Painting - Skullvane Manse Warhammer Scenery

Here's a post salvaged from the old blog - a little painting guide for the Citadel Skullvane Manse (a fancy piece of scenery for Warhammer) which looked like this when it was finished:

Ta-daah!

It's a beautiful model which I'd wanted for aaages, before finally 'accidentally' ordering after too much wine. Here's the 'before' picture:

Work in progress with some base colours on:

Work in progress - chaos!

And here's some random pictures of the finished model:

Scary cliff carvings.  Also skulls!

Something tells me the Warhammer guys really like that skull motif... Subtle!

I based a lot of the colours on a painting guide from an old issue of White Dwarf magazine, but as the paint range has been completely overhauled since the article was written I had to make a few adjustments. I also got a chance to try out some of the new Citadel 'technical' paints for dirt and verdigris.

Painting summary

Below is a quick summary of what I did, with Citadel paint colours for reference. I flit a bit between colour names as we have a mixture of old and new paints, but I'll put both the new and old range equivalent where possible):

• The whole thing was based with Charadon Granite (closest to Stormvermin Fur in the new range, though I'm sure any dark grey acrylic would do!)
• Rocks and bricks then got a heavy dry-brush of Codex Grey (now Dawnstone) then a dry-brush of Fortress Grey (now Administratum Grey)
• Individual bricks were picked out with washes (Devlan Mud/Agrax Earthshade, Ogryn Flesh/Reikland Fleshshade and Gryphonne Sepia/Seraphim Sepia)
• Rocks and bricks were given a light dry-brush with Tyrant Skull, one of the dry paints from the new range (my old friend Bleached Bone in the old range)
• Wood was painted with Rhinox Hide (old range close to Scorched Brown), washed with Badab Black (now Nuln Oil) and dry-brushed with Graveyard Earth (now Steel Legion Drab)
• 'Iron' looking metal parts were based with Chainmail (now Ironbreaker) and washed with Badab Black
• The roof was painted with a mix of Regal Blue (now Kantor Blue) and some Chaos Black (now Abaddon Black). Some tiles were lightened with a dry-brush of Shadow Grey (now The Fang) and some were darkened with a wash of Asuremen Blue (now Drakenhof Nightshade. Then I gave the whole roof a really light dry-brush of Fortress Grey.
• Metal on the doors was painted with Balthasar Gold (I don't think this existed in the old range, though it looks like Dwarf Bronze) and washed with Badab Black
• Skulls piled in recesses were dry-brushed with Tyrant Skull
• The observatory dome was painted with Tin Bitz (now Warplock Bronze), then dry-brushed with Shining Gold (now Gehenna's Gold) and then Burnished Gold (now Auric Armour Gold). The comet was painted with Shining Gold.

Technical paints for some finishing touches

Citadel technical paints: Nihilakh Oxide

The new Nihilakh Oxide verdigris paint was really useful for making the brass/copper parts on the model look old and weathered.

Weathered!

I painted the wash onto the observatory dome, focussing on the recesses, and then used a damp piece of kitchen paper to mop off the excess before it dried. I worked a section at a time to make sure the paint couldn't dry before I'd had a chance to wipe it off.

I then proceeded to knock the rest of the pot all over the painting mat, but I don't think that's an essential step!

Citadel technical paints: Typhus Corrosion

Not sure how to describe this one - it's like a wash with gritty dirt in it to add some texture.

Cliff skull and back door (with cute milk bottle!)

In the picture above I used it on the metal panels (top left and top right) before applying a dry brush of Ryza Rust (another new dry paint, bright orange for creating rust effects). I also painted it over the metal on the door and the bars in the picture below to make them look less shiny and new:

Side window with Typhus Corrosion

Painting the telescope lens

I painted the telescope lens Chaos Black, then mixed some Regal Blue with a bit of Hawk Turquoise (now Sotek Green) and painted this in a sort of crescent moon shape onto the lens. To make the lighter highlight I added some Space Wolves Grey (now Fenrisian Grey) to the blue mix and painted it at the bottom of the lens. The white-looking 'glint' is Space Wolves Grey on its own. A coat of gloss varnish then makes the finished result nice and shiny.

Painted telescope lens

Weathering the rocks

The last thing added was the greeny-brown weathering on the rocks at the bottom. To do this I used a dry-brush of a 1:1 mix of Deathworld Forest (was Gretchin Green) and Graveyard Earth.

That should help the Warhammer table look a little more colourful!  We have an awful lot of plain grey scenery kicking around in our house, a situation that I really need to remedy...