40k Hobby: Sons of Medusa Razorback
It hasn’t been too long since my last Sons of Medusa addition, but school and life found a way to get in the way of painting anything new for them, not to mention other projects that have come along as well. Spring Break found me at just the right time with just enough freedom to allow some SoM love.
I’ve had this Razorback for some time now, it was the subject of my magnetic post a long time back, and sat around primed and sprayed green for the many months between then and now. I dreaded working on vehicles thanks to my incessant need to have a smooth base color, and the time consuming number of layers it takes to do that by hand. As fate would have it, I now find myself in possession of an airbrush, and the time saved when working with a color like Scorpion Green is worth its weight in gold!
The piece started in Tamiya PS-8 Bright Green. As some might know, I found this color to be just off from the final hue I was hoping for, and end up painting much of the model over again with Scorpion Green leaving a bit of the later showing along with a wash of Thraka Green for some additional depth. For vehicles, I’ve found that I can leave out a step or two from this formula, and get much the same finish. I went straight to work with my airbrush mixing my Scorpion Green 50/50 or so with Windex. I gave the entire model a few passes until the color was nice and even. I can’t tell you how much I love my new metal paint cup. Since it’s arrived I haven’t used a siphon pot since. If you have a siphon pot set up, look into getting a metal side mount paint cup, it’s a small change that you won’t turn back from when doing mini painting.
Once the base layer dried, I painted in the black sections by hand. I then went to work adding a Bleached Bone highlight to panel lines, armor plates, joins, etc. I went with a single pass for much of the detailing, I just wanted to accent them, not make them stand out against the base color.
The highlights completed, I broke out my trusty gnarled brush and sponge for some battle damage and paint chipping effect. For mine I use Catachan Green with a lower edge highlight of Bleached Bone, even on the black surfaces. I don’t go further than this with my chipping, though some will add additional shading to each section to give more of a dented/scratched out look. This works great for smaller pieces/show models but for a table top model, the two step approach more than does the trick.
After the battle damage is highlighted, I went in with freehand detailing. I like to have at the freehand at this point because I don’t want take a lot of time on some freehand details only to have it completely covered by the chipping. Placement is key here and try to not overdo it. Sticking to the palette of your force will help these details fit in as well. I use Skull White for all of the freehand details on my vehicles to help tie them back to the troops. Multiple thinned layers with a steady hand will do wonders. I don’t go with the usual white formulas here as I want that nice flat look, it’s meant to look painted or stenciled, I’m not trying to get a three dimensional look.
With the freehand in place, Gryphonne Sepia is applied in streaks and into crevices all around the vehicle. I use a few paint chips as starting points here and there, while trying to stick to mostly rivets, armor joins and corners. For the top, I only pool the wash around the details instead of dragging it in any direction. Angled surfaces get the streaks though.
Rivets are done after the streaks using a black base followed by Chainmail. I don’t bother to wash them down, they’re too small for it to really matter and I like the way they stand out.
Headlights are done using Golden Yellow highlighted with Skull white to the center of the sections, as seen in my headlights tip from this very vehicle!
The black armor lines are highlighted with Codex Grey followed by a very light Fortress Grey final highlight.
Smokestacks were painted Chainmail and washed down twice with Gryphonne Sepia. The soot is done using my Tamiya Weathering Compact.
The tracks were painted Chainmail to start, washed heavily with Bestial Brown, dry brushed Chainmail and finally dusted with Bleached Bone. Expect a tip with full photos in the future for this.
Gems and Lenses were painted in either red or blue using the following forumlas: Red Gore, Blood Red, Fiery Orange, White or Shadow Grey, Space Wolves Grey, White.
Metals that were not already mentioned I went with a very simple Chainmail washed heavily with Badab Black.
With a full dusting of the entire piece of Bleached Bone, I sealed the model with Purity Seal and called it finished! A good bit of feedback from my friend migsula will have me going back with Bleached Bone to add a bit more dusting to the skirts and rear of the vehicle. I normally don’t bother to go back on a vehicle to change things, but with the amount of time saved by the airbrush I wasn’t burnt out on this one as I’ve been in the past.
I hope this look into my methods helps some of you and gives a new idea to consider for others. Expect more tips from this project as I get the write ups done with a bit more depth to what I’ve explained here. Until next project!http://thepaintingcorps.blogspot.com/
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