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The Making of Magmatrax

IntroductionAs I promised when I started the project, should my Juggernaut projectprove successful at the Golden Demons, it would be worth writing atutorial about it. Little did I know this project would eat over 400 hoursover 14 weeks. Most of these hours were spent looking at the model,adjusting the pose, revisiting the color scheme, and learning how topaint each element, taking 2-3 attempts for each new thing. I mightnot taken many step-by-step pictures on how to paint each element as

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I walking in the dark myself, trying to nail the effect I wanted. Andwhen I did, it was already painted... Within a year of starting thehobby, I went from applying paint to converting and painting a modelthat would win the 2004 Canadian Slayer Sword. I wasnt half thepainter I am now just before I started this project. It was a very long

process, but as Jason Richards himself (an amazing Artist andGentleman) told me at Toronto Gamesday 2004, once you know how topaint certain things, you just do it, its much faster. This article istherefore meant to be more of a Walkthrough of my endeavors intomaking a Golden Demon-class model.It is a long read, but true to myform I wanted it to be thorough.My wish is that this will serve as a source of inspiration to everyone, todemystify the whole Golden Demon elite painting thing. I am not thelong time great artist. I wish to inspire other into believing that with alittle bit of talent and a LOT of hard work and dedication, it can beachieved. Just undertake a project that's much higher than your

current skill. That's the best way to learn and improve. Frankly, the Juggernaut was way over my skills, had I seen the end resultbeforehand, I would not have believed I could ever paint that. But withfrequent questions asked to the resident painters atwww.bolterandchainswordd.com and my favorite artists atwww.coolminiornot.com , I raised my skills, and there is no reason youcannot yourself. Try hard, repaint it as much as you need to get itright, dont just finish your model and hope to improve on the nextone. If you really are serious about painting a terrific model, step it up!

You wont learn much by doing your next rank and file trooper whichyouve already done before. Challenge yourself! I have no background

in arts, so if I did it, you certainly can elevate your skills to the nextlevel too. Im not a big time Golden Demon artist, Im the underdogwho worked really hard. Magmatrax, Champion of Khorne is the resultof 25% talent, 75% hard work. Skill, I believe anyone can improve. Theonline community helped me learn, now Im returning the favor.

The ConceptI wanted to make a Golden Demon-winning model. How? What to do?So I went online, and since I started the hobby Ive been collectingpictures of fantastic miniatures. What made a winning model? Is therea recipe to winning a Golden Demon? Yes and no. Through readingarticles by my favorite artists such as Cyril Abati, Victor Hardy andAllan C, chatting with multiple-GD winners like Mark Mosler (Anthraxus)and even the judges at Gamesday, I determined what were vagueguidelines I was going to adhere to.1- The most valuable thing I discovered is that your entry must beoriginal. Sad to say, your interpretation of a Green Typhus model willhave a hard time to score, even if its magnificently painted, simplybecause there has been so many submitted already. Dont go for the

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usual GW color Scheme, and/or convert it to make it a new, never seenmodel. I wanted my model to stand out, make it something new anddifferent, though clearly identifiable. As Mark Mosler said: You seeMagmatrax and the model punches you right in the face!. You dontneed flashiness, but an attention-grabber was what I wanted, I wanted

people to remember my piece.2- Not all models are created equal. Though it is true a simple modelcan win the judges over with the purity of its lines, I feel its a toss-upwhen it comes to appeal to the judges. A termagaunt for instance, hasless potential than a Tyranid Warrior, but not because bigger is better.Because, in my opinion, the warrior has more potential for you toshow off. Of course, you want to make something you like, not whatyou think the judges will like. However, Im a fan of the safer tactic, thein your face big flashy thingy models that draw attention. This is notto suggest this is the only way, but if your model is impressive anddraws attention with the conversion, its that much less you have to

rely on your painting to pull off.3- Conversion. Make your model your own, make it unique. It doesnthave to be completely redone like my Juggernaut, but the moredifferent the better.4- Freehand. Incorporate some freehand painting, something to showyou can paint without lines and borders. This helps making the modelyour own, and shows youve spent effort on it. Magmatrax is not just a

Juggernaut, its the one with the magma scales effect on its armor.Freehand further personalizes your model.5- Make it flawless. Ive heard that sometimes models are very closeand often given 1st, 2nd or 3rd based on which has the fewest

mistakes. This can be a big time sink, but if you can have someoneelse scrutinize your model for flaws you might have missed, youre thatmuch closer.6- Realistic expectations. Ditch that. If you cannot reach higher thanyou aim, youd better aim very high. Think of a great idea, then thinkabout how you would redo it if you had already done it once. Think of other good ideas, then pick your favorite. Make sure its ambitious. If you dont win, youll have learned a heck of a lot at least, and end up amuch better painter in the end.7- A friend to consort with goes a long way. Preferably, one who knowspainting miniatures. For painting tips and opinions, and support on

those long weeks where I was getting a little discouraged, my gratitudegoes to Mark Mosler, Multi-winning Golden Demon winner no less.Watch this guy out, I smell a sword in his future too.I had wanted to paint a Juggernaut, I thought the model had a lot of potential, though let down by a very static pose, and being a difficultsculpt to modify. I thought the Rider was just boring, and could bespiced up too. I wanted to use certain nice bits I had seen, and I hadthe vision of Archaons chest piece as a rider on a more dynamic

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Juggernaut, holding a more prowling posture. This was my basicconcept. I bought some Blu-tac (the blue gum used to hang poster),browsed for various suitable bitz and ordered them. Since my skills insculpting were limited, I was going to use bitz as much as I couldbefore having to resort to sculpting my own. I then discovered that Blu-

tac was a dream come true to temporary hold pieces while you workon the posture, so I used plenty of it to get the feel of the model, andsee how the parts could be matched.

The Conversion The list of bitz I used:- Juggernaut model- Archaons Torso- Grimgors left arm (WHFB Orc Warboss)- Obliterator legs (the walking version)- Berserker Head, shoulderpads- Skull Beltbuckle from a regular Chaos marine torso- Chaos Champion backpack- Ork Choppa arms- Marneus Calgars right Powerfist- 8$ Walmart Jewelery chain- Old Guitar Strings from a friend- A few Skulls from the Unded sprue- Round Toothpicks

My workspace:

Tools I used:

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Juggernaut ConversionI had never seen much work done with Juggernauts in GDcompetitions, and now I know why. Though I felt the model had a lot of potential, I realized that the sculpt was horrible, with asymmetric parts,and badly sculpted finer features. I spend many hours just filing awayexcess and sculpting minor add-ons to try and make the modelsymmetrical. Even so, some things I couldnt pull off, like how the

Juggernauts neck collar has 3 spikes which are not evenly spaced. Thecollar wasnt actually straight, but that I fixed with GS. The model was

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not a simple case of cleaning the mold lines, but throughout it all, I stillloved the look of the sculpt.

