Wednesday 3 August 2016

"Nor It Is Unbelieved... That A Troubled Ghost Haunts The Old Trunk..."

"...Lamenting deeds of which the flowery ground is conscious."
This incredibly characterful 28mm scale pre-painted plastic “Wizkids” Tree Of The Damned is one of the exclusive figures found within the “Horrorclix” Starter Set. An impressive 70mm in height the twisted perennial plant is a ‘special object’ which apparently allows the active player to get one extra action to use that turn “if a victim is slain while adjacent” to the Tree.

However as I didn’t want to simply use the impressive-looking model as either an objective marker or a piece of scenery, I fixed it to a “Games Workshop” 60mm circular base and undercoated it with “Vallejo” Heavy Sienna. I then heavily washed the warped plant with plenty of “The Army Painter” Strong Tone Quickshade, and began a series of ever-lighter dry-brushes using a combination of “Vallejo” Heavy Sienna and White. Lastly I gave the ghoulish figure a haphazard dry-brush with some “Citadel” Adeptus Battlegrey, and followed this old OOP Foundation paint up with some “Vallejo” Heavy Bluegrey around the monster’s eyes, nose and teeth as a final highlight.
Plaguebearer WIPs - Plaguebearers in various stages of painting and washing
In-between finishing off my Tree Of The Damned I have been making some quite considerable progress on my current painting project; a small Host of Nurgle for “Age Of Sigmar” by “Games Workshop”. I’ve essentially just been concentrating on one Plaguebearer for now, and using the vile plaguesword-wielding demon as something of a test piece for my putrid paint scheme.

Having settled upon a fairly generic light(ish) green base colour using “Vallejo” Heavy Khaki, I have slowly been trying to build up the creature’s festering sores, boils and putrescent pimples with a variety of “Citadel” washes, and believe I’m now in the position where I can hopefully start to ‘batch’ paint them using a sort of factory line-up.
Plaguebearer WIPs - Plaguebearers with Nurglings and the Piper all-drybrushed
 I’ve certainly managed to not only undercoat my ten-strong unit of Plaguebearers. But wash and dry-brush them too, so I can now pick out all their puss-filled wounds with a mixture of white, pink and red. These can then be somewhat ‘blended’ in with the rest of the model using a second dry-brushing phase before I ‘pick out’ all their zits with yellow and give the stomach-churning horrors a final wash here and there.

In addition to the ‘run of the mill’ followers of Nurgle I have additionally made a little headway with the unit’s Plagueridden (leader) and Piper (Musician). Ultimately I might leave these ‘command figures’ until last as they’ll take the greatest time to finish. But there’s something awfully seductive about painting a three-eyed demon who is holding a bunch of severed heads. Praise be to Nurgle…

18 comments:

  1. I really love that tree monster, Simon. I t probably looks better in real life but in your photos it just looks like it is one uniform colour. I'd have added more contrasting colours as highlights. Foundry Granite is a good mix of brown and grey and I'd have made full use of its triad of colours - shade, normal and highlight versions. As I said, it is probably just the photos failing to do it proper justice.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thanks Bryan. To be honest I had to recheck the model after I posted the mini as it is way different to the eye (a lot more grey), and you can really see the detail and colours on it. I'm not sure whether the gloss varnish has 'taken' some of the ink washes away when I was dabbing it dry (which it has done in the past) or whether the lighting was just naff when I took the photos. Hopefully when its under different lighting on the tabletop it'll stand out a bit better. I'm actually trying to source a few more as I'd like to do a sort of lumbering orchard, in which case I'll certainly go for a lighter base colour and mark the layers more contrasting/stark with one another. Not my fave result I must admit, and I may return to this piece at a later time to do some more work on it.

      Delete
  2. Wonderfully putrid work on those Plaguebearers, Simon - I can practically smell them! Makes me wish I felt rich enough to buy GW products :)

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Cheers Bill. "GW" are indeed a bit pricey. Fortunately both my Plaguebearers and Nurglings are old boxes from yesterday I've dug out. Though I have some more en route courtesy of the company's army starter deals.

      Delete
  3. Nice work on the Tree of the Damned. :)

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thanks Leon. Not my best work but it does look good on the tabletop surrounded by my Gravemarkers.

      Delete
  4. Praise be indeed!

    I like the colour scheme you've ended with, very traditional.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Cheers Dai. There's a few interesting colour schemes in the Grand Alliance: Chaos book. But green is always how I think of them. I have some old metal models somewhere, which I plan to use to represent Plaguebearers who have been summoned during the fight. They'll probably be tan in colour, to stand out as 'old school' putrid horrors.

      Delete
  5. Great to see the tree finally finished, it really is a wonderful addition to the collection.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thanks Michael. Something simple to use as a break from all the green I'm currently painting :-)

      Delete
  6. That tree looks great and is a very impressive model, I have to say (and I'm not just saying this because I'm biased), but I think the gloss varnish isn't doing you any favours in the photo, as the shine seems to be disguising some of your shading and detail work here, as you say I bet it looks better in the flesh (bark?).

    The Nurgle stuff look suitably horrendous too, I'm surprised Jez isn't all over this stuff for his Ghostbusters project, Slimers long lost family?

    Cheers Roger

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Cheers Roger. I do think the photos don't do the Tree of the Damned Justice. But I'm glad you like the Nurgle models. Plenty more of those to come :-)

      Delete
  7. The tree and your plaguebearers look disturbing and discusting respectively - job well done I'd say.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thanks Joe. I'm certainly aiming for disgusting with the Nurgle :-)

      Delete
  8. Go Nurgle! A fittingly repulsive group, Simon.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Cheers Finch. Hopefully I'll be posting the first finished models soon.

      Delete
  9. I have to say that the 'new' plaguebearers are a lot more varied than the originals = and Roger is right, these would make suitably good "ghosts". Plastic multi-parts...might have to take a look at these.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. They assemble really nicely too Jez. I do have some metal Plaguebearers to paint at some point, as I plan to use them as additional units which can be summoned during the battle. So I should be able to show a comparison at some point :-)

      Delete