80's Kruleboyz and Painting without Pressure

[Nos]

Hi all

Just a place to share my Kruleboyz project, and the motives and inspiration behind how I'm going about it. Those are the things that get me painting and that I find interesting about any creative procedure really, I enjoy this process as much as the finished result,  so hopefully it will encourage and inspire people in the same manner!

I was pretty meh about their reveal initially but on closer inspection realised it was mainly the GW paint jobs doing them a disservice. The sculpts themselves channel the gangly, bent and pathos ridden orcs of the likes of Alan Lee, John Howe and a whole host of countless 80's artists investing their talent in the comics, fantasy covers and Heavy Metal Gatefold LP's og my very early childhood. With a friend I've started to get rid of some of the more needlessly wacky extraneous bits here and there but it's otherwise essentially conversion free. The models do the talking themselves (Well, most of them. The Beast Snagga and weird rat crocodile thing probably won't be included in my collection. They're a bit busy). This Alan Lee illustration is the main thing I've been drawing mood from: 

The KB's also lend themselves to my increasing interest in trying to establish a painting method and style which is spontaneous and painterly.

The real reason for this is more of a need. I was diagnosed with a chronic eye condition this year which involves frequent loss of sight and intense pain. At present it is under control,but I've been told this may not always be the case. Bottom line is I want to paint while I can, and I dont want any of that time to feel like a chore or waste of good vision.

At this point the GW layering technique which I have learned over the years leaves me frustrated and cold, and seems to be a ridiculously drawn out and detached process without space for experimentation or error. It has its place, but it does nothing for me at this point if my life. 

So I've been practicing with thick wet acrylics and oil paint and just blending on the model, treating it as a canvas essentially. I find this draws me into the subject, as I plot out highlights and shadows on the fly, and the sense of adventure and creativity as I smudge things together to see how it works out is very satisfying. I pick colours from artistic inspiration (see below) and then I put them together in a manner I think will work. Sometimes it does, sometimes it doesn't, but the sense of creativity and of learning (so, fun, basically) is always present, the sense of obligation and tedium of assembly line layer painting very distant.

The other advantage is speed. I hate the phrase speed painting as it sounds either rushed, or alternatively showy and competitive. I enjoy painting for it's own sake, so the aim is principally just a process which facilitates that. But I've come to embrace finishing models in one it two sessions, rather than drawing them out over multiple stages, because I find limitations create their own artistic benefits and character, little nicks and imperfections which create more soul, and the time and pressure I place upon myself to otherwise "do everything properly" often translates to a sterility somehow. So none of these have taken more than an hour each, all the time spent on them was engaging, none of have overstayed their welcome, and I'm happy with them all. It's a good place to be

So as to avoid dozens of images in one post, I've cut them up into a few.

First up, more examples of the art from which I'm taking my main inspiration from re colours and mood, Angus McBride and John Howe respectively. 

 

 

Edited July 31, 2021 by Nos

[Nos]

**Gut Rippaz**

Love ma boys.

I was thinking Pale Green for the skin initially, but I'm trying to increase colour saturation in my painting, so I thought I would try and get there by some other route rather than beginning with a pastel tone. So I started with a very bright yellow acrylic, then covered it completely in purple oil to kill the brightness and give the skin a sense of blood flow. Once the oil was wicked away I smudged bits of olive green and vanilla white around until I liked where they sat and they looked interesting. Clothes were painted in drab browns and greens, with a few accents of that bluey grey from the Alan Lee picture. Saturated red eyes.

I had no idea what colour to do the shields but noticed that orange/pink/red were spot colours in the pictures above, so went with that on the basis that if it worked for them it would work for me.

I love the sort of Hoplite personalisation of their shields and wanted to maintain that sense that each shield was unique . I Initially I mixed a russet orange for the base, then spattered red oil paint haphazardly leaving the orange for the highlights. Pure white for the details was another experiment, I tried to paint it on thickly so as to look like or was..well, painted. I made an aesthetic choice here though to favour the colour over a sense of realism- obviously an orc isnt going to maintain a pristine white finish- but, well, it looked good, so I just left it at that. I painted some of the teeth and eyes fully and neatly, some a little more messily.

