Death Guard Army Showcase Addendum 3

Almost there with finishing everything I have for the Death Guard!

Next up is a Great Unclean One. These manifestations of the plague god Nurgle are marvellous little models. It was surprisingly easy to build, consisting of only a few pieces. That being said is could have been done as fewer pieces even so.  I often find with Games Workshop kits that I think, "well those 4 bits could all have been one bit".  I'm sure they break their kits into pieces for no reason other than to sell plastic glue.

The Great Unclean One kit actually comes with a variety of heads and hand/weapon options and I think that many people magnetise these parts to give the kit some customisability. I considered this, watched a few YouTube videos on how to magnetise models, and the Great Unclean One in particular, and...decided not to.  It looked like a lot of effort, and although I have magnets to do this, I thought it'd be a bit too much bother.  I'm happy that as long as I explain to an opponent what this model represents I'll be fine. 

Anyway, after assembly there were a few gaps where the kit didn't sit right, and noticable joints. So I broke out the Green Stuff modelling putty to fill those in.

Next up, painting the beastie!

Continued...

So the painting is done, and I'm rather pleased with the result. For painting a model like this there are two basic stages after the undercoat - base coat and washes.  

In this case, I used a light ivory undercoat as I was intending to wash the model down from light to dark. The colour palette for the Great Unclean One will match the Nurgle deamons and Nurglings I've already painted.  "Out of the box", or rather in line with the "official" Games Workshop box art or colours, these daemons should be painted green.  While I usually like to paint fantasy models in line with their offical colours, a hangover of long years of painting historical models to acurate uniform colours I guess, in this case I've decided to paint my daemons in fleshy colours.

Base Coats

I put down the flat base coat colours. In this case a thinned wash of Tau Ochre paints served for the primary skin colour. The exposed fat I rendered in Dunklegelb (German tank yellow), which I felt was a good approximation of the colour of live human fat. The iron parts were treated with my "sort of rust looking" effect, and the exposed muscle and organs were base coated in a thinned dark red. the teeth and horns were given an ivory coat using GWs Ushabti Bone paint. Finally I used a dark bronze for the bell and other bits and bobs.

Oh, and to make painting a bit easier, I left the chain net thing off during the process.

From here on in, its just a matter of layering washes onto each other to try to create the look of rotting, diseased, and fly-blown flesh. The wash colours I use include mainly Games Workshop "shades":

• Carroburg Crimson (dark red)
• Reikland Fleshshade (sort of red)
• Druchii Violet (purple)
• Athonian Camoshade (dark brownish green)
• Agrax Earthshade (dark brown)
• Seraphim Sepia (light brown)
• Nuln Oil (black)

I also used a couple of contrast paints:

• Plaguebearer Flesh (olive green)
• Guilliman Flesh (fleshtone)
• Blood Angels Red (red)
• Black Templar (black)

And a few others (glazes and technical paints):

• Blood for the Blood God (red blood effect)
• Nihilkh Oxide (a verdigris effect - must be used very sparingly)
• Lamenter's Yellow (yellow glaze)

I use these in layers and wet mixes in a fairly random manner, to try to create an interesting, mottled skin effect that approximates the rotted and festering effect I'm after.  I'm happy with the result, although the washes do tend to create a bit of shine on the model.

On that point, I never varnish my models and haven't done since the late 1980's when I had a small army og West End Games metal Star Wars stormtroopers ruined by a varnish that yellowed.  I've almost never varnished models since (with no ill effect on the wargames table). Matt varnish would take the shine down here, but I just don't trust it.  If anyone has a way of taking the shine off without matt varnish commint below - it'd be a great help to me!

Anyway, here's the final result.