Dos' Imperial Fists Tutorial - Part 2

[Dosjetka]

Hello!

I promised to create a tutorial on how I painted my Imperial Fist from a few months back. Hopefully this'll give you all the information you need for beating the dreaded beast that is yellow on black undercoat!

Note: This is a living document that I'll expand upon and increase the quality as time goes by. The basic tutorial will be finished tomorrow evening (Friday 29th January '16) but I'll be adding to it as time goes by so make sure you follow or check back every so often to get the latest updates.

STEP 0.0

Get yourself a model that you'd like to paint (ideally a Space Marine with his boltgun unattached). Here's one I made earlier:

STEP 0.5

Find a clean, comfortable and well-lit area where you can paint in peace. Here's a bad example. Don't do paint in such messy conditions, folks.

As I said, baaaaaad. And yes, I use my table as a palette. Again, not the smartest of ideas.

STEP 0.75

Undercoat your model black.

I personally use Citadel Chaos Black spray paint. Make sure you get an even coverage over the whole model.

STEP 1.0

Take your pot of Citadel Base Averland Sunset. Give it a good shake. Now, take a bit of paint onto your brush, quickly dip it into the water of your water pot just to dilute the paint a bit and then slap it onto the model. Repeat until the armour is covered. You should end up with something like this:

Yes, it looks terrible. The key here is to go with multiple thin layers of paint so as to not obscure any detail and to have a smooth finish.

Now, add another layer of Averland Sunset all over.

Already looking better, yes? Now, another layer. Keep the paint thin but not too thin. We don't want it runny.

+ Top tip: Just before you add another layer, close your paint bottle and give it a good shake. +

See? It's looking pretty good already. There are still some dark patches though, so we need another layer.

That looks about right. The black still shows through in some areas, but I can assure you that those areas will be covered up later on. Please ignore the fact that I almost forgot to take a picture of this stage and had already started putting a wash on the model's right leg...

STEP 2.0

Now, take you pot of Citadel Shade Seraphim Sepia. Shake it well. Dip your brush into it, then into the water pot (quickly) and then paint into the recesses.

Be as clean or as messy as you wish. You'll have to clean up the later steps anyway, so it's up to you. I went for rather messy. Just make sure it doesn't pool anywhere it's not supposed to. If it does, rince your brush, dry it and quickly remove some of the wash.

STEP 3.0

For this step, you need a pot of Citadel Base Abaddon Black (HERESY! ). Again, shake the pot, add some to your brush and dip it rapidly into some water. Then go over any parts that are not going to be yellow on the end product. So any pouches, cables, armour joints, shoulder pad trims, eye lenses, etc. need to be painted black. You don't need a solid black colour but you need to cover most of the yellow that has spilled over.

As always, multiple thin layers are better than one thick one.

+ END OF PART ONE +

[Dosjetka]

+ BEGINNING OF PART 2 +

STEP 4.0

After the last two step, we really need to clean up the overspills on the yellow armour. Again, thinned down Averland Sunset is the way to go.

STEP 5.0

Now that the clean up is done, we want to get a really nice almost golden yellow on the armour. For that, we need two paints: some Citadel Layer Yriel Yellow and some Citadel Glaze Lamenters Yellow.

First, take the Yriel Yellow, shake it well and put some onto your brush. Make sure you dilute well (I'd say a 1:1 paint-to-water ratio) and then paint it over the armour while keeping out of the recesses.

Make sure you cover the armour as uniformly as possible so that there are no patches of darker yellow.

Next, take your Lamenters Yellow and shake it. Load onto brush and then paint onto model. No need to dilute this, just brush it all over the armour, even in the recesses.

It doesn't look much different in the pictures, but I can assure you that you'll notice the change.

STEP 6.0

This step is edge highlighting. Take some Yriel Yellow, dilute it a bit (less than half as much as when you painted it all over) and then go over all of the armour edges. Not just the ones that light would shine on. All of them.

As you can see, it looks pretty good. Try and keep the highlights thin and you'll be as good as gold.

To be honest, you could stop here and start painting the rest of the model (pouches, etc). If I were painting an army, I'd definitely stop here. If you're painting a single model, there's an extra step.

STEP 7.0

Grab a pot of Citadel Edge Dorn Yellow (quite an apt name, if I may say so). Shake it. Load the tip of your brush and dilute in water (70:30 paint-to-water ratio). Then go over the extreme edges where the light would hit the model. This really makes the model "pop" and stand out.

(No, the light wouldn't bounce off the edges of the cod piece that much. I just felt like highlighting it.)

