Angels of Absolution

[xnickbaranx]

Brief introduction: I've been collecting and painting an Angels of Absolution army for ~18 years, starting with the 2nd Edition Codex:Angels of Death. I paint very slowly and I have project A.D.D. so I'm just finally approaching 2000 points of fully painted models now. The Angels of Absolution have always been my main army. I've been documenting my painting through a couple of blogs for years now - primarily through http://2ndcitywarzone.blogspot.com but since I come here and to BoLS to follow other people's projects I figured I'd start sharing as well.

 

Today I completed my first Wardens (Ravenwing) bike. I consider this model a work in progress, like the rest of my army but this guy is table ready at least. I will likely add details to his back pole, a pistol holster, a purity seal or two, more squad markings, and weathering. Since I'm getting ready for a tournament coming up here in Chicago though, I wanted to get this guy done enough for play.

 

Here's some pics:

 

http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-vC2j5MbqTp0/UCrTv7mstOI/AAAAAAAAAhQ/0jaKEy_w3Yo/s1600/IMG_1660%5B1%5D.JPG

 

http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-o_N9M_SJZIY/UCrT0Di-MCI/AAAAAAAAAhY/xIS9X8L9sbE/s1600/IMG_1661%5B1%5D.JPG

 

http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-a2ZYR1VkGIk/UCrT6KUZTLI/AAAAAAAAAho/Wnq0vUju78k/s1600/IMG_1663%5B1%5D.JPG

 

For more pics and explanations check out my blog. Questions and comments are welcome!

 

Thanks for reading.

-Nick

[Grand Master Belial]

For a table ready Warden, that is one of the best painted table-ready's I've seen in a while. It makes me wonder what you Painting Competition standard is like.

[Interrogator Stobz]

Very VERY nice, such smooth bone and clean highlights.

Love the Auspex, you don't see many of those modelled these days.

Thanks for sharing and welcome (back?) to the forum.

 

stobz

[Sviar]

That is an awesome looking biker, I like the Ice blue (the new name escapes me) higliht on the bolters and the jump pack. If you don't mind me asking, what is your recipe for that bone white? Is it primed with White skull and the onwards with Ceramite white?

[Eeps]

That is super, super crisp. Truly a really fantastic piece.

 

When you are doing 2 levels of edge highlighting, I reckon you've gone well above tabletop ready! Can't wait to see more of the collection.

 

Out of interest, what's the total time from undercoated to this level of painted for you?

[xnickbaranx]

Thanks for kind words. I'll post a bit about how I painted the armor later, maybe with some stage photos. I'm not sure how long the base coating takes but a normal sized marine takes about 8 hours to paint. An assault marine will take me around 12 hours.

 

I'm not sure what the new blues are called. I'm actually using paints from the 90's. Citadel Deadly Nightshade, Festering Blue, and Hideous Blue. I was a GW Retail Manager when those colors got phased out so I stocked up.

 

Thanks again. More info soon.

[EPK]

Very well done! This is well above table top standard.

 

I also like the use of blue rather than the straight up black. Is the term "Wardens" in fluff somewhere or is that a house made term for the AoA RW?

[xnickbaranx]

I actually made a separate post about this a week or so ago. The pre-print copy of the 4th Ed C:DA named the Ravenwing & Deathwing the Wardens and Shriven in the AoA fluff blurb. The released copy says 1st Company and 2nd Company. I'm trying to track down a copy of it so I don't feel like its all in my head. Haha.

[EPK]

I actually made a separate post about this a week or so ago. The pre-print copy of the 4th Ed C:DA named the Ravenwing & Deathwing the Wardens and Shriven in the AoA fluff blurb. The released copy says 1st Company and 2nd Company. I'm trying to track down a copy of it so I don't feel like its all in my head. Haha.

 

Ah ha! I do recall the post about the Shriven now. That's pretty cool, wonder why they took it out? (which is probably mentioned in the other thread... I'll have to check it out)

[Adeptus-Alaska]

man, that warden is cool! pristine, even! and yes, their termies are the shriven and their bikers are the wardens.Iwas at a games day about 13yrs ago, when GW had their outrider program for areas with no retail store. well anchorages outrider team went to GD and met a bunch of staff. and one of them had an AoA army, a huge one actually, and he confirmed that.

