used to do. Because of this, your paint can be thinner and you have less chance of obscuring detail. Unfortunately they can be a bit dark and have a very matte finish. Sometimes this is what you want. Othertimes it isn't. For example Mechrite Red (a Foundation color) gives awesome coverage, but I find it darkens down the red and is very hard to bring back up to a nice bright red. So I use Scab Red or Red Gore with a bit of black as a base for reds and go up from there.

 

I tried Orkhide Shade (Foundation) for a base for Dark Angels and I felt it didn't look good. You can try it though if you have the time, paint and models to spare. (Paint stripper is cheap :))

 

Black Lining

The technique of using black undercoat and leaving the black in the recesses is one I've heard of for years and never been able to get right smoothly. I always use a wash of watered down ink or the GW washes in the end to bring out recess shadows, or I go in with black and very carefully paint in the lines. Painting black lines in takes a bit of brush control and you need decent brushes. I can give you some stuff about that if you like.

 

What I do with DA armor is this:

 

Quick and easy way: (I don't use this anymore, but it was good when I started)

1) Start with black undercoat.

2) Heavily drybrush Dark Angel Green onto the black undercoat. This will give a very dark green. It's important to drybrush properly. Use a big, old brush you don't mind messing up. Make sure most of the paint is off. You shouldn't actually see a difference after each stroke. If you need help tell me and I can maybe post a video or pics. There are a lot of tutorials that tell you to drybrush, but few really show you how clearly. It's kind of something you need to just get a feel for.

3) Lightly Drybrush the model again with a 70/30 mix of DA Green and Snot Green.

 

That's it. The black undercoat stays very clearly in the recesses and it gives a very dark, dark angel.

 

Slow and better looking way:

1) Start with black undercoat.

2) Take some Dark Angel Green on your palette and mix in chaos black or an equivalent, a TINY bit at a time till you get a dark olive green. Paint all the armor in this color, including the recesses and cracks.

3) Highlight armor plates with pure Dark Angel Green. Paint this only onto the top of the armor and leave the cracks the dark color. If you're like me, you will probably make a few mistakes here and paint it into the recesses. Don't worry. Just go back again later and either paint in the dark color or try running some thinned down black paint or ink into the recesses. I just paint it back in carefully before I highlight.

 

(Btw, if you want paint to run nicely, add a tiny, and I mean TINY bit of dishwashing soap to it on the palette. Like, dip the very tip of the brush into the soap and mix that into the paint. You will visibly see the change in texture of the paint on the palette. It will run into cracks a lot more easily.)

 

4) Highlight the very edges of the armor with a 50/50 mix of DA Green and Snot Green. Flatten your brush a little into a flat chisel shape and run it against the edges of plates at like a 45 degree angle. This gives you a very thin highlight.

 

5) Lastly, if you want you can add a tiny bit of white to the green and highlight the corners of plates or areas you want a more extreme highlight, try it.

 

Hope any of that helps. If any of it is confusing or you are unsure, let me know, I'll try to put up pics or a video. I was fairly lucky to be able to learn a few painting techniques face-to-face from some really amazing painters. It's often harder to just learn from tutorials on the net. You just have to keep trying stuff till you get a nice effect.

 

This site by the way is amazing: http://blog.brushthralls.com/

It has some excellent painting tutorials and guides.

 

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3) I would like to personalize all my DA with names, but I lost the name genrator site, anyone know where it is.

 

Try this: http://www.behindthename.com/usage.php That's where I always start. Biblical names, Roman, Latin etc.

 

Latin translator, good for making up names of vehicles and finding stuff to write on banners etc.

http://www.translation-guide.com/free_onli...sh&to=Latin

 

Random blog site with cool names:

http://bookofthenephilim.blogspot.com/2009...ngel-names.html

 

More angel names. FEAR their scary pink background!

http://www.angelicinspirations.com/page71.htm

 

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4) I would love to make a new DA army but I forget about the fluff abit. By that I mean can anyone explain to me how chapters are organized again in simple terms. I know we have the DW, RW, and GW right now. But how many men are in DW, how many would be in RW. I thought it was a total of 100, but now I see I read something wrong, and I am wundering if a whole chatper is suppose to be 1000 SM total.

 

Ok, this from memory, traditionally one chapter is never supposed to be more than 1000 marines and should stick at this number. A limit imposed after the Horus Heresy to curtail the power of the Space Marine legions. In practice, due to recruiting drives and casualties the number fluctuates a lot, often above or far below that number.

