I like the yellow on the worm, and the runes are very cool idea

Experimenting with basing. First, I picked up Citadel's Stirling Battlemire. It's working pretty well, but I went through a whole bottle already. It might be too expensive to be sustainable. I like it better than the Mud because it has more texture, and I'm hoping to add puddles on some of the bases of my figures.

This spring, my sister-in-law got married, and they had lots of craft moss for decoration at the reception, so I grabbed a gallon Ziploc bag full of it in case it would come in handy for terrain. More recently, I was looking at the Blighted Ground terrain, and it struck me how much it looks like the craft moss. This realization, combined with the crazy dark world in Stranger Things, and I came up with the idea to make the ground on my bases look blighted, as if the army of Waiqar the Undying is polluting the ground as it advances on the free cities of Terrinoth. Here's my first go at it:

I roughly painted the moss with purple, and then did some highlights in red violet. I left some green showing through, because the blight tokens and the dripping blight from my worm are both green. Combining the green of the blight, and the purple of the army's color seems to really work. I also applied some purple to the surrounding mud, just to give it a more eerie aura. I could probably go a little further with the aura. I can't decide if I want the blight to be smashed flat, so it's writhing on the ground, or if it's okay for it to climb up and have some body. Maybe the ground needs to look more saturated with some kind of blight-vine medium to really sell it. If I can get the technique to look good enough, I'm thinking of applying it to all of my troops, calling my army "The Blighted Battalion."

(Sorry about the white balance/color. I fought with it on my SLR for a bit, and I'm not satisfied yet. I think I need a brighter bulb for the light box.)

Fantastic! I would say yes to adding more glow to the mud.

As you can tell from my first posts, I'm pretty cheap when it comes to painting supplies. After struggling through my first 6 trays of Reanimates, I decided it was time to do some experimenting.

Exhibit A :

This was my first attempt at painting (and priming, shudder), and I think they turned out alright. The biggest problem was having to do layer, after layer, after layer. Having done 6 trays of these guys, I was less than enthused to do another 6 trays. In fact, here's a photo of two layers of the Concord Grape on my infantry command figures with white primer next to the minis that I just showed you.

Overall, pretty splotchy, and I'll need to do at least another layer so that I can get a deep enough base coat. I originally wanted white so that the colors would pop more, but now I'm not so sure. The Reanimates on the right were primed in black and have a wash of Agrax Earthshade.

Exhibit B :

Having trouble with the Apple Barrel stuff, I decided to pick up some Army Painter paints. Unfortunately, I didn't realize at the time that I had picked up the color that is used for highlights in the Waiqar Army Painter guide: Alien Purple. [EDIT: My mistake, they use Warlock Purple, which is even more pink] So I had this brilliant purple, but I didn't have anything that could be used to highlight up (sure, I could have purchased another color, but like I said, I'm cheap).

These pictures don't capture it very well, but the "highlights" I came up with are actually this nasty brownish purple. I mean, it's alright for tabletop gaming - they are dirty undead/dying denizens of the Mistlands. But it's not very pretty up close. May have to revisit.

Exhibit C :

One of the paints I had picked up was Purple Tone Ink from The Army Painter. I had used it on Ankaur Maro's cloak and some of the Reanimates, so I figured I'd try using it as a base on my Ankaur Maro figure upgrade, primed in white.

I'm actually quite please with the way this turned out. I'll need to finish painting the rest of him to see how it all comes together, but the cloak looks practically finished as it is.

Exhibit D :

I was tired - SO tired - of painting all the armor on my Reanimates. One of the local players, Jesse, primed his Reanimates in Silver, and I thought I'd give it a try since I had run out of my black primer, and I really didn't feel like priming my Reanimates in white, knowing that I'd be painting Skeleton Bone over their exposed bone areas anyway.

I had never tried Krylon before, but I was really impressed. And at 50% the cost of Army Painter primers, I can't complain. Now, some of them do feel a little tacky, even after they dried for 24 hours. Maybe I put too much on? Some of them look really smooth, and others are a tiny bit grainy where I didn't have good coverage over the model, but they are all MUCH better than my first attempt. And here are my 6 trays ready to be painted, alongside the completed 6 trays (well, almost complete - I still need to paint the "Resurrect" rune on some of their foreheads).

Exhibit E :

Unfortunately, my local store does not carry Army Painter, so I had to go with Vallejo. But to be totally honest, I am digging the Vallejo paints much better than the Army Painter paints I had picked up. The Alien Purple is quite runny, and the Skeleton Bone has a cracked dropper that leaks everywhere. Anyway, I saw this "Extra Opaque" line of paints, and considering the way my Infantry Command figures are looking, I felt this would be worth a few bucks to give it a whirl.

