Fairy’s Ultramarine Terminator Captain
We have finally been able to track down Fairy and tear him away from this month’s project to give us some thoughts on his Ultramarine captain. So today we are throwing it over to the challenge winner to learn all about Fairy’s Ultramarine terminator captain. Over to you Fairy.
I have to say this latest challenge was a heap of fun. I really enjoyed what we all created with the original iconic miniatures. To see such awesome variation of the space marine terminator captain was great. The grimdark for Fury’s Space Wolf and the molten resolve of Sparky’s Salamander.
It took me a bit to decide if I was going to paint Ultramarines or Blood Angels. As this decision would also decide the direction of how I would eventually recondition a 2nd ed 40k force. I settled on the Ultramarine given I love the contrast of blue and white on a miniature. I also don’t mind the idea of a ‘vanilla’ chapter to game with down the track. It avoids the opponent’s groans when you show up with your weapon skill 5 space wolf force.
Airbrush For The Win
With this challenge, I wanted to push myself to learn and develop new techniques. I felt the winner of this challenge would need to nail the highlights and contrasts on the model. I knew Sparky and Fury could both paint really well so I needed something to give me the edge. Enter the airbrush!
I have battled with my Grex Tritium Airbrush over the years but have started to get some better results this year with my Gryphonicus. My confidence was up with the airbrush. Although, I have never tried to airbrush the highlights on a 28mm mini, well not successfully anyway.
Knowledge Is Power
I started off doing some research online looking for things that would match the image I had forming in my mind about how I wanted the captain to look.
I came across this image online which lead me to the page from Centrepiece Miniatures. This was exactly what I was after. It closely matched what I had envisaged with the slightly darker blue contrasting well with the white.
One of the main things I learnt from this was about colour theory. Particularly the use of green in enriching the blue through airbrush highlights. Using Hawk Turquoise as one of the initial highlights would certainly be one of the keys to success.
I also took from this article that I wanted to start with a darker blue base. This gave the ability to gain greater contrast as I progressed through my highlights. I used Citadel Kantor and Macragge Blue in a 50:50 mix.
Another YouTube clip I watched was from Angel Giraldez who is an amazing painter and I have learnt a lot from. I found I was taking away a lot from Angel about my airbrushing and again with colour theory.
What’s With All This Colour Theory Talk?
I am just going to stop here for a minute to say, the first time I heard painters talking about colour theory I thought it was a bit of a wank. So I can’t really believe that it is something I am now talking about. It’s worth learning about though, especially to understand and obtain better results on your mini.
Here is the link to a clip from Angel I found really helpful for this challenge. I have also started mixing my paint separately before putting it in the airbrush cup. It ensures good consistency and no lumps. A plastic spoon blue tacked to an old paint pot does the trick for mixing.
From these two sources, I got my inspiration on how I was going to airbrush my blue armour.
Learning New Techniques
Next up I researched non-metallic metal (NMM). I was pretty certain that Sparky and Fury would both attempt NMM and I knew none of us had yet mastered it.
I found this YouTube clip from COG about painting NMM. (Yep! This is the same one I used – Sparky)
This clip was great and again explained the theory around NMM and also tied in colour theory. From this clip, I learnt more about glazing which I tried for the first time and I also liked the use of a purple glaze to deepen the contrast of non-metallic gold as yellow sits opposite purple on the colour wheel. Really cool!
I have to say I was happier with my NMGold when compared to my NMsilver on the captain. But that said both were a long way from perfect and I would need to keep trying and practising.
Transfers Versus Freehand
The rest of the model was painting fairly traditionally, and I regret not fixing up a few mistakes I noted after I had finished. I guess I got distracted by other projects at the time.
I really appreciated the freehand work both Fury (Well he told us it was freehand before his reveal anyway) and Sparky did on their shoulder guards and I shied away from this as I had airbrushed the guard and was scared I wouldn’t be able to easily neaten up any errors I made with my own freehand. So I went with a transfer. The problem I soon found with this was that all the right size transfers I had were as old as this miniature. I went through six of them before I got one that didn’t split or fall apart when adhering. Even though the transfer didn’t go on perfect I didn’t have the time to purchase another and had to make do as best I could using Vallejo Decal medium to try and soften and flatten the decal as best I could.
Basing Completes A Model
The final component of the model was the base. From what I had already learnt about colour theory I knew a brown with orange in it would contrast well with the blue armour. I also wanted to use the Citadel technical Agrellan Earth. This was a great way of adding some nice character and detail to the model. I couldn’t resist throwing an Ork skull in the base just to lend some insight into what our illustrious captain might be hunting. For a bit more texture to the base, I went with some dry grass tufts from Leadbear. This range of tufts is awesome and I recommend checking them out. (None of these links are sponsored, Fairy just likes giving credit where credit’s due. Unless he got some cash and didn’t share it with us?!)
In conclusion, I really enjoyed this challenge and I felt we all paid homage to such a great old miniature. My Ultramarine captain is not perfect but I was really happy with the result as I pushed myself to learn new techniques that has placed this mini up there with one of the best I have ever painted.
Thanks for sharing Fairy! Tomorrow we will have a photo gallery of Fairy’s completed Titan legion. I guess we should finally get around to an update on what everyone is working on this month too.
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