Brother Christopher's Purple Marines Project - A Little-Big Side Hustle, But Still Purple!

[gaurdian31]

The highlights came out really well, glad that the angry lines ended up working for you! I also think the gunmetal works well with your scheme, excellent choice!

[TheArtilleryman]

On 11/4/2025 at 10:51 AM, Brother Christopher said:

 

Thank you! That's actually very helpful - what you wrote somehow made things way easier - something appears to have clicked into place.

 

***

 

Since I went to the mountains and failed to get the fourth model finished by the end of October for the 12th Months Challenge, I figured that I can be lazy this time and skip the grass and bushes. For once. I'll glue some one with the next batch of miniatures. But apart from the greenery, the model is ready:

 

Unlike the case with the Phobos marines, the Company Champion didn't feel like a chore to paint. I'd even say that painting him was a blast. Don't know why. And to be honest: I will take it for what it is and enjoy the feeling.

 

 

 

 

 

 

My thoughts and comments:

- It seems I've given up trying to be a "better painted." And I'm growing more and more content with this. I've given up trying to refine the edge highlights and put more work into blending the colours on the armour partly because I feel liek improving this is a bit too time-consuming and partly because I think (ESPECIALLY WITH THIS MODEL) I found a great time-to-results balance. Furthermore, I quite like the chonkier highlights: while they don't look great in close-ups, they make the model better-defined when looking at it with the naked eye. Also, I bought a new purple paint - it wasn't what I hoped for but I've found a great use for it to get (more) reliable colours for the highlights. 

- I missed a splash of purple on the elbow pad - I'll have to revisit this part.

- The chequered patter on the tassets is a bit rubbish with close up, but you've got to believe me that it looks great in person. I'm very happy with it - a small bit, but very cool.

- I'm a tiny-bit annoyed that I failed to mask the line resulting from reducing the size of the shield properly. But I'm not annoyed enough to revisit this part.

- I'm still not entirely sure about the gold and if whether I want to continue using it for commanders in the future. I think I'll keep it for Champions and go with something more restrained for other HQs.

 

Next up: I'll try to equip some Infernus Marines with some Melta Guns (Rifles?) instead. I'm quite apprehensive about this since the weapons are resin and I expect that they'll put up a fight. Depending on how forgiving resin is, I intend to make a squad of 5 (including a Multi Melta) or a squad of 3 'tankbusters.' 

This guy is AWESOME. Possibly my favourite marine of yours so far. I like how you combined both the panel highlighting and edge highlighting to great effect.

[Brother Christopher]

Thanks for the positive feedback! Particularly about the reassurance about the choice of colour for my fire support guys.

 

This week has been... strange. Mostly because of work. In order to combat the time-consuming mundaneness, I surprisingly spent a lot of time doing actual painting progress. This has taken the time from other things, like being online, though.

 

I managed to finish the armour and do the base metallics for all three melta marines. I also did some soul-searching.

 

  

On 11/12/2025 at 9:14 PM, TheArtilleryman said:

This guy is AWESOME. Possibly my favourite marine of yours so far. I like how you combined both the panel highlighting and edge highlighting to great effect.

 

I'm very glad you like him! I appreciate the comment about the combination of panel and edge highlighting. This ties neatly into my soul-searching.

 

During short breaks between chores, I did some Googling in an attempt to research alternate painting techniques and find some inspiration to perhaps change the way I paint my minis.

 

And I think I meandered a bit but turned the full circle. For some time now, I'm slightly enamoured with the idea of trying to do volumetric highlighting or focus on panel "highlighting" by properly blending paints so that the painted-on lights and shadows imitate reflections from a single light source. I'm not particularly sure whether I'm using the right terms but I'm considering trying to 1up my painting and do some 'pro-style' models that are more like display pieces than game pieces.

 

Putting aside my skills threshold (i.e. I doubt whether I'd be able to pull off blending lights and shadows and whatnot), in the end I'm not sure if I really need that: it might just be me wanting to try something new. 

 

The conclusion I've come to is this: in the near future, I'll need to decide whether I want paint an army or whether I want to paint miniatures. Right now, I'm leaning towards the former - I think I'll want to stick to painting models that will look nicely in a display cabinet and - hopefully, one day - on the tabletop. And for this purpose, the style I'm developing for my Purple Marines works pretty well. I see it as a bastardised 'Eavy Metal wannabe style. Depending on the complexity of models, I manage to get single marines painted in between 2 and 5 hours. I think it's reasonable. The thick edge highlights help in defining the details and my attempts at making colour gradients make the large flat surfaces look more interesting. Does it make sense to make armour darker at the bottom and lighter towards the top? Not always and, therefore, not really. But it's simple enough and doesn't require much though, knowledge of (art?) theory, nor skill.