[Gillyfish]

That's really, really nice. Very clean painting style. I'd love to see some more of the army, particularly if they are all painted to that standard.

[Pistorius]

Fantastic stuff. I checked out your blog as well, and I will be following your future posts!

[Hexagon Sun]

I was just looking at your tutorial for AoA a few weeks ago, they look great. It's a nice and clean style and as Gillyfish said it'll be really good to see a whole army painted like this. Plus AoA are my favourite successor.

[xnickbaranx]

@GrandMasterBelial Thank you. Unfortunately, table ready just means that I don't have all the squad markings and weathering done. I look at the models at Crystal Brush at Adepticon and think, "I shouldn't even bother." I haven't entered anything since the first year because I don't think I'm good enough to compete with the master blenders, freehand gurus, and weathering realists. I just can't touch their magnificent detailing.

 

@Stobz I love the little detail bits like auspex, etc. At some point I would like to go back and put additional gear on all my models like grenades or pouches. No marine should have no gear other than a bolter. It just seems silly.

 

@Sviar Here's an old Stage-By-Stage I did for my original blog before I teamed up with some friends to do 2ndCityWarzone. The photos aren't as good as I seem to be getting now. But yeah, essentially it's Skull White Primer, give a Brown Ink, after the ink dries then layer on Bleached Bone (Ushabti Bone) leaving Brown Ink in the recesses, once the Bone is nice and opaque (this is the longest stage and takes several coats), Bleached Bone mixed with white as a medium width highlight (Screaming Skull), and then finally a thin Skull White highlight (White Scar). Here's the old tutorial: http://redemptorsofgolinar.blogspot.com/20...e-by-stage.html

 

@EPK I'm guessing they dropped the named references so that people weren't harassing them for color schemes and details which I guess is reasonable. They love dropping open ended ideas for people to wonder about but if they give away too much then people get demanding because the want the blanks filled in. haha. You know, people like me. :whistling:

 

@furioso-prime/@EPK I'm glad I'm not insane and other people recognize these names.

 

@Gillyfish My whole army is roughly that standard. It was 18 years of evolution but they've always had neat clean lines, but it wasn't until old GW US guys like Jason Buyaki and Brenden Terrill hammered at me about the opacity of my Bleached Bone that they really hit their peak. That would have been over 10 years ago now, so most of the army.

 

@Pistorius Awesome! Thank you.

 

@Hexagon Sun They're my favorite too. It's funny because I originally selected them because I wanted to do Marines and I liked the monastic look of the Dark Angels, but when I saw the AoA I thought "Man, I know how to paint bone from doing my Undead army. I'm going too try it out." I never looked back, and somehow the army just fit me. Out of my 3 40K armies I toy around with they are the army that suits me best and that I feel the most proud of. The only army I have an affinity for that I don't own is the Tau.

 

http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-xNpYmwRvT9Q/Tm-WGrzZgMI/AAAAAAAAAQw/qkPaUvzmTao/s1600/Terminator%20Complete.jpg

 

I have nothing new to post at the moment. I worked 12 hours days most of this week so just to keep with the Wardens/Shriven discussion I figured I'd post my Shriven test model from September of 2011. You can see more angles of him here: http://2ndcitywarzone.blogspot.com/2011/09...terminator.html

 

I'll try and drop something fresh later this week. Hopefully.

[xnickbaranx]

Working piece by piece (as always) on another bike. Pictured is the base (completely prepped) and a bike in need of a little detailing but close to completion. More tomorrow with a bunch of photos as I prepare my army list for tournament this coming weekend.

 

http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-ZSllddFYz3k/UDRNGf1MFrI/AAAAAAAAAjc/wYMsXcuGjhk/s1600/IMG_1668%5B1%5D.JPG

 

Thanks for reading!

-Nick

[xnickbaranx]

So today I pulled my 5 man Devastator Squad out of the case to spruce it up a little and dabble with FW Weathering Powders for the first time. Here's the blog post about it: Angels of Absolution Devastator Squad: First Attempt at Weathering Powders

 

And here's just a shot of the squad.

