Sunday 6 September 2009

Marauder Horsemen of Slaanesh - WIP

The progress on my army has been slightly halted by the start of a new semester at the university, but I've gotten a bit done; two of my Marauder Horsemen of Slaanesh are done - with the exception of arms.
To keep them in line with the white and black colour scheme I've choosen for my army, I painted the horses white, and I've finally found a recipe which gives results I'm happy with.
All my models are undercoated with black, and after that I give the areas to-be-white two thin coats of watered Astronomican Grey, to get a lighter background to work with, but not ruin any details. Then I "sort of" drybrush with watered down Skull White; I have more paint on the brush than I'd normally have when drybrushing, and I keep the brush strokes going in one direction, horizontally. I try to only pick out the raised areas, like the different muscles, and keeps the Astronomican Grey base-colour alone in the recesses, or other areas I want to keep dark / in shadow.
The first brush strokes of Skull White will not be very white, however, so I repeat the dry-brushing technique until I'm satisfied, then I water down Skull White to a glaze, and simply brush it over all the grey-white areas of the model. That way, I get the borders between grey and white smudged out a bit. After that, I highlight every raised area with Skull White.
It's a lenghty process, but at least I get a result I'm happy with.
The metal armour is painted black with white highlights (I found that mixing Skull white and Astronomican Grey, gives a very light, almost white grey, which covers black much better than Skull White alone - probably due to the abilities of the foundation paint), while leather have been painted Scorched Brown with Vermin Brown highlights, then washed with Badab Black.
One thing I feel is missing, however, is something to tie them to their mark; there won't be no banner for the unit, and no shields neither to paint the rune of Slaanesh upon, so I'm kind of at a loss...
Any suggestions as to how I could withdraw any doubt as to which of the four gods, my Horsemen ride to war for, would be most welcome, along with any other suggestions and/or critisism.

6 comments:

  1. Well, first things first, these guys are looking awesome and I can't wait to see a unit of them finished. I love how you've done the white on the horses. Sounds like a bit of wok but judging from the results it's definitely worth it! Sounds like overbrushing is what you're doing from the description. Drybrushing but with more paint so you're not applying a dusty effect but painting the raised areas.
    As for making them Slaaneshi I'm unsure. It is difficult with the Horsemen as you say there's not much room for marks on shields etc. My horsemen had some small areas of purple but that would detract from your colour scheme. I would carry on as you are for now. The white horses to me seem Slaaneshi, they're far too pretty to be Khorne, Nurgle or Tzeentch. I'll give it some thought see if I have any ideas!
    But as I said, these look brilliant. I really love them so far and can't wait to see them finished!

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  2. Those are some awesome looking Marauders - really love the detailing on the armour You just dont see those units looking that good

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  3. RE: putting Marks on them why not paint them onto the horses? There are documented cases of various Native American tribes doing just that sort of thing

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  4. I quite like that idea. Of course the cruel northmen would most likely use some kind of firebrand to mark a horse. I can't see them being quite sentimental enough to go easy on the beast... :s

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  5. Thanks for the comments John! Glad you like them.

    I'll try what you said on the next horse I paint; I think the neck got the largest and best spot to try some freehand. A firebrand could also work, but how to paint it? Some dark skintone, like Tallarn Flesh maybe? I'll try that aswell as black paint, and we'll just have to wait and see what works best.
    Thanks to both of you for the input *smiles*

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  6. Kind of a muddy brown seared pattern for the middle of the brand, grey/white with Mud Wash or similiar and dulled black around the edges

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