Hello guys, welcome back to Not Just Mecha, it s Marco here and today we speedpaint vampires
with the fastest and most efficient process you have ever seen!
This is the third episode of the speedpainting series dedicated to Cursed City and if you
are new to the channel, I strongly suggest you start from the skeletons.
I painted all these miniatures in a couple of days working them as part of an ideal army
and the mood of the models, the colour I chose and the techniques I m going to use are all
connected to the big picture and dependant or in contrast with my previous choices so
consider the three videos as a single one! As always don t worry if you don t have these
precise models because I put the accent on the techniques and the reasons behind every
little choice so you ll be able to transfer and adapt these ideas to any other model or
army. Until this point I loosely followed the official
colour scheme but I find the one used for the humanoid vampires a bit too bland and
subdued so I played with the theme tinkering with the relative quantities of its tones
and their saturation to give the idea of something different, more powerful and quote unquote
alive, still keeping the general aesthetic tight and coherent.
In the lore they are well fed vampires of a feral bloodline, chosen from the nobility
of the city so I don t want for them the rough cadaverous look of zombies and skeletons but
the one of slick apex predators fuelled by the magical power of blood.
For skeletons and zombies the foundation of the colour scheme is in these cold tones with
an accent of warm red that ties them to the bloody heraldry of the enemies so to show
the jump in the hierarchy I literally switch these proportions. The colours are the same
so I don t have to worry about their harmony when they are all together on the table but
you can easily tell that they are something different.
This is always a good way to add subtle diversity or highlight specific units and heroes without
breaking the uniformity of an army. Don t forget to SUBSCRIBE and hit the bell
button to always know what happens on the channel and if you want to support my work, like,
comment, share watch another video and maybe check my Patreon page where you can find the
real time footage of my videos with every single little line and brushstroke! Thanks
a million guys! Let s start immediately with a game changing
trick! These are the colours I m going to use to prime the models. We tend to consider
priming like a stage independent from painting, something we do only to seal the plastic and
create a better textural surface for the next layers but as any canvas painter can tell
you, the primer can do much more than that. Working on the zombies you saw me priming
in blue to introduce from the beginning a strong cold note able to influence all the
following tones but if you need more than a single chromatic sensation you can simply
use more colours from the beginning. I want the core of the bodies to be pale but
with a strong warm red note as if they have just ingested a ton of blood. But moving away
from the centre I want the skin to become stretched, inflamed and then livid and dead
or completely mutated into unnatural animal paws.
In terms of materials you have several options to tackle priming in this way:
you can use proper coloured primers, Vallejo for example has an entire line of cheap chromatic
surface primers or like in my case simply use paints that you know have a good grab
and general resistance or you can even use standard acrylics, maybe boosting their toughness
with a light coat of varnish on top. Working on few models this approach has a
tiny impact on the working time but if are painting an army it can save you a couple
of days of boring work. Army painting is not necessarily speed painting but even if you
are not in hurry this helps projecting you immediately into the fun part of the painting
process keeping awake your interest and inspiration. As you can see, I don t really care about
transitions and even if I m using the airbrush for speed you can clearly see a strong line
where two colours meet. This is just a quick colour blocking to set the lose proportions
of the various colours on the model, but the fluidity of the shade is something that will
be created by the following layers! As direct consequence of the multiple tones
of the priming step I m going to use multiple tones for my zenithal light!
I use a simple grey for the bases and their architectural elements. I want the focus to
stay on the models so I set from the beginning a low saturation on these parts painting a
foundation softly modulated by the different values of the volumes but with a flat grey
that will tone down the vibrancy of anything on top.
I don t touch the blue at the very end of hands and feet because I want it dark and
livid and it naturally blends into the cold violet without extra work, but I use a light
magenta to highlight these upper, warmer parts. I chose this strong chromatic and value jump
to set a good contrast with the first layer and to facilitate its blending with the major
skin tone of the core. This is the layer that changes everything
and the step that in few seconds brings the models from the primer to I would say 80%
finished. I came up with this idea trying to make more interesting a bunch of little
Skaven; usually I like to add the underlying colours on top of the basic skin tone to make
them more powerful but sometimes because of the small size, low definition of the sculpt
or a complicated pose it s difficult to follow this path. The humanoid vampires are little,
with small and smooth muscles and in dynamic complicated poses so, like on the Skaven troopers,
a linear layering is an easier and more efficient option. Even if the colour from the bottle,
is a classic, quite basic skin tone, the extreme value and tonal jump between the two layers
helps creating the sense of something alien and unnatural full of interesting tones in
every little volume. It s also a light and neutral base for the oils that need a receptive
canvas for their load of extra colours and sensations!
At this stage they lack definition but the load of chromatic information you can get
with two simple steps is something crazy! You can see how the Vargskyr in particular
is already quite close to the box art! I close this stage with just a tiny bit of
white. Its main contribute is on the strong, highlight of the flowing hair to give the
idea of shine, like on non-metallic metal, but I extend the spray also to the upper parts
of the muscles to set the maximum amount of contrast possible on the pale skins.
I quickly paint the fur using on this modulated undertone some of the tones I used to paint
the wood on zombies and skeletons. This greenish brown is a secondary, supporting tone but
still integral part of the army s scheme so I must find a way to add it to these models.
It doesn t matter that this is a totally different material, later I ll set better that difference
with blends and textures, but I need to use it for the sake of uniformity. The overgrown
pubic hair/furry pants are perfect for this role. Plus, the green sensation coming from
Militarum green is great to create contrast next to the red and violet tones of the skin.
