Been meaning to write up a painting guide for my Elfdar for ages! This has been a busy old year and when I have had spare time it's either been spent designing or painting so I'm afraid this blog has languished a bit. Still, there's some bits I'd like to get written up to be able to refer to. So, without further ado, here is how I paint my Elfdar!
I am slowly moving away from 100% Citadel to a mix of Citadel and Vallejo, however this recipe is almost entirely Citadel. I started with a brushed on primer of the polyurathane primer. It's great stuff and sticks to resin prints like glue.
Next several thin coats (I KNOW, I HATE NOT BEING ABLE TO JUST SLOP IT ON) of Morghast Bone:
Next slop on some Agrax Earthshade:
After that has dried, drybrush on Morghast Bone, Ushabti Bone, and a final layer of Wraithbone. The Morghast and Ushabti bone should be quite complete coverage of the areas while the Wraithbone is more refined to bring out the highlights. The right hand ship has had the Morghast layer while the right has had the Morghast and Ushabti layers.
Looking closer at the nearly complete ship, all this rough brushwork has left an inconsistent surface texture on the model.
This texture then gets picked out by Wraithbone drybrush to pick out the detail. The sails are then carefully basecoated in Caledor Sky. This doesn't have to be a perfectly smooth layer as it breaks the sails up a bit. Just try not to go over the lovely hull.
Again, the next step is a good coat of Agrax. I much prefer it over Nuln Oil as it gives a warmer and more organic finish.
Again we'll be building up the colour using several successive drybrushes. First a repeat of the base Caledor sky, then Teclis Blue, Lothern Blue, and finally a very gentle dust of white. This needs to be done carefully to avoid the hull, but avoiding the areas near the hull also creates an interesting gradient as the colours get brighter.
The completed sails:
The blobs (technical term) on the sails are my weak spot, I pick them out in Mephiston red, give them a bit of Agrax, and then finally a drop of Evil Sunz Scarlet. A tip from Horizon is then coat in gloss varnish to give them that bright spot jewels traditionally have. Weapons are painted Abaddon Black before getting a drybrush of Grey Seer or Mechanicus Standard Grey to make them look less flat.
This technique also works really well on ground vehicles, I have done a number of Vanguard vehicles with it. Recently I've also started doing a very light white drybrush at the end followed by a glaze coat or two of Agrax again to blend all the colours together a little.
Eloi Tempests
Eloi Typhoons (which I also designed!). The guns here are Vallejo white, then Apothacary White contrast, followed by a tidy up of white again.
A trio of Fire Banshees. These used a large makeup brush for most of the drybrushing which both sped things up and gave a more consistent finish.
Hopefully this is useful for someone, it's a quick, relatively simple, and definitely easy method for getting an interesting texture on flat faces.
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