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[Reserve][images]Assembling and Painting Guardsmen

Submitted By: Date: September 16, 2005, 03:08:56 PM Views: 5089
Summary: In this tutorial, I'll take a look at the different steps I go through when assembling and painting my guardsmen. I've chosen to chronicle the process of assembling and painting a remnants squad. This gives me the option of including a minor conversion and a representative selection of basic guardsmen. I could have painted a complete infantry squad, but that would've involved painting quite a few extra models with little extra explanatory value attached to them. I also feel that heavy weapons are worthy of an article all to themselves. On to the actual article:

Paints used:



Chaos black (spray can and paint pot)
Codex grey
Ghostly grey
Skull white
Graveyard earth
Dark flesh
Snakebite leather
Bleached bone
Scab red
Red gore
Dwarf flesh
Elf flesh
Boltgun metal
Tin bitz



Step 1



I selected the parts I wanted to use for the models, removed them from the sprues and lined them up to get an idea of how they would end up looking. I had already assembled the sergeant prior to deciding to make this step-by-step article.

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Step 2


Now it was a case of shaving off all the flash and mould lines with a hobby knife. After having cleaned all legs, I glued them to the bases. Then came torsos, heads and so on. It pays to fiddle around a bit with parts before applying glue, so you end up with a realistic pose.

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Step 3


Now for the sergeant conversion. This kind of conversion is completely optional, and not all people will like seeing a guardsman running around with a bloody trophy, but I'm quite happy with the fellow. Something's got to represent the die-hards and hardened fighters doctrines. I took my inspiration from Cpl. Andor (BGB pg. 246).
I'd already given him a space marine pistol holster, Empire artillerycrewman head and a chopped off head from the ork boxed set. However, the area where the head met the sergeant's hand was still a bit messy, so it was green stuff time. I filled up the gap and used a needle point to give the green stuff a hair texture, dragging it in vertical lines. I'd found the sculpting too's edge to be insufficiently sharp to get a realistic hair effect. When using green stuff, take care to keep your sculpting tool wet whenever you manipulate the green stuff with it, to prevent the two sticking together. The same goes for your working surface and hands. I still had some green stuff left, which I used to create the small ridge on the base, not having anything better to do with it.

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Step 4


Finally a picture in broad daylight, so you can see the actual colours. I now glued sand to the bases with PVA glue, as well as a few small pebbles here and there. This is best kept to a minimum, to avoid cluttering the base.

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Step 5


This stage consisted of spray painting the models chaos black. You will inevitably miss a few spots, so touch them up with a paintbrush and some chaos black from a paint pot.

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Step 6


I now painted the helmets, torso flak armour, fatigues, winged skulls, chest eagles and the sergeant's stripes codex grey. I took care to keep the recesses chaos black, to simulate depth. The chainsword, boots and shin guards, left shoulderpads, gunbutts and gun casings had thin codex grey stripes applied to the edges as highlights. The sand on the bases was drybrushed with codex grey as well.

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Step 7


I now painted chaos black stripes on the fatigues. You'll want to leave a lot of codex grey showing, to avoid the camo scheme looking cluttered. I made this mistake on my first 50 or so guardsmen, and their fatigues look all cluttered and messy. It doesn't show that much from a distance, thankfully.

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Step 8


The camo scheme was now completed with ghostly grey stripes. As with the chaos black stripes, don't go overboard. Less is definitely more. The chest eagles, winged skulls and the sergeant's stripes were also painted ghostly grey. When doing the chest eagles and winged skulls, take care to leave codex grey in the recesses, to simulate depth. The helmets and codex grey parts of the flak armour were highlighted with ghostly grey as well.

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Step 9


All flesh areas were now painted dwarf flesh. The recesses were left chaos black, like the codex grey areas.

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Step 10


I now highlighted the flesh areas with elf flesh.

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Step 11


The various metal areas were painted boltgun metal. Again, the recessed areas were left chaos black.

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Step 12


Parts of the bases were drybrushed with graveyard earth, followed by bleached bone. I left roughly 50 percent of the original codex grey showing. This adds some additional colour and liveliness to an otherwise mostly grey and black model.
The chopped off head's hair was painted dark flesh, highlighted with a roughly equal parts mix of dark flesh and skull white.
All leather straps, webbing, the sergeant's hair and bandage were painted snakebite leather. The bandage and chopped off head were then painted with bleached bone. The sergeant's hair was highlighted with an equal parts mix of bleached bone and snakebite leather.
All right shoulderpads were painted with a thin coat of scab red, followed by another two thin coats of red gore. You'll need this many to get proper coverage.
The chest eagles, winged skulls and sergeant's stripes were then highlighted with skull white.
The flamer's muzzle was drybrushed tin bitz, followed by a chaos black drybrush on the very tip.

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Step 13


The sergeant's head wound and the chopped off head had blood painted onto them with watered down scab red. Think of the blood effect you're after. Did it seep through a layer of cloth/bandage? Did it splatter about or run freely from a wound? These are the three most important effects you can simulate.
The red shoulderpads were highlighted with an equal parts mix of red gore and skull white.
The red shoulderpads had my regiment's number painted onto them: 76 for the 76th Thracian Guard. I copied the style from the Cadian transfer sheets. I handpainted them because transfers always end up looking shiny and unnatural. Not to mention the fact that the Cadian transfer sheet doesn't even come with the right numbers.
The black shoulderpads had the company, platoon and squad designations painted onto them: 133 for 1st company, 3rd platoon, 3rd squad.
I then applied static grass to the bases to finish off the models.

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