Well this week has been hectic as life usually is with kids, work and surgeons all using up my valuable hobby time. But on the plus side I now only have a week to go until I find out when I will get the surgery I have waited on for almost 5 months now and I did manage to get the first of my dreadnoughts finished.
Pictured here is Brother Cadeus the first of the army’s dreadnoughts. He is an Ironclad Dreadnought and is set up just now with a chainfist and a hurricane bolter. I have also built and magnetised the close combat arm so that it can be armed with either the storm bolter or heavy flamer and the seismic hammer arm can have either the meltagun or heavy flamer. I have also magnetised the missiles and Ironclad assault launchers so they can be put on if needed.
This is the first of the models that I bought in Warhammer World to be built and painted and as I worked on the model I kept remembering different parts of the day we spent there. This was also the first model that I have tried out a new paint I bought recently. The paint in question is from the Army Painter and is a spray can of angel green. Now the reason I had this can of paint was due to buying some new brushes and while on the site came across this and thought well if it works its going to save me a bit of time. After shaking the can and spraying the model I have to say I am very impressed with it. The spray went on very smoothly and the coverage was excellent.
It also meant that I didn’t have to coat the miniature in caliban green as I have been doing for the troops and the match is very good indeed. So once the spray had dried I highlighted with warpstone glow for the chainfist I based it with mephiston red and used ushabti bone for the chest angel. The yellow details were done with sunburst yellow as I have not yet bought any of the new yellows. Exhausts, pipes and bolters were based with leadbelcher and that was him base coated and looking fine. All the metalwork was given a wash with nuln oil and the angel was washed with seraphim sepia.
At this point I covered the base in astrogranite texture paint which was then drybrushed with longbeard grey. I also applied the decals at this point and then tried out another of my purchases from Warhammer World which are the weathering powders from Forgeworld. Now this is the first time I have tried these out and it took a little bit of getting used too. They are just a very fine powder which you brush on to give a very effective rust, mud or soot look to the piece you are brushing. I used the fresh mud and dry mud powders on the feet of the dreadnought and then used the black soot powder on the exhausts. Now the thing with the powders compared to using washes or paint for these effects is that they don’t dry. And if you touch them with your fingers you can smudge them or even remove them so care needs to be taken. Once you have applied them you need to give the model a coat of varnish to seal it in and stop them from rubbing off. Not that this is a problem but it is worth bearing in mind as I don’t normally varnish my models. The effect from the powders though is gorgeous and it looks much more realistic than any other method I have tried and you can’t ruin it by putting too much on to start with as you need to build up the effect and bear in mind as well you need to knock the brush inside the tub to remove excess powder or else it just falls off and ends up all over your trousers ( yup I learnt the hard way), but they are well worth a try and I will certainly be using them a lot.
Well that it for this week but I have posted a photo of the army so far below so you can see just how its coming along. So until next time Happy Gaming.
- Dark Angels 40K Dreadnoughts Painting Showcase - August 22, 2012
Nice work. The army is coming together well.
I’ve been wanting to try out the powders for a while now. I may finally have to order them. How come you don’t normally seal your models? I’m too afraid of chipping and scratches and everything I do gets sealed.
Curious, why the Ironclad? I didn’t think Dark Angels had access to an Ironclad?
Powders are well worth trying they are very good indeed. The reason for the ironclad is simple……….impulse purchase in warhammer world so although technically its not in their list it will be used as a standard dread until new codex lets me have them :-) Never have sealed my models as they have always been fine but if they are going to be seeing a lot more action may consider doing it