It’s no secret that hobby discourse online can get a little… heated. Wars rage about model quality, release schedules, rules issues, representation, you name it. And yes, it can get quite draining sometimes and dull your enthusiasm for the miniature wargaming hobby.
So with that in mind, I put the question out on that one Bird AppTM, asking you folks what your favourite aspect of the hobby is. Let’s take a day out to focus on what makes us love this hobby, from the newest painter to the most experienced veteran of the tabletop battlefield. What brightens your day? Let’s take a look at some of my favourite responses (and check out the full thread for a smorgasbord of hobby happiness) right now!
(If I’ve included you in this article and you’d rather I didn’t, please do DM me and let me know and I will amend the article!)
Spending time converting messed up little guys that no one has made before. Like my chaos cybermutant with an arm where his head should be or my tiny marine sized tactical dreadnoughts.📯 pic.twitter.com/aTcWKMWSJM
@runesexplosive and @Chaosform1 were two of the many folks who expressed their love of the creativity afforded by kitbashing your miniatures, with some fantastic examples posted in their replies. Sometimes it can be daunting to try kitbashing, and it doesn’t always end up as you imagined it… but when it does, it feels great. I’d recommend giving it a go sometime – we even have our own Kitbash Garage channel in the PaintSlam discord!
The ability to be as creative as I want and tell a story though paint and context clues alone!!
I love seeing my armies come together and the narrative I've created for them too! 📯 pic.twitter.com/bCuFMpwLgH
— FunnyBonesMcJones (comms open!) (@Bones_Jones69) January 24, 2023
I have five kids, so I have used painting miniatures to relax, destress, and find peace. Even after they have grown (I do still have one at home) I enjoy just painting. 📯
@bones_jones69 and @amorell expressed their own love of painting their miniatures. There’s tons of great reasons to want to paint your models. Do you want to tell a story for that one miniature? Paint a whole army to fit your own narrative in the world(s) of your choosing? Or perhaps like @amorell it’s a way to unwind and let the cares of the real world melt away for a few hours at a time! I find painting to be very theraputic and calming, it’s surprising how fast the days can fly when you’re sat at the paint table.
The competitive play! Even those months when I'm not avaible for playing very often, I can spend hours and hours just listening to podcast about tournament and how players make their choices when they are preparing their rosters📯
On a more gaming focussed note we’ve got @Stiem_Gaming, @TDS_Gwen,and @MoriaWargames – wargaming brings people together, both in competitive settings and tactical discussion and more casual gaming as part of your local friend group or hobby club. Even us generally introverted and shy folks can find ourselves opening up and making genuine, close friendships both across the table and our screens. And any trip to Warhammer World or an exciting hobby show or event is better with friends! There’s often those experienced hobbyists who love sharing their passion with new starters. Those folks who give up their time to help new folks learn the ropes deserve medals!
It's 70/30 between community and expression. I'm from Ukraine and during this period of war, our local community supported each other and grew really close. I got into this hobby to escape from reality but found an outlet to express myself and some of the best people in my life
@TheBeardedLynx shared his experience from Ukraine, and shows the strength a community can provide. The friends we make in our hobby can support us even when times are extremely tough. Treasure those people!
I get so much dopamine from showing off my models and knowing I did something to improve my paint jobs
@LiamWritesThing and @John09748783 both enjoy the spectacle of gorgeous models. It’s so satisfying to share sometimes you’ve worked so hard on, especially if you can see a notable improvement over some of your older work. And when you have two or more players dropping gorgeous, fully painted armies onto a scenic battlefield, isn’t that just the greatest thing to see? I can’t be the only person who finds themselves unable to avoid stopping to crouch down and take cool models-eye-view photos of the action!
My dad got me into warhammer when I was a kid. A few years ago he showed me how to paint like he does. I've always admired his painting, so It's something I share with him. When I paint i still think about being in that dusty old shed next to him. That's my favourite thing. 📯 pic.twitter.com/0wbvtnHjD7
The hobby is generational too! @Mettatrack here tells of how they were inspired in the hobby by their dad! It’s a great hobby to share with your kids if you’re a parent, and how proud you can be when you see your kiddo finish their first ever miniature. It’s a wonderful family activity that crosses that generation gap.
These examples were just the tip of the iceberg for the replies in the thread, I tried to cover a number of aspects of the hobby when picking these out! Again please do check out the full thread and see the inspiring replies – and maybe let us know what *you* enjoy most about the hobby too!
Gloom Tench 1926 is a game that takes the grim real world setting of WW1 and introduces an alternative history, where human science has resulted in a world overrun by fearsome monsters known as “The Scourge”. The upcoming Kickstarter for the Russians is due to launch at 1pm GMT (8am EST) on the 7th Feb 2023. You can follow this campaign right here!
