Kruleboy tutorial

Gnashtoof stood in front of the old tower. He knew trouble was coming, but he was prepared!! Let ’em stinky tin can boys come and do their worst! I’ gonna show ’em! And then I’m gonna rip of dere ‘eads and play ball wiv ’em!! I’ma ready fer ’em stinky tin can boys!!!

Tutorial time!! It’s been too long. I haven’t made a tutorial here since late 2019, but here we go again. I have assembled a Kruleboy Gutripper boss from the new Warhammer Age of Sigmar Dominion and it is time to put on some colour. SO if you would like a little insight into my personal way of painting minis in a fast, rough and ready style for the gaming table, then read on. This is a cool way to get good results quite fast, you can easily paint units in this way too and it is quite possible to skip stages on the way to make the painting of rank and file troops even faster.

As always I have prepared my mini. Cleaned the mold lines and such, mounted him on a base. I textured the base with a mix of sand, soil and PVA glue. I stuck Juweela bricks and some balls I had rolled from spare putty. Whenever I sculpt and use putty, I roll small balls of the excess putty, these can come in handy for basing, they can be used as smooth stones, tops of skulls, fungus, whatever you like. I added a little static grass to the base as well. And yes, I put that on before paint! That makes for a wholly different expression when you paint it in along with the rest of the miniature. Nothing wrong with adding fresh grass after painting, it is just something different.

I gave my kruleboy a zenithal primer, meaning that I primed him black and then sprayed Wraithbone (white will work just as well) from above. In this way I get the definition of light and shadow before I even start to paint!

Well, no reason to linger. Let’s get some colour on the pallette! I always start out with a selection of the colours I am going to use, so I can compose freely and don’t have to stop every second to load up more paint on my pallette.

My wet pallette ready for action.

For a paint job like this, I start out with a bunch of GW contrast paints. I’ve loaded some Contrast medium on there, some Flesh Tearers Red, Black Templar, Plaguebearer Flesh, Creed Camo and Cygor Brown.

You do not have to use the exact same colours, this is much more about method and you can get similar results with different colours.

It is always a good idea to start with the skin or whatever is the bottom layer, beneath clothes, armor etc. Now I work fast with the Contrast paints and often blend them wet in wet, this is really one of their strengths. At first I painted the skin Plaguebearer Flesh and then emediately put creed camo in the shadows, while the plaguebearer was still wet.

After the skin, I blocked in all the rest of the colours with Contrast paints. I added a little contrast medium here and there to help the paint run of the high points and get light where I wanted it.

Now, I have blocked everything not metallic in with Contrast paints on the kruleboy! I’ve used Cygor Brown, Black Templar, Fyreslayer Flesh and Wyldwood for his patchwork clothes in different areas, but let the paints blend and mix randomly in several places. The skull ornament in the front got Skeleton Horde. The spear haft got Wyldwood, the wrappings on his lower legs got Agaros Dunes. The topknot got some Fleshtearers Red. The shield got Fleshtearers Red all over, then I added Wyldwood to all the shadow areas of the shield, while it was still wet, basically mixing it upon the figure. The mouth of the shield got a helping of Black Templar.

I painted the base in normal acryllics, for want of a better term. I used Vallejo Model Color Leather Brown, heavily thinned all over the base, then added VMC Dark Bluegrey to the rocks and Privateer Press Paint Umbral Umber for the bricks. all of this wet in wet! Now these colours and brands are of absolutely no importance! you can use any earth brown, any grey you like and any brick-like red brown.

Now for the drybrushing! I used a 50/50 mix of VMC Beige and VMC Pale Sand for this, but any bone colour will do. For this job, I use an Artis Opus D series brush, they are perfect for stipling and drybrushing. I stipple the base and the horizontal areas of the figure and then drybrush in a vertical motion, so everything gets this highlight from above, but all downturned surfaces and shadows go free. A fast and easy way to make details pop, create texture and define the highlights. By drybrushing this same off-white all over the figure, I tie all the colours together.

Now it’s time to wash the base!

I make glazes of black, P3 Bloodstone and Schmincke Aerocolor Permanent Green. I then paint the black glaze heavily all over the base. While this is still wet, I apply the green in splotches over most of the grass parts of the base, but let it flow randomly into other places, then while everything is still wet, I paint P3 Bloodstone on the bricks, more or less undiluted and use the glaze to run in random areas and mix with everything else.

