Antarius' wip thread (CtA 26)

[Antarius]

Okay, finally some progress to report after a month of dilly-dallying!
First off, a picture of my very organised and normal workspace:

As you can see, my process - such as it is - consists of doing everything all at once. I don't particularly recommend it, but it works for me - except when it doesn't...

I'd started off by priming everything with Vallejo's "German Red Brown" for some nice, warm shadows. Then I gave everything a zenithal of Death Guard Green and finished the spray-painting part of the project off with a light dusting of Army Painter "Skeleton Bone".
Then I drybrushed pretty much everything with AK "Deck Tan" (which I imagine to be the original armour colour) and coated almost everything with "Skeleton Horde" contrast (except, ironically, any skulls and bones that I don't particularly like it for, for some reason). It's quite good for giving things a weathered, greenish (but not actually green) appearance.

I did a bit of experimenting with putting some crackle paint on some of the bases. Plus some cork and/or stone. Some of the minis already had gravel on their bases, but I think I can make everything fit together reasonably well...

I stripped some Traitor Guard "just because". If I manage to finish up my current vows and feel up to it, these might make an appearance later on...

The shoulder pads got a coat of "Militarum Green" contrast. I don't want things to look "army green", because I really don't like that look for Nurgle. But I think a more verdant green would have taken away from the overall appearance, so here we are.
In a similar vein, I don't like the usual GW scheme of army green, bronze trims, purple cloth and pink tentacles. For one, I don't think the Death Guard sat down and said "Okay, now that we've fallen to Nurgle, let's all repaint our armour green", but mostly, I just find that it gets way too colourful and "unfocused". Perhaps ironically, my attempt at the cloth ended up rather purplish (AP "Blanched Berry" diluted water and some flesh wash), but I think it looks okay and it fits with the Heresy scheme, so...

I also experimented slightly with my rust recipe, because I don't want it to become too brightly orange. Then I smeared some crackle paste on some of the bases. We'll see how it works out...

I experimented with Black Templar and Wyldwood for weapons and things that need to be rusty/metallic later on. I eventually settled on wyldwood as it looks less clean, but the lascannon barrels will probably remain black.
The heads are still a bit of a sore spot. Maybe I should have attached them before painting, but doing them separately seemed like a good idea at the time...
The bright off-white head is my "this is too bright" cautionary example from earlier attempts at DG. 

The tanks took drybrushing surprisingly well over the spray-gradient. It helps that things don't need to look neat and smooth, of course. I'm not going to give them the same coat of contrast as the power armours, because that doesn't look good, but I think they'll fit in with the minis well enough. At least I hope so. Weathering and goop will go a long way, I'm sure!

 

Also, 60 sci-fi zombies that I think I have from some pre-Dark Imperium trade and had forgotten all about, turned up in the course of my daily rummaging. I actually have a bunch of painted Poxwalkers, but these might make an appearance in the future...

[Firedrake Cordova]

Looks like you're off to a good start.  

 

Whilst it's an obviously different colour, your dreadnought reminds me of David Soper's Predator in terms of perceived colour and tone.

[BadgersinHills]

Great work! The armour looks really good.

[Antarius]

Thanks guys! I am quite happy with it so far - I've always felt that DG should be greenish, but not green. Or rather, that the overall impression should be green(ish), but that actually painting their armour green tends to take away from that effect. I think the combination of reddish-brown shadows and a middle layer of green that's almost entirely covered up with dirty grey and off-white colours is probably the key. But it has taken me a couple of tries to find it...

 

@Firedrake Cordova That Predator looks fantastic and I take that as a huge compliment  I am personally going for a slightly less "jolly" look, but it's just the kind of thing I love about old school(ish) Warhammer and Chaos specifically! I actually have two paint-stripped Predators standing around waiting for conversion, so I'll definitely be looking at it (and his other work) for inspiration.

[Antarius]

Okay, more progress and a game on tuesday, where (if I'm very, very lucky) I may be done enough to field some of these guys!

