Imperial Knight Shoulder Pad Gold NMM and Freehand Heraldic

Hi everyone !

coming back for the new year with more pictures and ideas to share. I did not have much time lately to update the blog but I'll do my best to upload more regularly in the future (that's one of my good resolutions for this year !).
As promised, let's look at the step-by-step tutorial of my Imperial Knight Shoulder pad...

1. I started with the airbrush to fix the base colors. The red part consists of Scarlet Red (Vallejo) for the middle tone, then I made the highlights with Bloody Red (Vallejo) and for the shadow I made a mixture 4:1 of Scarlet Red and Cayman Green (Vallejo). For the white part I went for Bone White (Vallejo) as mid tone, Off White (Vallejo) for the highlight and Barbarian Flesh (Vallejo) for the shadow. I used masking tape to get a clean separation in the middle of the piece. I then applied a bit of diluted Agrax Earthshade (Citadel) at the interface of the metallic parts to increase the contrast and get a good lining effect. Finally, I covered all the metallic parts with Heavy Brown (Vallejo - extra opaque) as basecoat for the gold NMM.

2. The next step consisted of placing the lights. For that I used Heavy Goldborwn (Vallejo - extra opaque) as recommended by the excellent Angel Giraldez in one of his books ("Painting Miniatures  From A to Z"). It was my very first attempt with the NMM technique, so I tried to keep things simple and not to worry too much about the realistic placement of the lights, that's why it may look a bit odd at the beginning. I'm sure experts would have done it in a completely different way but still at the end it came out pretty nice. 

3. Then I smoothed the transition applying fat glazes with Heavy Goldborwn (Vallejo - extra opaque). I've learn a lot from Kujo Painting (Youtube) about this technique and I find it very efficient and clean.

4. I started placing shadows in between the bright parts, applying consecutive layers of Seraphim Sepia (Citadel). In this case it's very important to wait for the layers to dry completely before applying the next one, otherwise the finish won't look so good.

5. Then I continued the shadows using Agrax Earthshade (Citadel), still using the fat glaze technique. This time I reduced a bit the painted area so the previous shadow color still shows up.

 6. Finally I applied the last shadow tone, Nuln Oil (Citadel), using the same technique and reducing even more the painted area. I applied enough layers so that the darkest regions appear almost black.

 7. After that I came back to the bright side, using Pale Yellow (Vallejo) for the second highlight color. This color is my real MVP. Yellows are difficult to use and there are not so many brands that propose good options. This one works very well as it is fairly desaturated, so perfect for gold NMM, and it has an extremely good coverage. At this point I simply did the placement without working the transition.

 8. I used a combination of glaze, feathering and wet blending techniques to smooth out the second highlight transition.

9. I applied a final highlight using pure Off White (Vallejo). I made a thin line right in the middle of the brightest areas, I did a lining on all the edges and a white dot on the upper side of the rivets.

And this is it! At this point the gold NMM is finished. I applied the same technique to all armor plates and other details of the mini. As I mentioned earlier the placement of the light is not perfect, by far, but the render still works and it gives a lot of character to the whole model. At the end it didn't take so much time either, when a layer is drying just go to another piece and do the same. Working glazes in "parallel", it took me something like 10 hours for the whole Knight.

The next step was a bit more challenging since I convinced myself to try freehand instead of using the GW transfer sheets. I've done few attempts in the past, adding basic freehand logos on space marines shoulder pads or on banners, but this time I wanted something bigger with a little bit more details.

 10. There are several ways to start freehand drawings but I decided to go with a pencil, very gently, in order to outline the main shapes and draft the first details. The basecoat was covered with mat varnish so it was possible to erase mistakes just using a dry finger. I tried to draw a stylised version of the Aquila, trying to keep the "rough square" look typical in the WH40k universe.

 11. Then I started to fill the shapes with the base color, in this case Heavy Brown (Vallejo - extra opaque).

 12. I re-defined a bit the edges with a black line and did few corrections to clean up the shapes.

 13. Finally I applied more layers of the basecoat color to get a nice and opaque finish.

 14. Then it was time to add the details inside the shape. Since I wanted the Aquila to be gold NMM, I started by placing the first highlight with Heavy Goldbrown (Vallejo - extra opaque).

 15. I then worked out the transition using the fat glaze technique.

 16. As shown in the first part of the tutorial I continued with the first shadow, using Seraphim Sepia (Citadel) applied in many consecutive thin layers.

 17. I then applied a second shadow with Agrax Earthshade (Citadel).

 18. And the last shadow with Nuln Oil (Citadel). Each layer was applied on a smaller surface to make a smooth transition.

19. For the finish I painted the final highlight with Pale Yellow (Vallejo) and Off White (Vallejo) to give a shiny look. And voilà !

Of course this is not a super complicated scheme with extra details but I was quite pleased with the result. I like the fact that it is covering a large surface, it gives a lot more credit to the mini and a personal touch. I drew other shapes on the other shoulder and some of the armor plates, always following the same steps:

For the final touch I added scratches and weathering, just to make the Knight a bit more interesting and lively. I'll make a tutorial on that later on.

And that's all folks, thanks and see you soon !