Cockroach Coloured Tyranids, a Blackadder Work in Progress

[Blackadder]

[FONT=Tahoma, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]Tyranid Cockroaches, Ewhhhhhh!
[/FONT]


Well here I am laid up with a immobile shoulder and my right arm in a sling and I tell you I am getting stir crazy. Books, TV, Internet surfing, No porn; right arm; remember.............

Anyway visiting my 40K forums I stumble across this fantastic rendering of a Tyranid army by a certain 'DeadMuppet' his sobriquet. He has produced the most realistic Tyranids I have yet seen.

[FONT=Tahoma, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]Basing his colouration on cockroaches he has produced the most intriguingly disgusting arthropods I have yet seen so I have set out to duplicate his technique.

From what I have seen on his thread he starts out with a light gray primer, I have gray primer, followed by a khaki base coat. I still can press a spray can button so here goes..............[/FONT]


http://i.imgur.com/9IiFe5m.jpg

I'm starting with the only Tyranid in my possession; a Hive Tyrant recently purchased.


I have very limited experience with painting so this thread will be basically a trial and error excursion into the do's and don'ts of colourization.


It should prove fun..............

 

[Blackadder]

Tyranid Basic Paint:


I know I am circumventing conventional wisdom with my painting and am taking too many steps to accomplish that which pro-painters can do with ease. Never let it be said that the Blackadder takes the easy path when the harder is available.


After a coat of gray primer and a coat of cardboard box cover coat (The only tan paint I had) I masked off the areas not needing further base painting and sprayed the chitin carapace areas with a coat of rust brown primer.


http://i.imgur.com/kbwY47Q.jpg

After drying removing the tape reveals I missed a bit of leg chitin. Never mind I can touch that up with a brush.


http://i.imgur.com/6ZwE9Jc.jpg

Well these photos came out disappointing; the flash kind of washed out the dark brown primer. The actual colour is more the cheesy simulated leather wood grain table pad hue in the photo.


I've gone about as far as I can go with spray cans, time to break out the airbrush.

 

[offline]

This is kinda small! i was expecting a fully scratch built, green stuff, bio-titan and nothing less

 

[Blackadder]

One must learn to walk before competing in a marathon. I have just introduced myself into xeno-biology having not heretofore paid attention to Tyranid anatomy. I have the epoxy clay, armature components, swivel joints and an idea for a biological Titan biped on the order of half a meter tall scale height but first I need background in the requisite morphology.

Thanks for the reply.

 

[Blackadder]

Tyranid Base Coat Part Two:

Removing the masking revealed an acceptable contrast.


http://i.imgur.com/ZKmX73Y.jpg

The flash show the paint as more red than it is but hey the entire base coat will be covered anyway, this will just give a depth to the final coat.


http://i.imgur.com/4ZDiQRm.jpg

The rust undercoat will (I hope) supply a subliminal ruddy glow to the burnt umber carapace surface pigment.


http://i.imgur.com/FUNmWNF.jpg

Now for the airbrushing:

 

[Demihuman]

Maybe you could convert this for your Xeno Titan:

http://www.ebay.com/itm/ALIEN-movie...creature-suit-PROP-Predator-AVP-/261334651268



I've been having good luck with washes made of acrylic ink and acrylic matte medium on big organic shapes like this. There is a nice write up here:

http://www.coolminiornot.com/forums/showthread.php?55160-Painting-the-Nautiloid&p=710585#post710585

 

[Zab]

I like where it's going! Keep at it.

 

[Blackadder]

Blackadder Straddling Two Concepts


Originally there was only the one master plan for organic appearing cockroach coloured Tyranids.

Since posting this thread I have be made aware of more. They seem to be multiplying like..........well like cockroaches.


I have narrowed the field to two and will attempt to fashion mine somewhere between them as the first was too light and the last seems a bit too dark.


I am listing the colours I have just ordered for a delivery later this week. I chose Vallejo paints instead of Citadel for no particular reason as I do have a conversion chart from one manufacturer to another which may prove useful to those with a goodly supply of alternative manufacturers paints:


http://www.dakkadakka.com/wiki/en/Paint_Range_Compatibility_Chart


The colours I shall be using are as follows:


71024 Khaki Brown
71027 Light Brown

71040 Burnt Umber
71042 Camo Black Brown
71083 Orange
71109 UK Pru Blue
72014 Warlord Purple

72034 Bone White
72050 Cold Gray

72066 Tan
73200 Sepia Wash


And Citadel 21-27 Rakarth Flesh


I bought these paints on Amazon from a third party distributor 'SIFI Comics and Games' who seemed to have the best price and one price shipping regardless of the number of small items ordered which seemed a bargain. This information for any of you that may wish at your peril to follow along on this painting odyssey. I should be receiving my stuff with in the week....


