How to paint Dark Vengeance Tutorial: Hellbrute of Chaos part 1

Step 1

Prime miniature black with aerosol can. I use Halfords Car Primer Black matt because I know that I will be ‘dusting’ the miniature with Vallejo Primer which offers the surface I need for smooth progressive blending. Vallejo surface primers (both aerosol and Air) are good and I have found army painter’s line of aerosol primers to be excellent. 

Step 2

‘Dust’ miniature white. Dusting is a technique where white primer is sprayed at the top most part of the miniature at a 45 degree angle. This creates the false impression of light hitting a surface and helps me decide where to put highlights and shadows. We can also start directing focus by highlighting certain areas like the head a little more.

Dusting also helps give you a head start on troublesome colours like yellow and red when working from a black base coat.

I use Vallejo White Primer run through an airbrush to give me greater control of where I want the areas of interest to lie. 

Step3:

Airbrush Citadel’s Incubi Darkness into darker parts of amrour. This stage is a pre-shade for the red. Incubi darkness is primarily blue with a hint of green with will help add interest to the shadow. This stage will also help us blend the red from light to darkness.

Step 4:

Airbrush Reaper Master Series (RMS) diluted with gunk and Vallejo Airbrush solution (40;20;40).

The paint should be thin enough to allow the Incubi Darkness from the previous stage to be seen through the coat of red. Give the armour 2-3 thin coats of red to ensure a consistent finish.

Step 5:

Mix RMS Phoenix Red into whatever is left from stage 4 (remember to keep the  same consistency of  gunk and airbrush solution to paint) and highlight armour plates from a 45 degree angle.

Although this stage may not seem to be doing much, it will pay off in the end.

Step 6:

Extreme highlight RMS Fire Orange onto highest parts of model.  Airbrushing the amrour is now complete. 

Step 7:

Cover armour plates with low tac masking tape and blu-tac (for those hard to reach places).

Airbrush shadowed areas with RMS Bronzed Highlight. Don’t be afraid of overlapping with the highlighted areas of the flesh.

Step 8:

Airbrush highlighted areas of flesh with RMS Fair Shadow.  Make sure all areas of flesh have been painted (don’t worry too much about overlap between step 7 & 8). 

Part two covering metals, oil skin and glowy effects coming soon!