Librarium Painting Challenge - my Chaos force

[Midgard]

So, better late than never, eh?

 

For the current Librarium Painting Challenge, I am trying to paing a 10-figure squad of Chaos Marines (Word Bearers), a 7-figure squad of Plague Marines, and one Sorcerer, whose color scheme I still have not quite decided on. With time being of the essence, I am expecting to have a healthy amount of updates every week as much as possible... well, as much as I can paint. I am not much of a painter, but hopefully I can make them look reasonably decent, or at least not altogether horrible.

 

So if I have to make up for the lack of painting skills with heavy-handed attempts at humor, then at least hopefully I can elicit a few laughs from you guys.

 

Here is what I am starting out with.

 

 

The entire gang of miscreants as it stood at the beginning of the challenge:

 

http://www.counter-factual.net/miscreants.JPG

 

 

For Lorgar and cookies!!! I mean, for the Dark Gods, ahem, yay! Oh, and cookies, too:

 

http://www.counter-factual.net/forlorgarandcookies.JPG

 

 

Serving Papa Nurgle: taking a shower or a bath is strictly optional:

 

http://www.counter-factual.net/needabath.JPG

 

 

What am I doing here leading these misfits? Who am I supposed to be? Identity crisis imminent:

 

http://www.counter-factual.net/dazednconfused.JPG

 

 

Fear me mortals, for all the powers of Tzeentch cannot match the power of Microsoft Paint:

 

http://www.counter-factual.net/fearme.jpg

 

 

As of this writing, I have undercoated the Chaos Marines, the Sorcerer, and one of the Plague Marines Chaos Black. If I get time to paint later in the week, I hope to begin working on red/crimson color of Lorgar's bunch (thanks to an excellent tutorial in the Tutorials section of the site), and hope to have them look reasonably passable later in the week. Then, more pictures should be coming.

 

That is, as long as I can balance this with the needs of a young child, a pregnant fiancee (to be wife in less than two weeks now), work, and grad school. Which should explain the haphazard nature of the updates, as they come along.

[Midgard]

And... the first "real" update. The squad of Chaos Space Marines has been mostly painted in Word Bearers colors, with only a few things to finish up, mostly small detail. Excuse my lack of painting skills, and the mediocre quality of pictures (at best) - I am still figuring out how to properly use my new iPhone.

 

The entire coterie of happy-go-lucky sons of Lorgar:

 

http://www.counter-factual.net/wb_squad.JPG

 

Trying to get a better picture... not much luck there:

 

http://www.counter-factual.net/wb_squad2.JPG

 

And again, last time I promise!

 

http://www.counter-factual.net/wb_squad3.JPG

 

The entire group is led by this charming individual:

 

http://www.counter-factual.net/aspiringchampion.JPG

 

Here he is again:

 

http://www.counter-factual.net/aspiringchampion2.JPG

 

I have a feeling this particular Battle Brother is taking his fashion tips from Abaddon:

 

http://www.counter-factual.net/wb_marine.JPG

 

Abaddon the fashion icon strikes again:

 

http://www.counter-factual.net/wb_marine2.JPG

 

Marine with heavy bolter:

 

http://www.counter-factual.net/wb_heavybolter.JPG

 

Is it a bird? Is it a plane? Ah, who cares, let's barbeque (a.k.a. my plasma gun marine)!

 

http://www.counter-factual.net/wb_plasmagun.JPG

 

When Old West meets Eye of Terror:

 

http://www.counter-factual.net/wb_twoguns.JPG

 

This is it for the moment - next update will show the finished Word Bearers, and, hopefully, Sorcerer and some Plague Marines. And that should complete the vow! Isn't that special, or what? B)

[Muller]

May I suggest that you severely thin down your paints and practice on your brush control?

Less flashes, and a steady hand would also aid in showing the minis off.

 

There's plenty of guides for all of this and much more here in the B&C Library.

[Warsmith Aznable]

I use my iPhone to do my update pictures. I find that if you take two or three pictures rapidly then usually one of them will turn out in good focus and you can just toss the others. Also, ifi you hold the phone too close trying to get the individual figure then the thing will never focus right. It's best to back up a bit for focus and then crop out the extra. I agree with the no flash train of thought. There are some good tutorials on B&C, but a quick suggestion from myself is to photograph against a light background, like white poster board, with no flash and the several quick snapshots I mentioned. If you have photo editing software the easiest thing to do after cropping is to adjust the brightness and contrast a bit (not too much) to try and bring out the details. That's the "quick and dirty" to it.

[Midgard]

Thank you for the input guys! I will try to incorporate it for the next round of pictures, hopefully at some point later this week if at all. Well, there are probably nine year olds out there that paint better than I do (I guess I am... visual arts challenged...), but at least hopefully I can eventually get to something that is not so, well, amateurish looking.