 

http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-CAdAqO9WGxw/UDUGwFCXC5I/AAAAAAAAAkE/yfG2zZmophQ/s1600/IMG_1671%5B1%5D.JPG

[Cactus]

So today I pulled my 5 man Devastator Squad out of the case to spruce it up a little and dabble with FW Weathering Powders for the first time. Here's the blog post about it: Angels of Absolution Devastator Squad: First Attempt at Weathering Powders

 

And here's just a shot of the squad.

 

http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-CAdAqO9WGxw/UDUGwFCXC5I/AAAAAAAAAkE/yfG2zZmophQ/s1600/IMG_1671%5B1%5D.JPG

Those are lovely. Excellent job on the free-hand squad markings. I was considering investing in those weathering powders to dirty up my Deathwing. I think you've convinced me. :devil:

[Sviar]

Xnickbaranx, thank you for the tutorial. Going to test this on a mini.

[xnickbaranx]

Xnickbaranx, thank you for the tutorial. Going to test this on a mini.

 

Awesome. Let me know how it goes!

 

So after spending the morning working on another Warden Biker I realized that I wouldn't get them done in time for the tournament on Sunday so I made an army list and am scrambling to get models battlefield ready. This is what I accomplished today:

 

http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-RxH8OnfG3mE/UDbdKhvBZPI/AAAAAAAAAkk/PJ2XBuJNcNE/s1600/IMG_1675%5B1%5D.JPG

 

I have a couple of Assault Marines, some bitz, and some touch-ups planned over the next couple of days. More soon.

[HJL]

that guy looks really mean! nice job

[Lone Scout]

Your painting is awesome! I was wondering why you highlighted the "black" with blue. I'm looking at starting a AoA army as soon as my pre-order lands and was going to high-light the black in a green to tie in with the DA's proper. I have seen quite a few AoA and the black is blue....what am I missing? (does the blue just look better than green highlights?)

[xnickbaranx]

Your painting is awesome! I was wondering why you highlighted the "black" with blue. I'm looking at starting a AoA army as soon as my pre-order lands and was going to high-light the black in a green to tie in with the DA's proper. I have seen quite a few AoA and the black is blue....what am I missing? (does the blue just look better than green highlights?)

 

I originally started highlighting black with blue because the AoA pic in the 2nd Edition Codex:Angels of Death depicted the AoA with what appeared to be Shadow Grey/Space Wolves Grey highlights on the backpack and bolter casing. Those greys are blue based so originally, with my limited palette of colors at the time I used Festering Blue and Hideous Blue instead. This evolved into the look I have now. Were I to go back and do it over I would have highlighted those elements with black based greys.

 

As for highlighting black with greens, you can do that. I think it would be even more divergent but it would connect with DA's visually, but it might look more Nurgle/Skaven inspired - like Warp Stone. Green used to highlight black is usually for mystical items or decay/rot. Still, that's way better than purple or red or something. But yeah, if I were to do it over again, I'd have used grey highlights.

 

 

 

So I played in a tournament this weekend here in Chicagoland and I got demolished on the field of battle, but took the Steady Hands award for painting. Here's a write up with close ups of some of the winning models...

 

 

2nd City Warzone - Steady Hands are All I Can Boast

 

Here's a teaser pic:

 

http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-umrKrToj4ms/UD4-OaYHcBI/AAAAAAAAAk8/__T7mBRo-44/s1600/IMG_1676%5B1%5D.JPG

[xnickbaranx]

Tactical Squad Midas

 

http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-aDUpiqyIiIw/UD5sBbgsSRI/AAAAAAAAAmE/gEdG7tBPrVI/s1600/IMG_1683%5B1%5D.JPG

 

http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-1DBaNfbAS5M/UD5sFV2afPI/AAAAAAAAAmM/lB9EeiIzQNA/s1600/IMG_1684%5B1%5D.JPG

 

The complete blog post:

 

2nd City Warzone - Tactical Squad Midas

[Isiah]

These are some awesomely painted and modeled minis. The freehand iconography is stunning. Can't wait to see more of your output appearing here.

 

Cheers

I

[Lone Scout]

I love your work! Great blog too BTW. I'll drop the green highlight idea and do a test mini with greys and shoot you a pic.