Legion of Everblight by Runic

[Ruпic]

The first miniature I've painted after a 1,5 year break, and the first miniature of my Everblight army. Theme inspired by Diablo, altough 3 sucked.


Techniques used are blending ( Khorne Red - Wildrider Red + Blazing Orange for the skin, you can see different shades if you look carefully, there's around 9 layers. Black - Light Grey for armour. ) sourcelightning, and some wetblending. The miniature was painted based on the light shading it while basecoated. I gave it the Scythean shoulders as they look more dynamic and cool. The thing is magnetized, and I'll be painting the other weapon/head options after my army with the initial options is fully painted.

Army list:

eLylyth
-Ravagore
-Ravagore
Max Nyss Raptors
Max Nyss Striders + UA
Anyssa Ryvaal
Nyss Sheperd

-Runic

[callmeHK]

Oh boy! This looks awesome!

How long did this take you?

I really need to start learning how blending is done..

Keep it up!

[Ruпic]

Thank you.

I took a new mindset for painting this time ( I've played since 2006, and owned an army for every faction except Minions & Retribution ) and I only paint when I feel like it, and stop when I don't, even if it's in the middle of a single blend stroke. Before I used to keep painting even after not really feeling like it. I feel this is the most monumental aspect of painting well. I've had the miniatures for 4 weeks and painted around 2-3 hours a week in total, so thats somewhere around 10 hours or so, can't say for sure.

[PG_PlagueZombie]

This looks awesome!

[mennie]

Very nice painting! Did you start this on Black or White surface?

[Crusader85]

Very nice scheme, I did something very similar with my Legion...you just did it better lol.

[Blighted Panda]

I'm lovin' the exaggerated highlights. I do that sometimes too.

[Defenstrator]

Very sharp and very smooth. I like the lighting effect as well.

One mistake though. You spent a lot of time doing the lighting but the flame isn't correct. It has the bright part on the edges and the dark red in the recesses. This should be reversed. The hottest part is in the centre while the cooler (and darker) flame is on the outside. Normally I wouldn't mention it, but this is a superior paintjob where details like that stick out.

Unless it's meant to be that way due to artistic expression or blight or something. If that's the case ignoreme.

[Ruпic]

Very sharp and very smooth. I like the lighting effect as well.

One mistake though. You spent a lot of time doing the lighting but the flame isn't correct. It has the bright part on the edges and the dark red in the recesses. This should be reversed. The hottest part is in the centre while the cooler (and darker) flame is on the outside. Normally I wouldn't mention it, but this is a superior paintjob where details like that stick out.

Unless it's meant to be that way due to artistic expression or blight or something. If that's the case ignoreme.

While physically that's probably the realistic thing that happens with a fireball spewed by a Dragonspawn, I don't really care about such things when painting. The studio Ravagore has the same "bright edges, dark recesses" -paintjob aswell. I checked how it would look reversed on my computer and my own opinion is it wouldn't look as visually good that way. So I guess I'll go with artistic impression.


Thanks for your comments folks.

[captainspud]

One mistake though. You spent a lot of time doing the lighting but the flame isn't correct. It has the bright part on the edges and the dark red in the recesses. This should be reversed. The hottest part is in the centre while the cooler (and darker) flame is on the outside.

That's actually a common misconception. In actuality, the temperature of the fire in different locations has only a minor effect on its apparent brightness. Here's some actual fire:



Notice how the brightest parts are very thin ribbons that travel seemingly indiscriminately between the center and edges of what we see as each "area" of fire. If temperature was the actual determinant of colour, you'd get the brightest light just above the bottom, with little or no colour variation except a gradual drift darkward as you move away from the fuel.

The reason this doesn't happen is because of two basic properties of fire:

1) It emits its own light
2) It's translucent

What this means is that if you stack up two "Fire Bits" in front of each other, you don't just see the light from the front one as with a normal object-- rather, you see its light, and also the light of the bit behind it, resulting in an overall "brighter" flame than one Fire Bit alone. Stack ten behind each other, and the effect is even brighter-- each Fire Bit throwing out a small packet of light that joins with the emitted light of any other Fire Bits it passes along the way; by the time they all arrive at your eye, it doesn't know one Fire Bit's emanation from the others, and just combines them together into "the brightness from that angle".

So, here's how fire actually gets coloured:



In truth, it's actually completely impossible to paint fire "correctly"-- even if you could freeze a complex flame (ie, not a small blowtorch flame) so that it didn't move, it would appear completely different on the same spot depending on the angle you turned it to. Beam C above cuts through a long area of the fire widthwise, so it would appear very dull; but if you rotated it and looked at that "arm" right down the middle, the exact same spot would appear as one of the brightest points in the overall flame. The is simply no way to approximate that with opaque paint, so actually, all methods of painting fire can be considered wrong.

