Prince of Daemons

Hi folks, today we've got a big one to check out:

The daemon prince is for a Slaanesh chaos space marine army I am painting for a client. Now I am going to be up front here. This model and I are not friends. I've painted four of them over the years for different stores or clients and we still haven't made up. For some reason it is fiddly and some of the details merge together making it hard to figure where colours will look best. But enough grumping Jeff, you're paid for this!

Starting with the purple. Naggroth Night forms the basecoat. I then built up the highlights through Xerus Purple all the way to Lucius Lilac. I then shaded it back down with Druchii Violet. Finally I went back in and did some twiddly bits (technical term there) with reconstituted Lucius Lilac. I am starting to use dry pigments with added water to create a thin layer paint. Perfect? No, but it works well enough.

 I wanted the sword to really stand out so went for something completely different to the rest of the pallete. I loved the hot swords that the Bloodletters wield in the Space Marine computer game so I thought I'd go with that. Now I can't go into every stage as I used about twenty different layers. Mephiston Red formed the basecoat, highlighted with drybrushes of Kindleflame and Hexos Palesun. I then layered Nuln Oil onto the red to make that hot iron look. I glazed the whole thing in red ink and then ran thinned Ceremite White mixed with a little yellow into the runes. A glaze of Lamenter's Yellow made them hot and a coat of Water Effects finished the sword off. Gloss black is also going to be a feature of the army so it'll sort of tie in visually.

For the flesh I just used Daemonette Hide highlighted up with Slaanesh Grey, bone areas used the same mix but I added bone to change the texture without adding another tone to the colours. It also allowed the skulls to stand out from the daemonbone. You can also see more TwiddlyBits (TM) on the other shoulder pad.

As you can see from the back view, the overriding feeling is purple despite there being flesh, bone and armour in the same shot. The gold and yellow cabling balance each other and the green gems are tiny spot colours to add interest.

More chaotic goodness to follow folks.

TTFN

A Deluge of Devilish Daemonettes

Hi folks, we're well and truly back up to speed here at PVP HQ as I've actually got client models rolling off the production lines. Today it is a squad of the old metal daemonettes, much as I like the new plastics, these old ones really had something extra:

Haven't got too many pictures as I haven't got my light box set up yet (where it is going is nothing but boxes) and the colour of these ladies is a swine to capture with the camera.

I wanted to try and get a classic feel to these daemons so I had a quick read of my realm of chaos books. Daemonettes come in all colours but tend toward the pale pastel. Their eyes are usually described as black and they tend to wear gold and pastel silks. Well, that seemed like a starting point! The skin is the majority of the model and turned out to be pleasantly easy to produce. Starting from Rakarth Flesh and gradually highlighting with added Pallid Wych Flesh gave me a nice pale fleshtone. A thin wash of Druchii Violet gave me the pale purple toning I was after. I then worked up the claws from this colour into bone as I wanted them to look like part of the flesh of the daemon rather than afterthoughts.

This poor lass had lost her right arm - either long ago, in transit, or - to my potential horror - in the move. I decided to replace it and give the unit a focal champion by sculpting a new arm to join a Dark Elf Cold One Knight champion sword I had knocking around. A paperclip armature pinning the hand to the shoulder was then covered in ProCreate and shaped. Still not completely convinced by my sculpting but it is improving gradually. The pastel silks they wear was a total experiment. A clean layer of white was achieved with a couple of layers of the glorious Ceramite White, once dry I just ran glazes over them. Pink, blue and yellow were the colours mentioned in the Realm of Chaos so I went with those three. Care has to be taken to avoid pooling as you want a clean finish but this is the fastest way I have found to paint these pastel shades. The different silks give them a varied feel without breaking unit cohesion.

Well, that's it for another post, there are some more daemonic delights to come along with the Chaos Marines that march alongside them. Until then,

TTFN