The Dark is rising

I bought these guys at the same times as the Grey Knights I spoke of before; on the first day I decided to actually get into warhammer. I bought them because they looked cool and were relatively cheap - in fact these are some of my favorite GW fantasy models. I've basically decided they count as inquisitorial paladins.

I started painting them a few months ago then got busy and forgot about them, so I've forgotten a couple of details of how I painted them. Basically, I wanted them to be very dark - I know I've been saying this a lot lately but it's especially true of these guys. I wanted to try a bit of weathering, mainly the stippling on the cloaks and the worn paint over metal on the shields. I also tried some feathering on the blades. Finally, I was experimenting a little with a unified palette.

First I cut off some horns and spikes where possible to make them less chaos-y. Of course this involved filing the star off their shields. Then I filled in the gap in the fur over their shoulders with greenstuff and tried to sculpt it to match. The results were not great, but I think I got better as I worked, in the end it didn't look too bad. I also filled in the cut-outs in one model's sword.

I painted the armour tin bitz to make it dark, and edge highlighted dwarf bronze. Steel was boltgun washed black and highlighted chainmail. Wooden axe-handles were painted in grey then lined with snakebite leather to make a more colourless , "bleached" wood.

Leather was just scorched brown drybrushed or edge highlighted with snakebite leather. I decided to paint the wraps around the weapon handles as cloth rather than leather, so painted them grey and edge highlighted white. I believe the bone was done in calthan brown then bleached bone, possible with some white highlights and/or a gryphone sepia wash, I'm not really sure.

The fur was painted brown and the cloak red, then both were given a drybrush of snakebite leather. This was one of the experiments I was trying; highlights in a different colour. I hoped it would make the cloth look more worn while simultaneously better tying it together with the fur. I may have also used a red wash on the cloak, though I don't believe I did. The cloak was then stippled black at the base, as were the boots.

The shield was just painted black with the hourglass design in white. Again an adaptation of the Sentinels Eternal logo: no need for the shield since it is already painted on one. I painted boltgun metal unevenly around the edges to make it look as if the shield was steel underneath black paint. I also tried to apply a few fine scratches across the surface.

Ihad initially planned to use army painter quickshade, but eventually settled on washing the entire model in devlan mud, with the exception of the shield which I wanted to stand out. After that I decided the fur needed more definition, so I applied another drybrush of bleached bone. Finally I feathered the edges of the blades with chainmail - I usually paint slim lines, but I wanted a more worn appearance, the idea being that the edge is brighter from sharpening and use.

I had a problem with the matt varnish, for some reason it was very inconsistant. I had to apply a second layer with a different varnish to fix it.

Gloss varnish

The matt varnish did not come out well

A different matt varnish mostly fixed the problem

Unless viewed in bright light they look a little too dark and homogeneous. In contrast the feathering on the blades contrasts too much with the surface, I suppose next time I'll need to avoid washing the blade with the rest of the model. The highlights on the cloak were darkened more than I expected by the wash, and the fur is also too flat, I should have brushed both up to a lighter colour. The armour and the leather are a surprisingly hard to distinguish, perhaps brighter highlighting would maintain the 'dark' look while introducing a bit more definition? Despite all that, I think they look pretty cool.