when you think of a game's workshop mini what do you think of what makes
a model a games workshop model well in addition to a frankly upsetting price
tag it's probably a model dripping with detail which is a problem right
hey guys jay here welcome to eons of battle a common complaint i hear about
games workshop models is they are overly detailed and all that stuff
adds up to not the most enjoyable painting experience i definitely feel that a little
from time to time and recently i took another look at probably the best models in the primaries range
the models that have finally converted half of the primaries haters into primaries enjoyers the
blade guard veterans these sexy little veterans are classic knights of old the chief complaint
about the primaries is that they're too plain and they don't look grim dark while these guys are
basically the knights of the round table complete with swords and shields these guys are great but
they followed that frustrating habit gamership has of embellishing their models to the point
where it can be hard to see the model through the forest of details i can imagine sitting
down wanting to paint a space marine but instead i have to paint tassels and holsters and loincloths
and belts and buckles and amulets and emblems and decorative trim and pouches and holy moly
the skulls everything gets a skull and being up against all that is a little intimidating so i'm
a little nervous to paint them well at least they can pop on over to workshop's website and get a
little painting advice right blade guard veterans scroll down the page to the painting section and
holy moly games workshop suggests 30 different paints if i want to make it look like the box
these models are tripping with details and it looks like it's going to be an absolute nightmare
to paint i've seen enough games workshop models suck case closed i hope you guys enjoyed the video
as always thanks for watching just kidding so are games workshop models over detailed well no
i think it's pretty standard that all wargaming natures are very detailed that's the nature of
wargaming models taking something big and scaling it down to an inch and some change tall you have
to decide what stays and what goes with scale models this isn't even a question everything stays
the thing is just really small now so pouches and straps become teeny tiny itty-bitty little things
if you've ever tried to paint something like tamil military models it's a different beast
but with working minis it's very different as the scale gets smaller all those little
details are inflated so that they're easier to see in paint belt buckles become thick and proud
heads and hands are made bigger and weapons are made huge because they're cool so what
about all those ridiculous painting suggestions from games workshop well that is a weird one
games workshop has created a system so they can explain how to paint anything with the same steps
base coat wash highlights and they don't tell you that mixing paint is a thing which is why
they have so many colors those are all just variations of a couple primary colors games
workshop paints the way they do to achieve a very different goal than you or i would games workshop
paints their minis to be perfectly presentable blown up huge on a computer screen so customers
can see every detail and know exactly what they're buying having every detail show up perfectly under
beautiful studio lighting blown up 300 in a 360 degree spinning is not something the average
person needs to worry about they also must stick to styles and color schemes that work across their
whole range so they can take photos for their rule books and websites and have everything look good
together all those hobbies have to worry about is if our minis look decent on our kitchen tables
games workshop paints that way because they don't know what'll draw someone in one person might love
those shields so they accent the shield another person might love the loincloth so they accent
that too basically every single detail in the mini is perfectly highlighted but no one actually
paints like that once the model is in your hand the only thing that matters is your decisions
i know what i like and i can just focus on those things and kind of ignore everything else
details aren't a problem unless you make them a problem for yourself i have definitely been guilty
of making problems for myself but that experience has taught me a thing or two about coming up with
color schemes i'm gonna paint up probably the most bedazzled minis games workshop has put out in a
while models i've seen a lot of people struggle with these blade guard veterans i love these
guys i want to try and see if i can do simple things and cut corners where i can and invest
my painting time into the things that matter to see if i can make these models fun to paint
and thanks to today's sponsor the painting is going to be a little easier cobalt keep makers
of the finest magnet ready bases and display cases around have just launched a kickstarter for the
dual palette wet and dry palette combo this is a wet palette with all the trimmings it of course
comes with a sponge ready to soak up water and keep your paint nice and hydrated with pre-cut
sheets of pallet paper for your precious paint to rest on but that's not all it also comes with a
slot for water paint mixing or holding your paints spots to store your brushes in during and between
painting sessions and a clear lid that lets you see what colors are on your palette while it's
closed this lid comes with a nifty rubber plug that is removable so whatever climate you are
working in you can find the perfect balance of airflow or seal to ensure that your paint lasts
as long as possible and as if that was not enough the dual pallet also has a second dry pallet made
of cups to hold paint and ridges to help with dry brushing this dual palette can act as a lid for
the wet palette in fact all of these parts lock together so you can create the perfect painting
sandwich so even if you have many projects all at once you can condense it down into the ultimate
