Day 16: Imperial Fist

Years ago I won a few eBay auctions full of Space Marines. They were both pre-built. The first lot still had all it's mold-lines, the second lot looked like the mold lines had been hacked off with a bowie knife, which was worse. I salvaged the ones I could, and tend to use the rest as test minis.

Late last year I felt like doing something new, and like anybody with too much free time, and too little sense, I let 4Chan decide.

Aside from the Star Phantoms shoutout, the best suggestion was Imperial Fists. I've been meaning to try a yellow wash technique too, so it fit. White Dwarf & GW painting guides are always touting how easy it to create a decent yellow armor with washes & glazes, & I thought I'd give it a go.

Obviously, It wasn't as easy as the painting guides make it out to be.

I started with a few layers of Lamenters Yellow Glaze over white primer. The end result *was* really yellow, but it wasn't a very deep color. I wanted it to be darker in the recesses. I gave it a glaze of Seraphim Sepia to give it darker tone. Once dry, I picked out armor highlights with white, then hit it with another layer of Lamenters.

Pros:
* It's still faster than most other yellow painting methods.
* It produces a clean look. Great for tabletop quality minis.

Cons:
* The color is more lemony than I like. This might be fine for brighter armies like Iyanden, but I feel like Space Marines need to be a bit more grimdark. (I usually work from Snakebite Leather to Golden Yellow, up to Bad Moon Yellow highlights. It's a nice rich yellow, but it takes forever.)
* Without having a paint to fall back on, it can be tough to fix blemishes & areas where you overpaint. Usually I painted it black, then silver to make it look like weathering.

I'm glad I did it, if for no other reason than to test a new painting process, but if I were to do a unit of Imperial Fists I'd go a more traditional route.

~Muninn

P.S. It's the 16th, so we're halfway through. It's all downhill from here, right?