Lightning and Fluff

Here's my quick and pretty easy lightning claws how to tutorial. The advantage is it's pretty quick, requires no mixing of paints and looks (in my opinion) pretty good from any distance other than right up close.


Firstly I base-coated the claws regal blue.


Next I paint on some jagged lines in Enchanted Blue. I use a fine tipped brush and my natural hand wobbliness pretty much assures a jagged line! I like to make two arcs from the base and cross them over a couple of times, but other than that it's pretty random.


In each of these pictures, the bottom claw is the one being worked on.

Over the top of that, trying not to go outside the Enchanted Blue lines, I squiggle on some Ice Blue. Don't worry if you're as poor as I am at staying inside the lines, we can neaten it up later.

Next it's white, just at the bottom of the lightning and where two or more lines intersect. Again, try to stay inside the lines, especially at intersections. You can see that I'm really hopeless at that!

Now I go back with Enchanted Blue once more and try to edge the lines better, cleaning up splodges and trying to make the ice-blue and white a bit smaller and thinner as it gets towards the tip of the claw. I also try some edging here, just with the edge of a brush run along the edges of the claw to try and brighten the edges up. I use Enchanted Blue towards the base, Ice blue further along the edges and (not shown in this picture, but you can see it on the other claws) White on the very tip.

The lightning still often looks a little too bright and washed out at that stage, so next I go back to Regal Blue and put some in between all those lightning bolts. It may not be super noticeable in the photos, but the extra dark layer between the lighter lines really helps them stand out. And that's it! I also like to do a gloss coat of varnish over them to protect the paint and make them a little shiny, but I know some people hate that look, so just do what you think looks good to you!

And there it is =)

And for some bonus fluff, here's what I submitted to the GW Elite competition (about your model and a 400 word story). I think I'm ineligible because it's a Forge World model, but what the heck...

I have been playing Lord of the Rings for years, but my brother and I have recently decided to try out 40k. For my birthday I got a whole pile of Space Wolves. The first 40k mini I wanted to paint was the dreadnought as I’ve never painted a vehicle and they’re just so cool! Unfortunately during this time my 10 year old white fluffy dog, named Loki, passed away. So in his honour I’ve named my dreadnought after him, he always considered himself to be a big wolf (really he was a small fluffy lap dog!).

I’ve added a wolf skull from the Space Wolves kit, a heavy flamer from the Space Wolf Terminators and an axe from some Warhammer dwarf bitz that is strapped on with greenstuff and a tiny bit of paper clip for a bolt. The designs are all free-handed on, like the wolf on the banner and melta arm, most of them celtic knots (unbroken lines) in the shape of a cross (right torso), a wolf paw (left torso), a claw(claw arm) and a spike on the back.

He’s on a lava style base made with some cork tile to match my citadel realm of battle board. The colours range from Fenris Grey through to a 1:1 mix of Space Wolves Grey and Shadow Grey.

And now just 400 words about Loki, a small part of his long saga...

Loki, White Wolf, is a venerable Space Wolf Dreadnought. Each white “tattoo” is s signature of a major battle. On his back rests Vorecaster, his pre-internment axe. It was named after a Tyranid assault on a colony. ..

Waist deep in gaunts, Loki, then a Wolf Guard, saw a massive Pyrovore settle back on its haunches and angle towards where his Lord was defending the last of the evacuating colonists. As gelatinous ooze began to collect around the hideous bioweapon’s sphincter, heralding the imminence of the strike, Loki tore his massive axe from the head of another gaunt, swung it straight back over his head two handed and with a mighty full bodied heave he sent it flying through the air!

Axe whirling towards the hideous creature, Loki used his wolf claw, boots and a long stream of shouted invectives to clear himself from the chitinous horde surrounding him. The axe thwacked home with an audible splacking sound, right in the grotesque bioweapon’s muzzle.

Packmates supporting him with well placed bolter fire, he hurled himself forward, dodging, weaving, clawing, kicking through the fray. Whenever a larger creature reared up in front of him, accurate fire from his pack sent it down.

The Pyrovore fired, but the axe had both blocked and damaged the colossal biogun. The bioplasmic discharge still emerged, but ripped free through the weapon itself and was sent off course. Tyranid blood and ooze splattered from the wound in a hideous shower of green, red and purple ichor. Just at that moment, Loki leapt up from the back of a surprised gaunt, whose jaws clicked shut on the air where an armoured boot had just been. Impaling the back of the wounded pyrovore with his claw to stick his landing, Loki ripped his axe free in a shower and spurt of putrid ooze, lifted it high, jumped forward and brought it crashing down with his whole bodyweight behind the blow.