Not, however, equally wrong.

As with anything that's impossible to model scientifically (love, satisfaction, the ideal doneness of bacon), certain approximations are better than others. In the case of fire, which is usually built out of interlocking "sheets" of flowing gases, the best approximation is to paint more brightly the areas of the flame that are more likely to be seen "thickwise" more than others when you consider all possible viewing angles. This ends up meaning that protruding edges should be painted brighter, then allowed to quickly drop off to duller tones. The very center of the fire will be brighter than the "sides" of the fire sheets, but much duller than the very edges of the sheets that the viewer is looking at edge-on.

So, in a nutshell, the most "least wrong" method is some variation on:

1. Basecoat the fire in the darkest tone you want in your fire
2. Wash the midtone of the fire into recesses
3. Highlight protruding edges in your brightest tone

Translate that to blending/layering/whatever technique you use, as long as you have midtone in the middle, darktone as you travel to the edges and points, and then brighttone right at the very end of each vein.



While Mr. Runic's ravagore fire looks a bit odd, it's actually only because we're seeing it in the wrong context-- he's painted a very realistic fire effect for a black backdrop. If he were to photograph it against jet black (but still well-lit), you'll probably find that it looks almost exactly like the first image I posted, with the odd-looking "dark" center actually representing areas where the fire is thin.

[LichLordVexing]

Words.

[mennie]

If it look exactly to fire, I think it's done with no mess about light theory. Some people painting fire and it look like monster hold some fruit in it's mounth, That's failed. :P

[Cyanid3]

very nice i might have to try that for my next ravagore

[komodokeeper]

The 'reversed highlights' of fire imply a flammable material such as metal, or gas...

metal-
(note the brighter core versus dark corners- hotter is brighter)

gas fire-
(farther from origin is darker)

so spud is correct . . .to a point, fire by itself reflects the highlight pattern of other material, but the fuel source of heat/fire may impact it. so either way is technically correct, it just matters if you intend for the figure to be made of fire (dark shadows, bright highlights- as Spud suggested) or have the figure be burning aka made of a substance that is on fire (Bright shadows, dark highlights). Either way, if it's aesthetically pleasing, especially to you...it's painted correctly.

As for the Raver (aka ravagore) in the OP, I like it, it's painted very well, but I think the flames mimic the color of the skin too closely,suggesting the flameball is a bulbous tongue rather than a flaming projectile, but refer to my previous sentence.

[PG_DesertWynd]

Awesome, really like this paint scheme.

[Ruпic]

In a way it's funny how my Ravagore -thread turned partly into a discussion about fire itself. Not sure if honoured or thread derailing.

Very nice painting! Did you start this on Black or White surface?

Sorry, somehow I didn't see this comment until now. Both black and white basecoats are a bad choice ( unless the theme includes white or black mostly ) asfar as I'm concerned. They both dictate the shades painted ontop of them in a very strong manner. If one wants a basecoat not related to the theme, the best colour is the 50%-50% neutral grey. It doesn't dictate shades into lighter or darker and it's very handy for looking at shading on the miniature. I'd rather buy a grey spray from a hardware store than use a miniaturepainting black/white one, ever.

However, the best choice for me is a basecoat with the dark colour of what your theme will include the most, in this case Army Painter Dragon Red ( talk about a fitting paint name. ) If I did a blue theme, I'd use a dark blue basecoat, and so on. This way your recesses/shadows are the correct shade by default and you get fuller colour for your miniature when using blending.

[captainspud]

In a way it's funny how my Ravagore -thread turned partly into a discussion about fire itself. Not sure if honoured or thread derailing.

Sorry about that. I just didn't want to leave the question hanging of your technique being wrong, because it isn't.

Needless to say, it's a beautiful mini.

[Ruпic]

Sorry about that. I just didn't want to leave the question hanging of your technique being wrong, because it isn't.

Needless to say, it's a beautiful mini.

No need to apologize, I thought it was funny in a sense. And thank you.

[Defenstrator]

Thanks as well, that was a nice write up. Still, I associate fire from the Ravagore looking more like the gas fire in Komodokeepers example, which is why I mentioned it.

That said I paint my own blight fire a combination of purple and red, so artistic expression is fine with me. It's a very nicely done model.

[Cheesy Flip Flips]

This model is fantastic. I've chosen a similar paint scheme for my legion models, but I chose bone for the plating as opposed to black. I'm really excited to see some of your other models.