Following the box art I use Basilicanum Grey to add a darker tone to the upper parts of
the masses of fur on the Vargskyr trying to use multiple, delicate brushstrokes to create
extra lines and the illusion of extra movements inside the single strands.
Another major detail is the red tone of the hair so I invest a couple of extra steps to
make it more striking. I apply a base of flesh tearer red on top
of the modulated underpainting to obtain a deep solid tone with a bit of internal movement.
Red is all about luminosity, so I come back with white ink to boost the lighter tone I
ll put on top of the deeper red. You know that I usually don t mask my models before
spraying but here the stakes are too high to risk anything; the skin is basically done
and in the next step I m going to spray a super saturated red so even a single pigment
in the wrong spot will be seen from miles away!
So white ink followed by blood angles red. The cool thing is that you can repeat this
step multiple times to obtain more and more luminosity and vibrancy with every new iteration.
I close the progression with a light pass of fluorescent orange. I used yellowish note
on the other models, but here the kick of the fluorescent paint will give to the vampires
something more. Fangs and claws are based with a simple coat
of Akhelian green. And the armours with a mix of a dark silver
mixed with black and turquoise ink. This is not the metallic contrast paint I used on
the skeletons; here I don t have an interesting modulation of the underpainting to maintain
or shapes that can benefit form that behaviour, so I use inks simply to add tones while boosting
the shine of the metallic paint with their finish. Still, the extreme fluidity and the
high saturation of the mix make this layer super quick and easy to apply.
Time for oil paints! The block on the left is for the skins and the block on the right
is mainly for the bases. The application in this paint job is similar to the one used
on the zombies but in the last video I used them to tone down, desaturate and fuse the
colours, while here I use them for saturation and to visually separate the different sections.
You can see from the strong, vibrant colours on the palette that the game here is totally
different. And since I want them to have a more powerful impact on the surface, I add
less thinner to make the mix stick better to the models while delivering more pigments
per units of surface. On the zombies I painted random patches to
create a natural free flowing chaos of tones, but here the application is very precise and
the placement is clearly based on the work of the previous layers.
Mimicking the blocks used for priming I create a transition from blue to magenta, dark and
light red. These colours are progressive in the colour wheel and they mix well into each
other creating new saturated shades, so you don t have to worry about muddy results, and
you can use the brush to blend the edges of these blocks as you need.
I use a bit of brown as neutral, transitional tone in the central parts of the skin. I use
green on the fur and I don't want it to mix with red because it's a complementary hue,
but brown can easily bridge the two tones blending with them in harmoniuos colours!
I wait 15-20 minutes to give the thinner the time to evaporate and I start cleaning.
At this point you know well how it works. I dampen the q-tips with just a bit of white
spirit only working on the big guy, mainly to speed up the process on its large volumes.
And I clean the other models with dry q-tips because I don t want to risk taking off too
much from their small smooth shapes. For the sake of chromatic coherency, to paint
my definition, extreme highlights, and textures I use the exact same tones I used on the zombies.
They will be great for all the peripheral parts, but I also add a light skin tone to
be able to better connect the colours when moving to the central areas.
Let s be brutally honest! These are already much much more than battle ready models and
I needed less than two hours to arrive at this point. I can t consider this step optional
especially if you are working on a small warband or an elite group like this one but if you
skip it while working on a bunch of troopers, well I won t tell anyone.
Jokes aside even if I love to creep on details and I have all the time in the world to add
more and more stuff I feel that I don t have much to do on the smooth bodies of the little
guys but I have simply to enhance what it s already there.
A major part of the work is made by the ruins that because of their virtual material and
strong geometric shapes need a good amount of sharp definition. Usually, I do very little
on these parts because I want the strong eye-catching definition completely focused on the models,
but in this case the ruins have a finish and blending too similar to the characters and
the extra time invested in their textures and volumes makes them clearly different under
every visual aspect. The work on the bodies is mainly on faces
and extremities. It s a subtle detail but working on the blue, magenta transition I
use light brushstrokes to simulate the movement of a fine layer of short fur. This sensation
creates a nice contrast of consistencies with the sleek muscles of the upper parts.
Oils naturally create a super smooth finish but it's quite unrealistic to have that kind
of smoothness everywhere. Breaking the uniformity with these elements, even if they are really
subtle, you get extra definition, variety and realism!
Similar process on the actual sculpted fur where I add just a bit of high and extreme
shine. I m quite conservative on the central skin
but on the faces, I add a ton of little lines and wrinkles to define better the expressions
and take something away from their apparent humanity.
The work on the Vargskyr is 100% pure texturing using only thick undiluted paint. This guy
is made of wrinkles and rough skin so it s all about little lines and dots everywhere.
At the beginning I thought this was going to be the most interesting part of the video
but because of the amazing behaviour of oils and the fact that details are so many and
so defined and obvious, detailing becomes just highlighting a bit what s already there.
Don t get me wrong this is a great thing for speed painting that means also that the model
has been sculpted with easy painting in mind but yeah it was too easy lol.
An high level of visual noise works well on this kind of feral models so I use again brushstrokes
and thick paint to add textures to every flat area.
I close this step with a simple highlight on the metal parts using thin broken lines
to enhance the sharp angles and add a ton of little scratches.
And here s the final result! Four hours of work only because I used four hours in all
the recent videos but taking off the compulsive detailing I did on the little vampires because
I had the extra time and I was having a ton of fun I could have stopped at the third hour
still having something really cool to put on the table. As always, I expand a lot the
explanation of every step to let you know the reasons and the micro problem solving
involved in the process but at the end what I ve done is just priming, zenithal light,
oils wash and highlights, and I can t wait to see how you ll use these ideas for your
models!