Oz Painters

Firstly, thanks to Sebastian for taking some really good shots of my unit! In fact I am going to steal the photo as the first in this thread.

I actually started this unit back in June, I was planning on entering them at GDLA. Unfortunately, due to the excitement of being on holidays, I didn't get a chance to finish them off properly. So I decided I would enter them back in Australia instead.

The conversions have been kept to a minimum - only a few weapon and hand swaps (I didn't like the hand weapons, so I turned them into stikk bombz, and replaced two of the hands with those from the plastic ork boyz).

There are so many little areas I could have improved on, in particular I think I over-did the weathering in some parts and not enough in others. I also found weathering the Dark Angel green a lot tougher than weathering the red - probably due to my colour selections. There are also a number of areas where the painting could have been a bit sharper and crisper - in particular, the backpacks and their grey shirts. Anyway, I got more Orks planned, so it was a good learning experience!



Whilst painting them, I took a lot of WIP photos. You'll notice a lot of them are with the unit on a scenic base - in the US, you can enter a scenic base with your squad or unit entries. I used a 6"x4" photo frame as the base - it fits the whole unit nicely without going overboard. When I entered it here, I used a 5.5" x 3.5" sheet of 5mm plasti-card. I hope the judges enjoyed the fact they were easy to move around (I feel sorry for you guys having to move so many individual miniatures in the squad category, that cabinet was packed!).

Anyway, I hope you enjoy the step by step!

Clean-up and assembly:

















Undercoated with Tamiya fine surface primer:



Painting:

























































And a rough list of colours I used (I wrote all this down as I was painting them, but I stopped with about 20% to go, so it's a bit give or take). I used a lot of mixing and layering when I painted them, so please don't treat these as discreet layers!

Skin

Basecoat: Gretchin Green (CF)
Shade 1: German Black Brown (V) + Oxford Blue (V)
Shade 2: German Black Brown (V) + Oxford Blue (V) + Cadmium Maroon (V)
Highlight 1: Gretchin Green (CF)
Highlight 2: Gretchin Green (CF) + Menoth White Highlight (PP)
Highlight 3: Gretchin Green (CF) + more Menoth White Highlight (PP)
Highlight 4: Gretchin Green (CF) + even more Menoth White Highlight (PP)
Back Shade 1: Gretchin Green (CF) + Water
Back Shade 2: Gretchin Green (CF) + Cadmium Maroon (V)

Lower Lips

Glaze: More Cadmium Maroon (V) + Gretchin Green (CF)
Highlight 1: German Black Brown (V) + Khemri Brown (CF) + Gretchin Green (CF) + Dwarf Skin (V)

Upper Lips

Glaze: More Cadmium Maroon (V) + Gretchin Green (CF)

Teeth

Basecoat: Khemri Brown (CF)
Highlight 1: Menoth White Base (PP)
Highlight 2: Menoth White Highlight (PP)

Scars

Basecoat: Gretchin Green (CF) + Dwarf Skin (VG)
Shade: Gretchin Green (CF) + Dwarf Skin (VG) + Cadmium Maroon (V) + German Black Brown (V)
Highlight: Gretchin Green (CF) + Dwarf Skin (VG) + Menoth White Highlight (PP)

Cigar

Basecoat: Beastial Brown (C)
Highlight 1: Beastial Brown (C) + Tausept Ochre (CF)
Highlight 2: Beastial Brown (C) + Tausept Ochre (CF) + Iyandan Darksun (CF) + Water

Cigar Ash

Basecoat: Black (P)
Highlight 1: Dheneb Stone (CF)
Highlight 2: Skull White (C)

Pants

Basecoat: Raw Umber (P)
Highlight 1: Charred Brown (VG)
Highlight 2: Charred Brown (VG) + Scrofulous Brown (VG)
Highlight 3: Charred Brown (VG) + Scrofulous Brown (VG) + Menoth White Highlight (PP)
Highlight 4: Charred Brown (VG) + Scrofulous Brown (VG) + more Menoth White Highlight (PP)

Shirt

Basecoat: Charadon Granite (CF)
Highlight 1: Charadon Granite (CF) + Menoth White Base (PP)
Highlight 2: Charadon Granite (CF) + more Menoth White Base (PP)
Highlight 3: Charadon Granite (CF) + even more Menoth White Base (PP)
Blend: Menoth White Base (PP)
Shade 1: German Black Brown (V) + Falcon Turquoise (VG) + Black (P) + Charadon Granite (CF)
Shade 2: Chaos Black (C) + German Black Brown (V) + Falcon Turquoise (VG) + Black (P) + Charadon Granite (CF)

