I Am Iron Man

Hi folks, bit of a departure from the norm today. I recommend opening this up at the same time because:

"the truth is... I AM Iron Man"

This is the new Knight Models sculpt of one of my favourite superheroes, especially now he has a movie incarnation played by a man who frankly is Tony Stark. I've always had a soft spot for the heroes who are not super powered. I love the ones who use tech, grit and cleverness (the Iron Man's; Batman's; Judge Dredd's and Hawkeyes of the world) to win out against the super-powered types. I nearly called this post "The Easiest Model You Have Painted This Year" because as you'll see below, it was staggeringly easy to complete. First though, a word on the sculpt as it is one of the first Knight Models figures I've painted. Scale wise, the Knight Models are a little bigger than GW. They are 32mm rather than 28mm so they're about a head taller. Frankly though with the kind of games you'd use a model like this for (ultra small skirmish) it is not really a problem. The quality of the sculpt and pose is excellent. A little thin laterally but not so bad that it is an issue. But lets get to the really fun bit, painting!

this is the best shot for the accurate colours

I'd had a bit of a brainwave when I was on-line window shopping for this bad boy. The red needs to be metallic to be "right" for the modern look Iron Man. But as I have found with the Corsairs, metallic red is a bit of a bear. But then the penny dropped, transparent layers, inks! So the incredibly complex paint scheme goes like this:

1. Paint primed model gold - I used Vallejo Liquid Metal Gold and burnished it with a cotton bud (Q-tip) to make it really shiny.
2. Wash with thinned brown ink. I add a bit of Lahmian medium to all the inks to kill off the shine and help them flow.
3. Once dry apply two smooth layers of red ink (I added a tiny dot of brown ink to this) mixed with Lahmian Medium. Leave to dry.
4. Shade the key edges with a 5:1 mix of brown:red ink.
5. Paint some glowy blue bits.
6. Gloss varnish the red
7. Done.

Well, not quite done, I did edge highlight some of the gold with a silvery-gold mix to define them better but otherwise, yep, done.

I'm delighted with how he came out. Has just the same effect as the movie armour. Now, I am really, really hoping that they are planning the rest of the Avengers. Would be awesome. Until next time folks.

TTFN