Sláine: Kiss My Paintbrush!

Ran out of layouts on the last post but still have more comparison shots:

I’m using non-Warlord miniatures in my project and @demonsub has asked to see some size comparison shots.  There have been quite a few Sláine adjacent ranges over the years so this will take a few photos.  Firstly, the Warlord models are 32-35mm sized but how big is that?

Compare to standard reference monopose Space Marine and GW Gondorian swordsman:

Alternative ranges I’m planning on using are from:

Alternative Armies Erin, Brigade Models Celtos, Fantasy Forge/Harlequin (some of the Roy Eastland sculpts are available through North Star Figures), Wargames Foundry 2000AD range (oop),Warlord Chronopia (Target oop) and  Confrontation Sessairs

First up, the main man himself:

So we can see that ranges aren’t even consistent to themselves, Warlord’s two unwarped versions are different sizes and there is a huge difference in the various Foundry models.  So far so unclear.

Next up the Fomorians:

First finished miniature from another manufacturer.  This one is a Celtos miniature, now sold by Brigade Models.  Same AP Speedpaints as before – loving the Orc Skin on the snakes which I brightened up with some Plasmatic Bolt.

I’ve had a big order of Alternative Armies Erin miniatures arrive.  I bought some more Fomorians, Fir Bolg and Sidhe to be able to add a couple of extra factions.  Super excited about getting them done.

Finally there is some extra scatter from Ainsty Castings.  Standing stones and a dolmen.  Standard reference Skull Sword for scale purposes.

A Wicker Man is featured in a number of storylines.  Warlord’s publicity table setup features this model which is called Alan and is from Ainsty Castings.  He comes with an alternate head to make a wickerman monster and a Green Man mask for any folk horror weirdness you may want to get into.  The basic version is great for us.
Black undercoat and then drybrushed with a makeup brush in progressive layers of: Citadel Khemri Brown, Vallejo Flat Brown (patchy), Vallejo Japanese Uniform WWII (patchy) and then a light drybrush with Citadel Dheneb Stone.  It takes a while to build up the depth of colour that looks right and the two patchy colours provides a bit of colour variation across the surface which doesn’t show so well in the photos.  Woodwork has been overpainted with Contrast Snakebite Leather and the wood around the feet has been tinted with a range of different brown colours, thin glazes to ensure the highlights show through.
The model is huge – 250mm/10 inches tall.  Standard reference Skull Sword for comparison purposes.

The Warped version of Sláine was zenith undercoated and then I worked a blend of Citadel Contrast Magos Purple and Vulpus Pink into all of the grey undertones that escaped the white zenith.  The idea behind the purple is that the Warp Spasm must cause an enormous blood pressure rush and therefore the complexion will be very purple.  Once this was dry I switched to Speedpaints again and started with Purple academy to blend into the low-lights.  I then mixed this into some Crusader skin for the mid-tone and painted this into the deeper muscle recesses.  Remaining white areas were covered in neat Crusader skin.

As this is a character model some additional attention was paid with Vallejo Tan being used to highlight the upper areas of shaded muscles.  This was then blended into some Vallejo Pale Flesh to create a lighter highlight which reinforced some mid tone upper muscle areas. The popping and bulging veins were reinforced with the pink/purple contrast.  Then a final highlight withe the lightest skintone, and on the highest areas a very thin glase of pure Pale Skin.

Other details were painted with the usual speedpaints, Gravelord Grey and palid Bone for his axe, Brainbiter.  The cloth is a blend of Sand Golem, Palid Bone and Zealot Yellow.  Hair is Grim Black.

The eye sockets had a nice deep pink/purple from the first contrast layer.  Eyeballs were picked out in white for a good effect.

It was the Exmouth Club’s Legionary Show on Saturday.  First show I’ve been to since before The Event.  A highlight for me is always the Bring and Buy.  Once again the Fates shone kindly and I spotted these in a ziplock for £8.  Thank you Earth Goddess!

These three are from the now OOP Foundry 200AD range.  The Horned God and Sláine the King in the front and Warped Slaine behind.  Now I can paint up the other Warped One and we can compare and contrast.

All of the Drune characters care finished.  Speedpaints as before with some additional layering and highlights, particularly on the skin for Medb and Megrim.  First up, Medb and Robym.  Medb has a Talassar Blue Contrast cloak with some of the uneven blobs re-layered and highlighted.  The chainmail is AP Holy White with a broad highlight of Wolf Grey and then selected highest-lights with White.

Megrim.  I like a purple highlight over a black cloak, especially for “evil” characters.  This was AP Grim Black with P3 Sanguine Highlight over the top.

Drune Priest.

Slough Throt.

And coming soon.  What will this be…?

For the Lord Weird I had a go at wet blending.  These AP Speedpaints stay wet and workable on the model for a while and don’t stain the same way some inks and contrast paints will.  This allowed a nice wet blend working up from a Dark Wood and Hardened Leather blend through pure Hardened Leater to a blend with Sand golem to pure Sand Golem with the zenith underneath helping the notion of light/tone transition.

Other parts were treated similar to previous models with the Sand Golem/finger wipe highlights on the antlers.  The bone colour on the scull he is holding was reinforcesd with some Vallejo Bone White.  The sickle bronze effect was a brown mixed as part of the wet blending on the skin.  This was overpainted with Citadel Technical Nihilakh Oxide (why is it called that GW?) for the verdigris.

The base is the only one not in the standard flocking scheme.  He is modelled to stand on skulls already, like in the art, so I filled the rest of the base with skulls from the Citadel Skulls plastic kit and the painted Dark Wood, wiping off the tops for the highlight.

Finally there was a thinned wash of Malignant Green added between the skulls and given to selected areas of the figure to give an unnatural look to him, he is well over 10,000 years old after all.

This week the project got one of these 🙂

All the Skull Swords.  Used the same scheme as the pre-release miniature.  The cloth is Slaughter Red.  I’m loving the NMM steel effect, especially on the champion’s 2 handed axe.

Here are the three units of Skull Swords:

And these are the three champions.