Barbarians and subtleties in skintone.

The final 4 miniatures for my Barbarian warband was another adventure in flesh tone painting. We have a swarthy, female reclining assassin, an albino shaman, a ruddy female with broadsword and a two-weaponed, pallid Beserker Dwarf:

 

 The painting technique was the same on all of them (white prime, contrast base wash, highlight up with increasing amount of white added to the base Contrast paint and then glazed with reds to warm up), but they each had a different starting colour:

The paler two characters also had extra white added to their highlights from the start of the process. 

And here's the simple conversion for the shaman; a LotR goblin body and a zombie head with some greenstuffed hair and largely goblin bits on the staff:

In another project I would like to experiment with how to capture skintones other than caucasian, but for now my Barbarians are complete and I'll do some nice group photos later.

Orctober 2015. Finished Orc Warband.

The finished Orc Warband of the Orange Sun:

JugNugg Igg - Orc Shaman - Level 10 (Magic Teef)

Harnack - Underling Level 5 Orc (The Beserker)

Durz and his boyz - Orc Champion leading 7 Orcs

This warband was rolled up using Erny's Warband generator.

I've chosen some classic Orcs from my leadpile to create this warband. The only conversion is the banner as the original was tiny and I wanted to have a go at a big freehand design.

The first five I completed (I like Orcs in 5's and the symmetry of the leader in the middle and flanked by musician and standard bearer. I also decided to raise Durz on some rocks to make him look even meaner and bigger..

 I've also repeated the standard's motif on his breastplate with added black and white checks in the style of John Blanche

JuggNugg Igg and his bodyguard. The shaman is one of my favourites (I think because the model was used as the basis for the illustration of the Mercanary Shaman in Warhammer Armies) and I have also raised him up on some rocks. I believe he was originally supposed to be mounted on a boar, but I like his dancing pose here.


The Beserker just looks mental and is such a dynamic pose.


The other two orcs are slightly different looking to the other sculpts, with their elongated faces and narrow eyes. To me they look like distinct siblings so act well as a bodyguard for the slightly mad shaman.

I really wanted to go to town on a freehand banner. With previous Orc armies I eschewed the idea of a design ("how are those orcs ever going to get a beautiful banner design on a piece of cloth?") for more totemic versions. But here I've gone oldschool, being particularly influenced by John Blanche's .......... from p. of the WFB 3rd edition rulebook.

I also enjoyed doing a few freehand shields in the classic GW style with grotesque faces, this one's lifted from an illustration in Warhammer 3rd Edition Armies book:

Many thanks for looking and I hope you enjoy my contribution to Orctober 2015. Right, let's paint some Red Redemption cultists next, actually, no I'd better finish that minotaur and greenstuff my bitzbox warband...