The other day I received a little package in the mail. It was a pair of
Orcnar Eotans from Gavin over the way at
Tor Gaming...and when I say over the way, I mean half way around the globe baby!!! Now these guys are uhgly...and I mean that in a good way...some serious table top nastiness headed your direction with a pair of these.
Now these two hurking beasts are for the Orcnar from the upcoming game
Relics now in the open beta stages and with the size and shape of their upper bodies and um...arms.
So Gavin started a pretty sweet little 'club' giving a number of us painters across the world the ability to put brush to mini and showcase these figures.
From the Tor Gaming site:
The Brush Army program we run is a special program where some of the most talented painters are given our miniatures to paint.
The Brush Army members are given full creative freedom to paint the models how they want and you may even see some conversions in there too!! (The Brush Army gallery is not on line yet!!! Keep checking back!)
Now for the last couple of nights, I have turned my attentions to one of these 'things', I managed to snap shots of my work each night.
Obviously the first thing I do it wash the fig with a mild detergent and a toothbrush, fill the flash and mold lines and then give it a prime, I didn't take any shots of this...as if you've seen one primed white beast you've seen them all...plus my wife would whup my rear if I was taking candid photos of her sink.
So we'll just start with the initial paint and roll thru the final stages. This fig was painted over the coarse of 3 evenings.
Since Gavin gave me free reign to do what I will, I decided to use colors that I do not normally use. Typically I'm a very neutral paint color kind of guy, I do the whites, greys and blacks or the green, browns, yellows and oranges...sometimes I get wild and do some blues or maybe reds...so with this choice I figured I'd go with a purple flesh over a deeper green coat of scales.
I'll go over color choices and mixes. I'm a firm believer in the power of a limited color palette, not just across a single fig but keeping it tight across an army as well. But this about a single fig and not an army...so on to the base coat!
Paint for this project is limited to these colors:
Skin:
VGC - Dead Flesh
P3 - Beaten Purple
P3 Sanguine Base
Scales:
P3 - Ordic Olive
P3 - Cryx Bane Base
P3 - Cryx Bane Highlight
P3 - Menoth White Highlight
Washes and depth:
P3 - Mixing Medium
GW - Black and Brown Inks (circa 1988 - yes I still have originals)
You'll have to forgive my horrible ability to take photos...as I'm great with say like sports photos, or shooting the kids...when it comes to hitting the macro action...um I SUCK!
The whole model get an initial thinned down coat of Dead Flesh (I actually love this color very very much...if I could hang out with it on a Friday night I would...cause it rocks). The scales get a deep wash of Ordic Olive - the whole model is then given a thin wash of Cryx Bane Base. This sets the base tone and lets me build from there.
Second coat is Dead Flesh with a paint brush tip of Beaten Purple added - this brings my flesh color up to a base purplish flesh.
A light wash of Ordic Olive is then laid down over the whole model to tie the two colors all together. This also gives the scales a bit more base.
The next step is to bring more depth to the skin, I add Sanguine Base to Dead Flesh and start the blending process.
I add Cryx Bane Highlight to the Ordic Olive and give the scales another coat of paint - now based off of the texture of the scales, I use a very thin paint and take a dab highlight approach vs a blend, I want to build up color on top of the scale and blending it down with a second brush would make it very tough to do.
The entire model is shaded with a mix of Cryx Bane Base with GW Brown Ink and the scale are shaded with Cryx Bane Base with a touch of GW Black Ink (I want more contrast between the scales as well as a tight outline).
At this point I've also started in on getting color on the spikes on the arms. This is a blend of the Ordic/Cryx Bane Highlight and straight Ordic, washed down with the Cryx Band/Brown Ink mix.
From here I am back to the skin with another lighter blend of Dead Flesh and Sanguine Base with a touch of Menoth White Highlight (I love this color too...one of my favorites for adding warmth to a highlight). I have also added a touch of Menoth White to the Ordic/Cryx Bane Highlight to hit the scales with.
The skin is given a glaze of Cryx Bane Base and then a re-highlight of the last skin tone used. The spikes are then hit with another highlight, again with Menoth White added to the Ordic Olive.
Finally Sanguine Base is washed into the mouth and eye sockets to create a base color, Beaten Purple is used as another wash to give both a bit more depth. Menoth White Highlight is mixed with a touch of GW Brown Ink and used to bring the teeth up in color and a final Menoth White Highlight is given to the teeth to bring them out completely.
The base was made by cutting some stone shapes into a bit of green stuff, painted with Cryx Bane Highlight, washed down with the Cryx Bane Base/GW Brown Ink mix and blended with Trollblood Highlight. Static grass was places between the stones and things were cleaned up.
Overall the Eotan was a great piece to paint, plenty of character and texture, a real solid piece of rock...er a real solid Orcnar.
My thanks go out to Gavin and Tor Gaming for allowing me the opportunity to have some fun with this bad boy and if you haven't already, take some time to take a look at the really characterful pieces that are starting to hit the market from
TOR GAMING!!!!
Time to pack him up and send him back to the studio to allow someone who actually knows how to take pictures give this guy some decent coverage. :D
Till next time, keep your paint thinned and your brushes clean!!!