Archaons chest turned out a perfect fit, the cape having a curve thatmarried itself with the Juggernauts rear right leg perfectly. The Riderwas going to be bigger, but I wanted him to look like is was leaning onthe Juggernaut a bit, reeling for the impending jump of the Beast untoits prey. To accomplish that, the Juggernauts body had to be muchlower than usually mounted on its legs, to keep the Rider low. Thefront Left leg would have to be cut and a joint added to fit the prowlingpose, and complement the cape flowing on the other side. I decided tohave the legs angled in a triangular fashion, wider at the base, to helpaccentuate the feel of the model being grounded and ready to jump.

This also made the juggernaut wider and more imposing. The head hadto become horizontal to keep with my concept, and at that point Ifound 2 horns that were just perfectly curved to make the Juggernautlook meaner.So piece by piece, I would convert a part and return to the blu-tacmaster assembly to check for fit. Needless to say I had to rebuild theBlue-tac assembly numerous times as it was sagging with each fitcheck. I started with the legs, first drilling multiple holes in the legs andbody, and inserting half a dozen paper clip rods on each of theshoulder joint. With a gob of Green Stuff, I would stick a completed legto the body, press to give the right angle, and use lots of Blue-tac tohold the position while the GS cured. The front left leg was sawedabove the claw, then each part drilled, a continuous brass rod insertedon each side of the new gap, and glued with epoxy. I could thenslightly bend the rod to position the claw, having checked rod lengthbefore gluing. Once happy, I made a rubber joint-type connection withGS where there was now a new gap, just like the leg joints on a regularMarine model. The 3 remaining legs would simply need to be

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positioned with paper clips like I did the first one, each time checkingthat the Obliterator legs I was going to use would fit well in between.

This left me with a big ugly surface between the front legs and a gap atthe read of the Jugger, between the legs. The front and rear legs werealso farther apart that the original model. I came up with the idea of

adding fur to cover these areas, which would also tie in with the pelt onArchaons body. Thanks to Nexuss GS Fur tutorial (found here:https://reader009.{domain}/reader009/html5/0524/5b05af294aa9f/5b05af2e616fa.jpg,) Ipracticed on spare GS, and then sculpted fur on the Juggernaut model,and a handy filler which did not need to be a symmetrical feature, easyto cover large areas of sculpting..

The Rider had to be holding onto the Juggernaut, so I glued in each endof a jewelry chain, which each had a bigger link. I then GSed a link tothe Juggernauts collar. A strand of the chain would be glued on the furand the Powerfist would then be glued on top, but the other end wasleft loose, as I wanted it glued inside the clutched fist, to make it look

like the rider was holding the chain.

The head was a lot of work, mainly because the Stock Juggernautmodel doesnt have a neck. I cut the neck off, saving the neck collarwith 3 spikes to glue back on the body. I then drilled a hole in the bodyin the middle of the collar, and one at the back of the head underneaththe Collar of Khorne on the head. I then used a brass rod (well minewas iron wire) cut to proper size to join head and body. I positioned thehead actually lower than the body, to emphasize the prowling pose of the Juggernaut. Again, I would refer to the Blue-tac master assemblytime and time again to adjust the position. I epoxy glued the rod in thehead, then once dry, made final adjustments and glued the other endof the rod in the body. Next was time to make a neck. Made a fewsketches, tried on spare GS, and then put a gob on the neck, workingfrom under the model. I sculpted wires and such, continuing what littlewas suggested by that very small part of a neck provided with themodel. Once dry, I bent Guitar strings to a proper shape, guitar strings

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being very stiff, I did not have to worry about loosing the shape, and Iused GS to attack to the head and the body. I made sure to give theguitar strings a different bend, being more curved on the left side of the Jugger, since that leg was leaning forward, the cables close bywere of same length, but restricted in a smaller space. Its all in the

little details. Ill mention it here, but through the painting process whenit became time for the eyes I decided the stock models were too small.I therefore cut myself a piece of plastic sprue, drilled only 2 mmthrough an end and beveled the plastic around it, like this pictureshows.

The slightly spherical tip of the drill bit would make a perfect rivet-typestamp to make bigger eyes out of GS, which I then stuck over the tinyoriginal juggernaut eyes.Checking with the Obliterator legs, the original saddle was much toosmall and deep. I simply filled the original gap with GS, and texture thesurface like a leather seat, with a diamond-shaped pattern on the

sides. I glued on tiny metallic studs made out of cylindrical pewterflash from another model. I made sure to round the surface with a filebefore each cut was made in the pewter flash rod, to make a betterpainting surface later on.

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The Base

I wanted the Juggernaut standing atop the battelfield, looking at thepuny mortals soon to be crushed. I found a natural rock, which size andshape suited my model well. It had a cleavage cut, too, from which Icould exploit the recess underneath to show off my previously acquiredglowing lava-effect. I had to pin the juggernaut to the rock somehowthough, for solidity. I couldnt drill through the rock, but I figured Icould add features with Milliput., a two part putty which is more likeclay, whereas GS is more plastic. I added gobs of Milliput on the rock toimprove its features and make it match the Juggernauts pose better. Ineeded an outcrop for the front left leg to stand on. I also needed alittle extra thickness for some legs to be able to place pins in the basefor solidity between model and base. I did so for both right legs, as therock was thinner on that side. I pinned the Juggernaut paws, andpressed it in the wet Milliput to leave an imprint, but removed themodel, which was going to be painted separately. On the extra puttyfeatures, I used a broken piece of cork to press on the putty and maketexture to work with in the painting stage.

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Later, when the Juggernaut was finished and it was time to paint thebase, I went back with some putty to exploit a recess in the rock tomake a little pool of lava emptying itself a little lower. (back right side).I also added A few skulls to tie in with Khorne and fill an otherwisesimple base. The area I had left untouched in the alcove for lava felt

like it could be improved. I decided to simulate bubbling, thick lava,and found that the little ball on the back of a SM where you glue on abackpack was just right for the task. I also used a round plastic ball ona leftover sprue for a bigger bubble, and some rigs cut from a smokelauncher nozzle. The smallest burst bubbles were made with a grenadeclip, cut in half thickness-wise. Very small, be sure to hold them downwhen you cut them, or youll have them bounce out of your sight andloose them.

