How Not To Paint: Otherworld Shriekers

In a continuing bid to make this blog more informative than a high school scrapbook I thought I’d bring you a step by step guide as to how I painted my latest Otherworld model… The Shrieker.

Unlike any other painting guide I might do, the first step here is to under coat the model White (rather than black) There is no need to be neat but use a primer if you have one to give a good solid base.  Next I washed the model with Chestnut Brown.Next the top was undercoated with Royal Purple.  Then all the raised surfaces were highlighted with Khaki. This can be rough because the whole thing will be washed down later.  Then all the raised areas of the mushroom stalk were highlighted with Sand.Followed by White.  By this stage I was working reasonably neatly. I don’t worry too much about where the detail is sculpted on the model, I use my brush to add texture. Next I painted the dots on the cap in Tanned Flesh and the fringe around the cap in Tanned Flesh followed by Blue Grey just for variety. Although this should be reasonably neat an ink wash will help pick out the details and remove some mistakes. Next I washed the whole stalk over with Blue Grey. Don’t worry… It may look like I just ruined the last hours work, but I always intended to make the stalk grey. Why did I paint it Khaki first then? Building up a base coat of other colours, in this case Khaki adds depth, the variations in the grey will be greater than they would have been had I just used grey from the start. Also all these layers mean that chips don't tend to show through if the model sees a lot of table time. You will also see in this photo that I’ve started to work on shelf mushrooms. These are basecoated in Chocolate Brown. Then painted over with Rust. Highlighted with Sand. A thin layer of Rust over the top of that. Washed in Chocolate Brown. Highlighted with Sand again then finally another thin Layer of Rust over that. Each additional highlight should be thinner and closer to the edge of the fungus.

While I waited for the Blue Grey wash to dry I washed undiluted purple ink over cap.   Next the stalk was highlighted (patchily) in white to allow some of the Sand and Khaki to still show through. Finally several little details were finished. I added some patches of Chocolate Brown wash to the base of the stalk and under the cap. I then further highlighted these washes with a Khaki wash. The underneath of the cap was then highlighted with Sand and finally washed over with undiluted Purple ink which was allowed to “spill” a little into the recesses near the top of the stalk. The recesses in the cap were filled with Flesh Wash ink. To finish, base with the material of your choice. And that’s how I spent almost 2 and a half hours painting a single Mushie!  All paints mentioned are produced by Game Craft (available through Ral Partha Europe) and all inks are Vallejo. To produce my group of fungi I will vary the colours used, in particular the washes and the dots on the cap to give each mushroom a distinct individual feel, while the actual techniques used should draw them together and unify them as a group.

Hopefully this was informative and fun (?) next week I will try and bring you a How Not Paint Violet Fungi guide to show how, using different colours, the same techniques can provide different results.

If you like these guides let me know and I’ll try to keep doing them. Obviously they take longer to produce so please let me know if they are being useful to you.

The Duke