I hate painting metal, so I like painting metal on figures who have crude armour and weapons, so I just smudged it on and gave it some brown, black and blue washes for depth and character. On the shields, I just pricked the bolts with silver, as I felt too much would detract from their lo-fi, folksy vibe. 

 

 

 

Edited July 31, 2021 by Nos

[Nos]

**Hobgrot Tester**

Thinking about painting this little guy gave me conniptions and it was only yesterday I felt brave enough to give him a go. Love the models but I hadnt really appreciated just how much they vary from their bigger cousins. They look great with their own kind, but a bit random next to their bigger pals. Almost as if they're a different species.

Also the Gut Rippaz essentially have one massive focal point or "face" in the form of their shields that the Hobgrotz just dont. The main contrast depth on the Hobgrotz comes from their being half naked and their exposed muscles, so I knew I would have to focus more on the skin with these. I like painting skin but wasnt sure my more sloppy approach would work for something with so much of it on display.

I really like their Samurai armour aesthetic, and wanted to maintain the slightly more martial feel it gives them compared to the Gut Rippaz, but felt that anything too regimented or brightly colour co-ordinated would be a departure from the more organic, rootsy nature of the army as a whole.

So I thought I would try to match the colour volume of the Gut Rippaz by going for even brighter variations of the skin tones, and went for a bright custard yellow for the skin and slathered that in magenta oils. After clean up the skin didnt have nearly enough punch though, was too desaturated and blotchy, so I went back with the bright yellow on it's own to try and give it more life. I blended in vanilla into this for establishing the highlights and glazed the same olive green as the Gut Rippaz into the shadows. The depth was good at this point but it looked a bit dead and white, so I mixed up a rosey pink, again taking a cue from the art above, and that brought him back to life. White teeth- again, not realistic, but artistically inspired.

Can't really overstate that the skin looked awful, until it didnt. I would have given it up as a bad job in the past, but the experimental approach meant I was a to just keep pressing on without pressure or anxiety. And then suddenly it looked good. 
 

Went with an Orangey Brown Helmet, to try and subtly echo the shields of the big lads, and blue grey armour, again as an echo from the Art above. I felt the blue grey didnt work initially but I've warmed to it, it maintains that sense of discipline. Will go dark green armour for some of them I think but otherwise pretty happy.

Crucially  despite pretty disparate aesthetics, I think the tones of both species work alongside each other.

 

 

Edited July 31, 2021 by Nos

[flamingwalnut]

That's a fun inspiration for your orks! It's weird, that 80s fantasy style was never nostalgic for me as it is for those who grew up with it, but it was ALWAYS in the background as I grew up. lol

The Kruleboys are a great way to bring out these inspirations. And I am quite fascinated about your painting process. Fun to see something new.

[Nos]

**Hobgrots**

Unit done, an hour a piece. Browns and Greens are becoming more significant within the army as a whole, that's one of the things I love about creative projects, when they start to develop their own character and keys.

I tend to get bored by the sheer amount of detail on GW minis so I usually focus on a few things and then just a simple job for everything else, at least when I'm painting a project of this size.

 

The GR's were all about their shields and a complimentary muted tone elsewhere, but theres so much skin on the HG I felt like I needed to do it the other way around and make their skin the focus, with muted armour etc. I applied the initial Midtone a little thicker for half of them, so some are more yellow and some more pallid.

I undercoated the Orcs white over black to get a more dynamic shift in contrast, but the HR got white over grey to preserve a more natural light so more organic base for skin. Both experiments, both more or less worked out as intended.

The blue flowers on the base of the champion are another experiment which illustrate the benefit of working from art. I would never have chosen that colour myself as I veer very much towards subtlety and complimentary tones, but the presence of colder tones in my inspiration art work made it feel safe to give it a try, and I'm really pleased with how it offsets and adds to the whole scheme.

