Asslessman":3cpuumsc said:
ardyer":3cpuumsc said:
D'oh, meant to post this for John since he's had some problems figuring out what to put on shields.
Wow, that's some very good shield back, if this just free hand, I'm very interested in your technique for such a result. MIne sucks big time compared to this and I'd gladly change for yours if you're OK for sharing.
The technique (the colors are my preference) was originally give to me by Jeff Wilson who won a bunch of US slayer swords, so it wouldn't be fair for me to keep it now, would it? BTW, he did it better
It's pretty simple, I base the back of the shield Graveyard earth, a couple of thin coats. After that is dry, I mix in some dark brown (what ever the new name for scorched brown is, that's what I used) with Graveyard earth, and paint three lines representing the shadows between the boards. They need to be straight, but not perfectly so. The paint should be thick enough to go on in one coat, but not so thick that it looks like it is literally sitting on top of the shield. The next step is to tidy up the lines with Graveyard earth again, thin coats, as many as necessary. The next steps are all done the same way, just using thinner lines and attempting to stay on top of the previous layers line. But don't worry if you don't, this technique is pretty mistake tolerant. Basically, I use a mix of 50/50 Graveyard Earth/Kommando Khaki thinned with 50-75% water and draw lines down each board. You should barely be able to see them. I repeat a few times and then go mix in more Khaki...to the point where it's almost pure Khaki and repeat one or two times again. After this step, I start adding in Uthalan Grey (no idea what if there is an old version of this) and repeating until I'm happy with it. The photo above also has been finished with gloss varnish to make mistakes while painting the rims easier to clean up and because the varnish with the model is done won't reach the shield back very well anyway.
The trick is to just use thin coats so that when you don't perfectly retrace the lines of the previous layer it doesn't matter. What you're really going for is the appearance of wood grain which the eye will generally interpret a bunch of wavy lines as anyway. I used to be a lot better at it, but I don't paint much now so some of the lines are thicker than I'd like. Hope that helps!