The Champion

The Champion is where I realized how handy it is to carefully selectbitz. I cut off the obliterator legs, and quickly realized that it was aperfect match. On the left side the lag was open outwards, which

worked well with my Champions pose, Turned on the left side andholding that Huge axe. The spacing between he obliterator legs wasalso a very good fit for the Juggernaut width and required no bending. Isimply filed off the fleshy bits from the legs, using once again mymighty rotary tool to grind away. I also sculpted treads underneath theboots, in case the GD judges would look.Now this is where countless checks with blue-tac took place to assertthe pose of the champion as each element was gradually glued in. I

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used the rotary tool to grind away Archaons shoulder armor, peepingfrom under the pelt. Starting with the Right shoulder, this was a verylong grind and check procedure, until I could fit a complete Berserkershoulderpad. Remember to use a mask, pewter particles are bad foryou! I then cut off an Orc arm at the elbow, pinned it in the Torso, and

pinned the other end to Marneus Powerfist, previously drilled betweenthe thumb and fingers to insert the chain form the Juggernauts neck. Ialso had to cut off the ammo clip form the bolter that was in the way of my Juggernauts right leg. Nothing was glued at this step, just usingblue-tac whenever necessary for the parts to hold while I fit them. Iwent back to the torso and legs, drilling each, and pinning with a pieceof rod, cut to length, then glued, and finally bent to appropriate angle. Ialso drilled a hole in the obliterator legs and glued a paper clip in thesaddle. This pin and hole would allow me to pit the champion on the

juggernaut at the same place every time I put it on for fit. Torso and legs now being one, I could glue the right arm on the torso,

underneath the shoulderpad with epoxy, and let dry overnight,champion on the juggernaut. Then I worked on sculpting a midsectionbetween torso and legs, and came up with GS trims with studs made inthe same fashion as the Juggernauts eyes, to keep them the exactsame size.

The left arm was trickier. I knew it was going to be something theviewer looks at instinctively, so it had to be suitably impressive. Ioversized the weapon with an Orc knife as the main blade extension,and reversed part of an Orc axe to complete the other side. Since theplastics were thicker than Grimgors axe, I used greenstuff to ease thetransition. Filing down the plastic knife and axe would have lost the

facets of the weapons. I added a toothpick tip on top for good spikymeasure, and another knife blade at the bottom of the are handle, tomake it a handier weapon for a rider to wield. I finally superglued oneend of a cheap jewelry chain on the axe head, wrapped it around andbrought it down to the bottom of the pole for looks. Now I had chainsand fur on both the rider and mount, which helped emphasize thecohesion of the model.Next was the left shoulderpad. Since there was going to be too muchgrinding involved, I tried a new approach: only adding the visible partof the shoulderpad. It proved tricky to match to the fur, and in the end,I only used a little bit of a pad, stuck in there with GS which I sculpted

the missing parts to smooth the pad with the fur line. I drilledunderneath again for a pin to attach the axe arm with. Once the armwas glued (using epoxy and a profusion of blu-tac to hold in placewhile it dried,) I finished the connection with the body with GS.

The backpack was then stamped on a gob of GS stuck on the back fur,and removed for the GS to dry. A paperclip was used as a pin, but thebackpack kept separate for painting.

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Finally the head, another focal point. I really liked the Berserker head Iused, and didnt feel major conversion was in order. I simply added afew toothpick spikes on the head for a little more cohesion with the

Juggernauts spikes. I glued the head in a forward position, and thensculpted a collar our of GS with stamped studs, and that was it!

To this point the complete conversion took about 50 hours.

Painting MagmatraxNow was the toughest step for me. I felt more at ease with convertingwhich I enjoy a great deal, and the painting I knew would force me tostep it up to live up to the conversion which I was very proud of. I knewI wanted a Magma theme, which would tie in with the rest of my army.Oh yes, this model was going to see battle. Im too slow a painter toafford painting something that I wont use afterwards, as I want to geta full sized army finished and play the game which I enjoy. I decide Iwould go for a cleaner, flashier look for the model, it is a style I like,and quite frankly, it is the only style I had any experience with. Themodel was Khorne, and thus called for Bone, reds and goldish colors tokeep with the ethos. Yet it had to be original and not just another redand gold model, like every other Khorne Berserker. Thats when I camup with a Magma scale pattern, which would make it original andtake care of the Freehand aspect of my entry.I also wanted to try out Non Metallic Metal (NMM) gold, which I hadseen in admiration on other models at CMON. The Sky-Earth NMM was

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a variant, which really made things shine, and I decided to step inunknown territory and aim for the toughest thing I could. Previously, Ihad stared at countless examples of models with NMM, askedquestions to some of the artists, and began to get a feel of how colorswere supposed to be applied on various surfaces to give the

impression of shine. My basic color scheme set, I decided to start withthe right rear leg of the juggernaut. As it was going to be partiallycovered with the Riders cape, I could get some practice in without itshowing on the final model. I also decided to change my approach topainting, and concentrate on 1 element at a time, that leg for starters,and fully paint it before I moved to the next element. You get to test aparticular effect and see the end result of the color combinations rightoff, instead of waiting until you finished the entire model and realizeyou don't like the result.. It also allows you to get more familiar with aregion of the model and ensure you tidy up all the little painting flaws.On with a Chaos black Primer coat, after washing the model with soap!

Gets rid of finger oil. My 4/0 sized paintbrush will handle all the maincoats and highlights or the red armor, and my trusty 10/0 paintbrushwill handle all the detail and NMM.

General Tips1- I had heard that you should dilute your paint. I somewhat did, butnever enough, in perspective. When I realized that properly dilutedpaint makes smooth transitions in color MUCH easier, it clicked in myhead. For this, I prepared a little bottle of dilution water, which is about15% Future Acrylic Floor Finish and 85% water. More Future madebubbles, and less made a lesser effect. This stuff makes the paint morefluid, it tends to dry less chunky, for smoother transitions. Its a bit likeusing dishwashing soap in your ink washes. Breaks surface tension andmakes paint application smoother. Whatever I painted, I dilutedbeforehand on a palette, with at least 1 part water to 2 parts paint.Depending on the technique, It could go to 15 parts water to 1 partpaint. More on this later.2- Use a palette. This was another big discovery for me. I discoveredusing a piece of plastic to put paint of all the shades I needed for anelement. For NMM gold, I did one little trim at a time, with a bit of allthe colors I needed on the palette, available to touch up and finishwhat Im painting. That opposed to doing all the trim base coats, thentake out the next color for next stage, etc. You waste a little morepaint, but results are better, and the actual painting is quicker, allcolors available right away. Be sure to periodically add dilution waterto your paints to slow down the drying on the palette.3- I used Vallejo Game Color paints, but mostly because I find theirbottles smarter. GW paint I find is pretty much as good and have noproblem working with it, actually I did when the appropriate color wascloser to hand that the VGC container was! VGC has, however, an edge

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with smaller color pellets in the paint, which makes smooth layeringeasier. I will use GW color names throughout the article for easierreference, but in fact I painted mostly with VGC. I recommend theirVallejo bottles because they are more suited to dropping a little paintof each color you need on a palette.

