Wednesday 10 December 2014

'Oldhammer' - Albino Skink Champion

This 28mm “Citadel” model of a Skink Champion has taken an awful long time to complete, and despite the Challenge now being well into its second month is actually my first ‘Oldhammer’ submission for “A Tale of Several Gamers”. In addition, although I’ve put an awful lot of time and effort into painting the albino Lizardman, I am not terribly happy with the way his pallid skin colour has finally turned out. Rather than being known as ‘Gluckle The Greedy’, destined for greatness, I fear a more appropriate title would be ‘Gluckle The Grey’.

The model was first undercoated with “Vallejo” White before I started to work my way through the numerous bronze and red cloth bands which adorn his legs and arms. For the metal work I used a combination of Brass and “Citadel” Agrax Earthshade. Whilst for the red I went with “Vallejo” Heavy Red and “Citadel” Carroburg Crimson. The skink’s curved sword, snout horn and spear tips were also painted with “Vallejo” Brass. As the Champion wore a small chainmail loincloth I treated that to a coat of “Citadel” Boltgun metal and then a wash of Nuln Oil. The leather work was ‘picked out’ with either “Vallejo” Heavy Sienna or Heavy brown. Both of which were then washed with “Citadel” Agrax Earthshade.

Lastly I picked out his eyes with a tiny dab of “Vallejo" Heavy Ochre. I did consider giving the Lizardman red eyes as per many of the painted models in the 1996 “Games Workshop” edition of the “Warhammer Armies Lizardmen” supplement. But I thought the model had too much red on it already.
The Mark of The Old Ones, otherwise known as white skin, was created by applying a watered down “Citadel” Nuln Oil wash over the “Vallejo” White undercoat and then drybrushing more White over the top. I thought this worked well for the smaller areas of bare flesh as the wash simply pooled in the recesses and left everywhere else stark white. 

However when I came to apply this technique to the largest area, the head, left shoulder, chest and head fin, it simply turned the undercoat a murky grey, and no amount of repainting or drybrushing would bring back the white as it had done on the other areas. 

Having based the model though I have managed to ‘park’ my disappointment and begin painting the rest of my Skink warband with earnest. Most of the bronze work is now done, as is the leatherwork, and I’m currently ‘picking out’ all the pouches which adorn their hips.
In addition I have managed to completely assemble the Cold One Rider and make a little progress on his base and skink rider. This particular model will definitely be finished by the end of the month as it is to be my Mount(s) & Rider(s) Theme submission for the Analogue Hobbies Painting Challenge. 

12 comments:

  1. Gluckle the Grey is all too sadly, well named. It is such a shame he hasn't turned out as well as you hoped for. Your other Skinks look good and the Skink on the Cold One ought to be a cracker when fully painted. Onwards and upwards, eh?

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    1. Thanks Bryan. I genuinely don't know what went wrong with him as its a tried and tested technique I've used before and imho works well. I suppose I could have used a grey wash or a blue rinse (as these seem to work well too) but such is life. My hope is that when formed up with a unit of bright blue skinks he'll still stand out like a sore thumb (as any Champion should) and perhaps look a little whiter as a result :-)

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  2. Glucky is great looking, no need to worry on that front. But paint faster :P hehe

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    1. Cheers Chico. I genuinely appreciate the sentiments coming from the person I consider the Master of 'Oldhammer' :-) And I'm trying I'm trying!!! :-)

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  3. I think the white turned out well. White tends to "swamp" the camera and overcome greys quite nicely.

    I'm doing a dino rider for my Mounts/Riders entry as well! Great minds think alike!

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    1. Thanks Anne. I think he'll look better when he's surrounded by his blue-skinned unit. He's done now anyway, so on to the next skink. Not sure I want my painted dino-rider compared to yours on a Challenge Theme page though as that's a big no contest in your favour. :-)

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  4. Nice work dude!
    Cool entry for the mounts catergory.

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    1. Cheers Bob!! I thought putting it up as my entry would motivate me to get it done seeing as my enthusiasm for this project has taken a bit of a beating whilst painting Gluckle.

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  5. I really don't see what your problem is with Guckle, I think he looks great and much more natural than if he were a stark bright white. As a champion i think a bit of "wear and tear" gives him moreof the look that he's "been there and done that".

    When you paint a poor figure I'll tell you, but ain't done it yet.

    Now quit moping and get on with the rest of them! you hear.

    Cheers Roger.

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    1. LOL. Grateful to you as always Roger :-) I'm already close to finishing a few of the skinks. But I must admit I have (momentarily) put them to one side as someone very kindly sent me some minis which I simply must paint first for the Analogue Challenge.

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  6. "The ultimate (and rather shameful) answer to the problem of white uniforms is to avoid them whenever you can, particularly when you are just starting out." Sheperd Paine, 1980

    Mr. Paine was something of a modeling/painting rockstar back in the day. His work for Monogram remains iconic. (http://sheperdpaine.com/Monogram_Brumbaer.jpg) If painting white gave him trouble, you certainly have nothing to hang your head about.

    Taken on his own terms, Gluckle looks quite good. There's almost a NMM silver vibe about him.

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    1. Thanks very much Finch. That's an inspirational website - almost makes me want to put all my current minis to one side and paint WW2 :-) I do usually try and avoid white I assure you - good advice from Master Paine. I think the NMM feel comes more from the gloss varnish than the model but spookily, my first attempt on the head etc, when the wash simply merged with the white to form a 'silvery grey' did make me think I'd created a cyber-skink :-o

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