I made some good progress since the tournament – I spent a bit of time building my newly arrived Kotail (who was pre-ordered before I made the commitment to get things all painted before Salute 2015).
I went with a minor conversion on this one – the actual model is leaning over quite a bit, and I wanted him to stand a little more upright, so I added a rock under his right foot – it only required a small amount of bending of the left leg.
With him built, I got cracking on with the rest of the Aleph models who need some paint.
I tend to add block colours to multiple models first, before concentrating on one until it’s complete. You can see the block colours and drybrushed hair and washed skin on Diomedes, Machaon and Achilles first:
They’re painted with Abaddon Black, while the purple areas are given a coat of Naggaroth Night. Flesh areas are painted Rakarth Flesh and washed with Reikland Flesh-shade. Weapons are base coated in P3 Coal Black. I’ll be tackling these one by one next week until they’re done.
This week I worked on Phoenix to completion, and here he is:
As above, he’s Chaos Black and Naggaroth Night as a base coat. I highlighted the purple with gradual mixes of Naggaroth/Xereus Purple, then when I reached pure Xereus Purple I added in some Genestealer Purple (basically the old Tentacle Pink) and brought it up again to that. I then added a couple of spots of a 50/50 Genestealer Purple/White mix just to add a little contrast on the sharpest points.
I added some tattoos to his skin at the initial stage (ie: before the wash of Reikland Flesh-shade). I painted on some shapes with Regal Blue, then washed some watered down Rakarth Flesh over them to make them look a little faded. Then when that was dry I washed it with ink.
His hair was painted Fiery Orange and washed with Reikland Flesh-shade at the same time as the skin. I then highlighted it back up with Fiery Orange and Fire Dragon Bright once dry. I also added a couple of line highlights with Rakarth Flesh on his face.
The black was highlighted up first with an old black ink/Codex Grey custom mix that I made years ago that’s still going strong. I then added an extra line highlight of Adeptus Battlegrey. Pouches were also painted with Adeptus Battlegrey, then washed with Nuln Oil and re-highlighted with Adeptus Battlegrey.
The weapon was the usual method I use to paint Aleph weapons – P3 Coal Black, then Kabalite and Sybarite Green highlights.
I’m really pleased with how he’s turned out, and he should look nice alongside a link of Myrmidons – let’s just hope he doesn’t get critted to death again like he has in his last two games!