In this article I will show you how I painted an Enforcer for two of 3 Russian factions from the game. This painting article uses Citadel Colour paint names, although you can apply the same techniques to your own preferred paint brand.
The model was attached with Superglue to a piece of slate which I had attached to the 25mm plastic base. We’ll be adding more detail to the base near the end. The model was primed with Mechanicus Standard Grey hobby spray. I then went over the model itself with the same colour from the pot, to ensure an even finish. The paint from the pot is also a slightly warmer tone.
To bring out the details and highlight all the fur/wool parts of the model, it was given an all-over drybrush with Dawnstone. This was followed by a lighter drybrush with Screaming Skull, this off-white again adds a little warmth into the otherwise cool scheme.
To fully bring out all the details, I then applied a shade of Nuln Oil over the whole miniature. This settles into the recesses without overly staining the raised areas. I used a little Basilicanum Grey to give a blacklining effect around the edges where fur meets coat trim and gloves to help define these edges.
The gloves and coat trim were then painted with Thunderhawk Blue, a grey-blue paint perfect for our wintery themed model.
The blue areas we just painted were given a shade with Gryph-Charger Grey contrast paint. When this was dry, an edge highlight was applied with Fenrisian Grey. I also picked out the knuckles and fingers a little with this colour.
With the blue areas done, I moved onto the leathers by painting them all with Wyldwood contrast paint. This included the pouches, belts, and sword scabbard. This was highlighted with Steel Legion Drab.
To finish the leathers, I used Karak Stone to apply smaller highlights to all these areas. It’s ok to be a little rough with this, since you will create a worn leather appearance.
The face was started by giving it a paint with Tuskgor Fur, a nice reddish fleshtone. Be careful not to get it onto the fur areas!
The raised parts of the face were painted with Cadian Fleshtone, followed by a smaller highlight with Kislev Flesh on the ends of the nose and cheeks. His moustache was painted with Corax White, implying age and experience on the battlefield.
The eyes got a little bit of Wyldwood dropped into the pupils, then the whole face including moustache were washed with Targor Rageshade, a reddish-brown shade paint.
I then picked out the badge on his hat, his shoulder plates, belt buckle and weapon handle with Blood Angels Red contrast paint. This contrasting red colour helps round out the colour scheme of the whole model.
The red areas were given an edge highlight of Evil Sunz Scarlet, then a few dot highlights with the Cadian Fleshtone we used earlier on the face.
All the metal areas such as the breastplate, pouch buttons, and pistol were given a coat of Leadbelcher.
I used Nuln Oil over all the metal areas, then applied a little Basilicanum Grey contrast into any scratches and dings on the metals to add a bit of depth.
The metallics were then given a highlight with Iron Hands Steel.
It’s time to return to the base. I used a Vallejo textured paint to add in some battlefield mud over the flat areas and on some of the slate. You can use a Citadel textued paint like Stirland Mud if that’s what you’ve got to hand. Once dry, this was given a wash with Agrax Earthshade, before it got a drybrush of Screaming Skull.
Finally, I applied snow effects with Citadel Valhallan Blizzard. This texture paint dries to give a realistic snowy-slush effect that really helps ground the model. The rim of the base was given a couple of layers of Abaddon Black to finish the model off and call it ready for battle.
And that’s it! Our Russian Enforcer is now ready to face the horrors of the grim dark battlefields of 1926 and all the terrifying creatures that lurk on them! As you can see in the picture above, this scheme can be applied just as easily to both the 28mm and 15mm versions of the Gloom Trench 1926 miniatures.
All that remains is to once again thank Fickle Dice Games for sponsoring this content, do go check them out and get ready for their kickstarter in the first week of February. Have fun painting your own miniatures!
Games Workshop kindly sent me the special boxing day miniature, the Abhorrent Ghoul King with Crown of Delusion (henceforth to be simply refered to as Ghoul King!) for free, and I painted it up as my first miniature of the year! This is a beastly ruler of the Flesh-Eater Courts, depraved creatures that skulk in the night believing themselves to be noble knights and chivalrous heroes.
So, here’s how I went about painting it!
Firstly I primed the model with White Scar spray – you could also use Grey Seer for this, or Wraithbone for a warmer finish. When this was dry I shaded the whole model with Nuln Oil. This helped me identify areas of detail and define the key shapes. From here, I moved onto individual elements.
The Throne For the Throne I began with covering the whole thing with Basilicanum Grey contrast paint.
I followed this with recess shades of Poxwalker where moss would gather, and also ran this around the bottom of the throne to indicate climbing moss.
I used Mantis Warriors Green contrast paint in smaller areas within the poxwalker areas to indicate denser moss.
I then drybrushed the whole throne with Grey Seer paint from the pot, before re applying a little of the greens to re-establish them. This gave the whole throne a nice weathered and overgrown appearance.
The Flesh This distinctive orange flesh colour was achieved by using Gryph-Hound Orange contrast paint all over.
I then highlighted this with Jokaero Orange, Cadian Fleshtone and finally some small highlights of Pallid Wych Flesh.
To add variance to the skin tone I thinned down Volupus Pink contrast and applied it to the face, hands, knees etc to get a reddish tint.
Bone Areas Bone areas such as the ones hanging on the throne and his piercings were first painted Corax White, then given a coat of Skeleton Horde contrast paint.
I built up Skeleton Horde in thin layers here and there to increase saturation and achieve a rough gradient effect.
A few highlights of Screaming Skull on the key edges finished this off.
The ropes binding the bones were painted with Gore-Grunta Fur.
Black Cloth I painted all the cloth with Corvus Black, which is a deep grey rather than a pure black.
I washed it with Nuln Oil to deepen the recessed areas.
I then highlighted up with Mechanicus Standard Grey and Dawnstone.
A little Poxwalker was stippled onto some of the areas to imply the cloth was old and mossy itself too.
The Metallics All the metal areas were painted with Leadbelcher to start with.
To turn some of the areas gold such as the crown and sword hilt I applied a few thin layers of Skeleton Horde over the top rather than use a gold paint, this dulls the gold down nicely.
I washed the silver areas with Nuln Oil, and the Gold areas with Poxwalker to add a greenish hint to the worn, aged gold.
Final highlights were done with Iron Hands Steel on all the metallics.
Rust was stippled on using Jokaero Orange.
The Base After applying a grey base texture paint, I washed it with Nuln Oil, then drybrushed Dawnstone.
Finally I used Mantis Warriors Green contrast again to add mossy areas to the ground.
The model was finished off by painting the rim with Corvus Black.
And that’s pretty much it! If you’ve painted one of these yourself, why not show it off on our discord, or use the #PaintSlam23 hashtag on social media!
I always go a bit blank when I think about what to put here – what can I say that I haven’t said in previous months? Do I address current events? September was an eventful month in world news, not least of which being the local news of Queen Elizabeth II passing away. Or do I stay away and just share my enthusiasm via the usual superlatives? After all, your hobby that I get to showcase every month is always wonderful to see.
I’m blank. So instead of me writing a fancy intro, drop into the comments and let us know what your favourites are from this month’s showcase! And as always, don’t forget to drop into the PaintSlam discord ot share your hobby! <3 Onwards, to the showcase!
The Fireclaw is a huge, terrifying machine-beast that makes its home in the Frozen Wilds of the Horizon Zero Dawn setting. With it’s large claws, rotary blades and spewing jets of flame, it’s not a creature you want to bump into on your trek across the tundra. This bear-like creature is one of the toughest opponents you will face on your adventure, so prepare well… by reading this painting guide!
In case you’ve been exiled from your tribe for years like Aloy and aren’t aware, the Fireclaw is a monstrous machine from the Horizon Zero Dawn video game. The game was released in 2017 to rave reviews with over 20 million copies sold as of November 2021! The follow up, Horizon Forbidden West, followed in early 2022 to much fanfare and the franchise has even expanded to comic books, a planned television series and, of course, the fantastic board game via Steamforged Games.
Steamforged Games have taken everything that made the video game so special and distilled it perfectly into a table-top format. The expansion pack miniatures (they aren’t so miniature!) being my personal favorites. The Fireclaw, Stormbird and Thunderjaw look simply incredible!
I’ll be working closely from the image above for reference, if you are also painting a Fireclaw I would recommend having various images of the creature on standby to help identify areas of different material and colour.
The first step, as you may have guessed, was to prime the model. I have used a neutral grey primer for this miniature, as there are a lot of grey and black tones across the Fireclaw. Although a smooth coat is preferred, if there is a little roughness, it can help make the model look a little weathered so it’s not neccessarily a bad thing in this case. You can see that the weather seems to have caused a little texture on the primer on the arm here – but I quite like how it works on this model.
This model also comes pre-assembled in the box, and attached to its base. This makes it an ideal project for a hobbyist who doesn’t enjoy the often complex assembly of hard plastic wargaming kits. All of the Horizon Zero dawn models come either pre-assembled or in easy push-fit sets.
With the primer dry and ready to go, I began by picking out various areas of the “flesh” with Vallejo German Grey. This went onto areas like the muzzle, inside the mouth, the various softer areas like the waist and any areas of internal machinery poking out between armour panels. Remember to keep your paints thin and work in layers if the colour of the primer still shows through. I use a wet pallette to help my paints stay thin and usable for longer, but if you use a dry palette remember to add a little water to your colours.
After filling in much of the body with the darker grey, I set about picking out the sinewy cable “muscles” along the neck, arms, torso and legs. This is a sort of coppery colour, so I used Tin Bitz from the Nostalgia ’88 range. This gives a great metallic dull copper effect, without being overly bright.
To further distinguish various areas, I used Contrast Basilicanum Grey to filter a mid grey between the primer colour and the German Grey. This was applied over the feet, claws, wrist “saws”, and various other small details. This just helps break up more of those flat areas and vary the tones, implying different types of metal being used across the body.
Next up, it’s time to get MESSY! It’s time to go over everything, including the “bear” (heh heh) grey primer with Nuln Oil. This is a thin shade paint which slightly tints the surfaces but most settles into the recesses creating clear definition between each area and panel on the model. As you can see, it’s pretty much liquid talent in a bottle!
With the Nuln Oil dry, my next step was to drybrush. I went over everything but the copper with Mechanicus Standard Grey as a strong drybrush, then a lighter drybrush of Dawnstone. We don’t want to go too light, as most of these areas shouldn’t draw the eye compared to the brighter parts to come.
To bring out the more metallic parts of the model, a heavy overbrush of Leadbelcher was applied over the claws, feet, spinning blades and face, as well as a few key areas which looked like moving parts or joints. This is similar to a drybrush but with a little more paint left on the brush so it catches the majority of the area, just leaving the recesses darker. I then apply a little more Nuln Oil over these areas just to bring the shininess down slightly.
Time to start getting some colour down on the main armoured panels across the Fireclaw. There are mostly on the legs, arms, upper back, and the face. For this I used Squig Orange, which is a reddish, subdued orange tone. Orange paints tend to struggle to cover well, so build up over multiple layers. If it looks like the leg armour in the picture above where you can see the grey still showing through, wait until the layer is thoroughly dry then apply another thin layer. You may need 3-4 coats to build up a nice solid colour.
I applied a coat of Fuegan Orange shade over the orange to punch the colour slightly and get some shading into the recesses. After this I spend a little time going around the model with grey to clean up some areas where the orange spilled out of the lines!
To highlight the orange and create more depth, I made a roughly 50:50 mix of Cadian Fleshtone and Squig Orange, and drybrushed this over all of the orange areas. This catches the raised details and adds a lot of visual interest to the coloured areas.
Now comes a fun part, weathering the orange areas up a bit! As you can imagine, creatures like the Fireclaw get dinged about a bit in combat and from just life in the Frozen Wilds! So here I take Thondia Brown (you could also use Rhinox Hide or any other darker brown for this) and do dots and dashes along the edges and raised curves where paint would be likely to get chipped off. You can also add scratches here and there too. I thinned it down a little and painted it into some of the recesses to help convey depth, then painted the top of the base brown in preparation for the basing later.
To prepare for the glowy green and yellow-fire effects, areas like like the cabling, “eyes”, heat vents, and shoulder fire sacs are painted with Corax White. This will give a super bright effect once we add some Contrast paints to these areas!
A bit more bright colour! I used Karandras Green contrast on the arm cables and fire sacs on the shoulders. The “eyes” got painted with Aethermatic Blue, and then the heat vents and neck cables recieved a coat of Iyanden Yellow contrast. I also thinned the yellow down and applied it around the stomach area where the majority of the heat vents are.
I used Phalanx Yellow to highlight some of the yellow areas, then used Warboss Green on the green areas to smooth off the colour towards the centre and reduce any patchiness, with Moot Green used as a highlight on the cables. Looking at the concept art I noticed the orange panels did have some subtle variance, so I used Berserker Bloodshade over some of the panels to darken them slightly and bring them closer towards red tones.
Now we’re in a good place with it, I pick out some extra details like the yellow stripes on various parts of the body, and on the blades at the forearms. I also use Corax White to paint on some of the symbols here and there around the orange areas!
At this point I noticed the black areas needed a little more work – they’re a sort of carbon fibre texture in-game, but because replicating that would be extremely difficult, I drybrushed on a mix of German Grey and Leadbelcher, with a final stipple of the same mix to add texture and a shine to these areas.
Then I took Mythril Silver, and dotted it into the edges where the brown had earlier been used to create weathering, indicating “bear” metal showing through.
After this I decided to work on the base a bit, so I used Geek Gaming Scenics scrublands from their base ready sets, then added a bit of Valhallan Blizzard texture paint.
At the back of the model, there’s a power pack of some kind. I wasn’t able to find any clear pictures of this, but it had coils and exposed vents, which I painted Enchanted Blue and highlighted with a mix of that paint and Vallejo Verdigris paint to create a gentle glow effect! For the final step I painted the edge of the base with Corax White… and called it done!
Check out the final piece below!
And there you go! I’m equal parts proud and terrified of this very angry boy! Thanks once again to SFG for providing the Fireclaw Expansion for me and contacting me to create what I hope is a fun painting guide for you all. And don’t forget to check out the Horizon Zero Dawn core games over at the Steamforged Games website!
Above: The core set! I’m a big fan of the included game boards which show the routes the creatures traverse, just like in the video games!
Games Workshop very kindly furnished me with a copy of the Leagues of Votann army set, a (sort of) brand new faction for Warhammer 40k to paint up, with a suggestion to do them in one of the schemes presented in the Codex itself. As you can see above, I managed to paint most of the set in time, I’ve just got 10 more of the Hearthkyn Warriors left to finish up.
You can see my work, and that of other painters from around the Warhammer Community, in the blog post here!
I wanted to give a little advice on how you can paint your Votann the way I did – it’s a little different to the way they do it in the official tutorials on Youtube as I was kind of working by eye from the Codex and obviously putting in my own touches here and there too.
So, let’s take a look at the various areas now!
The biggest and most prominent feature of the models is the striking orange armour. This is what gives the Trans-Hyperian Alliance such a unique look, even amongst the other factions of 40k where orange is rarely featured.
I began over my White Scar primer with the contrast paint Magmadroth Flame. This was then given a shade of Nuln Oil to deepen the darkness in the recesses, as Magmadroth Flame is a very solid, flat orange right out of the bottle unlike many other Contrast colours. You could instead use one coat of Gryph-Hound Orange if you want less steps, but you’ll get a less even orange to work from.
Next I used Fire Dragon Bright in thin layers, building up over the darker orange until it was nice and smooth, but leaving the darker colour in recesses and areas of heavy shadow.
To highlight, I mixed in a little Phalanx Yellow for edge highlighting, before using pure Phalanx Yellow for the very top dot highlights in key areas.
For the dirty greatcoat of the Kahl, I began by painting the whole thing with Black Legion contrast paint. This is a fantastic paint that covers excellently in one layer to give a smooth, consistent black. I then used Mechanicus Standard Grey and Dawnstone for highlighting the edges and raised folds.
To dirty the coat up, I took Steel Legion Drab and used a drybrushing technique over the lower third of the coat, being heaviest towards the very bottom. This builds up into a convincing grimy dirt texture and helps ground the model.
The battle damage was simply dots and scratches with Thondia Brown paint. If you wanted to make it more realistic, you can use the lighter orange/yellow mix to highlight the lower part of every brown scratch to create the illusion of depth, but I was rushing to get as much painted as I could for the article ^_^;;
For all of the golden details, I began with Retributor Armour paint, then applied Agrax Earthshade over the top of this. I then highlighted with Liberator Gold.
For the white stripes, I used Corax White. Thinning the paint so it goes on smooth, paint in the outline of the stripe first, then fill it in. Two or three thin layers will get you a lovely smooth white finish. Then, take Fire Dragon Bright and add dots and scratches to the edges and a few of the flat areas to create a realistic worn-off paint effect.
I painted the trousers and belts with Vallejo German Grey (Corvus Black from GW would likely be much the same), then shaded with Nuln Oil. This was highlighted with layers of thinned Mechanicus Standard Grey and Dawnstone just like the greatcoat.
For the black weapons (also the armour panels of the hoverbikes!) I began with Black Legion contrast paint all over. This was edge highlighted first with Stegadon Scale Green, then a lighter highlight with Thunderhawk Blue. Finally, a few spots were highlighted with Fenrisian Grey.
For the skin, I used Guilliman Flesh contrast paint all over to begin with. I then raised up with highlights of Cadian Fleshtone and Kislev Flesh. To help the skin look more alive, I thinned Volupus Pink contrast paint down a lot with water and applied it to the nose and cheeks to create a reddish tone to the skin.
The power axe was painted with Vallejo Game Colour Turquoise. I created highlights by mixing in a little Game Colour Verdigris a tiny bit at a time to create a gradiated stripe texture on the blade, and a nice edge highlight. These colours were also used on lenses and plasma weapon bits too.
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