 

Come to think of it, I've reached pretty obvious realisation about painting styles. The 'Eavy Metal/boxart style is very striking and aims to market the miniatures, make them look nicely from all angles and on the tabletop and feels achievable. The other styles I have in mind look way more time-consuming and appear a bit prohibitive. Additionally, it seems that the minis look good from certain angles - something that's great for posting photos of them online or displaying them in a cabinet, but seems a bit problematic on the tabletop. There's also the real-life/hobby time factor involved. While the dream of doing 'pro-level' paintjobs of single miniatures appears to be alluring, in the end I find painting squads of Space Marines (instead of individual Space Marines) more pragmatic and fun due to potential of painting more different things.

 

On top of that, I do like my Space Marines but I think that even the coolest of SM models are quite boring. I'll try some of the pro-stuff in other projects. Or maybe attempt at a 5-6 model squad of fancy marines in the future. (There's also a chance that if I'm in the mood, I'll sidetrack my melta marines and do 1 'fancy' test model over the weekend, who knows.)

[gaurdian31]

52 minutes ago, Brother Christopher said:

While the dream of doing 'pro-level' paintjobs of single miniatures appears to be alluring, in the end I find painting squads of Space Marines (instead of individual Space Marines) more pragmatic and fun due to potential of painting more different things.

This bit to me is the most important part. Go down the path that offers the most enjoyment. You can always paint a one off miniature in the other method, but the main thing to keep in mind to me is what is most enjoyable.

[Brother Christopher]

@gaurdian31 That's what I'm trying to do. Although, this is probably the first project that really got me thinking about painting as a hobby. Before, with my Black Templars, I've been fixed on finishing the project and keeping to a more or less uniform style in a reasonable time.

 

With these purple guys, I find myself thinking and planning way more than I did about what I want to do with them. Presently, I want them to be my modern Templars: largely painted in this faux-boxart style. After experimenting with painting Primaris for the previous batch of models (including sponge painting), I returned to using brushes exclusively. There are also some ancillary ideas, realisations and plans - all a result of this week's soul-searching. Overall, this has been a very fruitful week hobby-wise.

 

The new thing that 'clicked' into place in my mind is that I realised that I want these models to be intended for gaming. 1. They should look nice at a distance (and the highlighted edges help with that), when looked at from all angles. 2. There's going to be a fair bit of them - I don't really want to spend more than 5 hours per model when there's 50-60 in the queue. 3. I want to get back to scratch building and I want to have some custom-made vehicles for these guys; I have to account for non-painting activities in the army project as a whole.

 

With these principles in mind, I am now set on painting them to a standard that's pushing beyond what I can do quickly and comfortably, but not my a lot. I still want to find shortcuts and fixes here and there. And with these melta guys, who are a direct follow-up of the 'success' with the Champion, I think I've found the sweet spot.

 

While not completely ready, I really wanted to share my progress:

 

 

Here's my first attempt at painting the heavy support symbol. It turned out that it was more tricky than I expected but I feel I'm quickly getting the hang of it:

 

Here's an example of me being overzealous. I thought that it'd be a cool idea to add a yellow stripe on the gun without realising that it'll blend with the scroll thingy. Now, I think I've managed to separate the yellow stripe from the tan ribbon... but yeah, it took some fixing and I should've thought about it sooner. I'll follow up with the same 'mistake' on the other two guns.

 

 

And here's a close-up on the face. I think it turned out pretty nice, although, it looked better without the eyebrows. I'm still not sure why I bother to keep on trying to get eyebrows right - it usually comes with a detriment to the face but... I kinda want them to have them. Maybe I should google a tutorial or something: perhaps there's some easy fix of other thing that I'm missing.

 

 

All in all, I'm quite stoked about these. At the end of the day, I'm not 100% sure about the metallic finish to the shoulder pads, backpacks and helmets but I think I'll reserve my judgement till they're properly finished. 

 

***

 

On the subject of heraldry and/or colours.

 

Over the months, with your help, I've been developing and redeveloping ideas for markings for my Chapter.

 

As it stand right now, I've decided on the following custom markings:

- Base chapter colour: Purple

- Company designation: Colour of the emblems on shoulder pads, as well as the stripe on top of the backpack.