Edited August 15, 2021 by Nos

[Nos]

**Wolf Riders**

One of the pleasures of getting immersed into a project is noticing miniatures which you previously didn't have justification for or interest in at the time. These sculpts are just divine. Their steppe aesthetic is very in keeping with the Hobgrots.

I struck a midpoint between the Gutrippaz and Hobgrots with colours, the Orange is there as the unifying colour but without the more brutal red accents of the GR's, but I figured I would give the Wolf Boyz a more saturated green and Pink than than the Hobgrotz, to highlight their more Independent, rogue like nature. I mixed purple into the brown on the wolf, to keep the palette warm in spite of the cold greys and white.

I'm increasingly thinking of this little project in terms of a Mercenary Company, made up from all different retinues, essentially treating each unit as a Dogs of War regiment.

Very happy with how they turned out, but they are a testament to experimentation and patience. I did the Dogs in Oils and I was being far too subtle with the transitions and after an hours work I just ended up with something that could have been base coated brown in a matter of minutes.

I basically decided I had messed up and that these would have to be an experiment because I couldnt work out what to do at all. With that decision made though I started doing all sorts of far less subtle and more experimental stuff. I looked up how to paint wolves on canvas and the principles there really helped, the advice was to ignore the fur and focus on the form, and as soon as I started to do that with lots of stippling it all came into shape. After that it was really fun, just dabbling the brush pretty much as I liked until it looked right.

My number one takeaway from this project is try stuff. You can take paint off. 9/10 where I have applied paint nervously, it has worked better than I could have hoped.

The Riders are a bit more yellow skinned than I intended but the whole army has a deliberately diverse approach to skin tone so it dosent really matter.

The sculpts are so fluid but they do have a lot of superfluous junk, little bones and charms and stuff, so I deliberately kept the shields and their adorable little coats bold and uniform in tone, to make sure the lines and dynamism of the models don't get lost

 

Edited August 24, 2021 by Nos

[Orsino]

These look great, love your style.

[Ggom]

The wolves look very nice, I love the colors you accomplished and agree re the sculpts (dynamic sculpts but too much little bits that get distracting if everything is picked out) Kickass project!

[Nos]

**Troll**

These minis are a delightful homage to one of my favourite minis of all time, the Stone Troll. When I first saw the original as a kid I was enchanted. This piece of artwork in particular:

I didnt think too much about the colours because these guys just *are* blue, that's non-negotiable with my childhood. I considered alternatives but I couldnt pass up the chance to paint Stone Trolls properly.

Cold colours are obviously the antithesis of my warm palette, but the blue greens of the Alan Lee backdrop made me reason that as these guys were pretty much the only exception to my otherwise established palette, the contrast in hues would actually enhance both sides of the army scheme. I remembered as well that my good friend Throgg canonically is red and blue, so he was reassuring on that front. The multiple tones on his skin in this piece were also quite inspiring, I tried to being an element of that in.

Nonetheless I brought in some warmth with the red eye and yellowish wood, just to try and create a little cohesion.

It is another GW example where unnecessary details jeopardise the general silhouette, that rock on his shoulder being the perfect example of something detracting from the lines of the model, so I stuck to my established technique of paying very little attention to the bits I dont think matter. Simplest paint job on those to allow the good bits to really stand out. 

I was aware last night while painting this that I havent actually posted any WIPS which isnt great for a log about the painting process. This is mainly owing to the nature of how I paint- unlike layering there arent really stages.

The exception to this though is the first 5 minutes or so, when my paint is at its thickest and wettest . Basically I establish the Midtones and separate shapes and shades areas very quickly, then pull all that paint together. This takes about 5 minutes with wet blending, it would take about 40 minutes with layers. The other advantage is that it establishes organic transitions which means glazes etc tend to sit better.

A glaze over a single colour is more striking and monolithic looking than a glaze over a few shared tones. In instances where I want a really strong glaze, like the nose, I leave it as a single colour for that exact reason.

Edited September 10, 2021 by Nos