 

Every Chapter is composed of 10 companies and each company is 100 marines.

 

The first company in a traditional codex chapter is known as the veteran company. Containing 100 veterans and their support. These veterans will often serve in other roles, such as sargeants of squads and so forth. For Dark Angels, the veteran company is known as the Deathwing and has exclusive access to all the Chapter's tactical dreadnought armor, or Terminator Armor. The Deathwing also have a few other differences based on their role and so forth, but basically to outsiders, they're a veteran company with all Terminator Armor. Incidentally, Dark Angel venerable Dreadnoughts are members of the Deathwing too and will be part of this company.

 

In a standard chapter, companies 2 through 5 are 'battle companies'. Consisting of 6 tactical, 2 assault and 2 devastator squads plus all their support such as transports, dreadnoughts, tanks and dentists. For Dark Angels, the second company is the Ravenwing. I believe it consists of a combination of Ravenwing Assault Squads (You'll notice one full RAS has exactly 10 marines in it) and Landspeeders. The remaining 3-5 companies are standard battle companies as in all the other chapters.

 

Lastly in a standard chapter, companies 6 through 10 are 'Reserve Companies'. 6 And 7 consist of 10 tactical squads. 8 Consists of 10 assault squads. 9 Is 10 Devastator Squads. The 10th company is known as the Scout Company and consists solely of scouts, usually in training to become full on marines. The size of this company, while supposed to be 100 scouts, varies wildly in practice due to recruitment vs. battle casualties.

 

====================================================================================

 

6) Any tips for me and my son to continue with DA and have fun that I might not have asked.

 

In your situation, I think you should look at making your own rules for a skirmish game of some sort. First try out the rules for Kill Team (both in the new Battles book and the original Kill Team rules by Phil Kelly). I believe the old Kill Team rules are available online for free and legally. I actually believe they're better.

 

Check out Necromunda as well. It's also available for free, and consider creating rules for space marines.

 

Consider converting up a squad or two of Fallen Dark Angels for your guys to fight against in a skirmish game. You'd only need a few and it would be a fun converting challenge. I'd say for Fallen Dark Angels to fight against, there should only be one or two, the rest consisting of either outright chaos marines, or cultists (imperial guard), xenos or whatever you can come up with.

 

I see you have the Black Reach box set. You can have some awesome games with just that. The orcs can be used for a campaign on Piscina which is a huge part of DA background. You could even play Kill Team really nicely with the contents. Given half a shot at it I could probably come up with books worth of scenarios just using the Black Reach set as Dark Angels vs Orcs on Piscina.

 

The key is to think in terms of narrative. What do the orcs want to do? (Let's say they need supplies) What do the Dark Angels want to do? (They want to stop the orcs from getting supplies...) That's your basis for a scenario right there. Place a couple of supply dumps on the board. The orcs need to get them and get off the edge of the board, or hold them till the end of the game. How are the Dark Angels approaching this? Are they setting an ambush? Great, all Dark Angel squads deepstrike onto the board starting in cover (representing them springing out of ambush).

 

Think of a narrative situation and try to translate it into the language of gaming.

 

(Hope my wall of text didn't give you a bloody nose...)

[HsojVvad]

No bloody nose at all. Thank you very much my friend. It means alot. Thank you for taking the time to post this. I am going to try and learn patience. Even if it takes one week per space marine to do. I really want them to look nice. I will try and follow your instructions and if I have any problems, I will come back and ask for help.

 

By the way what is baking paper. I have never herd it before. The only think I can think of is aluminum paper or aluminum foil. I don't bake, I am not much in the kitchen, I got a good wife who cooks, Maybe she will know if you don't get back to me in time. I never herd of using a sponge before, but I love the idea of having my paint last longer, I think that is why I rush so fast, so I don't waste paint drying on my pallate.

 

Thanks again, for all the help you have given me, I really do appreciate it. Maybe I can post up some pics later next weeks and see if there is any progress.

[Plastic Rat]

Ok, this is baking paper: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parchment_paper_(baking)

 

Pic: http://lh5.ggpht.com/_ubrgvKdCddk/S9vfsWd4NEI/AAAAAAAAAGs/dwgL0Wcp2tM/s1024/baking%20paper.jpg

 

Your wife should know what baking paper is. It's commonly available in supermarkets in the baking section. One roll should set you for life. Don't confuse it with wax paper, it's not the same.