painting stack the kickstarter is live now you can follow the link in the description to check out
the dual palette wet and dry palette combo there is an early bird tier that allows you to save on
shipping thank you cobal keep for sponsoring this video and letting me paint even more
space marines it's time to blade up my veteran guards from gw these models are very detailed
and i've actually added a few more details myself i've added some chain around the hands
black templar famously chained their weapons to themselves to show off their devotion to warfare
and i found these really cool helmets with spikes from the space marine vanguard veterans kit and so
i've actually taken a detail on the mini these iron halos and turn it into a motif we've got a
circle with spikes here we've got a circle with spikes here and now a circle with spikes on the
head i started off by giving these fine fellas a good old black prime these are black templars it'd
be weird if i didn't so i've sprayed their armor black which means black power armor done right no
black is not a very interesting color and it makes it such a challenge to paint because there's no
shades of black well technically there's like onyx and charcoal and olive black but those
don't count because they're not different enough they're not different enough to read on a tiny
little miniature so i have to introduce a little bit of color to make the black paint look good
and my first step of doing that is going to be introducing just a just a squirt of white ink
i like white ink liquitex titanium because i can throw it straight into the airbrush
it's also a little transparent so i can control how bright things get i squirted this from above
in a xenothon move focusing on the head and shield the parts i really want bright black
i ended up spraying kind of a lot this is my highlight i can already hear the comments good
job jay nice white scar as you painted there but there's a method there's a method to this madness
i'm working in biggest steps down to smaller steps the biggest steps are things that i can apply
to the entire model and they're very quick and easy to do and then i'm going to work on smaller
details just the armor and then i'm gonna finish with little tiny things just the finishing touches
it'll all work out in the end i threw some white paint into my cobalt keep wet palette and got
ready to dry brush i soak my bristles even when dry brushing your paper should not be bone dry
you want just a little moisture so the paint doesn't get dry and dusty while you paint
i dry brushed everything this will edge highlight all the armor and weapons which is good as i don't
like edge highlighting so doing it simply and easily here will save me some time and headache
later and that is a well highlighted blade guard vest i brought the value all the way up to white
so i can knock it down with a little contrast paint i mixed together a lot of null oil a black
wash then a dollop of black templar contrast paint to darken it then just a teeny tiny drop
of leviathan blue just to add a tickle of color i carefully put this all over his armor making sure
to keep it off of anything that i want to paint a different color later i'm working light to dark
and that is some good black armor some black armor that has a nice smoky complexion to it much more
interesting than just flat black armor finally i put some colors down on my palette keeping it
simple some brown some yellow and some red luckily most of the details are right here on his crotch
so i'm going to treat it like one big object and paint them all at the same time i took some brown
and made up a yellow brown and a white brown i put brown classic over his holster i'm using watery
paint so that they're a little see-through then i put yellow brown over his dick tabard some white
brown over the purity seals i mixed a little black into brown to make a dark brown for his belt and
then yellow over his dangly decorative belt buckle and to finish off some plain red on the wax seals
now with everything base coated i slobbered agrax earth shade a dark brown wash right over
everything then once it was dry i went back to my original colors added a little white to make them
lighter and did one quick highlight on each piece all these objects are basically the same thing
a bit of brown so it's easy to deal with them all together and even gold and red can get the
same treatment boom one dick's worth detail all done and that's a good percentage of the model
finished right there he has a couple of pouches hidden around him and i was tempted to leave them
black but i did just one little wet coat of paint and that is it no more no one will ever
look at those pouches anyway on his shoulders i painted the trim red normally black templar
have white shoulders with black trim and a black templar cross in the middle but on sword brother
and the veterans of the black templar they wear black shoulders with red trim and a red symbol and
i don't have red templar decals so i'm just gonna not worry about that right now the watery coat of
red i put on let my white xenothon show through a little so i used that as a guide on where to apply
some red highlights then it was time for a little non-metallic metal i mixed some yellow with brown
and white to make my highlights and shadows and i painted this on the iron halos with brown yellow
on the bottom half yellow yellow on the upper half and yellow white on the tippy top then i gave it
a coat of aggressive shade to help show off all the details and blend my paint layers together
so i've just painted the iron halos with a nice non-metallic metal but now i actually want to put
metallics on top and that's how i like to do metallics now i have a love hate relationship
with metallic paints they're great but i always struggle with them because it's hard to get a
good gradient i'll go from like a dark metal like a gunmetal all the way up to a bright silver and
it'll look pretty good but then as soon as i put the light on it it just turns into a
big reflective mess and it doesn't look right so i like to put a simple non-metallic metal
on things and then give it a little dry brush just to bring a little bit of that sparkle back