Back to the competing variations on the cockroach theme, Deadmuppet's beautiful work is slightly spoiled by the use of a brush to paint the highlights on the edge of the chitin armour; I intend to use an airbrush throughout even for the highlights using glue tac for the masking.


Another contender used gloss varnish for the carapace which gave a too shiny appearance. I shall be using a satin varnish.


Of course these projects are done and mine are just a figment of my imagination with little hard evidence of my imagined abilities so before I get too deeply into critical analysis perhaps I should actually do something. Ha!


Oh BTW if you intend to follow along you may want to have at least a medium sized Tyranid and an airbrush with a fine tip. Ha!

 

[Blackadder]

Tyranid Spoiler Alert:

Okay well we've seen my pitiful opening attempt at a cockroach colours army basecoat and the requisite colours are ordered. I have stated my goals regarding plans for a 'Nid army and a Pollyanna speculation on a future Bio Titan so now let's see the immediate painting goals I have set for myself. The way I look at it the small muscle controls needed for airbrushing will help retrain my fine motor skills lost during the current incapacity.


I have state on a few forums I eschew the party coloured 'carousel pony' painted Tyranids for something realistic looking and have set my sights rather high regarding the painting quality of the pieces so pictured below is a sample of what I hope to achieve. How close I come to that goal is what this thread is all about.

Good luck on that one Blackadder, yer gonna need it! Ha!

 

[Zab]

Please, you know full well that everyone will stop by with helpful hints, tips and advice. Some of which will even work!

 

[Blackadder]

I'm counting on that.

 

[Demihuman]

Looking forward to seeing the Blackadder approach to masking and what you concoct for a satin varnish.

 

[Kretcher]

Yeap some of it is actually good advice, SO preferably you sholdnt listen to me

Please, you know full well that everyone will stop by with helpful hints, tips and advice. Some of which will even work!

 

[Blackadder]

Don't be so hard on yerself Kretcher, as the French say even a broken clock is right twice a day.

I'll take whatever you've got.

What amazes me is here is a thread that involved so far virtually no actual work on my part and gets a number of replies all out of proportion to the actual productive content but redesigning a FW Titan from the ground up i.e. a FW Lucius Reaver gets relatively no attention at all not just here but on any of the 20+ forums (Fori) I post on; GO figure?............... HA!

Its like I always maintained, the Reaver Titan just isn't all that popular.

 

[CarbonCopy]

That's interesting, as I've been following your work almost religiously. I'm quite looking forward to all the work yet to come on the Lucius and Thunderhawk (which I had been following originally on the B&C). Quite inspiring if I may say so.

 

[Demihuman]

I think must folks here just feel more qualified to comment on a paint job. Your other threads just get stunned silence.

 

[Zab]

Given the amount of detail, math and engineering type jargon on your scratch build threads for me it's more like "dumb" silence. I work in TV so I like pretty colors and shiny things. I just consider myself lucky there are pictures for me to follow along with

 

[Crudelus]

That color scheme is just perfect. My first thought was "that is how the human race will end, when cockroaches and bugs will evolve ahahahaha "

however, i'd personally add some little contrasting details to the scheme, like eyes or alien blood...

 

[Blackadder]

Today I received my paint and tried out my new dual action air brush. My old cheap 'Badger' I felt wasn't up to the current challenge.


Damnme if I can get any paint through the dimned thing so I played around with the settings and the air pressure and disassembled the needle valve assembly to no avail finally in desperation I took the needle out of the thing and huge amounts of paint sprayed through. I had the needle set for paint with a mineral spirit base instead of water Ha!


Blackadder, do you really think you are qualified to pursue a project of this caliber if you can't even adjust the spray nozzle?

 

[Zab]

Oh hey, I went to do little with mine last night and couldn't figure out why it wasn't spraying. I checked and rechecked and cleaned and then realised I had to turn my compressor to the ON setting. I may still be suffering from some side effects of the flu. The flu effects your IQ right?