Old dog, new tricks

As I work on these new Marines, the first 40K minis I have painted in almost 20 years, I’m realizing how much my painting style has changed. The realization came about when I tried to incorporate some of master minis painter Finn Kisch’s advice into my technique. I should say I totally understand what he suggested, but actually doing it turned out to be harder for me than I thought. Finn uses a layering technique I think, one that gives very nice results when executed properly (especially by him!).

This made me think about my own technique – what is it actually? I never really thought much about it, I just did it, but what do I actually do? Looking at the Space Marine models I painted back in 1991, and the ones I painted just last week, I can see what I did then and what I do now.

So, to compare, here’s one of the Marines I did in 1991.

Way back then, I primed white…with a brush. Why didn’t I spray? I don’t know. At that point I had been painting minis (with any amount of technique) for about 4 years, and I always primed white. Anyway, I then basecoated and as I recall, I liked to use washes a lot, followed by drybrushing. I did that on this Marine here. As you can see, there’s not a lot of depth or detail. I did not blackline or do edge highlights that didn’t get on there from the drybrushing.

I also liked to do a lot of wet blending, which you can see if you go back and look at my Epic scale minis, particularly the Titans. Didn’t do any blending on this Marine though. I had also not discovered inks.

Somewhere down the line, I switched to priming black using a spray. I still used washes but not as much, and started using inks more (especially after I received a Citadel Mega Paint Set as a present around 10 years ago- yay). That led me to use blacklining, which some say is outdated, but I like the look of it. I won’t use it for everything but for hard surfaces like armor, it works for me. Still drybrushing for highlights but not as much (I really used it a lot in the past). I also began using thinner basecoats and doing more layers and edge highlighting. That’s pretty much the style I’ve used up until recently, like on this Cybertech Bunkerbreaker:

I think I started blacklining things maybe five years ago. Again on this one, not a lot of edge highlights, and I don’t do wet blending anymore.

So, I got those Marines and had a chat with Finn and tried to apply some of the techniques he laid on me, and some that I’d been dabbling with but not really gone whole hog on yet, namely layering and shading with different colors, and hard edge highlighting.

Obviously, I still need lots of practice. Layering with multiple colors is gonna take me some time to get right. I also tried the highlighting to a degree I haven’t done before. I know it’s not an advanced technique, but for some reason I hesitate to really work it. I also need to get better at figuring out the lighting angles. Anyway, I do like the way this Marine came out:

So, interesting to see how my painting style has changed over the years. As a side note, it’s also interesting to see how the Space Marine minis have evolved – they really are better and more detailed than the old ones, IMHO.

New Space Marines

Well, I’ve got some pics of my newly painted Marines up here for you. There’s a little story behind these guys. It’s been maybe 20 years since the last time I painted some Space Marines – check out the pics of my standard bearer in my Epic Armies post a few months back. Having seen the huge improvements in the sculpting and detail on the newer models, I wanted to paint some up. So, I bought a squad off eBay and got to work.

I also went and bought two new brushes, a Windsor & Newton Series 7 #0 and a new #1 (I wanted a Series 7 #1 but the store was sold out – I’m using a Reaper #1 until I get that Series 7), and a bunch of the Reaper Triad colors. I’ve been painting with the same worn out Citadel brushes and dried out Citadel paints for 3 years now and it was time to upgrade. Now that I mention it, I’ve been using Citadel paints for over a decade and this was the first time I’ve switched paints. I like the results with the Reaper colors so far.

I also got some advice from award-winning minis painter extraordinaire, Finn Kisch, who I am lucky to say is a personal friend.

But, old dog, new tricks. I found it actually rather difficult to integrate Finn’s techniques with my own methods. It’s going to take a lot of practice before I can reconcile the two. Although I was going for display quality, what I got was (I feel) merely tabletop quality. It’s gonna take some time and more minis before I get this right. Oh well, something to shoot for anyway.

