A Third Colour

I picked up Artemis Fang between kickstarters so I wasn't able to batch her painting with any other Marcher Worlds infantry models. One of the design elements I'm implementing with my Marcher Worlds is to not have any skin showing (as I don't like the idea of skin being painted in the same grey tones as everything else). Since a head swap on this model would be very impractical, I simply sculpted a bandana over the exposed part of the face. I think it looks pretty good, and is in keeping with all the flowing cloth and general "rogueish" looks Artemis and indeed most of the Marchers have. I also cut the tactical rock off her foot and just pinned her to the base.

But of course the big thing here is the second glow colour. Some of the feedback I received on my Dusk Wolf was that he needed a third colour. One idea that had vaguely occured to me and that was independently suggested by others was a magenta glow. But with so many models already painted in a consistent scheme and with my plan for my Marcher Worlds being to paint them quickly and not get too precious, I was reluctant to change the formula. Nevertheless, the more I looked at the model the more I felt it not only needed that magenta glow, it would actually look really cool with it. So I decided that, since all the models I've painted so far were "generic" units and Artemis Fang is a Hero - a special unit type with different rules - that it would still be consistent if I expand the colour scheme to add Magenta as a third colour exclusively for Hero units. Justification achieved!

Artemis Fang:
I started by painting the model the same was as the rest of my Marcher Worlds infantry. To summarise: over a primer of Vallejo 73.660 Surface Primer Gloss Black, I airbrushed a zenithal highlight of Vallejo 70.862 Model Color Black Grey, Vallejo 70.992 Model Color Neutral Grey, and Vallejo 70.990 Model Color Light Grey. I then edge highlighted everything with the Light Grey, before darkening it all down with a wash of Citadel Shade Nuln Oil. I picked out areas to apply a glow with layers and drybrushes of Citadel Layer Sotek Green, Citadel Layer Temple Guard Blue, Citadel Edge Baharroth Blue, and Formula P3 Morrow White.

With that all done it was finally time to try to figure out the new element: the magenta glow. At this point I realised I only had one magenta paint. I didn't want to have to mix my own colours, especially not for an effect that I might be repeating in the future for a uniform army, but I didn't want to order new paints and have to wait weeks for them. So did the best I could with the paints I had lying around.

First off I basecoated the "hair" with Formula P3 Murderous Magenta. I then drybrushed the Magenta onto the surrounding areas. Next I painted lines of Citadel Edge Fulgrim Pink along the strands. I brightened the centers of these lines with Formula P3 Morrow White thinned with Formula P3 Mixing Medium. I then drybrushed the Fulgrim Pink over the hair and the surrounding areas.

At this point I felt the brightness was pretty good but it looked too desaturated, coming across as a light pink rather than a magenta. So I glazed the hair with a Badger Minitaire D6-173 Ghost Tint Magenta thinned down a lot with Mixing Medium. I was reluctant to use the Ghost Tint as I have issues in the past with their flow properties; they are designed for airbrushing and don't seem to take all that well to being applied by a brush. Also when testing I found that applying the Ghost Tint Magenta directly on the Fulgrim Pink darkened it far too much (it is a very saturated glaze). When thinned with the mixing medium (maybe around 2:1 medium:tint?) it didn't darken the pink nearly as badly. I also didn't have any flow issues, which may have been the effect of the medium as well.

Once the glaze dried the saturation looked good. In fact the glow as a whole didn't look too bad, however it wasn't very bright anymore (especially when compared to the surrounding teal glows). So I applied the Fulgrim Pink again, trying to restrict the application to smaller areas than before, and followed that with even smaller areas of the thinned white again. The white was probably thinned to about 1:1 with the mixing medium, as a result it was more like a glaze that lightened the pink, and didn't really go up to an actual pure white.

Then it was time to paint the base in the established way, using Citadel Colour Tin Bitz, Vallejo 71.068 Model Air Metallic Copper, and Citadel Shade Agrax Earthshade.


I think perhaps I should have been more agressive when drybrushing the magenta and pink onto the surrounding surfaces as the glowing hair doesn't really cast very much light. It was hard because the immediate surroundings were hard to reach with my drybrushes, and I couldn't go very far without hitting the teal glowing areas. I didn't really manage to get a smooth gradient on the glows on the hair either. That's just the limitations of my lazy drybrushed glow technique I guess. Still, I think she came out looking pretty cool.