Dan’s 2026 Side Projects

It’s been a while since I tried gold non-metallic metal. In fact, I’ve only done it once before and that was back in November 2020!

Midas Nymph

How time flies!

This time I started by painting the gold areas Rhinox Hide. I then transitioned to Deathclaw Brown, then Averland Sunset, then finally Screaming Skull. For each transition, I first did a layer of the first colour, then a layer of 3:1 mix, then 1:1, then 1:3, then finally a layer of the next pure colour. Each layer covered a slightly smaller area than the last. That’s right – I did 13 layers of paint for this effect.

The Mummy’s bandages where XV-88, highlighted with Tallarn Sand followed by Karak Stone.

The blue bits on the golem were Macragge Blue highlighted with Calgar Blue.

The sand bases were Steel Legion, highlighted with Balor Brown followed by Zamesi Desert. They were then given a wash with seraphim sepia. The rims were painted Abaddon Black.

The skin was painted death world forest, then layered up adding in first elysian green followed by ogryn camo.

The loin cloth was painted dryad bark and highlighted with doombull brown.

The rope belt was painted  xv-88 and highlighted tallarn sand.

The chunk of meat was painted mournefang brown and highlighted with skrag brown.

The bone was painted zandri dustb then highlighted with ushabti bone.

The hair on the Troll’s head and back were washed with athonian camoshade.

The base was painted rhinox hide and highlighted up with zamesi desert. The rim was painted abaddon black.

A fairly simple paint scheme for this one, although I tried my best to replicate the glow effect from within the Dragon’s chest.

The model was painted all over with screamer pink and then highlighted with  pink horrow and then pink horrow mixed with white scar.

The chest area was then painted with  flash gitz mixed with  white scar, highlighted up with more white scar added to each layer. Then I went back to the outer areas of the chest and repainted the higher areas with screamer pink.

The base was painted rhinox hide and highlighted up with zamesi desert. The rim was painted abaddon black.

I finished the Castle hero models which I forgot to do along with the rest of the Castle faction models. The colour scheme is detailed here: https://www.beastsofwar.com/project-entry/1955682/

These are the last of the settlement models that I’d missed as I painted the various factions sets, plus the four campsite tokens.

They wee all undercoated grey seer.

The dragon utopia had its walls painted with gryph-hound orange and the roof tiles gore-grunta fur.

The campsite tokens were painted iyanden yellow, with gryph-hound orange painted over the top two thirds, and then blood angels red painted on to the tips. The bases were painted gore-grunta fur.

The three faction bases were all painted apothecary white to give some shading. The Rampart walls were then washed with agrax earthshade and the roofs painted gore-grunta fur.

The Dungeon was washed nuln oil.

The Fortress was painted athonian cammoshade.

The greenery on the bases were painted militarum green and the rocks on the bases skeleton horde. The base rims were painted abaddon black.

For the Rampart faction models I wanted to use the same painting technique, but adapt it to make it lighter and brighter.

The models were undercoated wraithbone then painted all over with apothercary white.

The following shade paints were then used:

1. Reikland fleshshade on the skin.
2. Agrax earthshade on the wood.
3. Carroburg crimson for the arrow feathers.
4. Casandora yellow for the hair and dragon scales.
5. Biel-tan green for the flags and grass.
6. Fuegan orange for parts of the dragon.
7. Basilicanum grey (a contrast paint) for the stones.

The metal areas were then painted with ironbreaker (no wash, shading, or highlights to keep the metal looking bright and shiny). The base rims were painted abaddon black.

I thought the Dungeon models would also be well suited to the darker painting style I used on my last set of models. Given the hard bit with the last lot was watering down the paints to make washes, for this batch I had the genius idea of just using washes from the beginning.

The models were undercoated greyseer then painted all over with basilicanum grey contrast paint. I then applied various washes (listed below) using paints from Games Workshops’ shade range.

1. Athonian cammoshade
2. Feugan orange
3. Biel-tan green
4. Carroburg crimson
5. Casandora yellow
6. Drakenhof nightshade
7. Druchii violet
8. Agrax earthshade
9. Reikland fleshshade
10. Seraphim sepia

The metallic bits were painted either ironbreaker or auric armour gold and then given a wash of nuln oil.

The Evil Eye’s tentacle tips were painted white scar then given a glaze of guilliman blue.

The Harpy wings were dry brushed administratum grey.

I left the bases as painted by the contrast paint, but painted the rims with abaddon black.

Following the painting style I tried for the first time on the Rogue (see my last project entry), I wanted to work on this dark gritty style some more.

All these models, with a few exceptions, detailed below, followed the following recipe:

1. Undercoat grey seer.
2. Pain the entire model, including base, with basilicanum grey.
3. Paint each area with a colour paint, watered down roughly 50:50 to make a wash/glaze.
4. Tie all the colours together with a wash of roughly 4:1 lahmium medium:basilicanum grey.
5. The bases were painted with talassar blue and plaguebearer flesh.
6. The base rims were painted abaddon black.

The colours used were flayed one flesh, deathclaw brown, loren forest, averland sunset, caledor sky, pink horror, warboss green, runefang steel, xereus purple, doombull brown, ushabti bone and evil sunz scarlet.

The Gorgon is supposed to have metallic skin, so after the coat of basilicanum grey the model was dry brushed runefang steel. The colour washes mostly covered all the metallic effect, so the model was dry brushed runefang steel again after the colours had been applied.

Overall I think this works really well to make some dark, broody looking miniatures. The final wash really ties them all together. I need more practice turning normal paint colours into washes.