4- Dont be afraid to go back and touch-up. I had to do it countlesstimes over, with each new element that needed paint I had to learnhow to do it. Skulls (always had a hard time getting the right colors),Fur, Magma effect, spikes and horns, NMM gold, NMM steel/silver, howto paint a chain... Took 300-some hours to paint it all, but now I knowhow to paint each of these elements, and I could do the whole model inhalf the time now.

Painting the Magma Scales

Using:

Chaos blackScab redRed goreBloody redBlazing orangeGolden yellow

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I started off by painting the magma scale on the right hind leg, givingme more freedom to try on an area I could repaint and repaint again asit was going to be partially hidden under the cloak. I startedhighlighting the armor in red, and then adding a scale pattern, but itlooked slightly off, as the lava veins were too similar to the highlighted

areas of the armor plate. Ok, lets try something else. I darkened eachscale, which improved it. Redefined the lava veins... better. Highlightedthe scales a bit, and voil! Finally the effect I wanted. This was going tochange a bit as I progressed through the surfaces though, so here ismy finally honed technique for the scales:Basecoat of scab red is in order. I tried to avoid overpainting on thegold trim to be, but no big worry, well fix it later. Since the paint isslightly thinned, 2 layers are necessary. Next, I take blood red anddraw fairly wide veins intersecting each other, to create scales. Theblood red doesnt cover much with one layer, but it doesnt matter atthis early stage. Next, a second layer with blazing orange, slightly

thinner than the first layer, to leave a little bit of the red on each sideof the veins. Still using thinned paint, roughly 30-40% water, if orangedidnt cover enough Id go back. The orange needs to be covering thescab red fully. Then, only where the veins intersect, a very thinneddown golden yellow is applied, at about 50/50 water / paint. The trick isto apply the paint with the paintbrush starting a few millimeters awayfrom the vein intersection and drag your paintbrush toward theintersection, lifting the tip off the surface at the center. Thinned paintwill be therefore very thin where you started your stroke, andaccumulate where you took it off. Paint will slowly travel down the wetpath you made with the brush. With the right dilution, paint will dry

with a gradual thickness, giving you a smooth transition from no yellowover orange to almost full coverage of yellow. This will require somepractice to get perfect, but a few trials will bear the understanding of this technique, which I will henceforth call wet layering.Each vein leading to an intersection must get this wet layering of yellow, to give the impression that underneath the scales, there is ahot spot. If you observe real lava, youll notice that warmer spots areat the center, with brighter colors. The more veins and the more lavaaround a certain region, the warmer it is kept. The borders of a lavaflow are darker, cooled down from exposure to the next medium, air,or rocks for instance.

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darkness. It also helps to bring out the NMM gold features, or anydetail surrounded by the darkened area.It is very important that each layer is given time to dry before applyingthe next or you will break off the previous layer, and create tide linesof darkness which you cant really fix unless you start over. To get a

good gradual darkening effect, usually about 10 layers were required.In the end, I thinned down black to about a 60% water to paint mix,and blacklined the magma scale armor plate to separate it from theNMM trim. After the darkening though, it was already pretty dark there,and only a quick stroke with black paint was required to define thesurfaces. Note that I did not use inks for this. The benefit is thatcolored water can be made out of any color, and is less harsh andprone to making tide lines like ink will. In a way, colored water is moreforgiving that inks, which would have to be diluted even further.Whenever the surfaces called for a different type or material, Iblacklined it with heavily thinned black paint. Being thinned (with

Future floor wax finish), the black paint flows and stays in the lineseasier. This gave a crisp clean look to the model, something I am fondof.

Painting the Plain Red ArmorUsing:Chaos blackScab redRed goreBloody redRed inkOver the black basecoat, a thinned down version (35-40% water) of scab red is applied, in the same manner that yellow was dragged onthe surface of the veins. Start the paintbrush at the darkest recesses,and drag the paint towards the brightest edge you want. In my casethis generally meant starting from the top trims to the bottom ones,away from the overshadowing magma scale armor plating.

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To explain this, lets take the right frontal leg of the juggernaut, right

underneath the lava scale plating (leading to the claws). I apply thepaint starting up on the leg, and I drag the paint down with the brushtowards the claw, using this wet layering technique. Since the paint isdiluted about 40% with water, little color will show at the top and morepaint will end up at the bottom, this shows even more on a blackbasecoat. Let it dry a few seconds, and repeat the process. This time, Istart putting paint maybe 1 mm below the first layer I just applied. Nowthis second "wet layer", once dry, won't appear to cover much either,but a little more than the first. I'll apply a third layer, again starting alittle below where I started dragging the paint the previous time. Dontbe afraid to step out of this procedure, as I did. Sometimes the layer

was just too thin, and starting a second layer a little below waspremature; Id simply do another layer starting wherever I thought thechange black/scab red was too drastic.Now it's time to brighten the color. I'll mixed some red gore in the scabred, re-dilute with water, and apply a new layer of brighter, thinnedpaint, starting a little below the last scab red layer made, spreadingthe paint towards the claw once again. I kept this process going, with acouple layers of each color mixes. I used pure scab red, 50/50 mix scabred/red gore, pure red gore, 50/50 mix red gore/blood red, until thelast few layers I applied were actually very short, close to the claw, inpure blood red. I actually started with scab red, added some red gore

about 50/50, then more and more red gore, then eventually blood red,periodically adding dilution water to keep the mix thin and fresh. Thefinal hilight layer is actually blood red with a touch (10-15%) of skullwhite. More than that would look too pink. Dont worry about actualcolor mix quantities, is you apply gradual, thin layers by dragging themtowards the brightest regions, youll end up with the same smooth(er)transition.

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How smooth your color transition, or "wet blending", is will depend onhow you mastered the art of diluting your paint just right (comes withexperience). It will also be better if you use 15 layers throughout thesurface instead of 3-4, and the more numerous the shades of red youused along the way, the better. The Juggernaut's leg, for example, was

made with 5 different shades of red, done with about 15 layers (3 eachroughly). And remember, once done, if a particular region of thetransition jumps to a brighter color too quickly for your tastes, use thecolored watered technique, with a shade of red that is darker thanwhat you are trying to fix, and apply to gradually darken the area. Bepatient though, it takes a lot of layers to make it really smooth, and ithas to dry in between. When I could, I would darken a bunch of adjacent areas, and by the time I was done, the first place I darkenedhad dried up and was ready for another thin layer of colored water.

To help bring out a nicer candyish red, thinned down red ink wasapplied all over the red armor. I preferred using 2 or 3 layers of thinned

ink than a heavy one, because the ink will blur the various shades anddiminish the difference in shades you have just applied, which youdont want. Ink is just to give it a tint, mainly to change the blood redcolor, which is too close to orange for my tastes. It also has the benefitof improving the blending effect. That extra tint, which can also beachieved with any color you thin extremely to colored water will hidea little bit of the layer transitions.

