Hive Fleet Draugr - a black & white paint scheme

[terminatoruk]

Hi folks,

Go easy on me - I've been out of the loop for a long time for WH40k and haven't painted for nearly 15 years.

An awful lot has changed in that time - fancy airbrushes and layering techniques didn't really feature much so I'm re-learning the wheel so-to-speak.

I've decided to collect a new Tyranid army which is primarily going to be a 'ghost' hive fleet called Draugr (a splinter fleet of Jormungandr) using tunnelling, mist and 'smoke' (Venomthropes) to evade the enemy and be difficult to kill.

I have searched and searched the internet to decide on non-GW studio paint scheme to use for my army and have been really indecisive.

Initially I thought I wanted to do a 'natural' paint scheme (like brown carapace and white bone skin) but I'm worried that my very modest painting skills would lack the ability to pull it off with enough 'pop'.

I'm sold on the layering techniques and paints and wanted to choose something that would be 'table-ready' fairly swiftly but give sufficient impact.

Against my instincts (I'm worried it might get too monochrome) I've 'decided' (still not 'happy' - lol) on a black and white scheme with purple thrown into the mix in select places and yellow for the eyes.

My pallet is fairly limited and the technique is very basic.

In summary, the Termagant below was made using the following technique (this is first time - and I changed my mind on this one a few times...hence a bit caked on):

• Assemble miniature
• PVA glue + flock on base
  
• Corax White spray primer
• Nuln Oil shade (2 coats allowing time in between - particular attention on the second coat to the recesses in the skeleton chest areas)
• Layer of Pallid Wych Flesh (swishes onto the raised areas mainly - don't add too much...leave some of the shaded Corax white showing)
• Highlight of White Scar in places (for example, the end of each bone section of the arms legs, top of the shoulder, teeth etc...)
• Abaddon Black over all the carapace areas
• Edge highlight + 'feathering' (needs A LOT of improvement here lol) with Administratum Grey
• Vents in skin and fleshborer - Xereus Purple
• Eyes + eye on weapon - Yriel Yellow
• Base - XV-88 all over, shade with Agrax Earthshade, highlight with Administratum Grey. Few blobs of PVA + a clump of static grass

What do you guys think of this as a paint scheme?

Negative comments welcome too as I'm personally not 'over the moon' at the moment but maybe I just need to get the brood going to convince myself it is 'ok'!

[hivefleetkerrigan]

If you're going to stick with the black carapace, then for the skin I might actually do hive fleet leviathans skin. It's white with a red/pink wash, relighted with white. I think that would give the models a bit more pop.

I'd also recommend making your nids eyes glow. It's a pretty easy technique to use and goes fast but adds a lot to the look of the model.

[terminatoruk]

Thanks for the tips - much appreciated!

I did think about hive fleet Leviathan skin for a while but I'm not a fan of the pink tinge at all unfortunately.

In terms of making the eyes glow - what technique would that involve?

[hivefleetkerrigan]

Dec 17, 2018 18:24:51 GMT terminatoruk said:

Thanks for the tips - much appreciated!

I did think about hive fleet Leviathan skin for a while but I'm not a fan of the pink tinge at all unfortunately.

In terms of making the eyes glow - what technique would that involve?

As far as the skin, maybe use a sepia shade? Its really versitile.

It's pretty easy to do. You basically put a white coat down let it dry, then put down a touch or two of one color. You then water down a second color a ton and put it in the eye socket. You can use the second color to do light highlights near by for a glow effect.

There's quite a few good YouTube tutorials for it (where I learned how to do the technique).

For color combinations:
yellow then green - green glow
White then yellow - yellow glow
Yellow then orange - orange glow
Orange then red - red glow
White/teal then blue - blue glow.

[mattblowers]

It looks pretty good. I think you'd be happier with your results (especially on our bigger bugs) if you used a lighter shade for the first wash. Nuln oil is too dark to go directly over white as it makes the end product look a bit 'chalky'. You'll find that GWs tutorials often use seraphim sepia to shade white. I find the sepia to be a bit too colored for my tastes so I make my own with burnt umber ink. By making my own I can control the amount of pigment and how well it flows into recesses. It has the added bonus of really reducing the need for tons of highlighting as the white still shines brightly on top surfaces.

If you want to use Nuln oil, then I'd start with a light => medium grey base that you bring up to white. This makes a nice sharp contrast without the chalky/blotchy issues. There's a free video on youtube from Miniwargaming's Chris about this technique. It helped me with how I conceptualized whites. It takes quite a few more steps but has a much more stark contrast over the more gradual fade of washes running into recesses.