Oh. My. Stars. This was accomplished in just two coats! And it wasn't even full coats, it was like, paint the whole thing, and then some of the high areas were still silvery, so hit them again. They went so much faster than the others! Definitely a worthwhile purchase, in my opinion. I'm using a wet pallet, and I am thinking I don't even need to thin this stuff very much, if at all. As long as my brush is damp, I can plop a bunch of this on the cloak, and just spread it around to a good, relatively thin coat on the model, and it will cut my painting time in half. I tried diluting it a little, but it just ran all over the place, so I may have to find a happy medium, or I'll just apply this straight from the bottle (I mean, bottle -> wet pallet -> model). Definitely anticipating faster progress here, and hopefully I can get my Reanimates all pretty before Store Championships in 2 weeks. Even if I just get the fabric and bone finished, that will be enough since they are already primed in silver, and I won't be bent out of shape if their belts and wooden shields are metallic.

Exhibit F :

And here's the whole gang together. I'm definitely liking the Extra Opaque Vallejo models. Do you agree?

I mean, the Opaque one still needs wash and highlights, but man, I dig it.

I also need to prime my three remaining Carrion Lancers, and then paint them up in the colors of each of the factions. Oh, and my Daqan Bane will get a new coat of gold over his yellow, because I painted some Daqan, and decided that gold looked way better than the yellow. So much to do, so little time, but I'll try to keep posting my updates. I am a little nervous that this Vallejo turned out so well, because now the ~$40* in craft paints I've slowly been accruing are going to be relegated to terrain and kids crafts, and I'll have to drop some real money on hobby paints for my Carrion Lancers. Probably still cheaper than buying a whole paint set with colors I'll likely rarely or never use...at least that's what I keep telling myself.

*Why is Apple Barrel $0.99 at Jo-Ann Fabrics, but only $0.50 at Wal-Mart?

Seems like so much work figuring out what you like. Thanks for documenting it all. Are you going to use Army Painter Alien Purple for your Opaque Vallejo highlights? Personally, I like the look of the Army Painter guy on the right best of all, but that's probably because it has highlights. I'm looking forward to seeing how the Vallejo one looks with highlights.

In terms of richness and depth I think the Vallejo purple is great. With highlights and shading I think it’ll look fantastic on the table.

7 hours ago, Parakitor said:

*Why is Apple Barrel $0.99 at Jo-Ann Fabrics, but only $0.50 at Wal-Mart?

Walmart buys in bulk, and doesn't carry the full selection of colors.

1 hour ago, Budgernaut said:

Seems like so much work figuring out what you like. Thanks for documenting it all. Are you going to use Army Painter Alien Purple for your Opaque Vallejo highlights? Personally, I like the look of the Army Painter guy on the right best of all, but that's probably because it has highlights. I'm looking forward to seeing how the Vallejo one looks with highlights.

I am not prepared to badmouth Army Painter. I think it's likely these bottles had sat on the shelf for a long time. Yeah, I'm going to highlight with the Alien Purple. I'm going to finish up these four Reanimates and post them, and if I like them enough, my wizard, soldier, and drummer will get a new base coat.

5 hours ago, Parakitor said:

I am not prepared to badmouth Army Painter. I think it's likely these bottles had sat on the shelf for a long time. Yeah, I'm going to highlight with the Alien Purple. I'm going to finish up these four Reanimates and post them, and if I like them enough, my wizard, soldier, and drummer will get a new base coat.

When it comes to Army Painter, you REALLY have to mix the paints well. I bought metal beads to stick in my bottles because they were cheap and I heard it helps. Even with those, I usually vigorously shake the bottles for several minutes before squeezing the paint out. I've noticed a huge difference between when I mix it well and when I don't. The medium appears to want to stick together and you have to break that up. If you do get it adequately mixed, it takes very little water to get a good consistency.

I think my Flesh Rippers took one or two coats of base Skeleton Bone and Dragon Red. Then it was wash and highlight. And with some of them, that second coat was more for touch-ups than a full coat. It shouldn't take tons of coats of Army Painter to get the coverage you want.

On 18.2.2018 at 4:25 PM, Parakitor said:

I am not prepared to badmouth Army Painter. I think it's likely these bottles had sat on the shelf for a long time. Yeah, I'm going to highlight with the Alien Purple. I'm going to finish up these four Reanimates and post them, and if I like them enough, my wizard, soldier, and drummer will get a new base coat.

