Averland nobility (my “counts as” Teutogen guard) and a foot knight (my “counts as” wolf priest)
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Jeez Louise!! Do you offer painting and/or photograph tutorials… would you consider posting one or both to the forum??? I want to paint some of my human factions like this! And I can’t take a decent photo if my life depended on it!!
~N
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@Nicodemus - I’m a lazy speed painter who has perfected the art of making my work look better than the effort that has been put in! Haha
I’d call this method slapchop plus
I actually have a day off today (for once!!!) and was gonna paint a couple of characters
Maybe I will take pics of the steps and do a little tutorial. I have something of a small series of speed painting tutorials on the forum.
And in terms of making photos of minis look good
- phone cameras ain’t great at the very small so photo a bit further away than you’d like to and then crop. You lose resolution but retain focus.
- avoid daylight. Use electric light.
- Find an iPhone filter or similar to make it a bit moody but only do it 50% or else it throws out the colours you’ve used
- use a vignette - even moodier
- profit
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Little tutorial @Nicodemus
The models start with “slapchop” then moves into what I think of as “slapchop plus”
I’m not the worlds best painter but I think I strike a good balance between how good the finished product looks and how quickly I can get models to table.
I’ll demonstrate the slapchop technique . The slapchop plus that I’m advocating and as well as this there are some optional extras I’ll go into.
Part 1 - Slapchop
We begin with the model undercoated grey and then we dry brush white. I actually almost over brush the metal parts as helps in the next step.
Next we paint the metallics using speeding metals. It’s basically cheating. Very easy to use.
Then we move onto the contrast paints. Try to keep a limited palette to keep life simple. Here is what I used:
And here is each coat going on
I start with weakest pigment paint and work up to strongest pigment. So here, started with flesh and ended on black.
This is now a “slapchopped” model and can absolutely be used on any battlefield. Passes the “3ft” test.
However, my next section is where I begin to upgrade it a bit.
Part 2: Slapchop Plus
I now use highlights to help areas pop. My big cheat is that I use only three colours here. The green and grey highlight the green and black respectively. But the off white highlights the skin, the browns and the yellows. Makes for a much speedier paint job.
Here are the highlights going on:
Next up I use washes in some of the recesses and over the metals for extra shading. Here are the two ubiquitous washes themselves nuln oil and aggrax. The nuln oil is used on black sections and the aggrax elsewhere. The metals get a full coating.
Slapchop plus is now complete. You’ve got something a big higher standard than tabletop ready and it did not take a tonne more effort.
However, I like details. So here’s how I do some of these.
Part 3 - Details
Eyes
My eye technique has not changed since I showed how it was done in my goblin streaking grime tutorial. White strip. Black dot. Purple wash underneath.
This step is SO optional. Basically nobody else will ever notice it. But I like it. I feel it makes the mini “come alive”
Stubble
Want to add some variety between some repeated heads? I have a 5 o’clock shadow using Celestra grey watered down and dabbed on around the chin and cheeks.
You can achieve something like a short cropped beard by using a darker grey.
Gems
These can absolutely just be painted red or something. Contrast blood angels red would be great. However, if you like the old school 90s gem look, it can be done like this.
Paint it red.
Paint a circular black shadow in the top corner. This will be larger than you think. Then a highlight of orange on the bottom. Then a white dot reflection.
Part 4 - Bases
I demonstrated earlier in this thread how I do the bases when @tjub asked me.
However here is the process played out in real life.
The Final Product
Thanks for reading. Happy to answer any questions!
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Some new state troopers join the warband
Is it a bird? Is it insane? Yes - it’s Otto Von Icarus. He is, game wise, an empire hero on Pegasus. But lore wise he’s a mad inventor with wooden wings!
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Oh wow! This is great!! I never would have thought it was as straight forward as this! 
Thanks for posting this. I have some Empire models that may need to be done up as an homage!!
~N
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Would love to see that 
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