"Now I'm Pissed!" - Horned Hellboy - Part 1

Hellboy, to be other than human does not necessarily mean to be less.

Remember that, remember me.

Hellboy Omnibus, Volume 2: Strange Places, Mike Mignola

It's Friday, which means it's time for your weekly fix of The Art of Caesura!

We're still on a Hellboy kick - I'm going to ride this wave 'till I run out of steam! We've already seen regular Hellboy, and his ghostly friend. Today Hellboy is PISSED!

A couple months ago one of my friends was selling a ton of hobby paints. I had only recently got my airbrush, so it seemed like a good opportunity to pick up a load of airbrush paints to save on time and faff of mixing and decanting from Citadel pots. Above, are all of the colours that I used on this Hellboy's skin. 

While my process was much different with this Hellboy compared to my one of a few weeks ago, the time they took was similar. I opted for the airbrush for this guy because the vast majority of the model would be red, so I wouldn't have to worry much about overspray. Also, I have had success with the airbrush at defining skin an muscles more quickly and naturally than with a brush. 

I started with "Dark Vermillion", I just wanted a very "red" red for my mid-tone. 

With the mid-tone base-coat established, I started towards the highlights. I sprayed Bloody Red generally from above (but really more in a volumetric way - trying to accentuate the large slabs of muscle, while leaving the depressions between muscle groups more in the shadow of the spray. 

For the second highlight, I used Hot Orange. I focused this on his left (forward positioned) arm, face, horns and top of head. I really wanted to avoid him looking more orange than red, but at the same time I did want him to be fiery. 

With all of the highlights established, I started in on the shadows. I sprayed Scarlet Red generally from below, and in the areas that would be more in shadow. I also focused this on his Right Hand of Doom. 

For the final shadow colour, I used Burnt Red. It is a really nice "brick red" with less purple in it than the previous colour. 

I fully acknowledge that these photos sure do make it difficult to see these different gradients, but if you look at the photo below, you can see a difference in hue between the top of his head and his lower back, for example. 

With the skin pretty much done, I put the airbrush away and busted out the hairy brush. 

His right fist wasn't looking as dark as I wanted, so I painted it in the same way as on the Hellboy of a couple weeks ago, with Contrast Flesh Tearers Red. I also used this on his horns. 

Next, I painted his hair, shorts and some of the gubbins hanging off his belt with Black Templar. 

These steps were very straight forward, because I already had the lower body of the previous Hellboy for reference. I used all of the same colours, but with the red base-coat (as opposed to the black-to-white zenital of the previous one) I painted his holster and pouches with Steel Legion Drab before giving them the Snakebite Leather. 

All that remained were the details. I painted his eyes yellow, and used some metalics for the bling around his belt. 

The final step was to give a tiny bit more attention to his big right hand. I dry-brushed the fist and horns with Pink Flesh and then used a "0" brush to pick out some of the hard edges to make it look more like stone. 

It was fun getting to bust out the airbrush. In retrospect, I probably could have done a quick oil wash to increase the contrast on his skin a bit while retaining the smoothness and vibrancy, but all-in-all I'm pretty happy with Ol' Red. 

See you next week for more shenanigans right here on The Art of Caesura!

Watching: Is it Cake (Season 3)

Next Week:

Full of atmosphere...