David デイビッド : Dark Angels Army

by David on 2013-02-02 (Sat) 12:10PM

... er, well, actually it's only a handful of models, not a whole army! :)

I decided to paint this small force as pre-Heresy Dark Angels, because I plan to match them against the other Dark Vengeance starter set models as pre-heresy Emperor's Children. So I started with a black undercoat, and a careful light drybrushing in medium grey. Then their legion insignia in light grey, and pretty much everything else in bone colours. I've also decided to add a little extra colour by painting a heraldic quartered blue and bone design on their knee pads, as a nod to the pre-heresy knightly orders as they existed then.

This is Captain Incruentus, decked out in his black terminator armour and tabard. He is accompanied by two veterans, who can replace the sergeant from the tactical squad if I want different weapons. These 3 models came as a set of metal miniatures, and it was great for them to see the light of day after 15 years! The banner is a mixture of high elf and bretonnian parts, with some forgeworld brass etched scrolls.

One of the new character models from the Dark Vengeance set. Great model, and well posed, but not 100% thrilling to paint!

The second of the Dark Vengeance character models - the Librarian. I gave this guy some lightning effects on his hand, as he is posed to release witchfire on some renegade scum.

The Interrogator Chaplain from the Dark Vengeance limited edition set.

This is Sergeant Calard of the Terminators. This was my first attempt at painting a force weapon, and it turned out okay. The cream and blue robes add a nice bit of colour to an otherwise dark model, and the striped helmet also marks him out from his fellow squad members. I was careful to drill gun barrels on all the models, as I think this always looks much better.

Here is Sergeant Calard's Terminator Squad, in black with bone-coloured and white highlights. Weapons were done in traditional Deathwing red. Having said that, the colour scheme needed a little jazzing up, so I took some extra effort and based them with the new GW Middenland tufts, and also with a scattering of very realistic autumn leaves from Secret Weapon (thanks, Miyao-san!).

One other new thing that I tried was a little weathering using Forge World's powders. On the bikes it was simply stippled onto the tyres, and wiped off again to leave it in the recesses.

The biker sergeant is also wearing gothic robes, which allowed me to bring some more colour to the model. Really, really nice models!

The Dark Angels specialize in plasma weapons, and I was looking forward to trying out some source lighting for these. The two marines carrying larger plasma guns have some light-blue reflections on the helmets. Apparently this looks much better when done with an airbrush, but I'm too scared to try (in case I mess up my painted models)! I also added a small brass-etched scroll on the sergeant's chainsword, which (I think) features the latin for "violence". Very fitting!

Finally, for now, I revamped this very old rhino I found in the loft. It had previously been converted as a whirlwind and was pretty messy, so I ripped all the doors off, neatened them up and stuck them on elsewhere. The side doors are made from the lids of 40K ammunition crates with 3 tabs of sprue cutoffs stuck across the top. The large white arrow on top is actually my favourite bit, but you really can't see the weathering I did there in this photo. I followed the instructions in Forgeworld's Imperial Armour Masterclass II book, and sponged it on carefully in boltgun metal as paint chips. Again, I used light earth weathering powder on the front blade and wheels, and also a tiny bit of orange rust powder here and there.

That's all of my Dark Angels models painted - a complete army! Sadly, it's not force legal, until I add in another tactical squad! Ah well....

3 Comments :

wesley 2015-08-05 (Wed) 1:48AM

Love the colour scheme. Which colour did you use for the cream of the cloth?

wesley 2015-08-05 (Wed) 4:49AM

do you have a painting tutorial for this?

David 2015-08-05 (Wed) 9:17AM

Ha - no painting tutorial... sorry!

The cream-coloured cloth used slightly old GW paints, so I'm afraid I don't know the new equivalents. It was a basecoat of Dheneb Stone, then a wash of Gryphonne Sepia, then a highlight of Dheneb Stone again, and finally a very pale highlight with a colour I mix specially for skin tones - approximately half white and half bleached bone.