The Completed Deathwing- Lots of Photos

Here are the shots of the completed Deathwing. Click on the images for a larger picture. Here are the links to the tutorial in case you missed it.

Painting Deathwing Part 1
Painting Deathwing Part 2
Painting Deathwing Part 3

Here's the whole army I painted. It adds up to 27 models plus two Landraiders not pictured.



A Thunderhammer/Stormshield Terminator. I used Asurmen Blue wash on the Thunderhammers to make them stand out.

For this guy, I used an experimental technique on his sword. I got the paint really wet on the sword, then swirled in a lighter color. I am still working on the technique, so I'll post some better pictures when I master it.

Here is the Librarian. It is the old model, but still full of detail. I had a lot of fun with this one.

The tricky part was making him look like part of the army even though he has blue armor. I resolved to make his shoulder and gun bone white.

To do the axe detailing I used a slow-dry medium and simply got lighter as I got to the end of the design.

Finally, the Company Master Belial. I know it's not the actual Belial but it still works. I still have to make a banner for him, but I'll do that later.

For the sword, the fluff says that the Sword of Silence was crafted out of part of the same black obsidian as the Lion's, so I went with black and a green highlight. I also tried to make the armor and gun more ornate to make him stand out. When I get around to doing the banner that will help him stand out as well.

You can get a good view of the sword here. It actually wasn't near as tricky as I thought it would be. Just some slow-dry medium and a gradual blending. I tried to keep it subtle as everything else is ornate. I like the effect as its simplicity makes it stand out against the rest of the model.

Painting Deathwing, Part 3

Painting Deathwing, Part 1
Painting Deathwing, Part 2
The Completed Deathwing

Ok, our third and final installation on how to paint the Deathwing. We'll start with how I paint the symbol on since GW hasn't made Deathwing decals since 2nd edition. I know there's a fan decal sheet out there but I didn't want to do it that way.

Step 1: Paint a thin red line to delineate the position of the sword. The sword has a break in it near the bottom, mark that with your line. I use Scab Red for this part.

Step 2: Now flesh out the sword. Keep the quillions of the sword close to the body, my mistake on the early ones was making them go too far out. Don't worry if you mess up, after you're done with the sword get out your white color and clean up your lines.

Step 3: Now add the frame for the wings. I had to switch models for this photo, you can see that I haven't cleaned up the lines yet. The inside lines for the wings go as far down as the break in the sword, the curves are a quarter circle and the outside lines of the wings are the same length as the inside ones.

Step 4: Now thicken the lines and add the other lines to the wings. I find this the hardest step, getting the angles just right. If you mess up it's fine, once you're done use your white to clean up the red mistakes. It may take more than one coat.

Step 5: After it is all cleaned up, use Blood Red to highlight. You don't need much but it really helps bring it to life.

So that's all for the symbols, now here's how I do the scrollwork and Purity Seals on these models.



As you can see this guy is laden in scrolls and seals. As mentioned before, I use regular Bleached Bone straight from the bottle (not my thinned out mix) for the scrolls themselves. I wash them with Gryphonne Sepia, then highlight with a Bleached Bone mixed with a bit of Skull White. Lastly I take a very fine sepia-colored pen (I use a Staedtler, but Micron is a great line as well) and do some Latinesque writing. For the purity seals I just do a big letter than a bunch of scribbles. For the larger scrolls I write a bunch of Latin type words. There's plenty of websites that can give you great words like fortius, fidelius, mortus and so on. Be sure to include the serifs! If you really want that "authentic" feel, change all the letters "U" into "V." Not necessary but I do it after having seen lots of Latin writing through my various art history classes. Some Latin scholars will point out that there's much more to make it "authentic" but that's good enough for me. Besides, High Gothic isn't actually Latin anyway.



Here's the lightning claws squad. I still have to finish their bases. I used the Baal Red wash to make their claws look a little bloodstained. I just finished up the thunder hammer terminators, only 5 guys left!

Painting Deathwing, Part 2

Painting Deathwing Part 1
Painting Deathwing Part 3
The Completed Deathwing

Phase two of my series on how I paint the Deathwing. Now that the basecoat has been established we begin picking out the details.



Step one is to undercoat the details black. In this case I paint the icons and weapons black. Most of the time, I leave the skulls bone white, though you can make them metallic if you wish.



Step two is to paint the metallics. I do the icons with Boltgun Metal on the outside, and Burnished Gold on the inside things. Try to be careful not to get paint in the crevices, but if you do we'll wash it later. Below you can see another example of how I do the Boltgun Metal/Gold combo. At this point I also highlight the areas that are going to stay black with Boltgun Metal to make them look scratched and used.



Paint the wings on the chest Dark Angels Green. I also paint the weapons housing green. I've seen it also painted red, I chose green because it helps unify the army.



I then do the wax portion of the purity seals in Scab Red and the parchment in regular Bleached Bone. Some models have other parchment on their armor, this too is given Bleached Bone. After this, I give the parchment a wash of Gryphonne Sepia. Now wash the metal areas with Badab Black and the gold with Devlan Mud, and touch up any armor areas that may need re-washing.



Time for the eyes. I do this with my first highlight color, a bit of yellow mixed with Dark Angels Green. The way I do it is I get my brush wet, dip it in the color and try to remove most of it from the brush. Then I gently dab it on the eyes. If you did it right, the color flows into the cracks of the eyes leaving the raised surface automatically highlighted. This doesn't work on every type of model, but it does wonders on Terminators because of the way their eyes are shaped. I then highlight the rest of the green, then do a second highlight with an even lighter Dark Angels Green and a lot more Sunburst Yellow.



Now I finish highlighting everything else. I use Mithril for the metal highlights and Blood Red for the purity seals. I use the highlight colors for the lenses above the model's helmet using the same technique as the eyes (both red and green). For the parchment, I use a bit of bleached bone mixed with skull white. Not quite as light as the armor color, but close. I then use pure white as the highlight for the bone colors.

The next part of this tutorial will cover finishing touches and bringing the model to life, including how to paint the Deathwing symbol. I'll also have more pictures of the final product in better lighting.

Painting Deathwing, Part 1

Painting Deathwing, Part 2
Painting Deathwing, Part 3
The Completed Deathwing

While painting a friend's Deathwing, I was searching online for the best way to do it. I wasn't satisfied with any of the ways presented and finally struck out on my own. Here's how I paint the Deathwing.

Step 1: Basecoat the model. I use about a 50/50 mix of Bleached Bone and Skull White as I don't think regular Bleached Bone looks as nice. Here you can see how I used the airbrush to get the entire army basecoated in less than an hour.



Step 2: Using Gryphonne Sepia, I airbrushed the wash right onto the model. I had heard about this technique with the Citadel Airbrush came out and I wanted to try it out. This picture is obviously not a terminator, but as I forgot to get a picture of this step it will have to do. Either way, the colors are the same as I'm doing a similar process for my Banshees.



I chose to airbrush the washes as opposed to brushing for speed. Also, I like the way the wash applies when airbrushed.

Step 3: Now, drybrush the bleached bone mixture over the washed figure. I use a large brush for this step and it goes quickly.



Now you're ready for the detail! The next part will discuss where to go from here.