Shirt Checks

Basecoat: Charadon Granite (CF)
Light Checks Basecoat: Dheneb Stone (CF) + Charadon Granite (CF)
Light Checks Highlight 1: Dheneb Stone (CF)
Light Checks Highlight 2: Dheneb Stone (CF) + Menoth White Highlight (PP)
Dark Checks Highlight 1: Charadon Granite (CF) + Ork Hide Shade (CF)
Dark Checks Highlight 2: Charadon Granite (CF) + Ork Hide Shade (CF) + Menoth White Base (PP)

Rope

Basecoat: Khemri Brown (CF)
Shade: German Black Brown (V) + Oxford Blue (V)

Brown Straps

Basecoat: Raw Umber (P)
Highlight 1: Bestial Brown (C)
Highlight 2: Bestial Brown (C) + Cobra Leather (VG)
Highlight 3: Bestial Brown (C) + more Cobra Leather (VG)
Highlight 4: Cobra Leather (VG)

Red Bits

Basecoat: Mechrite Red (CF)
Shade: Scar Red (VG) + Black or Scar Red (VG) + Charcoal (P)
Highlight 1: Scar Red (VG) + Vermillion (V)
Highlight 2: Vermillion (V)
Highlight 3: Vermillion (V) + Menoth White Base (PP)

Red Chips

Basecoat: German Black Brown (V) + Chaos Black (C)
Highlight: Boltgun Metal (C)

Metal Bits

Basecoat: Boltgun Metal (C)
Shade 1: German Black Brown (V) + Oxford Blue (V)
Shade 2: German Black Brown (V) + Jade Green (VG)
Shade 3: Cadmium Maroon (V)
Shade 4: Charred Brown (VG)
Shade 5: Cobra Leather (VG)
Highlight 1: Boltgun Metal (C)

Brass Bits

Basecoat: Brass Balls (PP)

They look great, and the step by step is really well done.
But I was under the impression that you can use a scenic base in Oz GD, but it doesn't count towards anything, just counts as a movement tray?

Cheers Lex - yes you can use a "movement" or "handling" base, but it has to be white, and can't be more than 2cm larger than any edge of the figure's base.

You can see the one I used in Ralph's photo.

Sweet looking unit Andrew (that sounded kinda weird didn't it) Anyways, these guys look awesome...and I like the step by step. If I scroll down fast enough it looks like a movie (kind of). Its too bad you didn't have them done for GDLA but it is better that you finished the properly!

I really like these, was my pick for gold

wow nice amount of info there andrew you should look at putting this into articles
they looked great on the day but i didn't get a chance to see them on the completed display base. the checks on the sleeves were a creat touch on a squad with tons of character. well deserved silver!

wow very very nice article andrew~!! and the display base sure looks good ~!also the chips on the red armor looks fantastic ~~!! congratss on the sliver

Oops double post.

Great stuff Andrew, is was one of my favourites units. Great to see the wip. I am taking note of the skin colour....should have used something similar on my own orc.

Ooooh! Work in progress shots as well. It's nice to see how long you have been working on them, as well as the steps you took to make that display base. These are great models, congratulations on the silver. It's interesting to see what colours you used on them as well.

Beautiful work. A highlight for me in this series of photos is seeing how you put the base together, always wonders how you artists did it

Great work and well deserved award

Great looking unit and congratulations on the demon.

Apart from the tones you've used and the overall finish of the minis, I really love the Ork skin tone you've created.

Thanks for the comments everyone!

As for the skin tones, I hope the paints I listed are enough for you to get started if you want to try it yourself. I used the same recipe on my GDLA orc that you can see on the GW website. I always liked light-coloured Orks/Orcs more as it could be offset with nice dark and dirty clothing or armour!

Ralph - I didn't sway too far from the basic 'Eavy Metal paint scheme, because I wanted it to be reminiscent of the colours people were familiar with even though it's painted in my style rather than the 'Eavy Metal style. So I used the strong reds, blacks and browns for the outfit. I reused the check motifs they did on their sleeves, as well as the Dark Angel green on the armour plates of the Nob. I carried this through to the other marine bitz you see scattered around as well.

olliekickflip - when the Aussie dollar recovers a bit, I'll be sure to come back with something actually finished before I leave Australia!

Turelio and torment - glad you liked the base! I always love building unit bases, it makes them look a lot better when they're on display, and makes it easier for me to carry them around! I'll make sure I bring it next time we have a meetup. I wish I bought more of those 6x4" frames now! I only bought 2. They were only $1.50 each from Hot Dollar, and are perfect for 5 man units!

The base sockets they stand in are Armorcast resin displays. I got a whole lot a few years ago. I put in a sheet of cardboard into the frame, and then I cut them up the resin base and fitted them in. They were then filled the gaps with plaster (I got a huge 10kg bucket of dental plaster back when I was trying to make Hirst Art buildings with Rob). The rest is just sand, bitz, rocks and flock to finish it off, as you would a normal base.

Very nice looking unit Andrew,even though i'm not a huge fan of the figs you have done them justice mate.

Congrats on the win

what do all the letters in brackets after the paints stand for?