Help for Daughters of Khaine Paint Scheme.

[Overread]

As the title says I need some help devising a paint scheme for my Daughters of Khaine. 

 

I was impressed and inspired by @Lysandestolpe painting method and style, however having seen his tutorial there is a lot of fine blending and mixing of colours that I think likely won't do well for me and my relative inexperience (straight from the bottle with some water or medium I'm fine with). Esp when it comes to getting a consistent look . (Also @Lysandestolpe you most certainly should do more video guides for your style of painting!) Hi thread for reference for those who don't know 

 

So whilst his early fantasy artwork inspired style in mind as something I'd welcome emulating or at least considering with a simpler approach it then comes down to the colour selection and how to paint and such. 

Daughters are quite varied and so this can get complicated quickly.

 

1) Skin - I want to go for a pale skin with a blood vein underlayer. Almost as if their skin is slightly translucent and you can see that red/purple/blue tinged colouration underneath. Think rather like the veins on the underside of your wrist when tensed - though with a stronger lean toward red instead of the blue/purple 

2) https://www.pinterest.co.uk/pin/464293042827960862/ That bit of artwork with white cloth, generally black armour and decoration with a hint of red and gold is what I think might work for the bulk of the army in its general theme. I'm thinking on a witch:

a) Black with a red edge highlight for boots/leggings bra and general body-contact clothing. 
b) sashes/drapes white
c) Details/decoration/trinkets a reddy gold
d) Blades - steel (not going to lie this is where Lysand's method really shines with regard to making weapons look far more fantasy like)
e) Armour/shields - not actually sure what colour to consider for these 
f) Hair - really not sure here what would work. Some variation would be nice (might even consider using it for denoting different squads on the table top for ease of control) however right now I've no idea what colour(s) would really work well with the proposed scheme.
g) General leathers/hilts/etc a basic darker brown shade.

Melusai
Upper body copy-catting the above for the general colours. The lower body I'm thinking a potential mix of black scales overall with a streek of scales either side (and perhaps down the back as well) of dark red. 

Khinerai:
Again copy-catting the above for witches for the general colours, adding in a deeper red effect for the wings with black along the wing-arms themselves. 

 

 

Any help would be greatly appreciated in working this out . At present the best I could do is use the GW app to get what colours they'd use for the basic colour-effects - however not all of what I'm after is there (eg the skin) and it doesn't give any hint as to a potential painting order nor any alternative (possibly simpler) approaches to the colours, 

[Lysandestolpe]

7 minutes ago, Overread said:

1) Skin - I want to go for a pale skin with a blood vein underlayer. Almost as if their skin is slightly translucent and you can see that red/purple/blue tinged colouration underneath. Think rather like the veins on the underside of your wrist when tensed - though with a stronger lean toward red instead of the blue/purple 

I would start with this and batch paint the skin on all of your Aelves, or at least a big portion of them. I would use rakarth flesh and then palyd wych flesh on top as two smooth thin (Duncan style) layers to get that glassy feel. Then I'd add whatever blues and reds you want by thin glazing using lamaiam medium and the GW glazes (red and blue). Red on knees, elbows, noses, chins, etc. And give it just a little bit more punch than you want the final result to be. After this I'd use a very very thin glaze of white. Maybe 7 parts lamaiam to 1 part white and glaze over the raised areas.  Not washing, just thin layer of glaze. Let it dry, see how it looks, glaze again if it needs to.

This technique is used when creating classical style oil portraits by painters such as Leonardo Da Vinci, Carravagio, etc, and it will help to create that translucent skin you're talking about make it look like the rains are actually underneath a layer of skin.   

2) https://www.pinterest.co.uk/pin/464293042827960862/ That bit of artwork with white cloth, generally black armour and decoration with a hint of red and gold is what I think might work for the bulk of the army in its general theme. I'm thinking on a witch:

a) Black with a red edge highlight for boots/leggings bra and general body-contact clothing. 
b) sashes/drapes white

make sure you don't do the white as an actual white. Always use an off grey. I use Celesta grey (GW) for my whites as a base, and Ulthuan Grey layered on top of it. Then I can do thin edge highlights, thin stripes or cross hatching to give it texture.  
c) Details/decoration/trinkets a reddy gold
d) Blades - steel (not going to lie this is where Lysand's method really shines with regard to making weapons look far more fantasy like)

This is actually super simple. Start with a black/blue base using a black, ultramarine blue, and a drab brown such as Armor brown (VMA) Then mix in a little bit of white and "fan it" (just like I do in my tutorial video on the shoulder pad) on the one side of the blade and then the other. Then drag the brush on the edge of the sword and then stripe the middle (this is the hard part). Then keep repeating this process until you got a crisp white. You can probably be satisfied with like 5-6 steps of this increasing the amount of white each time until the last step is pure white. You can also, mix in juuuuuust a very very tiny bit of blue about half way to increase the saturation of the highlights. It will help to make it look just a little bit more fantasy. 

e) Armour/shields - not actually sure what colour to consider for these 
f) Hair - really not sure here what would work. Some variation would be nice (might even consider using it for denoting different squads on the table top for ease of control) however right now I've no idea what colour(s) would really work well with the proposed scheme.
g) General leathers/hilts/etc a basic darker brown shade.

Melusai
Upper body copy-catting the above for the general colours. The lower body I'm thinking a potential mix of black scales overall with a streek of scales either side (and perhaps down the back as well) of dark red. 

Khinerai:
Again copy-catting the above for witches for the general colours, adding in a deeper red effect for the wings with black along the wing-arms themselves. 

 

 

Any help would be greatly appreciated in working this out . At present the best I could do is use the GW app to get what colours they'd use for the basic colour-effects - however not all of what I'm after is there (eg the skin) and it doesn't give any hint as to a potential painting order nor any alternative (possibly simpler) approaches to the colours, 

Hey man! Thanks so much for the shout out. I'm super stoked you like my work and enjoyed my video tutorial. Honestly, I have been working on the next two video tutorials for months now, and I am sure you know they sure take a while to do and plan out, they should have been done by now haha. The reason they are not is because I own barely any equipment to edit the video. My computer is ******, and so it can't handle 4k video editing. So I have to rent my ass into a studio space that offers Hi speed Macs. Wish it was easier. 

However, they are coming, so keep a lookout. After NOVA OPEN I will drag my ass to get them edited and post them on youtube. Thanks for the encouragement!

I have edited your post above with some suggestions of how to achieve certain colors and results. Feel free to take what you want and ignore the rest. This is what I would do.

I painted a which Aelf and tried my hand at my techniques. Not sure if I posted this in my thread, so here are three pics of her:

Good luck dude, and please share some pics when you give your first try. If you have any questions. Feel free to write to me here or PM me.

[Overread]

Many thanks for taking the time to read and reply @Lysandestolpe! Some very neat ideas in there and seeing your elf it seems the methods work well, though I see you've gone for a more blue/sallow colour on her skin, but I can see how it the effect would look with a reddier shade.