[terminatoruk]

Dec 18, 2018 14:11:06 GMT mattblowers said:

It looks pretty good. I think you'd be happier with your results (especially on our bigger bugs) if you used a lighter shade for the first wash. Nuln oil is too dark to go directly over white as it makes the end product look a bit 'chalky'. You'll find that GWs tutorials often use seraphim sepia to shade white. I find the sepia to be a bit too colored for my tastes so I make my own with burnt umber ink. By making my own I can control the amount of pigment and how well it flows into recesses. It has the added bonus of really reducing the need for tons of highlighting as the white still shines brightly on top surfaces.

If you want to use Nuln oil, then I'd start with a light => medium grey base that you bring up to white. This makes a nice sharp contrast without the chalky/blotchy issues. There's a free video on youtube from Miniwargaming's Chris about this technique. It helped me with how I conceptualized whites. It takes quite a few more steps but has a much more stark contrast over the more gradual fade of washes running into recesses.

Thanks Matt - appreciate the comments.

I didn't really like the chalky look at first either, but it is growing on me now weirdly - lol.

I'm sure that's a result of the oil going straight onto the Corax White undercoat but part of this was to save time and also my fear of adding too many layers and making everyone too thick / obscuring details on the miniature.

Noted on the Nuln Oil but, again, I think this is me being stubborn - I did contemplate using Seraphim Sepia (which would have been ideal on the 'natural' colour scheme) but now I've actively dedicated to dispense with earthy shades and go for this black / white / grey scheme, I didn't want anything to dilute away from the pale white.

As per the image below, I'm currently working on a ripper swarm that, incidentally, I had base a base of Ionrach Skin on first (this was my original idea until I found out how green it was) and that I subsequently covered up with a layer of Pallid Wych Flesh before re-oiling with Nuln Oil.

So on this one, I'm at the pre-layering / pre-highlighting stage so it'll be interesting the see what the consistency is like when this one is finished:

[mattblowers]

Dec 19, 2018 12:13:00 GMT terminatoruk said:

I didn't really like the chalky look at first either, but it is growing on me now weirdly - lol.

I'm sure that's a result of the oil going straight onto the Corax White undercoat but part of this was to save time and also my fear of adding too many layers and making everyone too thick / obscuring details on the miniature.

Find a scheme and works for you and knock out the models. If you are committed to Nuln oil think about applying the wash directly into the recesses instead of just slathering over the whole model. That works fine on smaller ones, but starts to magnify any issues on our bigger bugs. Don't worry about layers obscuring detail, if you thin out your paints and apply to top surfaces, that shouldn't be an issue.

Best of luck, I don't have the skill or the patience to pull off a black/white paint scheme. Other than yellow I think you chose the hardest scheme to execute well.

[hive fleet cicaida]

this scheme makes me think of the locusts from gears ahaha, you got anymore painted up?

[terminatoruk]

Yup - very slow progress though!

Trying to batch paint a brood of Termagants at the moment.

Have ummmedd and erred about the scheme and keep going full circle back to black and white.

Here is a completed ripper swarm which is better than my first attempt (a 000 Series 7 Winsor and Newton brush is really helping now!!):







I toyed with Steel Legion Drab for the bases but have settled back with my original XV-88 as I think it adds valuable colour and contrast to an otherwise monochrome scheme!

I'll keep updating this thread as I progress (bear with me, it won't be super quick!).

[terminatoruk]

Long overdue an update. I've been contemplating my black/white scheme decision but I've decided to stick to my guns and try and produce the best technique I can.

I'm pleased with my latest results now - here are some comparison pics (original on the left, new on the right). N.b. The base on the new one isn't quite finished yet as I ran out of time last night:

[hive fleet cicaida]

the new gant is much cleaner imo, the skin pops nicely

[terminatoruk]

Thank you for the kind comment!

I'm a lot happier with the process - I'll document the next one with a step by step guide and crack on with the rest if the army using this theme.

[mattblowers]

Much improved. The more you do the better you will get at it. Word of advice, don't repaint the older ones, it's nice to look back on your progress.

[terminatoruk]

Thank you Matt!

Much appreciated but it's thanks to your previous helpful suggestions (like layering up from grey, thinner coats, focusing the nuln oil on the joints and being more sparing with it) that's helped improve the finished product.

Funny you mentioned about the older ones, I was actually thinking about re-doing those but maybe it is worth keeping as you say for comparison.

[terminatoruk]

Hi folks - massively overdue an update on this project - apologies!

So  I did exactly what I said I wouldn't do - I've finished collecting the entire 2000pt Tyranid army I wanted to get in all up front rather than buying sections at a time and painting them in manageable chunks!

Over the past few months, however, I have scraped enough mold lines to make any sane person go crazy but alas, at last, I have reached an important milestone - everything is constructed.

Weighing in at just over 100, seam-free, interesting posed, green-stuff limb conversions in places and magnetised Carnifex models... I present the unpainted Hive Fleet Dragur: