[PLOG] Apocalypse Drow!
Posted: Wed Jul 09, 2014 1:54 pm
Welcome to my PLOG! This will be a video archive of my collection and paint projects from about 20 years of collecting and painting Dark Elves, with varying degrees of success and skill. It is obvious to me how much I've improved in my painting, I hope it will be to you as well.
As I said, I've had some of these models for a long time, and my initial forays into painting them were both uninspired (I really just wanted to play the game, and saw painting as a necessary evil) and unskilled (I had no clue what the hell I was doing!) Over time though, both my attitudes and abilities towards painting have improved, and I hope that shows up in the photos.
Some notes on my color scheme. Any good army has a color scheme, especially with a race so regimented as Dark Elves. There should be unifying colors and thematic elements that draw them together. Mine is no exception, but over time as my painting has changed, the uniformity of the color scheme has become ... shall we say frayed. I will work on correcting that over time.
That said, the primary color of this army is a dark red. It's not always the SAME dark red, though, see the "frayed" remark above. My current paint in use for my dark red is Privateer Press's P3 "Sanguine Base". That color did not exist when I started painting my Dark Elves, and to be honest I don't think I knew about any paint except Citadel when I started, so even if it did exist, I wouldn't have known about it. In the past, I used a lot of GW's Scab Red, and there was also some use of Crimson Gore. For a while I think I even experimented with GW's "Warlock Purple" on a few crossbowmen, it was a reddish purple. I don't think any of those paints exist any more either.
The secondary color you'll see in there a lot is a darkish purple. It was originally GW's "Liche Purple". Nowadays it's GW's "Naggaroth Night" with a "Daemonette Hide" highlight. I am having trouble getting that to show up especially on pictures, so I am still experimenting with that. I may end up trying the Hide as the Base color, with a still lighter highlight and the Naggaroth as a shadow. I do really love the richness of the color of the Naggaroth though, so I might just stick with it.
You'll see a lot of Boltgun Metal (which I use interchangeably with P3s "Pig Iron"). You'll also see all my chain mail done in GWs "Amethyst Purple". Back when I started GW made a line of colored metallics, and I liked Amethyst Purple. To me it looked very Dark Elven, and it also reminded me of Adamantium, and I thought maybe it would help with my armor saves. (Not so much, by the way!). When they discontinued that color, I bought the last 4 bottles at my old game store (may it rest in peace) . I'm betting it wouldn't be hard to remake a pretty reasonable facsimile of it though if I had to, with a normal metal and purple ink, for those who actually are interested in replicating the look.
My original Flesh tone was, appropriately enough, GW's "Elf Flesh", but now I use P3 for that as well, a trio of "Midlund Flesh", "Ryn Flesh", and "Khardic Flesh". You see, when I started, I thought shadows and highlights were a silly waste of time. Why paint a section of a mini 3 times when one will do? Just slap some paint on it and get it out. And mixing colors? MIXING? That would take some kind of palette or something right? If GW didn't make a color, I didn't need it!
Over time, I've come to the realization that I spend many more hours preparing my armies than actually playing the game, so I may as well try to enjoy that aspect too. And now I really do. I can use it to relax, I go down to my "man cave" basement, put on some music, and spend some quality time with my brushes. When I started, I painted minis so I could play the game. Now, I paint because I want to, and the game is a nice side bonus that allows me to use the minis and display my work. Funny how perspectives change.
I also want to mention that I go to Gen Con Indy every year, and one year, I actually took the year off from gaming entirely and signed up for mini painting classes the whole 4 days. I wouldn't want to do that every year, but if any of the rest of you go to similar shows, I highly recommend doing that at least once. It made a huge difference in my minis, and taught me some lessons in using the proper tools that I never would have gotten on my own. I've already told some people on here about wet palettes, I learned about those from there. For those who don't know, they are awesome tools for minis painting, and for $10 and a roll of parchment paper from WalMart, you can really make the process of mixing paints and keeping them from drying out MUCH easier.
Edit: Since writing this, I've also been asked to write up a tutorial on the use of the Wet Palette, which I have done. You can see it here:
http://druchii.net/viewtopic.php?f=9&t=75680
At any rate, I will post on here some of my oldest pieces, and over time you'll see that I am in the process of re-painting a lot of them. So hopefully we can see some "before and after" type pictures over time, as minis get the "Simple Green" paint removal treatment to be redone with an eye for improvement, and also just to help rebuild the color uniformity.
Enough chatting, what's a plog without pics of minis?!
Here's my work in progress Malus Darkblade for the "Avatars of War" contest ongoing right here on Druchii.net. More will come soon, I promise!
As I said, I've had some of these models for a long time, and my initial forays into painting them were both uninspired (I really just wanted to play the game, and saw painting as a necessary evil) and unskilled (I had no clue what the hell I was doing!) Over time though, both my attitudes and abilities towards painting have improved, and I hope that shows up in the photos.
Some notes on my color scheme. Any good army has a color scheme, especially with a race so regimented as Dark Elves. There should be unifying colors and thematic elements that draw them together. Mine is no exception, but over time as my painting has changed, the uniformity of the color scheme has become ... shall we say frayed. I will work on correcting that over time.
That said, the primary color of this army is a dark red. It's not always the SAME dark red, though, see the "frayed" remark above. My current paint in use for my dark red is Privateer Press's P3 "Sanguine Base". That color did not exist when I started painting my Dark Elves, and to be honest I don't think I knew about any paint except Citadel when I started, so even if it did exist, I wouldn't have known about it. In the past, I used a lot of GW's Scab Red, and there was also some use of Crimson Gore. For a while I think I even experimented with GW's "Warlock Purple" on a few crossbowmen, it was a reddish purple. I don't think any of those paints exist any more either.
The secondary color you'll see in there a lot is a darkish purple. It was originally GW's "Liche Purple". Nowadays it's GW's "Naggaroth Night" with a "Daemonette Hide" highlight. I am having trouble getting that to show up especially on pictures, so I am still experimenting with that. I may end up trying the Hide as the Base color, with a still lighter highlight and the Naggaroth as a shadow. I do really love the richness of the color of the Naggaroth though, so I might just stick with it.
You'll see a lot of Boltgun Metal (which I use interchangeably with P3s "Pig Iron"). You'll also see all my chain mail done in GWs "Amethyst Purple". Back when I started GW made a line of colored metallics, and I liked Amethyst Purple. To me it looked very Dark Elven, and it also reminded me of Adamantium, and I thought maybe it would help with my armor saves. (Not so much, by the way!). When they discontinued that color, I bought the last 4 bottles at my old game store (may it rest in peace) . I'm betting it wouldn't be hard to remake a pretty reasonable facsimile of it though if I had to, with a normal metal and purple ink, for those who actually are interested in replicating the look.
My original Flesh tone was, appropriately enough, GW's "Elf Flesh", but now I use P3 for that as well, a trio of "Midlund Flesh", "Ryn Flesh", and "Khardic Flesh". You see, when I started, I thought shadows and highlights were a silly waste of time. Why paint a section of a mini 3 times when one will do? Just slap some paint on it and get it out. And mixing colors? MIXING? That would take some kind of palette or something right? If GW didn't make a color, I didn't need it!
Over time, I've come to the realization that I spend many more hours preparing my armies than actually playing the game, so I may as well try to enjoy that aspect too. And now I really do. I can use it to relax, I go down to my "man cave" basement, put on some music, and spend some quality time with my brushes. When I started, I painted minis so I could play the game. Now, I paint because I want to, and the game is a nice side bonus that allows me to use the minis and display my work. Funny how perspectives change.
I also want to mention that I go to Gen Con Indy every year, and one year, I actually took the year off from gaming entirely and signed up for mini painting classes the whole 4 days. I wouldn't want to do that every year, but if any of the rest of you go to similar shows, I highly recommend doing that at least once. It made a huge difference in my minis, and taught me some lessons in using the proper tools that I never would have gotten on my own. I've already told some people on here about wet palettes, I learned about those from there. For those who don't know, they are awesome tools for minis painting, and for $10 and a roll of parchment paper from WalMart, you can really make the process of mixing paints and keeping them from drying out MUCH easier.
Edit: Since writing this, I've also been asked to write up a tutorial on the use of the Wet Palette, which I have done. You can see it here:
http://druchii.net/viewtopic.php?f=9&t=75680
At any rate, I will post on here some of my oldest pieces, and over time you'll see that I am in the process of re-painting a lot of them. So hopefully we can see some "before and after" type pictures over time, as minis get the "Simple Green" paint removal treatment to be redone with an eye for improvement, and also just to help rebuild the color uniformity.
Enough chatting, what's a plog without pics of minis?!
Here's my work in progress Malus Darkblade for the "Avatars of War" contest ongoing right here on Druchii.net. More will come soon, I promise!