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The Dangers of Black


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Hey all,

 

The last few days i have been preparing the bits and pieces for my first HH army. In a few days i hope to get properly started painting on them too! I'm planning on going 30k blackshields, called the Foresworn, a sub group of the Dark Brotherhood. As such i was also thinking to make them black following this guide:

 

https://youtu.be/ONOee_0Uldk

 

I have only one big worry. Over the last few years i have seen some excellently black painted armies. But also some where it just looked like it was chaos black spray and not much else. While the above video works great on a single miniature, what are good ways, colours etc to break up or remove an unfinished look in an army shot?

 

 

 

 

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I'd go the route of using other equally dark colors to break up the wall of Black: Dark Blue/Green/Red/Brown/Purple/Silver(with or without equally dark colored washes).

 

Since you're doing blackshields, how about having these colors denote squad types? This could be as simple as painting their helmets in the color or their squad marking, etc.

 

To me that could give you a pretty "dark" looking army that still has enough color in it to give visual interest.

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I haven't got much experience painting black, but I'd say, don't be afraid of making the edge highlights rather bright (i mean, not neon, but rather bright): I tried edge highlighting some Raven Guard with an old citadel dark blue base and the old enchanted blue, and you can barely make it out.

 

Have you also considered coating the model in a very very dark grey and giving it a nuln oil wash, add a bit of shadows?

 

Don't be afraid of painting a load of personnal symbols all over the place, not just on the shoulder pads, but also on the leg guards, the arms, the weapons and the helmet (use Slipstreams' suggestion of dark colours in that case)

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I agree with slipstream. currently I work on dark grey WBs and I suggest you use washes in several colors to create a variance of hues among your marines.

 

what i am saying is: paint dark grey, not black. then you can still shade normally and/or create some colors. e.g.: on top of grey dry brush on black primer I apply washes (in my case both brown and blue) and then darken in watered-down black layers until happy, then re-highlight. If you want darker grey/black you can just invert this process and start with a darker base, this might actually be efficient then.

 

i am far away from being a very experienced painter, but probably these example images help: (wip) here http://www.bolterandchainsword.com/topic/323178-into-the-arcane-red-ts-grey-wb-updated-47/?p=4431784

 

hope that helps finding a color recipe.

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First step is to make sure you paint Abaddon Black over the Chaos black Primer, they're actually different colours. Secondly, cheat. Use the new "shiny" Nuln Oil, black *always* looks better (imho) with a little shine.

 

Cheers,

Jono

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When it comes to breaking up the black to make it pop (both up close and from tabletop perspective) remember that there are other things to paint on a Marine than his armor.  Bits and bobs, seals, tabards, holsters, lenses, and of course the bases, which can always be used to give bright armies a neutral background or, in this case, a neutral army a 'bright' background.  No different from how you would use a white backdrop to photograph black minis and vice versa.  There's also weathering, but black may well be the most troublesome color to work with in that department.

 

I've done mostly hand brush painting on my Templars, but I've messed around with my airbrush on a couple of characters now.  Truth be told, airbrush does give you a more interesting model in the end, but my main issue is painting around the 'zenithed' black so carefully after the fact, because fixing any mistakes is a lot harder.  Multiply that slower, methodical issue across a whole army, and my brain would explode, but some people have that sort of dedication.  

 

As an aside, for the base black after priming, I recommend VMC Black.  It has a more charcoal black hue, which is perfect for the 'as close to black as grey can get' base you wanna get.

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Love the tips, it is really encouraging.

 

Them being blackshields, i will most definitely do some form of weathering. Basic chipping is quite a bit more challenging as there isnt much that can serve as the darker chip on black armour, so still doing research on alternative ways.

 

Will also try out the shiny wash. Im not sure if i like the gloss, but worth a try.

 

And as slips said, i will try to find a good way for alternative colours. I like a stripe on the helmet ala consecrators, or maybe a kneepad, bolter casings etc.

 

But keep it coming, feel free to post an army shot too!

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I remember seeing video demos of it on youtube.

 

Its basically a wash that doesnt tint the paint youre slapping it onto unlike the current washes. Also keeps metallics shiny.

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If you have an airbrush then something like this is easy to achieve. What I did with my Dark Angels Chaplain was just to paint the whole model in black and then, using a zenithal highlighting technique, shot all the sections of armor where light would shine with Eshin grey. I wanted my Chaplain to be more grey than black so I stopped there, but if you wanted to highlight further you could go with something like dawnstone or other grey lighter than Eshin grey to really bring out light shining on that section. Achieving something like the image below would be very easy using an airbrush with these techniques.

med_gallery_79873_10492_40764.jpg

http://i.imgur.com/zHL6yaFl.jpg

http://i.imgur.com/Zl4qIOgl.jpg

In this image you can easily see the high lights on the arm, power pack nozzle, and lower portion of the leg.