- Squad designation: battle role symbol on the left greave.

- Battle role designation: Colour of the shoulder pads, shoulder-pad trims, as well as the round element on the backpack; non-battle-line troops also wear helmets with a different colour.

• Battleline: purple shoulder pads, white trim.
• Fire support: gunmetal silver pads, black trim; gunmetal silver helmets.
• Close support: black pads, -undetermined trim-; black helmets.
• 1st Company Veterans: white arms (including shoulder pads), white helmets.
• HQs: some variation of the Veterans' livery (perhaps white arms but purple pads?)
• All sergeants wear green helmets. 

- Special formations and roles (Vanguard marines, Champions, Techmarines) may use custom markings, as need be.

 

In the end, I've decided to reduce the number of colours and focus on the more 'boring' combinations (white, black, silver, gold) - while it perhaps won't be as 'fun' as I wanted it to be, limiting variants of the livery should help with keeping the project more uniform in the long run and, perhaps, will make it a bit more mature (i.e. I won't regret the different arm colours and four variations of the scheme in two years' time).

 

[kabaakaba]

Wow, i don't check your purple pals for quite some time and.. wow! They are great. And I like you develop a plan. it's always help. Yeah black/white/metallic may be not fun, though depends how you paint them.
Regarding brows, just check some picts in web. find variant you like. Brows hairs always  faced in different direction at different part of brow so some parts darker some lighter. if color/darkness of brow is uniform it's looks like it shaved. 
Any way great work. Your guys is a one of  project which make me think about my own chapter.

[space wolf]

I dont know, i think the brows look fine, for what its worth. As for your color choices, i think youve made good ones. Going with those more neutral colors will let your purple "shine" and once youve got several units on the table, i think youll be happy with how they look.

[bloodhound23]

Highlights look great on the meltagun. 

[Brother Christopher]

So, here's for something different.

 

If you're following my hobby woes, you might've notices that despite me pressing for the faux-'Eavy Metal style, I'm bickering about edge highlighting looking for a way to avoid edge highlighting. After doing some Google searches, I've discovered the world that I was vaguely familiar existed but never truly delved into: the world of youtube/instagram/influencer painters, their tutorials and works.

 

Dipping my toes into that world, I did some thinking and some trying. The quick fixes they offered didn't work, frankly. This means that either I should practice more or satisfactory results require time.

 

The thing that stood out, though, was the 'pro paint jobs' I've seen and that now plagues my social media (damned be cookies!). With the realisation that quick solutions don't work (i.e. don't yield the results I expected them to do) and that 'pro level painting' is beyond my available time and won't work for a gaming-oriented project, I abandoned these forays and returned to painting my melta guys.

 

But some seeds from these searches were planted. Sure, I though, I can try some of the 'pro level painting' stuff for the large AoS models in the future. But... am I actually able to paint to a higher standard? 

 

***The following is a recollection of my stream of hobby consciousness. Be warned and feel free to skip this.***

 

I don't have the time for that, I thought again. I need to paint my Black Templars and Purple Primaris.

 

But there's the second-hand Indomitus Captain somewhere, in one of those boxes. I can't really find a way to fit him in my Primaris Project. And that shield, it's ridiculous, too! Too big and bligy for my vanilla marines. I should try and kitbash him.

 

I managed to find him, including the head with the visor up and got to attempted kitbashing. An hour later, I failed miserably. I tried various configurations of weapons, arms; I really wanted to make him hold the shield in a battle-stance, but due to it's size it didn't work. 

 

It's time to get rid of him. This time for good. 

 

But, then again... it's a cool model in principle. What if... just what if I try to paint him as a test model - just to see what I can do.

 

***

 

I primed the model, took a half-day off and got around to painting the model. This way I got rid of him AND got a chance to do something different. Something exciting.

 

EDIT: PLEASE NOTE THAT I FAILED TO REALISE THAT I SOMETHING MESSED THE WHITE BALANCE OF THE PHOTOS. Apologies, but I can't be bothered to reupload them. The purple IRL is much warmer.

 

Hours later, I think I've managed to paint the purple armour:

 

 

 

 

 

 

Since I still haven't bought a light box, taking photos of the model was a bit difficult. I wanted/needed to capture the shading/volume. I set up two light sources to remove the natural shine - this worked surprisingly well. 