 

Get yourself a plastic container like this: http://lh5.ggpht.com/_ubrgvKdCddk/S9vfr6LGKEI/AAAAAAAAAGo/CLjcZ_LwAC8/s1024/tupperware.jpg

 

Cut yourself a piece of baking paper slightly smaller than the sponge: http://lh6.ggpht.com/_ubrgvKdCddk/S9vkIru4uWI/AAAAAAAAAHQ/3IInPb3H4Uk/cut%20paper.jpg

 

Stick the sponge in the plastic container, fill with water to about 2/3 the way up the height of the sponge, make sure the sponge is nice and soaked, stick the paper on top. Doesn't really matter what side you use, although some people debate it. I haven't found a difference. I tend to put it with the curve downward so it stops the paper rolling itself up.

 

Like this: http://lh4.ggpht.com/_ubrgvKdCddk/S9vkJDf4PII/AAAAAAAAAHU/e8ImXiYc70Q/complete%20palette.jpg

 

If you use a sealable tupperware container you can stick it in the refrigerator if you're done painting and it still has paint on it that you want to use. It will stay wet like this sometimes for days depending on humidity. You might need to add a little water to make up for evaporation every now and then. If you paint in a room with an airconditioner your paint will dry up MUCH MUCH more quickly. In fact the wet palette really won't help as much as it should. I suggest painting with the AC off if you can survive it.

 

If you live in a very humid environment, clean the thing out, squeeze the sponge out and put in new water every week or so to avoid mold or other weirdness.

 

Another way to make one is with the top of the plastic GW boxes that the larger metal sets come in, like this: http://lh5.ggpht.com/_ubrgvKdCddk/S9vkKIetg-I/AAAAAAAAAHc/mGhstuyanPM/GW%20box%20top.jpg

 

Use a high quality, lint free kitchen paper towel, folded into four and cut to size. http://lh6.ggpht.com/_ubrgvKdCddk/S9vkK-rHYAI/AAAAAAAAAHk/w8mUsb_aZAk/paper%20towel%20cut%20and%20folded.jpg

 

Put a little water on the paper towel, just enough to soak it, but don't have it swimming in water and stick your baking paper on top like this: http://lh3.ggpht.com/_ubrgvKdCddk/S9vkMfqSK8I/AAAAAAAAAHs/6BqFYbH4w_k/alt%20palette%20with%20water.jpg

 

This is cheaper and sometimes easier, but the disadvantage is you can't seal it and put it away.

 

==========================

 

Another note. I found when learning to paint, people didn't tell me a lot of important stuff about brushes. For one, use a good quality red sable hair brush. The GW brushes use sable hair, but there are better brushes out there.

 

Windsor and Newton series 7 brushes are the best I have ever used bar none. They're a tad more expensive, but if you take care of them, they will last you many, many times longer than other brushes, and in the end will work out cheaper. They're also actually not all that expensive when you consider it.

 

To take care of your brushes make sure paint doesn't get near the ferule. If it does, which it often will, wash it immediately. The ferule is the metal part of the brush that clamps the bristles together. When paint gets too close to the part where the bristles and the ferule meet and goes hard, it makes the brush splay apart and it won't form a nice sharp point anymore.

http://lh4.ggpht.com/_ubrgvKdCddk/S9vo9JkkZvI/AAAAAAAAAIY/VOao28lLMKY/ferrule.jpg

 

For natural hair brushes, you can put some conditioner on them every week or so. You can either use brush conditioner from an art store, or just normal human hair conditioner. (I prefer Pantene for that extra silky shine and fresh scent ;D )

 

After cleaning, dip the brush in the conditioner and then drag it gently across something, like the palm of your hand and twist as you drag. This will form a nice sharp point which is what you want on your brushes. Put the cap back on (usually a plastic piece of tubing supplied with the brush) and store it standing upright. Wash it out first when you're ready to paint with it again.

 

The drag and twist technique is used a lot when you paint for detail work to set a nice point. In fact every time I put new paint on the brush, I wipe the excess paint off by dragging it across a paper towel and twisting gently.

 

Which reminds me. When I started painting, I had a problem loading too much paint onto the brush. If you're not sure how much paint you should have on your brush when you paint let me know and I'll try and put some pics up for you. Basically the brush shouldn't have blobs of paint on it, you should be able to clearly see the bristles. The paint should flow onto whatever you're painting in a controlled manner, almost like writing with a pen.

