I've been experimenting with the use of techical pens in miniature painting, and ended up aquiring some old Pelikan Graphos technical pens in the process. Getting them disassembled for cleaning was a real pain, and I couldn't find any help online, so I though I'd share the details along with some photos: https://soulsamurai.blogspot.com/p/pelikan-technos-disassemblyassembly.html.

Orsus The Barbarian

I've never loved Butcher's models, even though there's plenty of reasons to put him on the table. I thought Wolf by Hasslefree Miniatures, with his bald head and comically exaggerated musculature, made a suitable proxy - especially for the bare-chested Butcher 4.

Butcher:
I replaced the model's sword with Butcher's axe, which I ordered from the PP webstore back when they had their bits ordering service (I miss that). I made a shaft by wrapping green stuff around a brass tube and then using Green Stuff World's "Roll Maker" to texture it. I sculpted a Khador anvil over his original necklace, and put him on a Dark Age Groundwerks Ice Explosion clear resin base topper (that was glued on to a base that had already been primed white, and might have been painted light blue, idr).

I masked off the base using Talens Liquid Masking Film and primed the model with Tamiya Fine Surface Primer L (light grey), and old rattle can primer I still have lying around. I airbrushed a basecoat of Master Series Paint 09225 Redstone Highlight. I then sprayed on P3 Rucksack Tan down from about 60 degrees, then Vallejo 71.132 Model Air Aged White from about 30 degrees.

I basecoated just about everything other than the skin and steel with Green Stuff World 1832 Redwood Brown, then went over the brass with Citadel Layer Gehenna's Gold and the bronze in Citadel Colour Tin Bitz. I picked out the belt and straps in Citadel Layer Skrag Brown, and the fur in Vallejo 71.132 Model Air Aged White. I went over the "inner" parts of the leather with Redstone Highlight. The axe blade was basecoated with Vallejo 72.054 Game Color Gunmetal.

I wasn't happy with the skin colour at this point as it was looking too pale, a little like a corpse. So I tried to darken it a bit and add some colour back by glazing skin with a mix of Citadel Washes Ogryn Flesh, Vallejo 73.596 Glaze Medium, and water.

It looked better, but wasn't there yet. I removed the masking layer from the base and cleaning up my basecoats. I was having an issue with the axe head coming loose from the base, so after gluing it in place again I used some UV resin around the edge to build up the base around the blade and make it look like it was embedded in the ice slightly, better anchoring it in place. With the basecoats done, I carefully applied Army Painter Quickshade Strong Tone to the whole model, holding the model upside down to stop the quickshade from reaching the base. Oly after I had covered the model then removed most of the excess, and it was starting get less runny, did I turn it right side up. I worked it a bit more right-side-up to avoid excessive pooling. The quickshade added some extra shading and also improved the skin tone.

I washed the brass areas with The Army Painter WP1469 Quickshade Washes Mid Brown (closest one I've found to Ogryn flesh, because my Ogryn Flesh is old and has become too thick). I drybrushed the bronze with Scalecolor SC-72 Viking Gold; the result was a bit subtle, perhaps copper or steel might have worked better? Or maybe the gloss coat was interfering with the drybrush effect. I edge highlighted the brass with P3 Solid Gold. I tried thinning it with Vallejo 70.524 Thinner Medium, but that made it hard to use - it flowed too easily, going where I didn't want it, and was harder to build up the colour. Using it neat seemed better for edge highlighting. I washed the steel axe blade with The Army Painter WP1136 Quickshade Washes Dark Tone and gave it a rought scratchy edge highlight with Vallejo 72.052 Game Color Silver.

I highlighted the dark leather with Redstone Highlight, and the "inner" leather with with about a 1:1 mix of Redstone Hightlight to Rucksack Tan. The belt was highlighted with Formula P3 Bogrin Brown. By the time I had washed and highlighted everything, the browns had blended together more than I had intended. Oh well, that's fine; I think the different colours still come through a little, creating some subtle variety.

The fur (and the straps in the middle of the fur) were washed with Citadel Shade Agrax Earthshade. I drybrushed the fur with Formula P3 Menoth White Highlight. It felt like some other colours (blue, brown) were being pulled off the drybrush; even though I hadn't used it in months and I had tried to wash it last time I put it away? I tried washing the brush in Pebeo brush cleaner, and indeed it blue colour kept coming out. I wasn't going to go back and try to repaint it now, luckily it's a just a couple of small spots that are hard to see, so it doesn't bother me much.

I had actually painted the eyes before the quickshade, but the whites were darkened too much so I redid them. First I filled in the whites with Formula P3 Menoth White Highlight, then cleaned up the shadows above the eyes with Redstone Highlight mixed with Army Painter Quickshade Mid Brown. I dotted the eyes using a Copic Multiliner SP 0.03. I tried to add colour by running Amsterdam Acrylic Ink 517 King's Blue through an Isomars Technoart 0.1 technical pen. But the ink was too flowy and kept flooding the eyes. The 0.1 nib size was the smallest I could get, I might have been able to get away with it if I could get the ink/paint consistency to go through the pen without flooding the surface, but that would be very difficult so I gave up. I pulled out a loupe and went over the eyes with Vallejo black and Army Painter Warpaints Electric Blue, thinned with Vallejo glaze medium, through my thinnest brushes, trying to get an iris and pupil. After multiple attempts due to constant mistakes, I basically gave up. I painted dark lines around the eyes with Green Stuff World 2832 Acrylic Color Choco Brown. They look rather crappy in closeup photos, but good enough in person.

I blocked in skin highlights with a mix of 2:1 Aged White:Rucksack Tan. I thinned this with a touch of Vallejo Thinner Medium, but I can't say I liked the consistency; it was runny but didn't go down thin? I don't know, it just didn't work the way I wanted. I then heavily thinned the mix with P3 Mixing Medium and water; it was somethign like 2 drops of Tan, 4~5 drops Aged White, 12 drops medium, and about 6 drops of water. I used this to smooth out the skin highlights by building up gradients from the shadows.

After picking out the base rim in Vallejo 70.950 Model Color Black, I sprayed the whole model with Mr. Hobby Mr. Color GX 112 UV-Cut Gloss varnish, which would serve as my primer for the ice base topper. After leaving this for a day to fully dry, I washed the ice with Vallejo 73.207 Game Wash Blue Wash. This flowed and pooled more than I expected, likely because of the smooth glossy surface, but that was fine - in fact after I had drybrushed it with Formula P3 Morrow White, I think it looked even better than my previous ice bases.

Unfortunately some of the blue wash had gotten onto the black base rim, so I actually ended up painting the entire base rim black again before airbrushing on the final varnish of Mr. Hobby Mr. Color GX 113 UV-Cut Flat. I used an Isomars TechnOart 0.4mm pen with Dr. Ph. Martin's Pen-White to write the date on the bottom of the base. This worked quite well, I think technical pens have a lot of potential for use on miniatures and I intend to experiment more in the future. I did actually go back and brush a little Citadel Technical 'Ardcoat gloss varnish onto the eyes, but that was long after taking the photos and I don't think it actually improved the model.


I had a surprising amount of difficulty making colour choices on this model. The whole thing basically needed to be different shades of brown, and being mostly very natural materials was more limiting than models that are dyed cloth, painted armour, and various metals. The skin is still not great, being more yellowish than I had intended, and arguably paler than you would expect a near-naked barbarian to look. But at least it looks human, unlike how he started. I feel like I need to invest in more skin tones - although I don't have too many models with lots of skin planned for the near future.