As I mentioned last time, the whole tableaux for the Death Korps Quartermaster is a tad unsettling. Here is a wounded guardsman, reaching out for aid and instead is going to be mercy killed, his organs harvested, any useful garments reclaimed and his name added to a KIA list. The skull faced Quartermaster reaching calmly for his pistol stalks the battlefield making administrative decisions on who will live or die and the best use of resources. Damn, even for the Imperium that is cold. These have been some of my favourite DKK models for ages and were part of my reward to myself for finishing all the grunts. Lets take a closer look:
Firstly, the Quartermaster himself. I wanted to keep his colour pallete the same as the rest of the army and have any little changes be muted. This is so that he fits with the overall look and feel of the army but has his own personality. To this end I decided that the cloak, that covers half the model, would be lined with the accent green colour used across the rest of the force and be black on the outside. This gave him a sombre tone without making him leap out from the rest of the army. The bones were painted in the same way as the Grenadier masks, again making that link.
Next up, we see his intended victim. When you have a mask on, you have to use body language to convey any emotion. Here the sculptor has done a bang up job. The pose is perfect to convey that pleading for help, and the torn hose and shattered respirator give us that impression of a man not long for this Earth. Painting-wise he is identical to the rest of the army with the exception of a rather grevious wound. This was painted in my usual 3:1 mix of Red Ink to Chestnut Ink with gloss varnish added. It is very easy to make wounds look either excessively gory or cartoony and it is important to avoid either one. Gory is avoided by remembering "less is more", I could have soaked his greatcoat, made the ground awash with blood and so on. This would have looked gratuitous and taken away from the subtlety of the sculpting. Likewise had I just used blood red paint - staple of young gamers everywhere! - it would have looked cartoony. Blood isn't just red. It runs from a brownish red in old stains through bright arterial red in just-that-second-spilled blood to almost purple deoxiginated blood that you will never see outside the body except in blood tests. I always add a little chestnut to the red to give it that more-than-a-few-seconds-old look. I test the colour by painting a thin line on myself, if it looks like I have cut myself then I've got the shade right!
Deeply disapointed that he has bled all over his uniform is this servitor. Tasked with gathering the effects of the dead. I wrestled with the descision of whether to make the uniforms look battered, bloody and dirty and then decided that there was no urgency to reclaim that sort of kit. Only uniforms in good nick would need to be grabbed before they were ruined. Decision made!
And then there is this chap. Something of a challenge to paint as he is festooned with scrolls. Trying to find a purpose for each was taxing as I didn't just want to do wobbly lines on all of them. To that end, if you look closely you will see MIA and KIA lists, writs of authority from the Ecclesiarchy, Warrents of Office and lots of other administrative paperwork. I remembered just in time to paint KIA upside down as it spooled from the printer.
To round out this happy bunch we have this cheery fellow. I rabbited on about him at length last time so I would say go read about him there!
Anyhow, that is all for now folks, only thing to mention is that I have finally settled on my next big project after the Blood Angels are done and dusted. With the Dwarfs rumoured to have an impending army book I am reactivating project Corsair for my Dark Elves. Going to try and paint them as Drow to give them their own identity. As part of this I am going to need a couple of Bolt Throwers which are among the models being remade in that new Citadel Finecast stuff so I will post a complete review here when I get 'em. Until next time:
TTFN
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