 

There's a brilliant article on brush control in White Dwarf of March 2006 if you can get hold of it.

 

Anyway, hope this helps and good luck.

[HsojVvad]

Thanks again PlasticRat. I forgot to ask my wife for baking paper, so I will have to wait till she comes home. I am looking forward to see what I have. I hope not too much broke, or ended up in the garbage. My son is getting excited again that daddy is brining out the 40K stuff and the DA out again.

 

I got him the first Dawn of War, the first thing he did was say "Daddy help me make my SM Dark Angels." When I showed him that there was already DA colours and flags he was so happy. So now we need to make all our SM DA now.

 

I got 3 bikes, and 2 speeders. What colours do you guys suggest I should make them? When I eventually get to my Terminators, I will not be painting the Bleached Bone, but the same as my other DA colours as said above. I was going to paint them gold for something different, and I never seen gold SM, but then I read that is too BAish, so I will just stick to making my DA, DA green with black ink on them, or painted black, with DA green on them. This way they look black from far away, but up close, you can see they look more greenish than black. That is why I was wundering if I should make the lines or crevices a different colour so it would stand out. I was thinking of a bright green or something like that, but then, I thought that would look too Tronish, so decided agaisnt that. What colour would you suggest?

[Dark Dajin]

Heya HV, I guess I should thank you for creating this topic, and ofcourse Plastic Rat for posting such an extensive guide :D

Gunna try the baking paper palette next time ;)

 

Wouldnt be able to suggest a scheme, as I use standard DA at the moment.

 

Hope you stick around :D

[HsojVvad]

I hope I stick around too. I just asked my wife, and yes she herd of it, but dosn't use it. I will get some next time we go shopping.

[Arioch]

Take heart brother! Our sword may be broken, but we are not.

 

About the fluff question, I will try to make a brief summary. There is over a million chapters with a 1000 marines in each drawn from the original 1. founding chapters. The Dark Angels consists of 10 companies, the 8 of them being "normal" companies. The 2. company is made up of attack bikes, landspeeders and bikes, and 100 battle-brothers that pilots them. The 1. is a pure terminatorforce with 100 terminators(its 20 terminatorsquads.). It can all be seen in the DA codex. The DA have six known succesor chapters, so there should be some room for variation.

 

Hope that helped a bit :o

[Wayward]

HsojVvad, keep it up Brother! For what is worth, I understand the feeling of guilt nad the idea of wasting time you had... but dont blame yourself for it. being unemployed isnt "free time" at all. Its a st of a situation, and having wife and kid surely puts more weight on your shoulders, but also gives you two good reasons to stand up! So quit blaming yourself and do some painting, its not an easy situation but youll get along in time :wub:

 

Plastic Rat, Sr. you hit some nails with your tutorials! often people makes tutorials just to show how much they know rather than to share they knowdlege with others :P Yours its second case, no doubts about it! With your permission, I would like to translate this to spanish to post it in a spanish based forum, begginers could benefit so much with data so well delivered!

[HsojVvad]

Thanks for the kind words guys. Thanks for the explanations as well, they do help. I was able to go out to day and bought a new sponge and baking paper. My wife called it parchement paper, and I see it will last a long time.

 

I just want to say thank you, you guys have picked me up. Will do some painting tommorrow when the kids go to school.

[krewl]

It also helps to make a bit of a schedule for yourself.

Say 3 hours looking for work a day, some free time for some painting, after scholl playing with the kids.

 

That way your days will not just feel empty and you can keep yourself organised (Like gettingout of bed at a normal time and suchs.)

[HsojVvad]

Got back into depression again, so but everythign back on the back burner, and finally for the first time in I don't know how long got the paints out. I finally got what plastic rat suggested. I have to say it is really different using the sponge, container and parchment paper. I love how the paint dosn't dry up so fast.

 

Anyone who hasn't tried it, I suggest trying it. I seem not to rush so fast now thinking I have to use up the paint before it dries.

[bevulf]

Show us your painted minis :P

[HsojVvad]

Show us your painted minis :P

I will. Me and my son are both doing the painting together. He does a bit, I do a bit. We are both enjoying it.

[EPK]

We are both enjoying it.

 

Good to hear. Master painter or not, at the very least I find it to be therapeutic at times.