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I suppose it depends if you want actual black, or a colour that looks black.

For actual black, if you're going the gloss route, I would avoid Nuln gloss and all that - too expensive and faffy really. Instead, prime black with a good automotive rattlecan primer spray, and when dry, re-spray with a coat or two of a good automotive rattlecan gloss black spray. So much faster and cheaper when painting an army, I think it's folly to consider doing it any other way (except maybe using an airbrush if you have one).

Another option is to edge-highlight all the panels and armour plates in a dark grey over the black primer. If you prime, edge highlight, and then wash all over, you get an even colour without having to re-paint the black primer first. It's a fair amount of work though, and doesn't necessarily look all that convincing - see the GW 3E Black Templars from the main rulebook. I mean, it's tabletop standard, and that's about it; neat, looks fine, but won't "wow" people.

Similar to above, you can also zenithally highlight black with soft spots of white. You can do this by hand (it takes forever on a squad though), or apply it with an airbrush (takes some practice, but much easier). The tricky bit here is to get the lights placed in the right areas, and if this isn't quite right it looks odd. Afterwards, you need to add a few final sharp highlights on the corners of plates and panels with pure white. Overdoing this leads to the models looking grey and washed-out though, not glossy black. It's also very hard to add squad markings and such, because the "bloom" of the highlights is very difficult to match after it's applied.

The final option with pure black is to carefully chip all most/all the edges with a light or metallic paint. For models with a lot of black, it can look fantastic. For models which are almost all black, it can look rather messy. A good example of the chipped black effect can be seen here on the models' chest armour, shoulder pads, and helmets (and note what I mean about using the effect sparingly!).

Now, you can also paint non-black colours that look black too. My general comment with these is to keep the non-black colour subtle as it can look very garish (and non-black) otherwise. I have found that a surprising number of colours can be added here, and all produce a subtly different result:

Add a bit of blue to the black, highlight by adding a little white or ivory to this base colour. If you use a dark blue, you can even go as far as 50/50 with the blue/black mix. After you've highlighted, mix 50/50 black and blue ink (add a little matte medium and some flow improver too), and carefully glaze the model all over. This is an old Mike McVey trick, and produces a deep rich black colours that are ideal for lacquered armour and silks.

Add a bit of turquoise to the black, highlight by adding a little white or ivory to this base colour. Add this only sparingly to the black, as overdoing this can leave it looking a bit "Dark Eldar" otherwise (although this may be excellent for Chaos Marines!). After you've highlighted, mix 50/50 black and blue ink (add a little matte medium and some flow improver too), and carefully glaze the model all over. This is an newer Mike McVey style, widely used on the Warmachine and Hordes models, and is very good for lacquered armour and silks like the blue-black above. It also looks pretty good against the blue-black, should you want to have different parts painted in different styles of black.

Add a bit of cool or warm dark grey to the black, highlight by adding a little white or ivory to this base colour. Add this only sparingly to the black, as overdoing this can leave it looking very faded and grey. After you've highlighted, mix a little black ink with some matte medium and some flow improver too, and carefully glaze the model all over. This is very good for cloth, and for more aged/faded applications. It's also good for areas that are armoured, but may be made of materials like sci-fi Kevlar, or carbon fibre composites, and such (e.g.: good for IG flak vests etc.).

Add a bit of yellow, beige-tan, yellow ochre, or olive green to black. Add this only sparingly to the black, as overdoing this can leave it looking dark green (indeed, mixing yellow and black paint in specific proportions has -and still is- the default Military Green used by several real-world armies!). After you've highlighted, mix 50/50 black and blue ink (add a little matte medium and some flow improver too), and carefully glaze the model all over. You can also swap the blue ink for a mid-brown ink if you prefer, or just use the black ink without mixing. This looks great against blue-black, and the grey-black, but clashes with the turquoise-black a bit. It works well for anything like weapons, flak/composite armour, vehicles, pouches, leather, and can look good for cloth.

Add a bit of dark purple (like Liche Purple) to the black, highlight by adding a little cool grey, white, or ivory to this base colour. Add this only sparingly to the black, as overdoing this can leave it looking a bit faded and "Xenos" otherwise (although this may be excellent for Chaos Marines!). After you've highlighted, mix 50/50 black and blue ink (add a little matte medium and some flow improver too), and carefully glaze the model all over. You can also swap either the black or blue ink for a purple ink if you prefer, or just use either the blue or black ink without mixing (using purple ink on it's own however makes the purple richer, but doesn't really shade it - so I would always recommend mixing it rather than using it on its own). This looks great against most of the non-black colours listed so far, and gives a surprisingly rich but subtle colour. This works best for cloth and any felt/velvet finishes you may need, but can also look good on enamelled/lacquered armour too.

