How to paint Pack Markings

[SvenIronhand]

I've been negligent in posting on my painting thread, but I have been chipping away at all the stuff I've got. But one thing continues to escape me. Pack markings. To be specific, the pattern second from left on the bottommost row in the linked image. Any tips, brothers of the Aett? 

 

https://vignette.wikia.nocookie.net/warhammer40k/images/5/5e/Grey_Hunters_Pack_Markings.jpg/revision/latest?cb=20120517205737

Edited April 6, 2020 by SvenIronhand

[Bryan Blaire]

Are you talking about the two downward red triangles and three upward black/portions, or the three almost chainblade looking bars?

If so, I did one (but only one pattern, not three) of the latter on my current pack leader:

It's not the cleanest piece (and it's not completely cleaned up yet), there's some things I'd be going back over more if this were a display/competition piece, but it's passable for game-play.

Edit: Realized I sort of did the triangles one on my Bloodclaw pack:

Make the red into black, and the yellow into red and it's somewhat similar. For the two down red triangle version, I'd just extend the edges of the two smaller ones I did up a bit straighter and right into the raised pad rim.

Is there something specific you are looking for tips on doing about the Pack markings, or is it just freehand in general?

My number one thing - break it down into simple geometric shapes. Number two is "paint with a darker color over the lighter, and then paint over that with the darkest color" (i.e. I use a grey, usually lighter, to lay out the design over yellow or red, that way refining it is a little easier, then I go over it with black), number three is "clean up to refine/straighten/round", and number four is "don't do complex :cuss that you'd have to repeat on more than one model - you're probably not going to get it the same each time." The last one is for my personal sanity.

I use a lot of dots to try and refine the shapes before starting to actually freehand, which makes it more like a connect the dots problem than trying to paint a more complex shape straight with no guide. Also, make sure you do your freehand work before shading and highlighting the surface you are painting on - if you have shaded and highlighted, it makes it much harder to clean up/correct. Plus if you shade and highlight after getting your pattern done, then it will look cohesive after you do so, and you can have weathering effects affect the entire painted pattern the same.

You could try and draw out the pattern with a pencil, but you have to be really careful you don't gouge the paint and on one example I've seen someone do in person, the graphite still shown through a little - it wasn't very visible though.

[Ranulf]

I use a similar process to Bryan - start with the lightest colour (red) and paint the entire field of the pad.

 

Then I use very thinned paint (black) to place dots where the peaks of each point should be in order to get everything spaced properly. If you make a mistake, it's easier to fix the positions of the tiny dots.

 

Then I join the dots with lines with the same thinned paint. It doesn't matter if the lines are really faint, they're only a guideline.

 

Finally, once you're happy with the outline, block in the colours.

 

 

Haakon’s Intercessor Pack

 

Good luck!

 

-Ran

[Bryan Blaire]

Definitely what Ran said - keep your paint thin to freehand - it's harder to clean up and hide corrections if you've got this big ole wad of paint clumped up where you kept going back and forth trying to get something right.

[PeteySödes]

All of the above is pretty much exactly what i do too.

Edit:

I made this in my WiP, maybe its helpful

So we start with our base. This is going to be hard mode because i shaded this a bit so it's not just one nice flat base color, which is what i'd recommend. I'll go into that later though. My reason here is im trying to make it look like worked leather.

Step two is the outline. This is where I would break whatever i was doing down into its base shapes. This is going to be knotwork and you can see I don't care yet about the over under or was even that particularly clean here. Main thing is just to get the basic shape. Keep the paint super thin, I also like to use a retarder to slow the drying. You can sort of "push" the color around with it, its real nice. I use the Vallejo one.

Here we can start to reign it in a bit. For this example I used a darker color to now hem in the shape. Im also slowly cleaning up and fat or thin lines with that outline color. This is the point im not showing where the overs and unders are going. Again, with the darker color im being careful but not overly concerned.

Once I've got the shape down, I'll go back with the background color (easier if its one flat color) and "erasing" any mistakes from the darker outline. I'll go back and forth as many times as needed to that outline and the background color as needed. Sometimes its a lot so don't get discouraged. Next I'll do the same exact thing with that lighter main shape brown and the outline color. Same steps!

Here I'll give it some depth. I'll take that main shape color and add a bit of a lighter color, here Im adding a bit of orange for that cured leather look. Keeping it pretty thin I'll go over the middle of each shape and leave a bit of space where the shapes dive under eachother. I'll keep adding light color till i like the look/contrast.

So here in terms of freehand its just more examples of repeating the steps above. In the bottom curve where i made the even smaller knotwork and "FENRIS" runes I blanked out that part with a darker brown. I then hit it with the base brown (thinned and *slowed*), again the base shapes for the knots and just line by line for the runes. Went back with the darker brown to clean it up, then blended upward.

Edited April 6, 2020 by PeteySödes

[Ranulf]

Now that's some killer freehand PeteySödes!  

 

-Ran

[Kassill]

It may take me years to pick up all the pieces of my jaw, excellent work brother! 

[PeteySödes]

Thanks brothers! As everyone said above, it's all just breaking up the component shapes and proper painting thinning that will get you 95% of the way there IMO.