Topic: Dwarves!

[Artobans Ghost]

This is an excellent dwarf. I have yet to do my miner unit so all info is good!

[Demonslayer]

Thanks guys!

I usually do use some water when painting, especially for highlights (not for bases though, I always wondered whether that'd be good or bad)
, although I only add water after putting paint on the brush, not before. I'll try and find some parchment one of these days and try out that wet-palette you mentioned.

Also I did a bit more work over the holidays;


Standard bearer, back and front.


The mining cart


Group shot!


First of the thunderers. One down, nine to go!

As always, please let me know what you guys think, feedback is very welcome!

[Demonslayer]

And here's a group shot of the first three thunderers .

[Gankom]

I like the pony and the miners. The pony especially has a real natural looking coloring.

I'm impressed with the horns on the thunderers of all things. I've tried to do like you've done with the brown and white tips, and just never really been able to pull it off.

[Demonslayer]

Thank you!

I've also struggled a lot with getting horns right, a lot, but I think I found a method which works for me (and by found, I mean blatantly stole from somewhere on the web). I use a mix of Mournfang Brown + Skrag Brown as the base colour, and then I apply several layers of watered down (50:50) paints;

1) Skrag brown (everything but a very thin ring at the base)
2) Skrag Brown + Ushabti Bone, covering everything but a very thin ring of the previous layer
3) Ushabti bone, same procedure. This layer should cover at least 75% of the horn, otherwise it turns out too brown; if you look at the picture, you'll see I left way too big a part of the horn brown, especially on the middle one. This was the result of painting the previous rings too wide- they should be really thin!
4) Ushabti Bone + Ceramite White. I would have used White scar, but unfortunately it dried up. This should cover about the upper half of the horn.
5) Ceramite White to paint just the tip of the horn, really just touching the tip with the brush should do it.

Hope you can use that! I'll post another picture of the other thunderers (I'm up to 6 now) when I get the chance.

[Rogers Kul]

I highly recomend you tu use "shades". Every colour will be better distingueshed from the colour besides it. I mean, shades are helpful to put a visual limit to each colour.
You can see it perfectly in the first finished miner pic. If you add "oil nuln" on the helmet every colour will gain intensity. If you later put a final light on them, the result will be many steps beyond.

[The Peacemaker]

Nice work.
The more you paint the faster you will get as well.
So eventually you will be spending 2-3 hours per dwarf instead of 6!


Since you are dabbling in The mixing of paints, i suggest a wet pallet if you dont already have one. And google 'colour wheel' as it will help with deciding how to mix colours instead of relying on the funny paint names.
And look up how to enrich a color, i forget the name of this process but basically collours can be highlighted to different peaks.
Like purple can be highlighted up to a blueish or a pink.
A blue can be enriched by adding orange. Or it can be dulled by adding black.

Lots of good tricks in the paint mixing world.

[Demonslayer]

Thanks for the tips! I actually use shades all over the model- Nuln Oil gloss for the steel, Reikland Fleshshade for the skin and gold, and Agrax Earthshade for everything else. I'm probably just doing it wrong ! I paint on one layer of shade, wait for it to dry, then paint a layer paint right over it, leaving only the deepest recesses. This hides most of what the shade does, I suppose. Based on your suggestion, I did paint a beard with a second layer of shade after adding the layer (Khorne Red->Reikland Fleshgshade->Wazdakka Red->Reikland Fleshshade->highlights). I'll try and upload a picture of how it turned out.

Also I've got the thane coming up, so I'll try the base -> shade -> highlight on him .

I'll try and look around for the wet palette materials- the tutorial I found says I need parchment, so I'll have to locate some first! Also I've tried searching for "enriching paint", but google found nothing. I don't suppose you have a link or two...?

Also I find the funny names come in quite handy! I'm mildly colorblind, so actually having a name for a specific color really helps .

[Demonslayer]

And here's the whole unit !







Note standard bearer's paint hasn't dried yet, should take a couple more hours before it looks exactly like the others. For the musician's beard I relied, as well as the steel parts of the command group, I relied more on shades, as suggested, and it does nice!

[Demonslayer]

And their boss, the thane!







I'm happy with the darker metal (two shades of Nuln Oil over Leadbelcher, then Soulstorm Silver highlights)! Turned out pretty good, I think. Also I'm quite happy with how the fur turned out. I feel the cloak itself might've been better with a bit more contrast, but sadly the shade pooled and dried, leaving dark blotches rather than realistic shadows, so I had to use some more red to fix that, which in the end kinda messed it up... Oh well!

Anyway, let me know what you think! Comments, suggestions, feedback are all welcome !

[Sharkbelly]

Looking good! I like the dark color scheme. And I agree with you: horns are a pain to paint right.

[Xathrodox86]

Very nice color scheme. The Thane looks badass, just as he should. Dawi all the way!

[Shadespyre]

These little chaps look splendid, well done 

[Demonslayer]

Thanks guys, I appreciate the kind words!

I feel like I've really learned something from all the feedback I received on the pictures posted here. For now I am done with the dwarves though- I'll probably come back to them at some point, but at the moment I'm out of models! At the very least I'll add some warriors and longbeards so I have a nice 1000pts army. However I still have a huge amount of models from other armies that are still unpainted (96 I believe, including tanks and such but not scenery), so for now I'll focus on the next army. I'll start a new thread for that right away .

Thanks again for all your help!

[Sharkbelly]

Not sure how I missed the grudge pony before, but it looks great. Nice work!

Sad to hear that the dwarves are done for now, but it is a great feeling to finish an army.

[Demonslayer]

Sad to hear that the dwarves are done for now, but it is a great feeling to finish an army.

Considering I have five still in the pipe, yes, yes it is .