i put a little silver on my palette and worked it in the bristles of a small dry brush
this will also help to desaturate the yellow iron halo a little bit which is good these
templars are grim and dark and i want their gold to look a little dull and tarnished and i
did the same thing to all the parts of them all i wanted silver like the emblem on his shield
this is just dry brushing over the original xenothon and it looks perfect and that is how
i do metallics i get full control over my color and saturation but i still get a little glisten
these guys are pretty much done the only thing left now is lots and lots and lots of free handing
oh boy i really wish i had some decals but unfortunately all i got are black ones and it
wouldn't do me much good to put a black decal on a black shoulder so i'll have to do it by hand i
started out painting a plus and then making small v's at the end of each line then connecting all
the points and filling it in i used some paint retarder to slow down the drawing and this helped
a little but it was still hours of extreme focus my airbrush made such a nice gradient i
really really didn't want to mess up and have to fix anything all space marine players have
to make a decision of what kind of heraldry they want to go for the lore explains the markings and
what they mean so players can choose exactly how accurate their little power armor guys are
the black templar are a little different as they don't follow the codex astartes and instead
organize into neophytes the scouts initiates full space marines and sword brethren the
chapter veterans and these guys are definitely sword brethren so i want to have them correct
although on all my other marines i had committed a bit of a crusade faux pas and painted all of their
shoulder pad trims red i did this because i found my models were looking a little boring sitting
next to each other without any color so a little pop of red gives me more to look at and it still
works as my lore is that this crusade of black templars have been warring against nyx blue orcs
for hundreds of years and it's been such a brutal and bloody campaign that all initiates have been
given the honor of red trim as a show of respect for spilling orc blood now that the shoulders are
done it's time for those shields on the chests i really like the old john blanche artwork that has
a lot of yellow in it so i painted some red and yellow checkers and stripes onto these to give
them a little medieval style and the free handing wasn't over yet as i decided to commit to classic
blue black and white gradient power swords i painted them blue and then painstakingly glazed
many many thin coats of black and white until i had some crackling energy swords as painful as it
was to create this effect it is pretty magical to paint that line of white and see them come to life
three straight hours of free handing later the end is in sight holy moly looks like all i got
left is the eyes and the bases i used to paint classic games workshop lenses on all my marines
but it's hard to do and it doesn't even look that great so now i do a simpler method i brought back
my warm palette and then loaded up with some red i base coated the lenses with red paint and then a
fat stripe of pink and then a little line of white and then i glaze a very thin watery red over top
of everything then it was time for my bases and my black templar stand on simple light brown earth
also inspired by john blanchard i just airbrushed thin down earth i like to spray thin paint on the
base so i can control how saturated the color gets and if i splash it onto the model it's too
thin to completely cover what's underneath then a dry brushing of gray to desaturate the color a
little then the only thing left to do was to paint the rim of the base black then the sword brethren
the greatest duelists of the legion were ready to join the crusade these models turned out great and
i didn't need to spend a hundred and thirty six dollars worth of games workshop paint to do it how
about that after well over 200 black templar space marines the painting fatigue has definitely set in
and i have taken a few long breaks in between adding to the crusade but every time i dip my
toe back in i'm reminded why they're my favorite chapter the blade guard veterans are some of the
most storied marines in the crusade having proved themselves over and over in countless battles
all space marines are peerless warriors but the veterans are truly one-man armies
when it's time to select a new marshal to lead the crusade it is from the ranks of the sword
brother and they are chosen and the leaders of the chapters like castellans and chaplains are often
accompanied in a battle by members of the sword brother and create an unstoppable melee machine
i really like how these fellows turned out and if i had used decals and a simpler effect on
the power weapons that would have been a nice easy painting project i didn't paint anything i didn't
want to i didn't highlight any skulls i didn't paint the in between parts of his armor and how
many of you noticed i didn't paint the back of his dick tabard i bet none of you did until i pointed
it out you don't have to paint everything a lot of stuff can be left just as a dry brush or a primer
these three blade guard veterans being finished also brings me one step closer to joining the
exclusive ranks of the actually finished painting indominus club it's a very exclusive
club games workshop sold thousands and thousands of those boxes and i bet not a lot of people have
actually finished everything i haven't finished everything although i'm i'm getting kinda close
i have painted every single necron except for i'm only halfway through the scorpek destroyer lord
not nearly have i done such a good job on the space marines i've only finished five assault
intercessors some of the heroes and that's about it i also accidentally stepped on my bladeguard
ancient and ruined it so i might have to track another one of those down on ebay but i'm getting
close and that is exciting i hope you guys enjoyed the video and as always thanks for watching