Underworlds Eyes of the Nine

Another warband painted up for Warhammer Underworlds.  These guys were a combination of contrast paints and standard methods to get a decent outcome in a reasonable amount of time.  One of the challenges with this warband is that there's such a diversity in painting the different troops.

Ylthari's Guardians how to paint and pics

I started these guys right after Thundrik's warband, but wasn't able to get at them over the weekend.  Overall they were fun to paint.  I think what made it a lot easier was airbrushing the base colours (roughly).  This meant I didn't need to do multiple coats of light grey to get good coverage on their skin.  Other than that these guys were pretty straight forward.  Check out the video and additional pictures below.

New paint rack

Ever since citadel came out with its layer paint range I've been looking for a good way to store those paints.  I have the full set, minus a few of the recent additions, so I need a way to easily find and put away paints as I use them.  For a long time I used a parts drawer thing from Lowes, with each drawer holding about 6 paints (base, layer, layer x2).  This was ok, but not ideal.  A few years back I had made a nice rack for my reaper paints, but that style wasn't going to work for citadel paints.  Any purchased solutions were going to be too expensive or take up too much space for all of the paints.  I finally came up with a solution that I though would work and got to it.

Here's a pic of the final rack.  I put hinges and latches, so you can close it and its semi-portable.  Its a bit tall to take anywhere, and I'm not sure the paints would stay in place if it was on its side... maybe mark II will be improved to fix that.

 more after the break...

How to Paint NMM Gold

Here's a tutorial showing (at 2x speed) exactly how I painted the non-metallic metal on the Phoenix Guard I just did.  There were a bunch of requests on youtube for a tutorial like this where I film the whole process.  I've mentioned before that I use Reaper paints for this, but in this I have used GW paints.  I get a lot more requests for the specific GW paints, but I actually prefer the Reaper ones for NMM.  They have a slightly more yellow look straight out of the bottle, which I like.  To due true NMM you would want to use more steps, but this is a quick process that is great for blocks of troops.

Nihilakh Oxide Demo (Video)

Here's a quick video showing how the Nihilakh Oxide works (using an Ogre Leadbelcher as a demo).  I really like the look, as the method I use is too dark.  I suppose I could mix a better colour, but I really like how this looks.  I even went back and did a couple skaven models after doing the video because I liked it so much.  Obviously you may not see the need to buy a whole bottle of it, but I can see myself using it quite often.

Review: New Citadel technical paints UPDATED

So I zipped over to GW today and picked up all six of the new technical paints so that I could give them a try and post up a review.  I've done that in the video below, and summarized it in print here.

UPDATE:
There seems to be lots of controversy about Agrellan Earth... apparently its not working for people and GW is saying its a bad batch.  The GW I purchased mine at now says that they are out of stock, which I think means they pulled it off the shelves.  Anyway, I was able to get mine to work and have posted a picture below of what I was able to achieve.

How to Paint Gandalf

Here's the painting tutorial and finished pics of the Gandalf model from Escape from Goblin town.  A pretty straight forward paint job, but a little variation in the grey by using some blue greys.  Same sort of tutorial I've been doing with the explanation then 4x speed video of each step.

Got the inspiration again from Tale of Painters:
http://taleofpainters.blogspot.ca/2012/12/tutorial-how-to-paint-gandalf-from.html

Hope you like it.

Realm of Battle Finished

Here's a walk through tutorial showing how I painted up the Realm of Battle modular board from Games Workshop.  It is on the pricey side of things, but nice details and durable.  I've also done a modular table for much cheaper if you want to check out that video.

I had my first games on this on the 27th with my brother and it was a blast. I also made up a wood frame to keep everything together and stable on top of a table that isn't quite 4 feet wide.  I'll have to make up a tutorial for that one when I get a chance.

Skaven Doomflayer Complete

Here's some pics of the finished doomflayer using the new GW paints.  I've shown the ones I used at the bottom of this post.  The patina finish was done with a watered down coat of Sotek Green then a smaller coat of Temple Guard Blue.  I used to do this by mixing Dark Angels Green and Hawk Turquoise in the old range.

New Paints Review: Conclusions

Here's a video where I sum up my conclusions about the new GW paints.  I've already started painting with them and have finished a Skaven doom flayer (lots of metallics)... they are working out well.

How to Paint Citadel Miniatures 2012 - Book Review

Here's my take on the new how to paint book from GW.  Its a well done book, but at $60 not everybody is going to get good value out of it.

New Citadel Paint Review: Metallics

The Metallic part of a paint range is very important to me and GW has had great silvers in the past, but not so great golds.  Here's a video where I look at the metallics in the new 145 paint range from GW.

New Citadel Paints Review: Texture

Here's another new section of the range for GW.  While not technically paints, they do replace something that you used to have to paint; the sand after attaching it to your base.  There are other similar options out there, but this one seems decent if a little unnecessary.  Might be nice to have one of these sitting around, but most people won't want all 6.

New GW Paints Review: Dry range

Here's a review about the new Dry range of paints.  This is perhaps the most unique offering in the new set, and to my knowledge isn't done by any other hobby paint range.  For the most part I don't see myself using all of these, but for things like bases I will use it.  I can also see the silver one (Necron compound) being the new must have paint.  If you're like me and do metallics first when there's lots (like on Orks) then this is the way to go.  Just drybrush on the Necron Compound over a black base and you've got your silver base coat much faster than painting.

New Citadel Paint Review: Layers

Here's a look at the layers section of the new GW paint range.  I check out how the recommended combinations work together.

New Citadel Paint Review: Bases (foundations)

Here's the second set of paints to be reviewed... foundations.  Overall they seem to behave similar to the old foundations.  The colours aren't the same, but there's lots more.  The coverage seems similar but they might not be quite as matte.  This doesn't really matter because you're going to cover it with a shade and layers.

New GW Paint Review: Shades (washes)

Here's a video where I show how the new shades compare to the old washes.  In the video we have Badab Black vs. Nuln Oil, Devlin Mud vs. Agrax Earthshade and Thraka Green vs. Beil-Tan Green.  The conclusion is that the colour match is very close and if anything they behave a little better.  They seem to have a lower surface tension which leads to less foam type bubbles forming when you paint it on quickly.

Citadel Paints Review

Here's my first impressions of the new citadel paints.  I picked up the set as well as the painting book and am working my way through them now.  The main thing now will be setting out which combinations will get the various looks I'm trying to get.  If you have any questions about the new paints let me know and I will try to answer them.

New range Review video (from Buypainted)

Just watched this review, and while it is quite critical I really value it.  This guy has lots of amazing videos on youtube and clearly knows his hobby stuff, so I'd recommend watching this.  Not sure what the end result is going to be for me, I still haven't bought any of the new paints and I'm debating switching over to Vallejo or staying with my Reaper paints.

Any other input out there?

New GW paint chart

I've been hearing about this for a while now, and just came across this over at http://taleofpainters.blogspot.ca/2012/03/rumours-new-citadel-paint-range-colour.html

I'm super excited.  I love the reaper triad system, and will enjoy having the matched sets for GW paints as well.  It makes painting super easy and eliminates a lot of mixing.