Non Metallic Metal Gold (NMM Gold)Using:Scorched BrownVermin BrownLeprous BrownLight Yellow #010 from Vallejo Model color range; similar to 50/50white golden yellow mixAlright now, the most learning I did here. NMM had stirred amazement,wonder and a certain deal of fright since I first saw the Mastersresults. It looked incredible to me, and it looked impossible to achieve.Well my friends, it isnt as hard as it may look. But its definitelysomething you should attempt only after getting a good grip of the wetlayering described in the red armor portion of this article. I did a lot of searching and observation on this, and here is how I painted myinterpretation of NMM gold.First, there is no perfect way to do it. To each their own color picks. Ichose mine from the lists of Bolterandchainsword.coms renownedCommander Y (Tom Shadle) and Mahazael, the Demon Prince Masterof coolminiornot.com. There are a variety of colors to pick, and thetechnique is the same for NMM silver or brass, but youll have a veryhard time achieving results you like unless you have the right colorsfor the look you wanted. I wanted my NMM to be shiny, bright, to

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contrast with the darker red armor. Not too sure myself if it wouldwork, I had read that Gold would never reflect perfect white, its justnot in the tint of the metal. Some people would use beige to brightenthe brown and make it look gold. Others used yellowish to make thegold shine. I picked a yellowish color, but something between beige

and yellow. Too yellow isnt good, as it will look like yellowish metals,not actually gold, which draws its shades in the browns. If yourattempts end up looking yellow, then you are using too much pureyellow, and should stick in the leprous brown color ranger longerbefore going to light yellow for the final brightening.Colors set, the next and most important thing is understanding the waylight reflects on metallic surfaces. I have no background in arts andtherefore lack the proper theory to explain here. I am, however, a verygood observer. I spent hours upon hours searching and scrutinizingpictures of well made NMM models, the ones I though had achieved agood reflective effect and caught my eye. Most of the hundred or so

pictures I kept were found on coolminiornot.com, from browsingcountless high scoring models. I began to get a feel of how reflectivesurfaces could be painted to mimic reflections and give it a shinyappearance. Its hard to explain, its just something you eventuallyunderstand, from seeing this type of surface at this particular anglefrom the light source, painted this way. I can however teach you howeach type of reflection was made on Magmatrax, and hints as to whichsituation calls for which effect, to the best of my humble observations.

Sky-Earth NMM Gold (SENMM)Certain golden areas are sufficiently large to show off with someshinier gold effect. Or perhaps the area is small but you really want tomake it look like its polished, super reflective gold. Thats when youuse the SENMM technique. The idea is to simulate the reflection of thehorizon, where sky and earth meet. Have you ever looked at a shinychromed hubcap? Pretty much everywhere the car is parked, youll seea horizon line, be it from sky and earth meeting itself, or another suchdrastic color transition from dark to light, like the sidewalk and thebuilding behind it. To fool the eye into recognizing the horizon in thedistance reflected on the metal, you use this technique.

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I always started with a basecoat of only slightly thinned leprous brown.(20% water). 2 layers would usually suffice, but dont worry if thesurface is not perfectly covering the black undercoat, as there will bemany more layers applied. Take scorched brown, normally thinnedaround 1/3 water and paint a horizontal line on the surface. From thisstarting point, I paint the entire area underneath scorched brown.Next, I use light yellow to paint directly over the horizon line. I can alsouse this step to even the horizon line made with scorched brown. Withthis feature as bearings, I then slightly brighten the dark zone underthe line. Starting from the very bottom, Id use 50/50 thinned verminbrown and apply paint from the bottom, brushing sideways. When thehorizon line is high up on the surface, vermin brown wont be

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sufficient: the color has to become brighter. A 50/50 mix of verminbrown/leprous will often suffice, but for those really large areas, youmight have to bring it to full leprous brown. Next, over the horizon, Iwould go to the highest area of the surface and paint leprous brown.

Then, successively, mixes of leprous and light yellow, 50/50 thinned

with water, are layered horizontally. My best advice is to have all 4browns available on the palette, diluted 50/50 with water each, on yourpalette. That way you can mix various concentrations of paint for yourmixes, which comes particularly important in the leprous/light yellowtransition. Put a layer in between leprous and light yellow. If its toodark, just add more light yellow to the mix on the palette. Toobright? ...well you get the idea. A lot quicker to adjust the layering for asmooth transition. Just remember to add thinning water periodically.And if your horizon line is particularly low, the top color will tendtowards vermin brown. But dont go to scorched brown as it confusesthe eye which you need to fool into associating dark brown as the

earth line. Same with the bottom of the earth zone, dont go to lightyellow too much as it is reserved for the sky region.Now that its all painted, its time to hilight the very edges, the rimsof the metal surfaces. For this you must remember that the brightestrims are perpendicular to the light source. And as the rims tend to beparallel to the light rays, it reflects less and less of the light. So, if youtake the armor shell on top of the hind legs of the Juggernaut, the verytop of the gold rim is light yellow, and as the curved line goes down,the very rim goes from light yellow to leprous brown, and then nohilight at all. This also means that the underside trims should get nohilight of such at all, since light is above the metal. However, at the

very bottom of the metal trim, a little brightening is in order, with avery thin layer of leprous brown (always thinned) and then an evensmaller line of 50/50 mix of leprous and light yellow. This you apply,like the top rims, using the side of your paintbrush, only grazing theedge for a very thin line.

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Knowing how its done is not enough, you must also know where to doit. In the case of SENMM, your horizon line is the starting point. Thatstarting point should however follow a simple rule. If the surface youare painting is perfectly vertical, then your horizon line should be rightin the middle of it. However, if the surface is tilted up a little, then thehorizon line should be lower on the surface, the more tilted the lowerthe horizon. If the surface is tilted down, then the horizon should behigher up. Best way to figure this is to take a mirror and check it outfor yourself. If you tilt the mirror up or down, youll the featuresreflected in it move down or up, accordingly. In reality, it doesnt takea big angle for the tilted surface to only reflect the sky or the ground.For miniature painting, I found that the horizon line helps to show off reflection, and youll want to put that horizon in, and only avoid it whenthe surface is really very tilted.

The cylindrical features are done in the same way, but the horizon linehas to be alongside the length of the cylinder for the best effect.Furthermore, to accentuate the drastically curves surface, thescorched and vermin browns are very scarcely found, accentuatingmore on leprous and light yellow. The horizon therefore goes fromscorched to vermin to the normally unused leprous and finally a 50/50mix of leprous and light yellow.

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The horizon line might not always be horizontal. On curved surfaces, orsurfaces tilted both on the vertical and horizontal axis, the horizon mayend up diagonal. Magmatraxs waist gold trims are an example. Forone thing, on such a small surface, the horizon line horizontal wouldbe ackward (and too small). Instead, the transition was made vertical,though the light yellow for the sky transition was applied from the toprim, brought down at a slight angle and then continuing at the bottomof the trim towards the backside of the model, in an S figure. I lackthe proper explanation, but in this case, from studying many models,this technique clearly shows the eye that it is a reflective surface.