He half severed the massive head and slid to the ground amidst the acid blood and slippery tyranid ichorous goop. The massive beast slumped dead over him.

“The vorecast is mostly vine vith a chance ov green acid rain.” Loki quipped when they pulled him out after the battle and put a drink in his hand. Toasting the axe, they called it Vorecast after the “joke” and ex-Pyrovore.

And that’s just one of many stories in Loki’s saga.

Space Wolves Venerable Dreadnought Loki Finished

Well, with bits and pieces done here and there I think I've pretty much finished him now =)


Firstly I freehanded some celtic tattoos on him. You may need to click to see them larger but basically they're an unbroken line. One in the shape of a cross as befits a memorial, the other in the shape of a claw, which is one large knot with four smaller ones and some claws.


I got the basic idea from a google image search, then filled a couple sheets of paper trying to get one that fit and be paintable in such a small space.

Here's a wolf from the same tutorial series as the one on the banner. I've since blended him a little better. (http://www.bolterandchainsword.com/index.php?showtopic=184639&hl=space+wolves)

This celtic wolf claw was pretty much my design, loosely based on a celtic moon I saw for the zig zaggy claw bits. I'm sure there are others just like it out there, given that there's a limited number of ways to connect things!

You can see in the above that I've basecoated the claws in Regal Blue, that's to prepare them for the lightning.

Pretty cool huh =) I took some WIP shots so might put another post up with a "how to" even though I've seen other (better) ways of doing it in magazines and on other sites.


Of course, when I pulled the arm off the blu-tac half of the paint on the back stripped right off too, so I had to touch that back up. I'm really, REALLY hoping that when I varnish it, such things might not happen so easily.


I also stuck an axe/spike tattoo on the back to fill in that bit of blank space.

So what does he look like all together...


Here's a back view.

A claw-eye view, looks particularly good at full size.

Looking down into the lava at the base.

Standard from above type shot.

And a portrait rather than landscape shot front on.

To be honest, he's not glued to the base yet. I need to varnish him, but it's been raining all day today! When the weather improves I'll spray it with a matt finish for a bit of extra protection.


So there you have it, may have taken a while and was pretty slow progress, but I'm pretty pleased with the end result. It's nothing like you'd find in a white dwarf magazine, but I'd like to think it's better than average table-top too. 


I'll have to fill you in on the background fluff at a later date, I'm wasting precious sleeping time right now!


Oh, but one last look at my entire Space Wolves army =)

Shields up!

Still feeling pretty unwell, but did the shields anyway. Took waaaay longer than it would have otherwise, but the medication I'm on at least helped stabilise my hands a bit. Every now and then a cough would screw up something I'd done, but it's good to have them finished anyway!

The shields have a central bit and three bolts evenly spaced around the outside, so designs with triangles and stuff were what I came up with.

Here are the shields after the first coat. Using Hawk Turquoise for the alternate colour. There will be more of this colour on the metallic dwarves, especially Etako. I should probably add some to the banner as well.

The runes are S and K (simmuskhan).

These runes are E I F (Etako Iron Fist)

Then I outlined the turquoise in ice-blue. The edges of the shield are in Boltgun Metal. A little codex grey was mixed in with the purple for highlights, likewise with the turquoise. A little more was mixed in for a final highlight. You can kinda see it in the picture, but the shading is more noticeable in real life.

Not the greatest job, some of them I like more than others. Still, now I have a full set of warriors, ready to battle with!

As always, click on a picture for a slightly bigger version. The metal figures have been based, just waiting for the PVA to set. Etako has a tiny bit of greenstuff to bulk up his gauntlet and to put an eyepatch over one eye. He's also standing on a couple of very thin slices of gravel to put his head above the others.

Well, you can scroll back to April 19th for the Mad Cat inspiration for my dwarves, and see the progress from when they were still in sprues! I guess that makes it a little over two weeks to get 48 dwarves done.

I don't know how that compares to some of the experts out there, but I'm happy with the results. Oh, and one last photo, I found Gimli that I painted aaaages ago. I'd like to think that the new dwarves are better painted =)