Warlord Titan – More caution stripes!

For some reason, I got it in my head that the carapace top between the reactor ridges would be cool as black/yellow caution stripes.

Of course it’s one of the hardest areas to mask easily, but I couldn’t get it out of my head, so here goes!

First, about 45 minutes of careful masking with Tamiya masking tape.

Then about 30 (or was it 50?) light coats of Wicked Golden Yellow. If you spray this too thick it pools up and dries unevenly, so many many thin coats is the name of the game.

Hit the knee pads while I had the paint in the cup.

Completed base yellow coat, drying overnight.

Sprayed 3 layers of liquitex Glossy varnish so the base yellow would be less likely to come up with the masking tape.

about 20 minutes into the stripe masking job. Because of all the rivets I was sure I was going to get ‘leaks’ of black paint under the taps, so resolved to lay down very, very light coats of black (which dry upon contact and are less likely to ‘run’ under the tape.

and more masking

and more masking

and then paint! about 10 very light coats of Vellejo black primer.

The moment of truth when airbrushing over masks/stencils is removing the mask. Will the paint peel up? how are the mask edges? any leaks? Basically, any black paint over yellow is almost impossible to repair because of hour transparent the yellow paint is… it’d never truly cover the black and look smooth.

Fortunately, the paint stayed down nicely because of my varnish, and the light coats of black paid off, no issues at all with the stripes! yay!

peeling away more mask, still looking good.

stripe mask completely removed, looking good so far!

So I applied 2 coats of varnish, so the masking tape I have to put on top of the whole area when priming the rest of the model silver doesn’t pull up the yellow/black I just spent so much time laying down.

So, in my jubilation, I pulled off the ‘outer mask and pulled up some of my caution striping in my rush. NOOOOOOOoooo!

So, another quick mask

and many layers of Createx wicked yellow

and it’s more or less repaired. There’s a bit more color saturation and an textured edge on the joint, but better than primer grey!

And that is a day of painting. So. Much. Masking.

March 12, 2016 | Categories: Legio Titanicus, Modeling & Painting, Warhammer 40K | 2 Comments

Warlord Titan – Painting the Legs Part II

Next, let’s do some caution stripe pistons!

Yellow is a PITA, even with an airbrush. Below is about 35 coats of Createx Wicked Golden Yellow (W011). I thinned with W100 reducer, although I just ordered W500 reducer, which I’m super excited about as it’s supposed to be way better. W100 can cause cratering, tip drying, dries slowly, and dires glossy.

W500 claims to address these issues which would make Createx Wicked Colors my main paint for basically everything.

Airbrushing models like this is 90% masking, 5% paint prep, and 5% actually airbrushing. Give in to this fact. Just surrender. Trust me.

I used 1/8″ 3m vinyl tape, which is good for really sharp edges, but a bit too sticky (risk of pulling up paint).

To combat this, I laid down three layers of  Liquitex Gloss Varnish and let dry overnight. The gloss varnish toughens up the finish and makes the tape pull up without tearing the paint film. If you don’t have existing tape to use up, I’d recommend 3mm Tamiya masking tape, either the regular yellow stuff or the new white ‘for curves’ variety although I haven’t tried that yet.

After a few hours of masking, about 10 minutes of very light coats of Vallejo Black Primer  which is one of my favorite paints of all time, as it shoots through my Iwata HP-BCS Airbrush with the 0.5mm setup like a dream, has great adhesion, and a great matte finish.

Caaaaarefully pulling up the tape.

Starting to apply a brown undercoat to the trim. This is actually P3 Bootstrap leather, my favorite brown paint.

I’m trying the new Games Workshop golds and I HATE THEM. They are super chunky. Applied lightly they give like 2% coverage and would take 50 coats. Applied liberally, they pool up and dry with an uneven, chunky texture. After searching online, I’m going to try Citadel ‘Retribution Armor’ gold base, which is supposed to act like the older Citadel ‘Shining Gold’ Paint which I LOVED. Failing that, adding ‘Lahmian Medium’  is supposed to help the new metallic paints. Failing that, I’ll use Reaper/MSP 9050 Antique Gold which is a perfectly serviceable gold, just not as good as the old ‘Shining Gold.’

Here you can see the pistons painted and glued in. The second picture shows a piston that was clamped wrong, and dried in a tweaked position. :/ This is JBWeld, so once it’s glued, it’s glued. The Armor plates will make this mistake less obvious, but darn! :/

Not great lighting for these pics, but the warning stripe pistons on the warlord feet.

March 6, 2016 | Categories: Legio Titanicus, Modeling & Painting, Warhammer 40K | 2 Comments

Warlord Titan – Painting the Legs Part I

I covered the primed lower torso with Citadel Lead Belcher spray.

Then, I liberally applied buckets of Nuln Oil to the lower torso. It was messy… nuln oil was spattering all across my cutting mat, and citadel washes have a certain less than pleasant smell. It’s winter here and there are no flies, but somehow, somewhere, father Nurgle hatched a housefly just for me and I witnessed a fly buzzing around the drying nuln oil. I wonder what that stuff is made of…

Once the nuln oil dried (overnight, with the flies) I laid down a very light coat of waywatcher green glaze. The trick here is to not let it pool up, where it’ll look bright green. We’re just going for a slight tint to add some depth to the metal. If you really want to go crazy, you can actually add multiple tints (maybe a magenta) and make the metal even more complex.

After the glaze dries (pretty fast, a few minutes) it’s time to dry brush about half a pot of necron compound.

And that’s the basic metallic finish I’m using for the titan legs. 5 coats. Primer + Lead Belcher Spray + Nuln Oil + Waywatcher Green + Necron Compound dry brush. I sixth coat of the magenta glaze/tint would add more awesomeness.

Below I’m applying the same steps to the main leg pistons, plus the beginnings of the warning stripes.

I used the citadel Led Belcher Air to hit the back of the leg pistons (after masking the fronts)

Then I threw down the Nuln Oil

Masked Even More (PITA)

Then, I sprayed Creatix wicked Golden Yellow. For some reason of physics I don’t understand, yellows are always a complete pain the butt. It took about 30 coats to get the color saturation required without pooling/orange peeling the pigments.

And here is is a picture of my ArtoGraph 1520 Spray Booth but with the metal hood, which I don’t see on the artograph website any more.

So…much…painting…left. YAY! :)

February 26, 2016 | Categories: Legio Titanicus, Modeling & Painting, Warhammer 40K | Leave a comment