To tie things together, I smear these three glazes on the legs of my orc as well. He gets dirty from the land that he is in. This all takes some time to dry, a hairdryer might be of help here, but you can easily carry on painting the miniature as you wait for the base to dry. It migth be a good time to take a break though.

While the base was drying, I painted the metals. I used GW Leadbelcher mixed with a little black for all those metal studs and the underside of the spear. The topside of the spear got some pure Leadbelcher. On the above picture, you can see how much texture I achieved by stipling and drybrushing.

When all the metal parts were dry, I washed them with GW Agrax Earth Shade.

Then I drybrushed the base again with the mix of Pale Sand and Beige and then I did the black, green and brown wet in wet glazing. This repeating of the process is quite important to achieve a natural finish with depth and a natural play of colour.

In the above picture, I have added in some colour variation with wahes. Some GW Reikland Flesh Shade in the face, hands and knees. Some GW Seraphim Sepia on the shield for a warmer glow, a little GW Athonian Camo Shade here and there on the skin. Gennerally a deepening of all shadows with GW Agrax Earth Shade.

Let’s turn our attention to the speartip. The following method can be used on any kind of blade.

In the first picture we see the blade painted Leadbelcher and washed with Agrax Earth Shade. In the second I highlight each side towards opposite ends with Leadbelcher. Keep your brushstrokes perpendicular to the part, in this way, you imitate the surface of real blades. Next I gave it a black glaze, very lightly, just a little tying together and intensifying of the shadow. In the fourth picture I have highlighted with Vallejo Model Air Silver. In the same way as with the Leadbelcher, just brighter and in a slightly smaller area, still with the perpendicular brushstrokes. In the fifth (middle) picture, I’ve made a glaze of silver, whish I push into the light areas for a more smooth and bright finish. If you alternate between silver and dark glazes at this point, you can make the most amazing metal effect! But for the sake of a relatively fast result, I move on with this one. In number six, I have added GW Athonian Camo Shade to the mid tones. In the seventh picture I’ve used my smallest brush to draw a fine line of pure VMA Silver down the edge in the middle of the blade and sporadically at the outer edges. I’ve also added small silver dots for direct reflection in the dark areas. In number eight, I have applied a thin coat of P3 Umbral umber at the root of the blade, to start a rust effect. In the ninth and last picture, I have washed in a little thinned down P3 Bloodstone to finish my rust effect.

As mentioned, you can use this method on any blade or armor. You can go crazy with many reflections and layers upon layers of glazes, both dark and bright for a very refined result, the sky is the limit, but this is the method, boiled down to its basics. And did I mention that you can use any colour you like to achieve similar results, but with different expressions!

By the way, I added the same rust effect to the few other metal bits on my orc here.

I drybrushed the base VERY lightly with the usual mix of Beige and pale Sand, followed by a drybrush of GW Balor Brown on the grass bits. At this point the base would normally be finished, but this one has a few more details, which I will come back to at the end of the project.

Now for the detail work!

I detailed the teeth in the maw of the shield with stripes of VMC Pale Sand. I painted the eyes Pale Sand as well and shaded them with a drop of Agrax Earth Shade.

Now the super highlights!

Almost there with tiny white highlights.

I always end up with a series of tiny white super highlights. I make small dots and lines of pure white on places of direct reflection, to make everything pop and create extra definition of the details. Do this sparingly and avoid it entirely in the shadow areas.

I painted the orc’s eyes red with a tiny dot of white in the middle, followed by a black line underneath. A spur of the moment decission made me glaze the eyes of the shield with a little Vallejo Green Fluo… flourescent green, so now they glow a little! Green is after all the complimentary to the red of the shield!

Now he is all but done!

Now for the last finishing touches on the base! I painted the seed pods of the weeds GW Contrast Shyish Purple. I painted my putty balls Contrast Flesh Tearers Red, followed by white spots. Now they are fungus! As usual I painted the edge of the base black. I gave the fungus a thin wash of Agrax Earth Shade, mainly to shade the spots.

And after a matt varnish from the airbrush, followed by gloss varnish on the fungus and the orc’s mouth, I call my Kruleboy Gutripper boss Gnashtoof done!