 

I'm not sure about the fidelity of the photos, though. They seem a bit over-processed and, for once, I think they make the model look a bit better than in real life. Also, I've uploaded the photos in a higher resolution than normally: since this is my attempt at 'best I can do,' I'll have to be braver than usual :P

 

The worst part is the right greave - I just couldn't make the reflection/gradient/highlight right - and believe me, I TRIED (I was going back and forth for around an hour). In fear of ruining more, I'll leave it as-is. The rest is painted up to the planned standard.

 

What's not apparent in the photos, I wanted to try and make the bottom part of the model a bit darker and cooler; the torso (and later, backpack) are supposed to be more vibrant and warmer. The idea is to draw attention to the top of the top part of the model. I'm not yet sure if I've succeeded: I'll probably need good natural lighting to make sure (I'm using a regular desk lamp with a relatively warm bulb).

 

For the highlighting, I decided on two imaginary light sources: one at a slight angle, from the front (in a way to illuminate the left leg behind the shield) and one from the back.

 

So, while not exactly pro-level influencer/painter level, I'm stoked with this; painting the model differently is very refreshing. Regardless, I'm quite happy with what I have here. It's a better first attempt than I expected. It also made me empirically realise that I don't have enough hobby time to do this kind of painting on a larger scale. 

 

Since this is supposed to be my showpiece miniature, I think I'll also brave some OSL (never did that before) and even perhaps NMM.

 

In the next couple of days, I think I'll get back to finishing the melta marines for the 12 Months Challenge so that I can pledge this guy there, too.

 

I'm looking forward to reading your feedback. Since I'm surprisingly content with what I painted, I'm particularly keen on reading about things to improve/fix. The world of building volume is new to me.

Edited Tuesday at 11:53 PM by Brother Christopher

[kabaakaba]

That's great result, idk if it intended or not but purple-blue gradient is great, there is a little inconsistency in how different parts are looking. Like boots looks metallic cause of small highlights, and greaves are matt since have no sharp highlights.

You don't mentioned how you build you colors and which technics are used. With a bit practice and using proper technique you get even better smoother result. Tbh this guy already looks better compare to former. It's just another level.

Spoiler

You can try glazing it gives you smoother transition and excellent control on how your volume and colour builds. Or stippling(with proper brush, round drybrush should work fine for example) which have same control as glazing, though create additional texture for rough surface.

Spoiler

me myself discovered this approach properly only week or so ago and also happy. my nids painted this way, and latest castellan. And in fact it's gives you access to proper NMM since it's also just a volumetric highlight. 

 

Edited yesterday at 04:30 AM by kabaakaba

[Brother Christopher]

5 hours ago, kabaakaba said:

[snip] there is a little inconsistency in how different parts are looking. Like boots looks metallic cause of small highlights, and greaves are matt since have no sharp highlights.

 

Oh, maybe that's why it feels off... I'll try to do something about it, maybe add some edges to help even out the feel.

 

Thanks for pointing this out: this is exactly what I'm looking for.

 

5 hours ago, kabaakaba said:

You don't mentioned how you build you colors and which technics are used. With a bit practice and using proper technique you get even better smoother result. Tbh this guy already looks better compare to former. It's just another level.

 

I didn't mention that because I don't know . This is a process of discovery and - regrettably - I'm doing much exploration on the fly. I intended to use glazing but switched to stippling later on and (probably due to some fatigue and being annoyed with not being able to 'fix' the right greave to satisfaction) ended up doing things in between. The same goes with colours. That's probably why I should've done a shoddy test model first (like a regular Intercessor) or I should've followed a tutorial to the letter.

 

Still, despite going in blindly, I'm still happy with what I have, for the most part. 

Edited 23 hours ago by Brother Christopher

[kabaakaba]

I don't have access to youtube so can't recommend video guide for you. 

 

Spoiler

But you need glazing - adding colors with ultrathin layers which allow very smooth transition and look. there should be insane amount of guides. In general you thin you base color with water 1:2 so its "milk consistent" add some color to your base color, add few layers each next layer cover less area, add more of additional color add few layers.... get your transition
And you need stippling - mixing colors by adding clusters of dots like pixels on you screen. that also gives smooth transition, thought also allow to create rough texture. (not best example but check my Raveners. they are full stippling painted)
 

Also for stippling look out for stippling specific brushes. they VERY different from other. I'd unable to get acceptable result with my other brushes, 
Also for better understanding check Art Miniature Painting Study Books
 

Edited 22 hours ago by kabaakaba

[Brother Christopher]

10 minutes ago, kabaakaba said:

I don't have access to youtube so can't recommend video guide for you.

 

Don't worry about that! I won't be doing any major adjustments here. I'll see where the hobby tides take me.