I’ve done two Marines so far, and I’m still going. These shots are of the preliminary paint schemes, the “proof of concept”. I’ve updated my personal Chapter colors (the Japanese -themed Rising Sun Chapter) a bit from 20 years ago and I like the way they turned out. The base is GW Astronomicon Grey, shaded with Reaper’s Cold Greys. I like the bluer tone of these greys. Compared to my old base color grey, this new one is brighter. Using gold instead of dark grey for the breastplate eagle and the shoulder pad trim also makes for a brighter look that catches the eye.

The kanji are handpainted, the four characters being 「風林火山」which are read “Fūrinkazan”. In order, each character means “Wind”, “Forest”, “Fire”, “Mountain”. This was the battle standard motto of the feudal Japanese warlord Takeda Shingen, which he got from Sun Tzu’s “Art of War”. They mean “Swift like the wind, silent as the forest, as fierce as fire, as strong as a mountain.”

The idea is the Tactical Squads have all four kanji characters on their armor. Scouts have the “forest” character only, Assault squads have the “wind” character only, and Devastator squads have the “fire” character only. After a Marine in the Rising Sun Chapter has served in each of these different roles, he earns a place in a Tactical squad. He may then add the “mountain” character to his armor, signifying the unity of these elements in a powerful, all-purpose combat unit.

Hmm. I have an old write-up of the Chapter history around somewhere. Maybe I’ll post it tomorrow.

Starship Troopers – Marauder

Lazy me. I said I’d put pics up of the SST Maruader weeks ago. But, recently my urge to paint has rekindled fully and I’m forging ahead with new projects, of which the Marauder was the kickoff. I recently bought a squad of GW Space Marines off eBay (I got a deal – them plus a Rhino for about $35). I’ve started working on them but I’ll speak more about them and put some pics up in another post.

So, here’s the Marauder!

I lost the pilot figure somehow, but that’s okay ince you can’t really see it very well inside there. The cockpit canopy was originally clear, and since I liked the way the faceplates of the regular troopers were tinted, I wanted the same effect here. So, I used a thinned out wash of GW yellow ink applied to the inside of the canopy. Turned out pretty good. I find that I like the SST minis more than I thought. The only drawback is they don’t go together so well – the trooper models have a lot of fiddly bits some parts of the Marauder seemed to be slightly off. But, once past that, they’re all right.

Incoming!

More activity as of late. I finished that SST Marauder and it turned out better than I expected (especially since I feel I wasn’t trying so hard). I’ll post some pics up tomorrow.

Also, my copy of FFG’s Horus Heresy is waiting for me at the FLGS. I’ll go pick it up on Sunday and goob about it here after I bring it home. Will I paint the whole set? Dunno. I still need to buckle down and finish off my War of the Ring (FFG) minis…oh, there’s another photo shoot I can do!

And I must tell you now… I bought some Space Marines off eBay. Just to paint and see how they turn out… (the lies we tell ourselves…)

Back into it – Starship Troopers

I started painting again after several months of not picking up the brush. The urge to paint always waxes and wanes with me.

I started in on a Starship Troopers Marauder battlesuit that I have had for a while. I actually rather like the old Mongoose ST line, even though the minis are something of a bitch to put together. The fact that there are a lot of them still out there on the secondary market, and the fact that no one plays means I can get the relatively cheap.

The rules aren’t bad at all either. In fact, they’re quite good and it’s a shame Mongoose managed the line so poorly. Once I have this Marauder done, I’ll actually have a reasonable game force available. A few more warrior bugs in my arachnid horde and maybe a specialized bug unit or two and I might even try to get a game of this in sometime.

Horus Heresy

Man, it’s been a while. I haven’t done any painting since the last post, though lately, I’ve started feeling the urge again. I should get in there and finish my Space Hulk Terminators, but, hmm, something else is calling. I played War of the Ring again about a week ago and I’m jonesin’ for more. I painted all the of the minis in that game except for the North and I really should finish those guys off – it’s only something like 24 figures. I think if I do anything next it should be that.

