The Final Gurzon

The Armor - All I could see was red!

Painting the red portions of the armor

Here I used 77-718 Red, and just filled in the armor with this color where needed.  Easy enough!

Making the Red stand out even more

Once I was satisfied that I had the red areas covered well enough, I had to make that red really stand out.  One of the best ways to do this is by a very very light dry brushing with a light orange or yellow.  Anywhere that the red is against an edge, you should actually just brush on the lighter color in a very fine line on the edge.  You should only dry brush on areas that are edge- like areas such as the sharpest edge or leading edge of a forearm or shin. You really don't want to cover the red completely.  The effect is an illusion of lighting from a foreign source of light.  On this miniature, this is a very subtle effect and I don't know if it will be visible in the photos.  There are no sharp edges that require the fine line so the dry brushing merely gives depth to the red.

Note: Sorry about skipping around, but at this point the head had been finished where the eyes are, so I'm going to finish the eyes first. I'll finish this step later!

The Eyes

I decided to use a jewel painting technique for the bad boys eyes.  It's just a few easy steps and it will give them a lot of depth and oooooh will they look good! First I set the stage for the eye by using a tiny bit of black wash to bring out the wrinkles around the eye.  Once dry, I began the eye itself. Here's how:

1. Paint the whole eyeball black.
2. Paint the whole eyeball 77-710 Forest Green. [if you can do it, leave a slight edge of black - good luck]
3. Paint most of the eyeball 77-709 Shamrock Green. 
4. Put a very small highlighting or reflection spot (like pin point size) of 77-784 Bullywug's Belly Green [you could substitute white or bright yellow for this]

Tada! A very nice eyeball! Any over-painting can be corrected with a touch up of your red paint.  Typically, my Gurzon's right eye turned out better than the left. I hate that! (Don't look too close, Bill...)

Back to the Armor...

Silver plating

There is less silver than gold on this miniature, so I'm painting the silver first.  Using 77-702 Silver Metallic, I block painted the plates.  Easy enough again! I'm not painting the silver detailing yet.

Gold Plating

Same as above, only gold - 77-701 Gold Metallic.

Steel

Where the plate looks black, I decided on using 77-704 Steel instead.  Almost done with the armor!

Belts

Just paint the belts black!  Then I highlighted some of the edges with 77-707 Grey.

Details, Details I swear!

Teeth

Gurzon's teeth I painted 77-706 White. Then I washed them with black. His gums/lips I painted with the sample blood red color.

Rivets

All of the rivets I painted 77-722 Copper Metallic.

Note:  Once the metal was finished, I went back over it with a black wash. Where the black was too prominent, I repainted the metal color.

Nails

The nails I simply painted black.

Armor details

I painted all of the detail on the armor - such as chains and skulls - Metallic Silver.

Basing this bad boy out

This is how I like to do my bases.  First I start with 77-710 Forest Green. When this is dry, I apply a layer of watered-down white glue.  While the glue is wet, I dip the base in Woodland Scenics Blended Turf, Green Blend.  When this is dry, I paint the edges of the base black (if it has edges).  Sometimes a base shouldn't be grass covered so I do other things as well, but I'm not going into that here.

The Staff

The staff has three basic parts, the shaft, the face, and the metal ends.

The shaft

First I painted the entire shaft 77-712 Leather.

I followed that with a wash of 77-714 Dark Brown, but only over the top half of the shaft.

The lower half of the shaft I drybrushed with a sample bottle of bright yellow.  The end result is a shaft going form a nice piney yellow color to a dark walnut sort of thing.

The Face

I began with a layer of 77-731 Khaki.

Then I washed the face with 77-912 Cleric Brown to bring out the shadows.

Then I dry brushed the face for highlights with 77-715 Ivory.

The last bit was to paint the inside of the mouth the sample blood red color, the eyes 77-709 Shamrock Green, and the teeth white.

The Metal Ends

I painted both ends of the staff with 77-702 Silver Metallic.  I washed the lower end with black and painted the large flat areas of the blade on the top with 77-901 Aged Metal.

Black Lining

In this step, you go to each feature of the miniature and decide whether or not a black line should shadow it.  Or, if there are any areas like between the legs that should be shadowed so dark they would be black.  I black lined the edges of the armor.  I also painted black around the face guards on the helmet between the face and the helmet to give the effect of the guards being thin plates of metal.

Check Your Work [and fix the boo-boos, Hey! What boo-boo's?]

In this step, you must very carefully examine the miniature.  You need to look for the not-so-obvious places where you over-painted an edge or under-painted and left it primer colored (or any other wrong color for that matter.) Correct all of these mistakes now as it will be more difficult after you have put on the final clear finish.

Protection

Once you are completely satisfied with the paint job, it's time to finish the paint with a clear over coat.  With this miniature I chose to use Testers Dull Coat.  I wanted a flat finish.

The only problem with a flat finish is, not everything on a miniature should be dull!  None of the metal would be dull and the teeth and eyes would definitely be wet looking.  The solution?  Using a brush I painted over these areas with a water-based high gloss clear coat.

Pat yourself on the back - you're done!

Kick yourself for having painted this for someone else, box it up, and ship it...

This is the case with many miniatures that I have painted for other people. Even some of the ones that I don't particularly care for when they are "raw," after they are done, I really like them.  I know I will be purchasing this miniature soon and painting my way!

I would like to thank Bill for the opportunity to show him and you my painting techniques and abilities.

Matt Clark
Minis By Matt