NMM Gold trimsMost of the Gold on Magmatrax was simply done as a NMM gold trim. The area is painted in the same fashion as the SENMM areas, color-wise, with the following considerations. Generally speaking, a NMMtrim tends to be hilighted in reverse to regular surface, bright at thebottom, and dark at the top (assuming the light is at the top).However, the very top rim is hilighted with your purest, brightest color,light yellow in my case. So I start with a leprous basecoat (2 coatsthinned), then scorched brown in the upper part, covered almostentirely with vermin brown. To get my bearings, I would then paint a50/50 mix of light yellow/leprous brown at the very bottom of the trim,and then blend the colors in between, using strongly thinned mixes ox

light yellow and leprous brown, and then vermin/leprous mixes. Yourpaint should be thinned down 50/50 with water for a better transition.

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To get a good NMM effect, it is essential that your color transition is

very smooth; you cannot see layers. To practice, I suggest using verydiluted paint, to 2/3 water at first, only applying a small amount of diluted paint, and then adding successive layers of various mixes to fillin the color gaps in the transition. As you get familiar with thistechnique, youll pull it off with less water in the paint, at a faster rate.

The first few trims literally took me hours to do right. But it gave meexperience with paint thinning, and amount of paint in the paintbrushrequired for best application.Painting the studs had me discover that a simple SENMM techniquecould be used to great effect. Aiming for the sky, I kept my mottostrong: No shortcuts, make everything as intricate as possible and gothe extra mile, every time. So I decided to paint every last one of thestuds (over a hundred in all) scorched brown, and very carefully paintthe lower 1/3 leprous brown and the top 1/3, light yellow. Paint wasonly barely thinned (10%), as the paint needs to stick and cover.Besides, thinned paint on a stud tends to gather around the stud,which is a big no-no. For best results, I made sure to leave a scorchedbrown lining all around the studs. The biggest studs also got a very,very small touch of pure light yellow thinned down as usual (35-40%)at the very bottom of the stud, leaving most of the leprous brownshowing. Small zones of color as such might not seem worth the time,but for the overall piece, even the slightest hints of color will show. Justlike the smallest error in color transition will haunt you until you fix it.NMM Silver/SteelUsing;Fortress greyCodex greyWolf grey #47 (Vallejo Game color, like Spacewolf grey without theblue hue)

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The steel parts were done with the same NMM techniques, over theblack undercoat. I unfortunately do not have specific recipes for thevarious layers, and it is still a color I feel I need to improve on. Part of the problem is that there are no good dark greys out there, you shouldmix your own in a pot. I didnt, it took longer, and I will for my next

project. Basically, re-use the gold technique, however your verminbrown equivalent should be a 50/50 mix of black and Codex grey.

The chains were done with black basecoat, followed with 50/50 mix of codex/black, covering the entire links but avoiding where the linkstouch each other, to leave a line. Then a hilight of Fortress greycovering half of each link, brighter towards the light. Finally, a hilight of wolf grey on the top third of each link did the trick. As a reminder, thelava scales, where the chain crosses over, were darkened towards thebase, like any other edge of the magma scales, using the coloredwater technique explained earlier. This helped make the chain standout. Note that the jewelry chains were glued down to stiffen them. Thisbecame essential for the chain hanging from the axe, as otherwise, the

swinging motion would break the paint as the links rubbed. To hold itin place, making it much easier to paint, very liquid superglue wasapplied along the chain, to fuse all the links together.

Horns and SpikesUsing:Scorched brownVermin brown

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Leprous brownBleached bone

Though the color list is very similar to the gold, in this case, bleachedbone used as a brightener changes the final look considerably.Unfortunately, the step by step pictures turned out blurry, youll haveto forgive me for that. I basecoat scorched brown, then start makingthe spikes with vermin brown, thinned as usual. For this Id start at thebase, leaving a little ring of basecoat, and paint a spike, usually with 2strokes from the same starting point, on stroke towards the left, onetowards the right. The spikes should be rather fat at this layer. Onceyouve gone all around, a second layer of snakebite leather is applied.Start with more thinned down paint this time (40-50% water) and makea slightly thinner spike within the boundaries of the vermin brownspikes. 2 layers might be necessary at this point. Next, a 50/50 mix of snakebite/bleached bone layer is applied, again thinned down 40-50%,and starting the spikes even further, but keeping the with the same.Finally, pure bleached bone is applied to the last half or third of thespikes. Sometimes, when my blending wasnt nice enough, Id go backwith a very diluted paint mix of snakebite/bleached bone (75% water)and apply a little of this thinned paint on the spikes, where thetransition from snakebite to bleached bone was too drastic. A fewlayers usually did the trick. And to complete the effect, a 80-90% watermix with scorched brown is applied in a couple layers around the baseof the spike, to fade in the bone spikes into the darker browns. To topit off, like I did with every change in type of surface, blacklining thetransition between horn and gold trim made it pop out andaccentuated the clean look of the paintjob. Be sure to use thinnedblack, with the Future Floor Finish paint will tent to run along the line,making the task easier.

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SkullsUsing:Scorched brownBestial brownSnakebite leatherBleached bone

No Self-respecting Khorne Follower struts his stuff around thebattlefield without skulls. I had a lot of trouble getting te skulls to lookthe way I liked. To this day I still feel I have a hard time with skull andbone colors, and particularly the way I paint them. So take my

procedure with caution. I wanted to accentuate the shades on theskulls, and have a color that was bone, not yellowish or reddish like thespikes and horns seem to have. I found that substituting vermin brownto bestial brown from the mix actually helped make a more dry coloreffect for the bones. My final technique involved basecoating the skullsscorched brown, then gradually hilighting with Bestial, 50/50 mix of bestial/snakebite, snakebite, 50/50 mix with bleached bone, and finallyfull bleached bone. Most coats were regularly thinned, saving the

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heavier thinning of paint for the 50/50 and pure bleached bone coats.Doing so, I made sure to paint around the eye sockets, and the sidelines on the forehead very bright to accentuate the bony features of the skulls. Another thing I found helped the look was to highlight thebone structure right over and under the teeth similar the actual teeth,

but starting from a bestial/snakebite mix, instead of the darkerscorched brown found in between the teeth themselves. This helpscreate the effect that the teeth are lodged inside the jaws, and thebone structure is only hiding the teeth that emerge. Eye sockets werekept or repainted black at the end.