[AWM68]

Sweet paint job. CHECK
Educational interlude. CHECK
Most unbelievable mind-blowing GIF. CHECK

Favorite thread. Ever.

[Syas]

Have you considered entering this into the NQ Hellbound challenge?

[Chimosh]

Have you considered entering this into the NQ Hellbound challenge?

I would have to second this suggestion even if it hurts my entry lol.

[Ruпic]

The Hellbound Painting Challenge sounds like fun, altough I don't have the exact details on what's it about, what you need to do and what's the prize/goal, mind the the Hell -theme being on your army, as I don't have NQ -subscription. Would sound like a perfect fit though since I'll have a red army with lava bases inspired by Diablo, which is all about Hell. I've never participated in any painting competitions and such, altough many people have said I should. Not that I don't want to.

[Warcaster Feiss]

Do you have pictures of your other Legion minis? Really love the colour scheme on this Ravagore, wouldn't mind seeing some other things painted in the same colour scheme

May shamelessly be stealing the colour scheme, though nowhere near to that standard unfortunately!

[Ruпic]

Here's Lylyth, Shadow of Everblight.



Continuing the same Diablo/Hell sort of theme, I gave the bow a molten look. The armor highlights have been blended in a way that towards the bow there's more colour, and away from it there's less. Seems my lightning was a bit off so the hair became pretty bright, however I can guarantee it's blended from 50-50 Slaanesh Grey to pure white. The thorns in her hair have the same recipe as the Ravagores talons.

[Ruпic]

Do you have pictures of your other Legion minis? Really love the colour scheme on this Ravagore, wouldn't mind seeing some other things painted in the same colour scheme

May shamelessly be stealing the colour scheme, though nowhere near to that standard unfortunately!

As the original post states, the Ravagore was the first one painted, now there's more. Steal away.

Also, does anyone know how I can edit the thread title? Thought I'd update it with the newest miniatures name but editing the first post changes just that, not the actual thread name on the forum listing. Or who should I PM to change it to something general, since 3 PPS -people have not responded to my request.

[Minotaur]

Those paint jobs are DELICIOUS!

[Demonster]

Ok, so red primer and lots of layering.... Any other pieces of advice? Hoping to get mine a deeper shade of red than this, but yours looks pretty sweet. And by sweet, I mean chocolate covered in white chocolate encased in fudge.

[Warcaster Feiss]

As the original post states, the Ravagore was the first one painted, now there's more. Steal away.

Also, does anyone know how I can edit the thread title? Thought I'd update it with the newest miniatures name but editing the first post changes just that, not the actual thread name on the forum listing. Or who should I PM to change it to something general, since 3 PPS -people have not responded to my request.

I've hit 'Report Post' (the little icon to the bottom left of the top post) to bring a thread title change to the Mod's attention before, not sure if that's protocol but it worked for me.

Lylyth2 came out amazingly well, not sure I can do the colour scheme justice but it won't take long to strip a couple of Lessers if it turns out apallingly badly!

[MouseC]

First off: you nailed the Diablo theme! And I agree D3 sucked.
Second off: awesome inspiring work. very non legion colors that still keep to the legion styled work.
Third: really crisp suttle base work. 3 materials? grass flock, lava texture, and gravel. Nice job. Consistent painting, and nice clean looking model.

[peanutbutterconspiracy]

Very well-executed alt-scheme! I'm really digging that ravagore

[volt_ron]

I logged in just to say that that Lylyth is effin' GORGEOUS!!

[Grimwolf]

Yup I dig that scheme... A lot! Great stuff.

[Ruпic]

Thanks a lot for your comments guys & gals. Next up will be Striders ( as painting units this way is tedious and I want to get them done ) so the next update will be further away.

I've hit 'Report Post' (the little icon to the bottom left of the top post) to bring a thread title change to the Mod's attention before, not sure if that's protocol but it worked for me.

Thanks, this did the trick.

[Ruпic]

Hey everyone, it's time for a miniupdate now that I've finished work and having the time again. Lylyth got some touchup on her, and I painted half of the Striders:



I went for a more mundane look on the weapons of normal warriors of the Blight, so that ones wielded by Warlocks and 'beasts will give out a more "might & magic" -sort of feel. It took me around 20 hours for these 4.

[jdeckert]

Looking good! The blending on your reds is fantastic, really pops.

[Blue Claw]

I saw this thread bump and was instantly filled with. "Please be an update and not someone necroing with 'wow nice army'". So sick.

[silks]

Awesome models, really nice colour scheme very well executed

[pattison]

Yum yummy yum!