Painting some infinity models

Transcript

Siocast complaint of the day

Want to start this video off by saying: Siocast — or whatever this stuff is that Corvus Belli uses — sucks. As I’m holding this guy together, hopefully the super glue works. It feels like it doesn’t.

Crunch week

I’m in the crunch zone. I’ve got this Infinity commission — it’s been a nightmare from the start, but I’m in the final week. Was expecting July; now it has to be done by the end of the week. Bad bad.

Luckily, everything else I’m just painting at tabletop level. I went above and beyond on Maximus. The rest of these guys — tabletop level. My tabletop level is pretty high, lot of airbrush, but it’s not what Maximus got.

Getting the rest of them built. I didn’t realize I had some of them not built, like this guy. So this weekend is all about getting as much work into these guys as possible: prime them, airbrush them, airbrush them some more. Then the rest of the week I can do brushwork without needing big sit-down sessions.

Airbrush over zenithal

About three hours in. Everybody’s built. Everybody’s primed with zenithal. Almost done with Maximus — finished up the non-metal metallic. Time to do some thinking about Onyx.

Looking at the boxes again — looking at Human Sphere — I think it’ll actually be faster to not use the airbrush for the troopers. These models are perfect for contrast paint: I can bang it out, highlight it, and get pretty close to the box art. Not really worth messing with the airbrush for the boots when I can do the same thing pretty fast with a brush.

But for the alien centerpiece, airbrush time. There aren’t tutorials on this one — really a test. Starting with a green that’s probably closer to his mane than the body. Going to hit everything with this and see where I can come back in with yellow.

A couple drops, splash of water, a couple drops of flow improver. Vibing. Practicing being careful with where the paint goes, because I’m going to try to cut in a lot of stuff with the airbrush down the road.

I know this is the wrong color for the skin, but it’s pretty spot on for the mane to work up from. I’m just going to overspray — got to get it done. Laying the base of green, picking it up a lot, leaving the shadows.

Yellow into the green

Now Vallejo Game Ink Yellow — a few drops to push the green brighter. Want to keep this off the bottom of the mane, but get it on the hands, arms, and legs since they’re a lot brighter green. Don’t forget the backside.

Starting to get our different tones — values, tones, whatever. I don’t know what I’m doing. I’m going through some really hard shit right now in my life, honestly. I just got a paintbrush and a commission that’s stressing me out and I don’t know what I’m doing. Are any of us? Does anybody know what they’re doing? Does anything ever really get better? I don’t know.

Greener on the legs than on the face. Now we’re going to mess it all up. Watermarked the belly — got to tease it back out, make sure I don’t have a hard line that’ll make texture later, because I’m coming back in with more yellow on the belly.

The sickly belly

This bottle’s almost empty and I’d never use it normally, but this only has to be a one-off. Slowly working up to a crazier sickly yellow on the belly. Very slowly on the trigger. Turning yellow now — that sickly yellow color. Sometimes it’s better to be lucky than good. I’m not very lucky, but here, I’ll take it.

Getting a little on the tail. Hitting the abs hard, then feathering them out. With that first green underneath, the shadow really comes in. Is it one-to-one to the box art? No. Did I do it in 10 minutes? Yes. Does it look pretty damn good? Yes. That’s what matters.

Scary white pass

Now the scary part — taking some Vallejo Model Air white and going right in the middle of his face. Leaving some yellow in there. Way more white than I wanted in the cup, but here we go. Hit the middle of the face, feather it out over the top.

The middle of the face is going to be painted as flesh later, so just think about that beard. We’re pretty close. Not perfect — but I’m coming in with a wash and brushwork still. Pretty damn close.

Why I’m putting the airbrush down

I might actually be done airbrushing on these projects. I’ll airbrush the bases when bases time comes, but if I come in with my normal painting style on the troopers, it might be faster than the airbrush.

Because — my sink fell off the wall and took the water line with it, so I have to go upstairs to clean the airbrush. Time to clean the airbrush, mess around with the kids, say hi to the wife — that’s an hour out of the session. There’s a real time cost. I don’t know if it’s worth airbrushing base coats when I can just brush them.

Definitely still airbrushing the power sword guy and the skin tones — painting skin from scratch is not fun anymore. Probably the trench coat guy too. So today I’ll base-coat as much as I can with brushwork, see what’s left for the airbrush, clean it tonight, and come back tomorrow with the same approach.

Speed paints over zenithal

Staring down these troopers and there’s nothing left to do but go.

If you’re like me using contrast paints / speed paints for the first time: synthetic brush, the longer the better, shake them a lot, no wet palette. A couple drops in the well.

The whole bottom of the model is gray — even the flaps. We’ll highlight up to white. Tassels are orange. Still going to highlight on top of this — not a one-and-done contrast job. I love using these Army Painter speed paints for my style, which is sketching, glazing, a little bit of blending. They’re a great foundation; then I can go crazy on top.

Especially over zenithal — the priming was janky because my airbrush was clogged. Doesn’t really matter. The important part of priming is that it’s smooth; if it’s a little speckly, just do a second coat. This is helping us build texture and contrast on the model.

Building up the black armor

Started painting the jumpsuit black with Tenebris — really starting to fall in love with that paint, a cool bluish black. Taking some Tenebris on my thumb, mixing in some of the gray speed paint to lighten it. Probably not what speed paints are meant for, but it works. Painting in the highlights where the light is hitting — the belly. Subtle for now — I’ll come back in and take it to white like the box art.

Five hours later

In case I’m done for today: I tried a new way of doing non-metal metallic on Maximus’ gun — wet-blended, which I haven’t done before. Looks cool, but I don’t know if it reads as a metallic gun yet. I’ll revisit. Really happy with how the musculature turned out. He’s just chilling until I get the blues in the airbrush.

Five hours of hobbying. It’s crazy. It feels good — like I can maybe actually finish this in the timeline. Hoping to come back tonight for a couple more hours, hit it just as hard tomorrow, and find time every day this week. If I can get everything based and tabletop-ready by the end of the weekend, I’d just be highlighting and finishing through the week. That’d be really cool.

Maybe this is the end of the video. Maybe not. If it is — see you tomorrow. Keep painting.