Juggernaut Eyes & Gems

The gem technique is probably the only technique I mastered alreadybefore undertaking this project. Assuming you are unfamiliar with it,here are my pointers, using the Juggernauts eyes as example. Startingwith black undercoat, the lower half is painted in a slightly crescentshaped coat of scab red, thinned normally. Then, the lower third isrepainted with a layer of red gore, this time thinned 50%. You mightneed to coats for the color to show, but for now keep going to get all

the colors in. The bottom quarter is then given a heavily thinned coatof blood red, always in a crescent shape that should reach the half point on each side. And even thinner line of blazing orange is applied,thinned of course, and finally a single line of yellow is applied, thoughthinned normally, to show a little more with one coat.Now is the time to go back, using the marvel of having all relevantpaint on your palette should be quick. With 60-75% thinned down paintmix, reapply thin lines of colors where you feel the transition is notsmooth enough. As the paint is very thin, not much will change, but alayer or two should be enough to blend in the colors without creating anew paint line with the paint you just added. After all, that additionalline should be transparent a bit, as its supposed to blend in the colorsunderneath. In the case of the eyes, youll notice that I actually did thiswhole procedure at a tilted angle. I stated the lower half for the sake of keeping the explanation simple, but you should probably considerpainting the highlight at an angle too, because the light source israrely directly over the gem. The final, revealing touch, is made with alittle pure skull white dot at the top of the gem. In my case, I made a

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slightly oval dot with a smaller white dot right underneath it, mimickingmultiple light sources.A few final pointers on the subject. Keep the paint thin, as youll likelypaint and repaint the area until the color transition pleases you. If youdont youll quickly get a chalky texture, which messes any effect up. I

find that deeper-looking gems fool the eye better. A deeper gemshould keep black present all round the white dot; no hint of colorshould be touching the white dot. The color brightening should alsostart slowly and then brighten faster and faster as you get to thebottom of the gem. In my case, red was dominant, but red turnedyellow quickly on the lower quarter crescent.

Miscellaneous Champion Details The rider being a focal point for the viewer, I knew I had to go furtherand add details. The helmet faceplate was slightly plain. After a carefulwet layering job of red on it, using multiple watered down layers likethe rest of the red armor, I decided to add visor slits. As it was toolate to carve out the slits, I decided to fool the eye. A carefully painteda black spike, and directly facing the helmet, made a mirror copy onthe other cheek. Then, a careful thin line, on the side opposite to thelight source was painted, with a blood red/15% skull white, thebrightest red I used. You must make sure to keep the width of theblack slit and the highlight next to it constant. I suggest you paint thehilight and simply go back with black to make the transition line drasticand very straight. A thin wash of red ink is then applied, to make surethe highlight is kept with the same red hue as the rest of the armor.

The back of the Helmet panels was also subject to fool the eye. Thoughthe front side of those ears has god trim, the back doesn. I didnTfeel like doing NMM gold all over, and I didnt feel like sculpting trimsonce more, so I decided to paint it as though there were a gold trim. Istarted with teh magma pattern, then made a black line fairly wide butvery straight next to the magma. I then went through the regular NMMprocedure. At the end I made sure to add rim highlights, very thinbright lines to make the trim look like it has depth.

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The flesh arms were done with a slightly different approach. Ibasecoated dark flesh, then added scorched brown for shadows,normally thinned. Then, for the hilights, I used 50% thinned dwarf flesh,, followed by a 50/50 mix of dwarf flesh/bronzed flesh, and finallya thinned pure bronzed flesh layer. It made for a tanned, morecontrasted flesh color, which I thought suited the hardened fighter.

The red cape was done with the same red armor colors, keeping thepaint very thin to help the layering process. To give the ragged capethe impression that is was worn down and burnt, I shaded it black. I didso with a dozen or so applications of black-tinted water mix, first layerbeing widespread, and the last ones only applied at the very tip. Aword of advice here: protect the rest of your model on open-endedfeatures like the cape. I didnt and tiny black water droplets were

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unfortunately splashed all over the Juggernauts right leg. I had tospend 2 hours touching it up...

The Axe The axe blade I decided to keep within the magma theme and paintscales, similar to the juggernaut armor. This time however, I wantedthe effect to look more like a hot piece of molten lava, held at the corewith scales, and then stretching into blades, cooling down towards theedges. Just like the magma scales, I started with scab red, then paintedthe veins with blood red, then orange, then yellow. I kept the veinswider this time around, to show off more lava heat. I then hilighted thescales s entire surface (aside from a thin dark red border), but thatdidnt look quite right. I then decided that brighter yellow was required,and thus I added Light Yellow. The picture below shows the left sidewith my first attempt, and teh right side with my revisited concept. Thescales were covered with scab red again, and hilighted to blood red ononly the borders of each scales facing a top light source. I howeverkept a thin line of scab red showing, as a form of darklining aroundthe scales, making them stand out better. The light yellow was onlyused at the intersection of some of the veins, as the heat isntnecessarily constant through the surface, and this intermittent patternaccentuates the magma pattern.

The scales stop where the axe blade starts getting thinner towards theedge. To help plan the blending job, I applied a line of each colorparallel to the blade edge, darker as you go outwards. I didnt worryabout blending the colors in at this stage. With this matrix I couldthen work on blending the colors in-between, with 50/50 paint/watermixes, diluting being crucial here to keep the final result smooth andflat. The colors, from the magma scales are: Light yellow, golden

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yellow, blazing orange, blood red, red gore, scab red, 50/50 scabred/black, and pure chaos black on the very edge of the blades. This isanother fine example of where using a palette really helps. With allnecessary colors out, you can mix various concentrations of intermediate colors, add water and paint on the axe. If youre quick

and looking for an additional challenge, you can try pure blending. Thishappens when you put a layer of thinned color, say orange, and thennext to it you apply a thinned layer of blood red/orange, actuallytouching the orange line. When both lines are sufficiently wet, thecolors will blend in together, youll see them mix together,, so atopposite ends the color is pure orange or blood red, , and as you movetowards the interface of those 2 lines, some orange has made its wayinto the orange, gradually turning the color over. You can help theblend by putting you paintbrush in there and blend in the two lines alittle. The more skilled with this you are, the fewer intermediateblending layers you need to make a full color transition. I heard of

artists blending red to black with simply red and black. Though I had some success with this, but most of my work was madewith wet layering and some blending (about 10-15 successive colorlines, very thin). Simpler procedure, but very time consuming. My firstblade (excluding scales!) took me 3 hours to get to that result. Theentire axe head took about 20 hours total. Yes I am slow, but theresults are good, and Im getting quicker with each hour spentpracticing. If you want to get better, you have to invest yourself in it.So once this was done, scales hilighted, a colored water wash waslayered towards the chains, to darken the area and again, make thechain features stand out.

The FurUsing:Scorched brownVermin brownLeprous brownBleached bone

The colors for the fur are teh same as for the horns. My best resultscame with a basecoat of scorched brown, drybrush of vermin brown,followed with a drybrush of leprous brown. To complete the effect, Icarefully applied a 50/50 mix of leprous/bleached bone, 1/3 waterthinned as usual. At this stage I painted every little strand of fur,making sure to avoid the strands in the recesses and brighten the topof the folds, to show a certain wavyness in the pelt. One morethinned layer of bleached bone, again, dragged from middle of the furstrand to the very tip like I painted the red armor, to help make thelayered color transition smoother.

