SPACE WOLF ARMY

Here you can see what 20 minutes with an airbrush can do. They are all perfectly base coated with no paint streaks or over paint anywhere. Some of you have asked if airbrushed figures are as hardy as hand painted ones. Once they are varnished they are as durable as any other model. Since I must do at least one intermediate varnish, immediately after I finish all the airbrushing, and will do one Purity seal during painting as well these will last longer than most. The only real concern for later on is the prospect of touching these models up. Anywhere that the airbrush has laid down the final coat will be very hard to colour match with a brush. The colours can be exactly the same but since the brush uses so much more paint than an airbrush it comes down to paint thickness. This in turn looks like it is a colour issue.
Oh, it also only took about 1/6 of a bottle of Shadow Grey to do all those models.

Stage 2:

I wanted the troops to be lighter than the tanks and so this layer is a mostly covering layer. Like I mentioned with the tanks the colour will darken once varnished so I have to plan on that happening. I am doing all at once in a random order so that everyone looks the same. If I did them squad by squad, even with the same paint, the squads might not look the same. By doing them this way, if there is group similarity it is distributed throughout the army.

Stage 3:

In this picture I am done the armour plates and have also put on a slight grime wash on the lower legs. The wash is hard to see and I might increase it once I see what they look like after varnishing. I do not yet have good after varnish shots but the marines darkend up a fair bit and the grime is all but invisible. I will likely do another wash of grime once I switch back to the marines.

Painting:

Stage 1:

In these pictures I have the black done as well as the silver metals and browns. The eyes are done for the helmeted marines as well. Sure doesn't look like much but it won't take long for them to come together now.

Stage 2:

By this point I have done the swords and the knees. It can be hard at these early intermediate stages to see the end product but I can already feel the finished models.

Stage 3:

At this point I have finished the bone as well as two of the units unit symbols on the shoulders. The other Blood Claw squad has the symbol based. I have also based the yellow hair.

Stage 4:

In this stage I finished all the right and left shoulder icons, based the chest symbols and finished the blonde hair. Once the chest wings and wolves were based I really started to see where everything was going.

Stage 5:

In this stage I have added highlights to the wings and wolves on the chests of the marines. I have also done all the skull icons [chest, waist, hands] in grey through to white.

Stage 6:

In these shots you can really see what they models will look like. The evolution has been slow up to this point but now it all comes together quickly. I did the aqua diamonds, powerfist fingers, hair and faces today. I also did some minor odds and ends as they presented themselves. Stage 7 should see an all but complete model. The outlining of the armour will be abrupt and sharp and should make the entire model jump out at you. The first picture has the half blue faces that I hinted at awhile ago. I wanted them to tie very closely with Wolfguard Tyr and this war paint works perfectly.