Well, let's face facts here. I'm a fairly average painter. Sure I have been around for long enough that I have picked up a trick or two... but it's nothing all that innovative, and I am pretty stubborn when it comes to learning anything new. I do, however, love when I stumble upon a very simple method that yields a nice and fast result.

This was a method of base coating the model, which gave it a natural shade, and I did this while trying to paint a Rhino very quickly. The problem with the Rhino was, that I wanted to match Mechrite Red exactly, and since it was a little off, I washed it in Mechrite Red... and well ruined the look... then when I finally got it back to a place where I was happy, I realised I didn't have the hatch pieces. I was able to scounge the two crew members which was good enough for me, and since I had a beaky, I figured I would paint them up to be a sort of Kren and Frep from TSOALR, unfortunately, I remembered that Kren didn't wear a helmet... I abandoned the project... for now at least.

What I did find was that I could spray the entire model with a flat black spray paint, and then do a coat or two of light dustings with a flat red spray paint, that left enough of the black showing to give the model a natural shade. I think Paul does this on his models... of course he uses more layers, and gets a way nicer finished product... but let's be honest people... I'm Joe, and I'm lazy

So that's what I did.

The model was primed black, and given a good base coat.



This would probably be a good place to point out that I left a lot of the pieces unglued, so I could paint them individually. This makes it a lot easier to get in behind stuff like the shin plates, and the underarms of the weapons and such.

After that, well the whole model was a blur, and I rushed a lot, but I really wanted to see what this thing looked like all painted up. If you notice some of the pictures have me beginning steps on other pieces of the model before finishing the ones I am talking about, don't worry... that's just the way I do things. Plus, I wasn't exactly sure how I was going to finish it all, so I was kind of wingging it.

With any piece, I like starting with the biggest parts and working down to the fine details. So after the base coat, I went to anything metallic. It was simply Boltgun Metal, and then a Badab Black wash. It gives it a nice grimey oily look to it.



The gold was the biggest hurdle facing me in this project. I hate the GW metallic golds. I have never had any success with them. With my other Blood Raven models, I tried to start with a base of Iyanden Darksun. Then with my other models I tried to wash it with Badab Black and then highlight it, but it honestly doesn't give a rich golden colour. My Lizardmen on the other hand, get a Ogryn Flesh wash. It's redish colour lends itself nicely to the Iyanden Darksun, so I decided to try that. Although I went a little over board.



First I washed all the golden areas with Gryphonne Sepia.



Then I tried to feather Ogryn Flesh up from the bottom about 2/3rds of the way.



Then I used Badab Black on the lettering and tried to bring it up the bottom 1/3rd or so.



At the end of that whole mess, I wanted to bring some brightness back to it, so I highlighted the top have with a little bit of Iyanden Darksun.

Overall, it wasn't bad, but I am sure there are much easier ways of getting what I wanted out of that.

After that... I'm not sure, I think I tackled random bits.

The weapons got some Black accents on them here and there. The skulls and scrolls and left shoulder got some Dheneb Stone on them. The actual Marine helmet got the same treatment, but then got a Badab Black Wash, and then painted over with White. The eyes were simply Snot Green and then Scorpion Green on top... this is one of the few times I actually use my 5/0 brush.



The Plasma Cannon power coil thingy on top (I'm sure there is a diagram somewhere that tells us all what that piece on top is) was washed a couple times with Enchanted Blue and Ice Blue over Dheneb Stone. I was going for that glazing method... but I messed that up royally I am pretty sure I did it backwards. I can probably just throw the Ice Blue over top for a quick fix, but it doesn't bother me too much.



But the part that I am happiest about is the freehand on the Blood Raven Emblem. In all honesty, my freehand is average at best (and I am giving myself a lot of credit here). I found a Blood Ravens symbol that I liked (there are so many different ones for some reason), and then I toned it down, again, to make it Joe friendly, and went to town with my 5/0 brush. I actually got a lot of use out of that thing on this model.

The shoulder was first painted with Dheneb Stone (it's my goto paint for anything that has a whitish base to it), and then washed with Badab Black. On my other Blood Raven models, I then brought their shoulder pads back up to white... but I decided against that, as I wanted the helmet to really stand out.



Then I started with Chaos Black. Mine is really watery, and I can't remember if I added anything to it, or something, but that's the way it is. It is actually a good thing though, as I like to work with it like that. I did dip the brush in and then took most of the paint off... probably about 75%, just so I could keep the point of the brush nice and sharp, and didn't have excess paint running where I didn't want it. I started with simple lines and fleshed them out.

I should have taken pictures of that, but I will show you in paint... wait right there...





Then I added the blood drop in the middle with Blood Red (appropriate I know)



Honestly, at that point I thought I ruined the symbol and wanted to start over. I just wasn't happy and though it looked too sloppy. But I saw online that a lot of other painters highlight the Blood Raven emblem with some grey. I used Astronomicon Grey, and I really should have used something a little darker, but that's a matter for next time. That simple highlight, really cleaned up the blood raven, and I am actually quite happy with the result.



With that all said and done, I went over the rest of the model with a nice thin Blood Red highlight to all the edges of the model. Now my Blood Red is pretty much all dried out, so I had to wet my brush (the 5/0 again), and basically rub it against the dried paint until enough of the pigment came off that I could paint. I still took off at least half the paint so I wouldn't get it running all over the place. The best thing about highlighting a vehicle (well, any vehicle with flat sides that is), is that you can just run the side of the brush over the edges and it takes half the work out of it. That's all I did and this is the result:







Overall, I am very pleased with how the model turned out, and honestly, I didn't really have much of a plan going into it. Sometimes you just have to go for it. Try some new things out, and pray. You can always repaint stuff right?

Oh, and if you are a little weary about free hand, don't be. Just try it... just keep a steady hand, and little paint on the brush... it is a lot easier to put more paint on later, than take it off


I am currently painting the base, but I wanted to get this article up as soon as possible. I will talk about how I painted the base somewhere later... maybe an article, or I am sure Dave would like to make a video out of this