The tanks are all but done. A little work to go on the weapons and icons, basically:

All the infantry models are at this stage (bases done-ish, armour basically done, trims done but unwashed, weapons etc. painted dark brown in preparation for rust and grime, heads still in a big pile - I am beginning to think I should have stuck with my "don't paint heads separately!"-instinct, but oh well...). So still a lot to do but things are starting to look reasonable:

[Antarius]

A better look at what I'm doing for bases. Sand, stone/kork, crackle paste. I'm considering tufts, as they would give a nice splash of colour but it's not really the DG way, is it...?

I did a bit more on Typhus' base as I think he could stand to rise above the herd a bit (I also felt he looked quite small next to the other Terminator Lord character):

 

This "Lord-of-Something-Really-Gross-I-Forget"- guy gave me a bit of trouble as his cable-cloak was in the way, so I put some stuff on his base, glued him on with some plastic goop that will hopefully look like slime eventually and I'll just have to sprinkle a little sand very carefully around his feet and things.

The saddest thing about playing Death Guard is that you have absolutely no options to choose from, when it comes to characters... Sigh!

[Antarius]

Oh yeah and the Ogryns, Spawns and little worm-guy are getting done-ish (obviously, one could always do more - and I probably will).
The terrain is also slowly coming along. I still hope to do a marble effect on the statue, but we shall see...

I've experimented with some "gouaches" (there was a discounted set that was practically a giveaway and I got curious; it's nice that it's just acrylic/non-toxic stuff, but honestly, I would probably just have used regular acrylics if I didn't have it lying around).
Some of the weathering (the rust specifically, but also some of the other stuff) is the gouaches, but generally, I just use highly diluted paint - I tend to have a lot handy anyway, as I do wash my brush once in a while 
I find that it gives a more natural, washed-out look than e.g. washes. But you be the judge:

The Queen (of the Blackened Moon) said this guy would look creepier if his eye stayed blind. I'm not sure, though...

The container is coming along and could honestly be called done now. Oh yeah and the Bloat Drones are in there too - on'e got a nice skin section, the other's got a nice set of front armour plates, so maybe I should just have stuck to photographing them that way...

I've done a LOT of washing, staining etc on this one now. I should probably stop... I still need to do the ladder, though. Maybe some other details like the lamp on the ground floor and the control panel up top, too.

All in all, I'm pretty happy with how this is working out, though. It looks grimy and not too "flat" even though most of it is in sections of one colour (which is pretty much how I like my terrain; painting every little nut and bolt is not only an infuriating waste of time, it looks worse too - at least that's my experience).

[Antarius]

And here are the final shots of the terrain that exceeded the post limit:

 

I've drybrushed the statue and, as I said, I hope to do a marble effect on it (then grime it up a bit afterwards). In hindsight I really shouldn't have glued it on, as I will probably end up overspraying onto the concrete. But there's no going back now...

I also kinda need to bring the off-white flooring more in line with the other industrial off-white pieces. I don't quite know how, but I think that'll work out eventually. If nothing else, weathering covers a multitude of sins.

 

 

"Knock knock"
"Who's there?"
"A big hideous misshapen thing and a smaller hideous misshapen thing"
"A big hideous misshapen thing and a smaller hideous misshapen thing, who?"
Or something like that...

Anyway, the roof is the same basic colour as the concrete (just not drybrushed like the concrete is) and everything else is just paintwater and the gouache rust colours. It was a bit of an experiment, but I think it worked out okay. Good enough that I won't repaint it, anyway 
 

[Firedrake Cordova]

The terrain looks great, especially with the weathering.

 

With regards to the tufts, what about some dead ones, i.e. beige or brown..?

[Antarius]

That would certainly make sense. At the end of the day, I think it all depends on what colours I feel I really "need" once everything else is done. Maybe it will be super obvious that some green or dark brown (or whatever) would be nice, maybe it'll turn out to be unnecessary.
I know that sounds a bit weird but I am honestly still kinda shaky on how the final product will actually look; probably depends a lot on how I end up doing all the tentacly bits. I feel that the GW scheme becomes a little bit too colourful and "unfocused", so I'm trying to avoid using too many super bright colours, but we'll see where it all ends up