You, me and the Fear

This is the 75mm white metal Abyssal Warlord from the Scale75 range. This figure has a few components that lets you choose how you want it to appear, i.e. a mace instead of a sword, helmet or no helmet. I chose a sword in hand a helmet.

Since this is a fantasy figure it means that there isn't a colour scheme that needs to be followed, your imagination is the limit so i decided to go for a red armour but not a bright, clean red look; more like a red that's been in battle numerous times before. That meant a dirty look and not like it's been forged yesterday.

For that reason i first used black as the undercoat followed by liberal drybrushing of bright red called blood red in the Citadel range. What happens is that if you use bright red under a black undercoat the colour is reduced dramatically giving it a dirty, used look instead of the bright red that blood red really is. 

Also when you drybrush it instead of painting it you tend, in this case, to get a more rough look rather than a uniform red colour that works very well in this case. Allowing the detail of the sculpted figure to really show through as you can see from the picture below.

Notice the black undercoat still visible in the small crevices of the armour details giving it the depth and structure of the brilliant sculpting of that armour instead of just a layer of red paint covering those details that could not be seen if you had just doused the armour with layers upon layers of red paint.

Here you can see him on his right hand side. The sword has been painted typically with metallic colours and then a little black/red mix to produce the blood on the blade. The green water emanating from the grass on top was done with a mixture of greens and then coated with gloss varnish for that wet look.

The shield was done exactly the same as the armour with the sigil painted after. Here you can see the fish face on his shoulder painted metallic so it contrasted well with the red of the armour.

The cloak was done with a mixture of browns to produce that animal tone that's so distinctive on furs. basically working from dark browns to lighter ones using a brown wash ink to create the depth in the recess of the cloak. Drybrushing a mix of white/brown on the edges of the cloak gave it a worn look with a little bleached bone for the stitchings in the middle area.

The lava was done in clay by my wife and then painted with a mixture of white/yellow for that molten lava look. The red broken slabs of rock were painted using black/red colour to accentuate the high temperatures of that area. The pillar was a wooden cube covered with polyfila and then had the sigil carved with a toothpick whilst it was still wet. Then painted grey with some yellow at the bottom for the light coming from the lava. The top area was covered with PVA glue and had it sprinkled with sand and little stones. Grass was added later in random areas. 

Da Orcs are 'ere

Here are the mighty Black Orcs. This is once again from the brilliant Warhammer range Orc & Goblin army set. The painting of these figures was easy enough even though the detail involved, especially the wear and tear of the armour, was very tedious since it had to be done ten times; and that's a lot of chipping.

The skin colour was pretty basic to do. Dark green for the base colour, a lighter green drybrushed as the main colour and then pick out the highlighted areas (such as top of ears, front of face etc..) with a mix of that same light green with an even lighter green to make it blend better instead of just that lighter green painted on.

The armour was done simply by coating it all in a black colour and then adding metallic colour on random areas of that armour where i felt that the most chipping of the armour would occur. Places like the glove area joints, feet joints and random chipping on shoulders, legs etc.. I think the result was pretty good especially seeing how easy it actually is (though time consuming) to do the wear and tear.

This the General of the army Gimgor Ironhide done exactly the same way as the Black Orc regiment. He is just posted here because i think he looks great as a General and as the main focus of your army.

That's Grimgor from the back. The base, like the Black Orcs, was done by painting it in a sand colour, PVA glue on it and then dipping it in stones to create that rocky, desert effect. The static grass was added later once the base was dry.

The horns on their helmet were done in a very simple manner. Brown was streaked by doing straight lines on the horns, taking care to leave a gap in between each line. On that line bleached bone was used ( bleached bone is like white but with a little grey mixed in) on the brown line previously created but always leaving a bit of brown near the top. Finally pure white was used on that same line again but this time concentrating more on the bottom of the horn. Easy, time consuming too but very worth the effort in the end.