Army Painter paints do have separation issues. Vallejo has them, too (the one downside dropper bottles have), but not as badly. This might be because their inventory gets moved quicker, because of the slightly different bottle shape, or paint recipe. I found that for some of them, shaking is not enough, they need an agitator (stainless steel balls of a grade that can be in contact with water constantly for me, glass works, too).

Luke Fellows made a video on how to deal with potential problems:

Most of my AP paints don't actually need that much attention and I just shake by hand, but if you have massive issues, this is the way to go.

I've finally started painting Lord Vorun'thul. He's a lot of fun! Here's where I am so far:

I've inked the hair and face with blue, and have highlighted with light gray. Unfortunately, the skin and hair look way too similar. What can I do to make the two distinct from each other? I was planning to highlight the hair with white on top of the light gray to make it even lighter, but the face already looks close to white.

My two ideas now are 1) go over the face with a darker gray, then revisit the light gray, or 2) go over the hair with darker gray, and make him have a pale face with darker hair than in the art. I'm nervous about adding more layers to the face, but that may be the road I need to take to get the desired effect.

Once I get the head all sorted I can go back over the rest of him with highlights. I am loving this figure!

I'd go with a combination of 1 & 2 darker hair and lighter highlights on the face. If in doubt more contrast? Quite new to minniature painting so would take what I say with a pinch of salt.

On 1/22/2019 at 2:45 PM, Parakitor said:

My two ideas now are 1) go over the face with a darker gray, then revisit the light gray, or 2) go over the hair with darker gray, and make him have a pale face with darker hair than in the art. I'm nervous about adding more layers to the face, but that may be the road I need to take to get the desired effect.

I'd go with option 2. First, it will accentuate his light-colored skin, making him look more vampire-like. Second, the extra layers on the hair are less likely to obscure important details than extra layers on the face.

On 2/17/2018 at 10:36 PM, Parakitor said:

Exhibit B :

Having trouble with the Apple Barrel stuff, I decided to pick up some Army Painter paints. Unfortunately, I didn't realize at the time that I had picked up the color that is used for highlights in the Waiqar Army Painter guide: Alien Purple. [EDIT: My mistake, they use Warlock Purple, which is even more pink] So I had this brilliant purple, but I didn't have anything that could be used to highlight up (sure, I could have purchased another color, but like I said, I'm cheap).

These pictures don't capture it very well, but the "highlights" I came up with are actually this nasty brownish purple. I mean, it's alright for tabletop gaming - they are dirty undead/dying denizens of the Mistlands. But it's not very pretty up close. May have to revisit.

Exhibit C :

One of the paints I had picked up was Purple Tone Ink from The Army Painter. I had used it on Ankaur Maro's cloak and some of the Reanimates, so I figured I'd try using it as a base on my Ankaur Maro figure upgrade, primed in white.

I know this is an older post, so you may have picked up these techniques by now but for anyone else that may be looking into this:

The Purple Tone Ink that you picked up was a "quickshade", which is typically used in addition to your base layer paint, in this case, you could use it to shade the Alien Purple cloaks darker. Also, a possible technique to deal with the lack of a highlight up is to use glazing to darken down instead. There is a decent example of the process by Sorastro here .

The way I did the purple on my worms was to start with Army Painter’s Alien Purple as a base coat and then ink over it with their Purple Tone ink. This gave it a nice deep tone over an appropriate base coat. Then I drybrushed on Oozing Purple (a lighter shade of purple) to get the highlights. Not a lot of work and a great, layered effect. I really enjoyed painting the siege units. They were full of detail and you didn’t have to paint too many of them.

Yeah, I think looking at the selection Parakitor had back then, a good approach would have been to base coat the cloaks with Vallejo Heavy Violet, use the Purple Tone quickshade for the deep folds, then use the Alien Purple for highlighting along the raised areas. Give the Apple Barrel to the kids.

On 5/21/2020 at 8:45 PM, sarumanthewhite said:

The way I did the purple on my worms was to start with Army Painter’s Alien Purple as a base coat and then ink over it with their Purple Tone ink. This gave it a nice deep tone over an appropriate base coat. Then I drybrushed on Oozing Purple (a lighter shade of purple) to get the highlights. Not a lot of work and a great, layered effect. I really enjoyed painting the siege units. They were full of detail and you didn’t have to paint too many of them.

I'm so happy to see this since I just bought Oozing Purple and I alreasy have Alien Purple and the Purple Tone!

I actually do this with a lot of my stuff. I use the color as a base, ink over it for depth and shading and then drybrush on the original to get a nice layered effect. Most of the time I don’t have to go beyond that