Miniature Monday: Stormcast Eternals Prosecutor finished!

Not technically Monday still here in Sweden but I guess there's still Monday in other timezones so it still counts I think :P

Anyway, just finished my first Prosecutor for my Lions of Sigmar, fun to paint and I did some Airbrushing as well to get some blending on the wings and I'm really happy with the result. When the whole unit is done I think they will look awesome on the battlefield.

So here it is, hope you like it.

Tutorial - How to paint: Stormcast Eternals (Lions of Sigmar colors)

Stormcast Eternals is fun to paint, and quite easy as well as you don't need 100 different paints. You paint them up much similar to how you paint Space Marines, focus on the main color of the armor and then paint up the rest of the stuff.

So here's my tutorial on how I painted up my first unit of Liberators. And I painted these in the 'Lions of Sigmar' colors, so purple. Also I'm not a huge fan of golden armor, even though the new Citadel gold colors seem quite nice. So I went more of a bronze look instead, still shiny but more pale.

Colors I used:

Citadel - Base colors; Warplock Bronze, Rakarth Flesh, Screamer Pink, Mephiston Red, Mechanicus Standard Grey, Zandri Dust, Leadbelcher, The Fang. Layer colors; Evil Sunz Scarlet, Xereus Purple, Genestealer Purple, Ushabti Bone, Pallid Wych Flesh, Pink Horror Shade colors; Riekland Fleshshade, Druchii Violet, Agrax Earthshade, Carroburg Crimson Technical colors; Lahmian Medium Dry; Longbeard Grey

Army Painter - Shining Silver, Plate Mail Metal, Matt White, Matt Black, Weapon Bronze, Soft Tone Ink, Dark Tone Ink

Vallejo - Bright Bronze, Airbrush colors etc. Black Primer, Thinner

Step 1 - Armor

First up is the armor, I used an Airbrush (Harder & Steenbeck Evolution) for this, it makes it much quicker. Also I'm doing a method here that keeps some of the shadows, which comes natural as you layer on the first layers of paint.

I primed the models using Black Primer with my airbrush

I then painted them all with Warplock Bronze, also with an Airbrush. I had to dilute the paint with thinner to get the right consistency.

I then did the same thing with Weapons Bronze, and here's where I start to keep some the previous paint to get some natural shadows. I do this holding the airbrush in aprox 45 degree angle so most of the paint hits the top of the model. I also did this but keeping the angle even more with Bright Bronze.

I'm now done with the airbrush. Next step was to wash the models with Riekland Fleshshade.

I then go over the raised up and flat areas with Bright Bronze again, being careful not to get into the recesses or where the 'shadows' are. I do however do some edge highlights in the darkest areas to blend it together.

Step 2 - The rest of the base colors

So with the armor done we now have to paint up the rest to paint up. Thin the paint with sufficient water to keep all details and the surfaces smooth. In most cases it takes two coats of paint to get enough cover. This step is probably the most time consuming but already the miniatures is starting to look really nice. 

All purple parts is painted with Xereus Purple. Hammer head, scale mail, buttons, and bolts on the armor are painted with Leadbelcher. The leather straps, belt, sword cloth beneath the armor is painted with Matt Black. Parchment is painted with Zandri Dust. Haft on hammer and sword is painted with Screamer Pink. The lightningbolts on shoulder pads and shield are painted with Celestra Grey.

The plume on Liberator Prime is painted with Mephiston Red and the stone he stands on (and stones on two others) is painted with Mechanicus Standard Grey. The scroll and inside of the cloth on the Liberator Prime is painted with Rakarth Flesh.

Step 3 - Wash
Now you wash all parts except the armor. Remember to let it dry before going to the next step and be careful not to get to much in the same spot. As the wash runs down the model, you might need flip the model upside down with your hands so the wash gets where it should be, and remove excess paint as needed. When there's large areas like the shield and cloth I thin down the paint with Lahmian Medium and not water to get a smoother result.

All purple, hammer head, scale mail and stones is washed it with Dark Tone Ink (Citadel Nuln Oil works just as good here if you want to stay with GW colors). The red plume is washed with Carrobrug Crimson. The pink parts are washed with Drucchii Voilet. Wash the parchment and the inside of the Prime's cloth with Light Tone Ink (Seraphim Sepia if going with Citadel) and the scroll on the Primes shield with Rakarth Flesh.

Step 4 - First Highlight
After step 3 you really have nice tabletop standard. But to get back some nice contrast and brighter colors again you need to re paint all the washed areas with their original color, leaving the recesses of course.

This step takes a lot of time as well. For the metal parts on the hammer head and scale mail I instead used Plate Mail Metal, but only on the most raised areas. I skipped reapply Xereus Purple on the insides of the shields as you wont see them much anyway. Be extra careful when you reapply Screamer Pink on the hammer and sword hafts as the details here are easy to mess up. 

All the black parts are edge highlighted with The Fang. If to bright or to much just wash it down with Dark Tone Ink or Nuln Oil. 

Step 5 - Second Highlight

Now you do edge highlights on all the colors accept the armor, weapons and lightning bolts which I saved for last. Be careful in this stage not to mess up, you only want highlights on the edges and thin lines.

Genestealer Purple on the purple areas, Pink horror for the hammer and sword hafts (again, be extra careful here). Palid Wych Flesh on parchment, scroll on the shield and inside of the Prime's cloth. The red plume is highlighted with Evil Sunz Scarlet and the stones are painted with Longbeard Grey.