Add a bit of silver to the black, highlight by adding a little silver to this base colour. After you've highlighted, mix a little black ink with some matte medium and some flow improver too, and carefully glaze the model all over. You can mix the black ink with a little blue, purple, or brown ink if you want to tint the shadows a little. The ink will dry matte (thanks to the medium), and will contrast nicely with the shinier highlights to produce a surprisingly dynamic-looking metallic black. This colour is really only worthwhile on armour, as on smaller areas is just looks like you've over-shaded silver. However, it produces a really nice "mechanical" black, and would suit all sorts of Marines and Mechanicus models.

There are some colours that really don't work all that well when mixed into black IMO. These include reds/oranges (makes a brown colour), greens (makes a dark green colour), and any light colours with white in them like pink/flesh/greys (produces various grey colours). They are still useful, and with a dark/black wash may be cool for Chaos or Xenos models, but they do not produce a colour that you'd look at and think "yep, that's black".

Finally, and I've touched a little bit on this in my comments above, you have a choice in how to highlight black. Soft gentle highlights that don't get too light are best for suggesting cloth, whereas smaller highlights that finish very brightly are best for hard/shiny areas like armour. The most important thing when highlighting in either style is that you endeavour to have the shade of one area finish against the highlight of the adjacent area, and vice-versa; doing this produces the most contrast on the model, and therefore produces the most attractive result.

Moving away from black and its various forms, it is worth noting that any bigger areas of colour on its own aid your eyes in picking out subtleties or irregularities (whatever they may be); however, when placed against a very contrasting colour, the contrast fools your eye into overlooking these subtleties. Therefore, using well-placed bright contrast colours like bright metallics, whites, off-whites, reds, purples, and such all help to make the main colour stand out more. Similarly, using "glowing" spot-colours (like turquoise, magenta, amber, light green, and orange) is another way of adding in contrast without altering the main colour of the models.

In many official paint schemes you see, these techniques are normally combined with an off-black colour to produce a more visually interesting model. The best thing about these tricks, is that they can be used over a fairly quick black in a way that doesn't show up any areas that you maybe didn't give much attention to, and that they really stand out on the table and look sharp.

Hopefully my ramblings here have given you some food for thought, and perhaps there's some ideas there for you to try out. smile.png

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Major gilbear, you win the cookiez today sir! Excelllent oost, really helpful and well explained.

 

I was indeed aiming to go for a non black black. With either kantor blue mixed in or incubi darkness. But had no clue about the glazes/washes.

 

The theory on additional colours is also very welcome.

 

Again a really good post

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Something I'd say as a reminder is to not stress too heavily on your general troops. People don't like to admit it but 30k makes marines into a horde army, like orks or tyranids or guard. So you could sit there and obsess over your bunch of dudes, or you can get ceremite on the table.
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For a quick and dirty method of painting black without an airbrush you could try this:

 

Prime black, drybrush with grey getting progressively lighter (both with the grey colours and application strength), wash with Nuln Oil and apply some edge highlight with your lightest grey.

 

That's how I painted some of my Death Company:

 

http://www.themightybrush.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/08/Blood-Angels-Death-Company-01.jpg

 

Gives a worn, slightly battle-damaged look. You can see more pics here: http://www.themightybrush.com/death-company-razorback/

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Weathering and weathering powders are another good way to give black armour some character without going too crazy with all of the highlights. I used this method as well as the bright colour of the eye lenses to give my Raven Guard test mini some definition.

 

http://i1122.photobucket.com/albums/l522/kizzdougs/DSCN4298_zpsqrdloj0x.jpg

 

Here is a link to the step by step that I wrote: http://www.bolterandchainsword.com/topic/236305-the-sekhmet-hh-emperors-children-al-praetor-9716/?p=4365056

 

:)

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I paint an awful lot of black (black legion) and it took some getting used to for sure! Unfortunately I can't find any pics of them- but here's one of my Knights legs using the same recipe. Its just abaddon black- then a thick edge highlight of dark reaper- then a thin edge highlight of fenrisian grey! Looks really dynamic for black in my opinion!

http://i7.photobucket.com/albums/y290/abadizzilithium/Mobile%20Uploads/knightleg.jpg

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So today i have been testing how i can paint black at this stage. I used the Non-black black way of painting it, and added a purple spot colour, aswell as a bit of bone.

 

However, i am still unsure, especially as to how it would look on bigger models, like the leviathan. Obviously, if i continue this army idea, i will use mark V and older marks, aswell as transfers to make them pop a bit more still. I don't think it is looking as good on Mk VII as i would have liked.

 

Tell me what you think! i also added a night lord, as that is the other option, instead of blackshields...

 

http://i1124.photobucket.com/albums/l579/UltraWaarom/Ramblings/13632694_1731073943832570_674751503_o_zpszhlkox8d.jpg

 

http://i1124.photobucket.com/albums/l579/UltraWaarom/Ramblings/13647246_1731073940499237_944086850_o_zps5wj97xvl.jpg

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