And then yesterday I saw this. I don’t play 40K but I have always liked the fluff, and the battle for Earth has always been one of my favorite stories (spawning, as it did, from the 4-page short story in the long OoP Slaves to Darkness). Ah, makes me wanna get my old Space Marine minis out and blow up the landscape! Anyway, this new Horus Heresy game looks like it does away with the (IIRC) shaky dice based system of the old game in favor of cards. I’ve been quite happy with FFG’s retreads of old games like Arkham Horror and Fury of Dracula, and seeing this get the FFG treatment makes me very happy.

Yah, it’s expensive, but I’ll find some way to justify it to myself (and most importantly, my wife)!

Lost the buzz

For some reason, I have no desire to paint anything right now. Just lost the buzz. It’ll come back though.

Space Hulk re-paint begins

I finished my “proof of concept” paint job on my old 1st edition Space Hulk Terminators. Well, on one of them anyway. I usually paint one figure in the colors I’ve decided on to see if it all comes together, before I go and do a whole unit.

For these Terminators, I painted them in the colors of my old WH40K Space Marine chapter, the Rising Suns. Obviously, there is a Japanese motif. The base color is grey, which reminds me of the color of old warships. The helmet is white, which symbolizes death. The left shoulder has the rising sun emblem. The various kanji characters are hi/fire (right shoulder), shi/death (storm bolter), and shi/four (left knee). The texture on the base is just painted on, and I added a thin strip of paper to give it a little relief and resemble the decking printed on the Space Hulk tiles.

It’s not the best job I ever did, and the camera reveals lots of flaws up close, but I think these Terminators will look good on the table! At least I think my technique has improved over the first paint job I did on them 20 years ago!

Ready to paint

I finally got all the old paint of my old Space Hulk Terminators. Took a couple of weeks in the Green Stuf to soften up that paint, and I scrubbed it off with an old toothbrush. Back to that beautiful bare blue plastic! Got some new primer today, and while I was at the store, managed to get in a couple of games of the new Space Hulk as well (Endgame was having a “Space Hulk Day” – woohoo!)

On that note, I have to say, my old instincts for that game are a little rusty but a couple turns in, I’d knocked it off and I was bringing the pain! I played the good ol’ “Suicide Mission” as the Marines and got ripped up (of course – that mission is usually death on a stick for the Marines), then I played the Stealers in a different scenario and ate the Marines’ faces.

The rules are basically the same as 1st edition with a few new wrinkles. For example, any Marines on overwatch that jammed during the turn automatically clear jams at the end of the turn w/out paying an AP or CP for it; as long as your Sgt. is alive, you can redraw a CP marker you don’t like (OK, fine, but hardly as hardcore as before); Marines can go “On Guard” which allows a forced reroll of one of the Stealer dice in CC.

Without more play and some analysis I can’t yet say if I like the changes or not. But my brain is pretty hardwired for the old game. But, I’m very happy the timer is still used. I was offered the chance to not use the timer (which I of course scoffed at – no self-respecting Old School Space Hulk player would ever consider not using the timer!).

And I like how the new game incorporated the old Deathwing and Genestealer expansions into it. Sigh – I still won’t buy it but it does look lovely. If I can paint my old Space Hulk models to my current standard, I think it might help alleviate my cravings for the new game!

Space Hulk – still soakin’

Well, my project to repaint my old 1st edition Space Hulk minis proceeds apace. However, I’m still soaking my plastic Terminators in Green Stuff to strip the old paint. I put them into a jar full of it almost two weeks ago and the paint is only just beginning to soften. I guess the paint I used 20 years really cured on to the plastic! Anyway, I’ll give them a few more days and go at them with a stiff toothbrush. Hopefully the paint will come off.

Green Stuff has always done the job with an overnight soaking. So I’m a little surprised it’s been nearly two weeks!