Step 6 - Final Touch ups
Now I do the final things before the models are completed. I highlight the edges of the armor, and all the metals with Shining Silver, be careful not to overdo this, you don't need to paint all edges. The lightningbolts on the shield and shoulderpads are highlighted with Pallid Wych Flesh.

I based the models and put on transfers, done!

Miniature Monday: Space Marine with airbrushed Power Sword

Hey there, missed last Miniature Monday but now I have model to show you. It's actually an model I painted several years ago, but I wanted to try and do a power sword effect that you commonly see now days. You pretty much need to do this with an airbrush, so I wanted to try it out. In the same process I also updated the paint work on the rest of the model to better match how my Guardians of the Covenant looks now.

Took some hurriedly pictures of this guy so first photo the airbrushed power sword is in focus.

And on this one you get better focus on the actual Marine. 

I know the middle isn't actually in the middle. Did a mistake on both sides with the masking tape, not getting in the middle. Well it's my first one and I have to be more careful, you learn by your mistakes. 

All in all, the technique does not take long to do at all, I did this fast when my little daughter took a nap. For my first try I'm happy with how it turned out. I know I can make smother transitions because the airbrush where not in perfect shape when I did this.

Oh, and here's the recipe. White undercoat (I didn't have that luxury on this one though as it was painted red before), Model Color Sky Blue from Vallejo, then Vallejo Model Air French Blue, and for last Vallejo Model Air Signal Blue. I followed this guy's tutorial pretty much which you can find here. I also recommend the rest of his channel BuyPainted, he has some really nice tutorials there.

Airbrushing Pt 1: Getting started.

Several months ago I bought my first Airbrush, a really cheap one which worked okey I suppose but I went and upgraded it shortly after to my new Harder & Steenbeck Evolution Airbrush.

Here's my first impressions of both the brushes and also how my first month trying to master to the Airbrush went. 

The first kit

For starters a I bought a quite cheap air compressor and airbrush, just to try it out and see if it's something for my. In the manual to the brush there's a tutorial on how to start learning how to use the brush. You should try different techniques doing dots and lines on a piece of cardboard to practice your skills. Blabla.... I did some dots and then went on to paint some miniatures instead. I started with doing black base coats with Vallejo Air Black Primer, this one just like the rest of the Air line from Vallejo are made for Airbrushing so you don't need to thin out your paints or anything. Great for a beginner.

And all worked out great, priming your miniatures is really easy and the cheap brush worked nice for this. I also learned more and more on how the brush behaves, and how to clean it.

I then started to paint other colours, and here I noticed something. Dropper bottles are so much better when it comes to airbrushing! Obvious I know, but it is something to think about when starting a new army project for sure if you are going to use an Airbrush much.

The second kit
I did have some mishaps with the first brush, but I think I would have with my new H&S as well. The H&S is much easier to clean though and that is a huge plus, because you will do a lot of cleaning on your airbrushes. The H&S is much easier to use as well, however I'm still very much a beginner I do feel a big difference in how the brushes behave. My 0,2 mm. nozzle on my H&S brush clog easy though but that is due the fact I haven't mixed the paint correctly.

So here are my impressions and thoughts about using an Airbrush as an newbie.

The facts

• It wont speed things up much in the beginning
• It requires a lot of practice
• Cleaning and prepare your models, painting area etc. takes time.
• So you need time when you paint with an airbrush, I won't touch it if I don't know I have at least an hour (but more is preferred)
• It's not a miracle cure that will make everything easy to paint
• Treat you airbrush as another great tool for painting your miniatures.

What an Airbrush will do for you

• When you get better it does speeds up the initial painting steps.
• Priming and paint on the first layers of paint is easy and you get a smooth result.
• For larger stuff like building and scenery they are invaluable.
• With practice you can do effects which is very hard and time consuming without an Airbrush
• I recommend painting many models at a time (using the same colours) or larger models

That's what I have found so far, I'm still a beginner to this. I haven't actually found the time to paint with my airbrush that much at all (having a three year old and a 5 months old baby don't make it easy ) And my compressor is quite loud so I don't want to paint much when they are asleep. 

What I do is the first layers on monsters and larger batches of models at a time to speed things up. I haven't tried more advanced methods yet but I'm enjoying painting with my airbrush (as long as it does not clog up). I hope to find more time to practice and use it in the future and will post a part 2 of this in the future I hope.

Some of my first models where I did the first layers with the airbrush. 

Tanks and bigger models is a blast to do with an Airbrush.

Hobby Tools: Upgraded to an Evolution Airbrush

Like two weeks I have tried out some airbrushing for the first time, I deliberately bought a cheap Airbrush because I didn't know If I liked it or not. Well I did, it's so much faster to put down all the base colours. especially for vehicles. But the cheap gun I use (no brand on it, bought from a generic shop here in Sweden) works but not for much more than put down the most basic colours (primer and one base colour). And I want to try it out some more so I early decided to upgrade my Airbrush for a real brand.

After some checking on the Internet and what not I decided to go with Harder & Steenbeck Evolution 2 in 1. Haven't had time to try it out yet but I'm very eager to do so. I also bought some more stuff I needed, new hose, nozzle cleaning kit and a cleaning pot. Now I'm ready to do some more Airbrushing!

The Evo comes in this nice little yellow box

All the stuff I bought now

The old one and the new Evo

How I put down the basic first colours on my models (done with the old airbrush)

First model I Airbrushed, I used blu tac to do the camo on this one.