Painting Boar Fur

I’ve had several requests recently, some for me to just get back to blogging, others for specific tutorials, well, I took all of it on board and decided to do something no one had asked for.

This will be my second tutorial on Fur, but this time with a difference. My first tutorial focused on creating a fur effect by painting individual stands of hair. However, that is a long process, usually pretty rewarding, but I thought I’d present a different option. Drybrushing is a technique I have often shied away from, primarily because it is difficult to disguise the technique in the end result. However, recently I’ve been experimenting, so let me present my tips for painting boar fur.

I started with a basecoat of Mournfang Brown and washed it with Devlan Mud.

Then I drybrushed on a layer of Baneblade Brown. To do this I took my largest brush (a #2) and put a very thin layer of the paint on. Then very gently brushed the model, applying as little pressure as possible. My goal here is to highlight detail without creating a clumping effect. Also I wanted to follow the direction of the fur as much as possible to help keep the detail crisp. Then I added highlights in Karak Stone using the same technique.

The fur was then washed again with Devlan Mud to deepen the recesses and lower the overall tone.

After this had been allowed to dry I added more drybrushed highlights. Starting all over with Baneblade Brown before adding progressively lighter highlights using Karak Stone and then Bleached Bone. The spine and ears and tail were drybrushed with Russ Grey and then Administratum Grey. The belly was more heavily brushed with Balor Brown, then Tallarn Sand and Bleached Bone. 

Next I worked on the snout which I wanted to blend into the fur. The teeth were done with Tallarn Sand, followed by Bleached Bone and washed with Ogryn Flesh. Then I mixed up some Elf Flesh with Ogryn Flesh and Lahmian Medium and applied this very thin wash to the snout and inner ears. I made sure to let the wash run into the fur to allow me to create a transition later.

More Elf Flesh was added to the snout and ears to define the detail, before washing again with the same mix as before.

Pink was then added to Elf Flesh and some white to add highlights to the snout and front of the bottom lip only. Progressive highlights were added by adding more white to the mix.

Then more wash was applied to blend this down, again working it into the fur. Lahmian Medium will allow you to create these kinds of transitions quite easily, without too much of a gloss effect.

With that done I mixed up some Mournfang Brown wash (adding Orgyn Flesh) and washed the fur all over.

The fur was once again drybrushed to bring the detail back out again using the same colours as before.

 

Finally, I added one more set of washes, in different quantities to each boar. Black was washed into the spine and some of the deeper recesses, whilst a brown was was added to the flanks and face, with a tallarn sand and lahmian medium wash added to the underside. The black and brown washes both had a little ink in them to make the shade deeper. A coat of Lahmian medium over the top of these removed the gloss the wash produced. I also added a quick brushing of mud (using weathering powders) to the legs to give the impression that these guys spent a lot of time wading about in filth. Finally I added their eyes, brown, with a black pupil and a tiny dot of white, then based them and I was done. Incidentally the bases are from Fenris Games, I decided to base the models (and all subsequent cavalry) on 25 x 50mm bases because it works better on a battlemap/board game than the round 40mm bases.

 

I hope this was helpful and informative, until next time, have fun gaming…

 

The Duke