"Breastplate of Righteousness" - The Vulture - Part 1 - Armour, Fabric

What stronger breastplate than a heart untainted!

- Shakespeare, Henry VI

Good morning, and welcome back to The Art of Caesura!

I hope all is well with you in whichever part of the world you are reading this from! We are still immersed in the bleak midspring here in Ireland with plenty of wind and rain to go 'round. But that's what keeps it green!

After celebrating the 10th birthday of the blog over the last month, last week we looked at the painting competition I organised which helped mark the big occasion. For the next few weeks, we're going to look in detail at the painting process of my competition piece.

Bear in mind that I had never really painted a bust before (although, I suppose the character markers for World of Smog (the very first models posted on this blog) are really busts. I also had never entered a live painting competition before - so with a lot of 'firsts' at stake, I wanted to put a huge effort into this piece. 

Let us begin.

To continue the theme of firsts, I had never painted non-metallic metal (NMM - painting a surface to look like metal while only using "flat" paints - not paints with any shiny flakes in them). But I knew I really wanted to give that a go for this special piece. 

I watched a million tutorials, and starting with a light mid-tone grey (Dawnstone + black) I blocked in the areas where the the light would reflect with the most luminosity. 

A trick to help with this is the wet the surface of the mini with fresh water, and hold it under your bright painting light and take a photo - the water will reflect the light naturally. 

I mixed some white into my previous grey mixture and painted another layer inside the previous one. 

And then I did it again, adding a little more white. I also started to pick out the brightest areas (like his collar, and some of the trim - as seen below) with this lightest colour. 

At this early stage of painting the armour, I realised that I had to account for the object source lighting (OSL - the glow from his lighter and cigar) that I would be adding later. So I began to very roughly block this, and his skin tone, in just to give myself a sense of light direction and value.  

Okay, with the OSL and skin blocked in, I returned to the armour, to begin the process of smoothing out the blends between the layers that I had previously established. 

Using a stippling technique with my smallest brush, I painted five thousand dots - working the lightest colour out to merge with the next layer and then reverting to the darker colour and working it back in again. After several sessions of this, the blend started to get nice and smooth. 

Once I was quite happy with the transitions of the NMM, I began on the bounce reflections. I had established a mid-tone reflection in grey where his arms will be reflecting off the breastplate. 

I then used Contrast Guilliman Flesh and then Bugman's Glow mixed with Cadian Fleshtone to give the appearance of his skin reflecting. The pictures below show the same step from different angles and with different lighting conditions. 

Next I started work on the Imperialis motif (the winged skull in the centre of his breast plate); I started by painting it black. 

Wanting it to appear more shiny than the surrounding breast plate, I began my high lights with a slightly lighter tone (Dawnstone + white) than the mid-tone grey I used for the rest of the armour. 

I began to block in the light reflection on the complex shapes - this was honestly one of the more challenging parts of the whole model. I kept coming back to it throughout the project to increase the intensity or the depth of the shadows. 

The next step terrified me, I wanted to further blend all the NMM that I had just done, to once again heighten the luminosity and smooth some of the transitions. So I mixed up a diluted thinned white...

...Grabbed my very trusty airbrush...

And gave the lightest puff on the area that I had just spent a week painting (the left side of the breastplate - i.e. right side of the photo below). 

I'm happy with how it worked out. It did kill the contrast a little (which is all-important in NMM) but overall I think it served its purpose. 

Next, I focused on the other side of the armour and painted in the bounce reflection of the skin on that side just as I had done previously - but keeping it every-so-slightly darker, as this area would be in the shadow of his raised arm. 

And with that, the armour was complete!* (as I mentioned, I would return to areas of it - mostly the central skull - throughout the project to finesse the NMM, but at this point it was mostly done).

Time to move onto the clothes. I was really excited for this step. I use a stippling technique for my Black Templars, so painting a course fabric-type texture was much more in my wheelhouse. Plus, I knew that it would provide a much better backdrop for the breastplate that I had just completed, than the hodgepodge of overspray that was currently there. 

I started by painting his entire jacket (as opposed to his leather overcoat) with Ironclad Grey (a deep grey with a hint of blue).

Next, I mixed in more and more Anthracite Grey and applied it just to the areas that would take the light. 

I started by just painting it on to those areas (above) and then stippled the edges (below). 

I had to keep reminding myself not to forget the bit of sleeve on his right arm!

I kept going through pure Anthracite Grey - stippling small and smaller areas of the central or upper-facing areas of each highlight. 

And lightened things further by adding white. 

I was really happy with the fabric by the time I was done. I had managed to give nice contrast and texture without desaturating the colour too much. 

All that was left on the coat was the buttons - which I painted using the same technique that I had used for the other NMM. 

Phew-weee! Thanks for joining me for this in depth look at the start of the painting process for this, my first, competition piece. Tune in next week, right here on The Art of Caesura, for the next installment.

Reading: Malediction Lore Book - Tracy Hickman

Watching: Margin Call (2011) 

Next Week:

Skin and hair...