STEP 8.0

I won't go into an in-depth explanation on how to paint the rims, pouches, soft armour, etc. because I'll run out of painting time (though you can always ask how I did it afterwards and I'd be glad to share my recipes with you). However, this is when I'd stop with the armour and move onto the rest.

+] picture incoming [+

+ END OF PART 2 +

[Dosjetka]

+ RESERVED FOR PART 3 +

[CptCortez]

Lovely looking IF so far, but... FOUR coats of yellow over a black undercoat? Urghh! I'd go crazy having to do that. As you know, yellow is a b*itch to layer on. That's a lot of work to do if you want to paint an entire army.

 

I went with an undercoat of Army Painter's Demonic Yellow, one (or two) coats of Vallejo's Flat Yellow and a thinned down wash of GW's Casandora Yellow, edged highlighted or dry-brushed with GW Hexos Palesun. Job done!

 

 

But your's does have a nice toned down quality to it.

[Dosjetka]

That's why I'm hoping GW will release Averland Sunset in spray form or that I'll be able to afford a cheap airbrush soon. :D Also, I'm painting a single figure so that helps too.

 

Anyway, that's part 2 up. Part 3 will cover weathering of the armour. I'll work on that part tonight. :)

[Prot]

It's amazing how well it cleans up at the end. Very sharp and crisp. An army like that would look amazing on the table. :)

[Dosjetka]

Thanks Prot. :) There's quite a bit of effort involved but I do believe it's worth it in the end!

[WarriorFish]

A lovely Marine, a simple but effective method for it too. Fists painted well always look great :tu:

[Dosjetka]

I read your comment last night and thought "Simple?" before realising that you are quite right. It doesn't require any fancy tricks or skills. Just sheer determination to get those layers of yellow on as thinly as possible and not giving up because it looks terrible in the first two-three steps. The rest is just simple painting techniques. :)

[BattleBrotherJohn]

" Just sheet determination to get those layers of yellow on...and not giving up "

 

That's the Dornian way !

 

Seriously this is a good tutorial series and I'm looking forward to seeing the other parts.

[Dosjetka]

How right you are, brother. How right you are. :)

[Thousand Eyes]

Very nice stuff and something I will save for if I ever get around to my Howling Griffions plan.

[Bung]

Lovely looking IF so far, but... FOUR coats of yellow over a black undercoat? Urghh! I'd go crazy having to do that. As you know, yellow is a b*itch to layer on. That's a lot of work to do if you want to paint an entire army.

 

 

Well you could reduce the layers if you would do a brown layer first or even basecoat in brown.

[AndrewChristlieb]

I have to do two layers of yellow with a white base coat to get even coverage (and smooth, that's the trick) 4 with black isn't bad at all and if you're more comfortable with that primer then it's not a bad deal. Just more time consuming. I don't use gw primer though so different strokes and all that.

[Bung]

I now use grey primer for everything, but that has to do with lightning and weathering technics i start to use.

[Brother Argent]

Thanks Dos.  When I eventually get around to painting the yellow DIY I intend on making will be handy.

[MithrilForge]

I love it ...except for the black undercoat, no matter what, i'll follow every other step you have(prob less on the Averland one due to white undercoat) but not the black...i don't have that much time in my life for unnecessary steps (no offence to you honestly).

great stuff otherwise

Cheers, Mithril

[Dantay VI]

A very good tutorial.

 

The black undercoat will keep the yellow more muted, whereas with the white undercoat you will get a much brighter yellow.

 

Or that has been my experience in the past.

 

Brown would be a good alternative. I have seen me recently prime my Wolves with dryad bark instead of black.

[Dosjetka]

Exactly, the black undercoat mutes the yellow quite nicely. I'll have to have a look at trying out a brown undercoat. Or perhaps a grey one.

[mathaius]

I already found my own way to paint my Fists (as said before, Daemonic Yellow spray, casandora yellow+sepia wash and some highlights), but it's a very nice tutorial and will try it on some Scouts! :)

[DavianCool]

Nice tutorial. The yellow looks really clean, and it can be a really hard colour to paint...

[The laughing raven]

I've been using a black full undercoat, with a couple of light sprays of white to give shade then building up layers of Zamesi dust in the same manner,makes a more matt look, just wish I was clever enough to get a pic posted up:)

[Canadian_F_H]

Nice job... but mostly, wow the B@C marines look good with a better helmet...

[Dosjetka]

Thanks! Though I think the only part of the B@C Marines that I used was the legs. ;)

[Canadian_F_H]

Thanks! Though I think the only part of the B@C Marines that I used was the legs. ;)

Well, the gun is definitely b@c. And the pauldrons definitely aren't from any 40k kit I'm aware of... the edges are to thin.