 

As part of my coffee break, I did some more work on the problematic greave and I think it helped a bit. In the end, if I'm not happy with it, I can always attempt some freehand to try and distract from whatever's wrong.

 

Starting this, I've been quite aware that I will not get everything right. The model will end up being what it'll be and maybe I'll do better next time I try doing a more serious job.

 

13 minutes ago, kabaakaba said:

 

  Reveal hidden contents

But you need glazing - adding colors with ultrathin layers which allow very smooth transition and look. there should be insane amount of guides. In general you thin you base color with water 1:2 so its "milk consistent" add some color to your base color, add few layers each next layer cover less area, add more of additional color add few layers.... get your transition
And you need stippling - mixing colors by adding clusters of dots like pixels on you screen. that also gives smooth transition, thought also allow to create rough texture. (not best example but check my Raveners. they are full stippling painted)
 

Also for stippling look out for stippling specific brushes. they VERY different from other. I'd unable to get acceptable result with my other brushes, 

 

Oh, thanks for letting me know that there are stippling-specific brushes... I've been using my regular, older brushes since the method seems a bit harsh on them.

[space wolf]

I think kabaaka is right on the money, youve got inconsistant "levels" of highlight. For the "problematic" grieve, i would take the highlight all the way to the small white highlights you have kn the boot. More than likely that will look like a realy thin vertical line right in the center. Or you can tone down the other highlights. Different levels of highlight is fine for different materials, etc.

 

++BUT++

 

What you have here is really good, IMHO, better than what I do. If the highlights truly bother you, just remember different lightsources play on objects differently. If that model was to scale, depending on wjayblight was hitting it, it may very well look exactly like that.

[kabaakaba]

FYI Stippling brush

Spoiler

Stiff as Black Templars faith. Syntetic. when you touch surface with it you get circle filed with dots

Also there is different drybrush  brushes. like i have 2 kind right now, former for standard heavy drybrush. and soft drybrush which pretty good for textures or effects.
And glazing require brush with small belly(at least i saw this in some book and few manuals), so it don't take too much paint.

Edited 20 hours ago by kabaakaba

[Firedrake Cordova]

On the subject of blending/feathering/layering/glazing/stippling, I'd recommend Zumikito's "5 minute" videos on the subject (or Ataraxia's).

 

16 hours ago, Brother Christopher said:

Since I still haven't bought a light box

They're really easy to make.  

Edited 18 hours ago by Firedrake Cordova

[space wolf]

3 hours ago, kabaakaba said:

FYI Stippling brush

  Hide contents

Stiff as Black Templars faith. Syntetic. when you touch surface with it you get circle filed with dots

Asking for the room: Do you find these make the process easier? Is there a thinning consistency of paint that is necessary.

Edited 17 hours ago by space wolf
Spelling

[kabaakaba]

1 hour ago, space wolf said:

Asking for the room: Do you find these make the process easier? Is there a thinning consistency of paint that is necessary.

Let's say before I bought special brushes I can't do anything like I want. 

Considering thinning 1:2 - 1:3 paint - water ratio. Less thinned make layer too thick. Thinner then 1:3 make layer too thin. And you need more layers. Though it's for simple acrylic paints. Special glazes could be thinned with other ratio.  Check instruction.

[SvenIronhand]

I find it's not so much the amount of water, though that certainly helps, but the amount of paint on the brush itself. 

[Rusted Boltgun]

Artis Opus have done videos on stippling which I found useful before attempting a flat panels on my Ballistus dreadnought. I still had too much or too thick paint for a nice gradient but using a palette they way they do really helped.

 

AO Stippling Youtube

 

@Brother Christopher you'll see them use their own round head drybrushes (and in this video, their own new paint line they are advertising). 

[kabaakaba]

Some how ratio granting exactly amount of paint on brush

[Brother Christopher]

Progress report: I think I did most of the backpack purple; I've also made further attempts to 'fix' the right greave and did minor adjustments to the chest plate (right under the aquila).

 

This time, I made an attempt to get the white balance (more) right. 

 

 

 

 

[kabaakaba]

That's way better. Now front are pretty uniform and looks like some satin surface.

Spoiler

Highlights on backpack are a bit to rough, in my taste it would be great soften highlights border with purple using stippling or few layers of glazing .

I noticed while worked over my minis that a single hard highlight/or missed highlight no matter how small it is break whole picture. Bronze become something brownish-yellowish thin or mate surface turns metallic. And main issue if highlight misplaced its looks strange.