Probably 10-12 hours into this squad, so quick and easy by my snail speed standards.
I did the guns by pre-shading only, then the black oil wash over the top. Not overly happy with the result, but it saved alot of time.
The grey lining is a little messy in parts, but reasonably happy with it – its not my favorite thing!
Painted my first HQ unit. A legal army (actually, cancel that, no idea what constitutes a legal army on the current ruleset!) fully painted can now be fielded.
A lot of fun painting without the pressure of a harlequin checker pattern!
Airbrush precision getting better. Happy with the shading on him.
Harlequin squad completed with the Shadowseer finally done.
Chickened out on the grey and silver checkers – pretty happy with the final product.
Will probably do a HQ unit next, that way I could actually field a painted list if I wanted to!
Shadowseer WIP. I have still not had a close look at the photo, but I’m cautiously going to say its my best checker yet. Hard to tell in the photo, but I am also really happy with the highlighting on the metallic.
The green cowl and sash have been base coated only. Next steps:
The checker success (or lack of) will determine the remaining time, hopefully get it finished in a couple of weeks.
Shadowseer attempt #1 concluded with me spraying the mini with oven cleaner. Take 2 will commence shortly!
In the interim, I decided an easier job was required to ensure I kept up some momentum. Hence I decided to punch out half a Guardian Defender squad.
7.5 hours all up including prep and clean time for brushes / air brush. Since I generally don’t have time to sit and paint for long periods, this means the actual painting time here is probably close to 6 hours. The blue is alot lighter than the first squad I did several (read many) years ago. I also left the shoulders white, I figured this would help in terms of squad identification. The eyes I butchered – too much drying retarder in the yellow paint, and a bit too think, thus it ran out of the socket in some of them. Could have cleaned that up – but hey, its a basic troop squad, so good enough!
Only the shadowseer remains to be painted now. Tried some new gold highlighting techniques here, started with red gold. Then black oil wash, reapplied red gold. Then Old gold. Then finished with a mix of old gold and silver. Pretty happy with the result.
5 harliequin production line is finally nearing an end. Finished the sashes on them this afternoon, generally I am never happy with how I shade with a brush fairly smooth surfaces, I think this is some of my best results. The flash makes the transition look a bit worse than it actually is!
Time poor tomorrow, will try and get the bases done. Which will leave:
Finally finished one more harlie, 6 remaining!
The yellow freehand is not 100% crisp, but I am reasonably happy with it, I think it will look good on the table.
Decided to ditch the production line in order to finish something – the Death Jester seemed like the softest target.
He turned out “greyer” than I wanted, I should have chosen a different highlight colour for the airbrush, or maybe I should have black oil washed, or maybe both!
In any event, I am pretty happy with the end result, I think possibly my best gems yet, the grey lining is also probably my best (this photo seems a bit washed out, so I reckon it looks better in real life!) 7 moire harlies to go.
Wow – so much progress……
Ok bugger all, but I did some grey lining, then decided it was garbage, so painted over it, then went back and did more agressive airbrush grey highlights.
Happy with the troupe master face. The front row second from left face got butchered – will redo the black half as well