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The Powerfist FreehandOnce everything was painted, I wanted to still kick it an extra notch.Seeing a good opportunity to show the judges I could paint withoutborders, I decided to paint a skull feature on the fist. I started out witha few concept sketches with paper and pen, and once I had my basicconcept, I practiced the features of the skull. I decided I should draw ita bunch of times, always the same way, to get proportions rightlyrepeated every time. The eyebrows were drawn first, then the

cheekbones, teeth, and finally the sides of the skull. That way I knewthe V-shaped eyebrows had to start at this point, go up about thishalf the height of the total surface, and be about a third of the with of the surface. With that V for bearings, I simply added the features. Ithen practiced a few times on my palette, only making the black lines.Finally, time to put paint on the fist, using my practiced procedure. Iblacklined the motif, then added in the reds and eventually replace theblack lines with darker reds. Since a red skull on a red Powerfist wontshow much, I outlined the skull with flames, from orange to lightyellow.

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For a final touch, I decided to add a Khorne symbol on the forehead.Again, on paper I practiced to get the symbol looking right, startingwith an X that is wider at the base than the top, add the horizontallines, then the vertical at the bottom, and voil. Practiced 3 times withpaint on palette, then blood red on the Powerfist. I did it again withorange, then yellow, and finally a hint of light yellow, but only towardsthe intersection of the lines. Of course thats more a principle that afact, as this was getting very small. But thats the concept, anyhow.

The rest of it The axe shaft was basecoated leprous brown, again 2-3 thinned layers.I chose 2 lines of highest light, one on each side, and painted it lightyellow. This will be later covered but serves as bearings for now. Then,at 90 degrees from the light yellow, a scorched brown line is applied (2in all). At 45 deg. from the light yellow (halfway between yellow andscorched brown), a leprous brown line is applied (4 lines in all). Now,with 50% thinned paint, vermin brown is applied, covering just about

all the scorched brown, from each side towards the leprous brown.Using your palette, apply successive mixes of leprous/vermin, 50%thinned, to blend in the color from the pure leprous to pure scorchedbrown. The same is done from leprous to light yellow. Finally, oncehappy with the color transition, correcting and re-correcting until theblend was smooth (it sure wasnt on my first try!), then heres a simplytrick I learned from reading Allan Cs articles. Thin down a color, in thiscase leprous brown, to a point where its very thin, a bit like darkeningthe magma scales near the gold trims. Go easier on the thinning thistime though, say 1 part paint to 7-8 parts water or so. You then applythis very thin wash over the axe shaft or other such blended surface.

This will give all shades of the color the same uniform tint, and willactually help improve the overall smoothness of your blending. Thistechnique works for any surface requiring smooth transition, try usinga brighter to darker shade and glaze it over to see the results. Notethat I did not use this technique for the NMM gold. That is because thisleprous brown tint would spoil the light yellow which needs to be pureto keep the shining effect.

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First off, once the base was basecoated black, I drybrushed Codexgrey, then Fortress grey and finally a touch of Wolf grey, emphasizingon the rocky bulges I wanted to define. Next came the lava. Using 2-3coats each time of thinned paint (35-40% water), I applied scab red allover the untouched plastic base surface. Next came red gore, coveringabout 95% of the surface. At the blood red stage, I started making apattern of warmer rivers, branching off. With blazing orange the riversare getting warmer and the paint more concentrated in central areas.

Yellow was then applied as a thin line in the center of all the riverbranchings, but made wider where the flow was wider or the flows met.

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Light yellow was then only applied at the warmer regions, where theflows met, in the center. A little bit of 50/50 skull white/water was thenblended in the very center of the intersections, making pools of varioussizes where the lava is at its hottest. The rings and bubbles werepainted by applying thick coats of undiluted yellow around the base, to

fill in the interface from bubble to plastic base, and round up theinterstice. I did so instead of using Green Stuff as parts of the bubbleswas pretty much inaccessible to the tools, whereas paint was simplyapplied on the bubble and left to sag at the base. From yellow I wetlayered light yellow, and finally white on top, making sure to let eachlayer dry before painting the next. Since the bubbles were rising lava,or gasses trapped under lava, rising up, it was meant to be thewarmest of the base, and given the most amount of white.

The base had been planned to give me an opportunity to show off some light sourcing from the lava, accentuating the hot effect. Iactually added some Milliput on the vertical side of the rock within thealcove at this point and purposely made vertical lines and textureswith a sculpting tool, to facilitate the lighting effect. I then basecoatedthe area black again, then started the effect I had practiced on a fewprevious models before. Heres how I did it. First I figured out wherethe light was coming from, which was clearly the 2 bubbles, though thelava as a whole was emitting a hue. Then I figured out which areas of the rock around the light source were directly facing said light sources.

These areas would get the most light. So I started by painting the lit upzones with scab red, then red gore, making the zone smaller with eachbrighter layer. Scab red is painted on, but with red gore I startdrybrushing with a good amount of paint a smaller zone within thescab red zone. This drybrush can and will place paint in the crevices, atthis point this is alright. Next is a drybrush of the main zones withblazing orange. Youll notice that I completely skip blood red, as thatparticular color somehow makes the effect look too much like paint

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and not enough like light. With the red gore I started making 2 half circles near the bubbles, which I will bring out with a drybrush of orange. Finally, a drybrush of yellow is applied closest to the lightsource. In my example I may have overdone the light on the crack, butthat was to make sure that the light effect would stand out even

though its cooped up in the alcove.

Once the main zone was done, a little further from the large lit upzone, I painted the same colors on little outcrops of rock, leaving black

gaps in between. I found this made it look like a couple rocky outcropshave a directly exposed face to the light, hence they receive reds,oranges and yellows, even though those outcrops arent really directlyfacing the light source. With all this done, I glued on a few skulls,added broken horns for flavor and painted them like previouslymentioned.

ConclusionWell, on the slight chance that youve stayed awake throughout this

Tutorial, I thank you for your consideration, and hope youve leaned allI had to teach... for now. Again, Ill repeat myself. Aim high, and tryhard. Theres only little you can learn from painting what youvealready done before. Its in challenging yourself and trying somethingnew that you really elevate your skills. Start with an original idea,something you can physically convert in some way to make it yourown. Go the extra mile on everything, and show them your model isnot just a nice model, its that one particular model. Keep touching up,seek advice, and youre sure to achieve a model youll be very proudof. Its possible, with either a lot of skill, or a lot of dedication and hardwork like me. Step up to the challenge!

8/7/2019 Magma Trax

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