Bailey
A Fixture
I've been wanting to do another fantasy piece for some time now, so I decided to put my historical projects on hold for a bit and start on this piece from Big Child Creative's Black Sailors range of figures. I think these kits are absolutely fantastic. They are a combination of orcs, goblins, and trolls at 1/35 scale (though the orcs measure closer to 70mm) and are all themed around being the crew of a pirate ship. Each piece represents a different member of the crew and thus is totally unique. The sculpts themselves are wonderful and have incredible details. I picked up a bunch of these during their kickstarter, but the one I decided to paint first was Redghar... sort of the brute/muscle of the crew.
I've seen a couple very well done versions of this kit, but I wanted to do something a little bit different. I opted to go for a very dark shade of green for the skin (inspired by recent work I did using dark green for a dragoon's coat). The shade of green was created by mixing 2 parts Badger Minitaire's Dark Green with 1 part Reaper's Burgundy Wine. For the shadows I added more Burgundy Wine. To make the highlights, I added a 50/50 mix of Reaper's Dark Elf Highlight and Vampiric Shadow (basically that just made a light grey) to the base color. The top highlights were pure Vampiric Shadow (an off white). To create some color variation, I also used a mix of Burgundy Wine, Imperial Purple, and Vampiric Shadow for areas like the nose, lips, and around the eyes. Later on I'll be using some glazes to add a bit more color variation to the skin, but I'm not quite ready for that.
I'm trying a few new things with this piece. The first is the approaching non-human skin using the same techniques like color variation and glazes that I use to paint human skin/faces. The second is pushing myself to go for a much more extreme contrast range than I normally use. Sometimes that's easier to try on a fantasy piece than on a historical.
Here's what I've got so far. Obviously I've just focused on the face, though I'm about ready to start on the torso. I was working on the teeth when I got pulled away from the painting, so they are still in progress.
I've seen a couple very well done versions of this kit, but I wanted to do something a little bit different. I opted to go for a very dark shade of green for the skin (inspired by recent work I did using dark green for a dragoon's coat). The shade of green was created by mixing 2 parts Badger Minitaire's Dark Green with 1 part Reaper's Burgundy Wine. For the shadows I added more Burgundy Wine. To make the highlights, I added a 50/50 mix of Reaper's Dark Elf Highlight and Vampiric Shadow (basically that just made a light grey) to the base color. The top highlights were pure Vampiric Shadow (an off white). To create some color variation, I also used a mix of Burgundy Wine, Imperial Purple, and Vampiric Shadow for areas like the nose, lips, and around the eyes. Later on I'll be using some glazes to add a bit more color variation to the skin, but I'm not quite ready for that.
I'm trying a few new things with this piece. The first is the approaching non-human skin using the same techniques like color variation and glazes that I use to paint human skin/faces. The second is pushing myself to go for a much more extreme contrast range than I normally use. Sometimes that's easier to try on a fantasy piece than on a historical.
Here's what I've got so far. Obviously I've just focused on the face, though I'm about ready to start on the torso. I was working on the teeth when I got pulled away from the painting, so they are still in progress.
