My experiments

So this is my first try at a project log and I have always loved painting red, so I have decided on The Kabal of the Obsidian Rose. A few years ago I did my first large project of painting a red army of 1000s sons for 30k and I did them in a metallic red scheme which I would like to reproduce on my dark elder with some adjustments.
The way I did the paint job on my 1000s sons was to prime them black, then a base coat of gunmetal gray, then a high light of polished silver sprayed at a 45% degree angle. I then airbrushed a few coats of clear red and then a black and red wash and a few more coats of clear red.
For my dark elder I decided to try something a little different, I primed them with German Panzer grey and then did a dry brush of copper over the armor plates on the model. The model on the left I airbrushed with clear blue and the one on the right I airbrushed with red ink. One of the things I noticed was that the ridges on the armor really stood out and in person it almost appears to make the ridges glow. I think I am going to add a lighter dry brush of polished gold to the model  to see if I can make the ridges glow a little more and I will be posting those up when I do.

Highlights are looking great overall, I think it'll look pretty nice in bunchs

Thanks Masamune, here is another picture of the progress so far

But what I am trying to get is a red that looks like this [/url]

I'd have probably started with black...

http://www.thedarkcity.net/t17066-keister-s-kabal

the trick to red is either start with black and drybrush it (that is what GW is doing) or to start with red and then work into the shadows (for clothing etc...). anyway its very annoying color to paint xD

Nathelis wrote:

the trick to red is either start with black and drybrush it (that is what GW is doing) or to start with red and then work into the shadows (for clothing etc...). anyway its very annoying color to paint xD

I think GW actually edge highlight theirs, especially with their new Base->Later->Shade schemes. You can't get as crisp a line like that by dry brushing.

I say this as someone who was taught to paint (properly) by "Dreadlock Dan" who used to be (still is?) one of the Eavy Metal team (I live close to Nottingham in the UK, and frequent War hammer world).

This was when the shop was downstairs and Upstairs was just an empty hall, the exhibit (complete with the 1000 model strong Ultramarines Chapter) and Bugman's Bar.

If I concentrated (as I will on my characters) I can almost get my line thickness to match theirs... Takes forever, good brushes, a steady hand and properly diluted paint.

http://fromthewarp.blogspot.co.at/2010/12/painting-dark-eldar-and-doing-it-well.html?m=1

check this out.

There's no one right way to paint anything, and I feel like maybe we should start a new topic for discussing various techniques for red. This is supposed to be somebody's project log, after all.

I wanted to add a couple of points to this discussion. First, drybrushing is only one technique out of many. Lots of people like it and get good results from it, but there are other painters doing work at least as good without it. Alternatives include layering, two brush blending, and nested line highlighting.

Second, if you shade red by mixing in black, you're reducing the color's chroma, which is what the kids today call "saturation". Basically, that's a measure of how much color is in the color, as opposed to black/white/grey (which are not on the color wheel). That's not necessarily a bad thing, depending on what you're trying to achieve. Desaturated colors tend to look grimier and flatter, as though they lack depth.

The alternative is to mix directly across the color wheel. With red, that means you can darken it by mixing in green (and vice versa). You'll need to experiment to find the right green for your red, because not only do you need to mix straight across the wheel, but different pigments will have different properties. Dark Angels Green used to be my go to paint for mixing into red; P3's Gnarls Green is an almost identical color, but doesn't work at all with my reds.

So I have not had a chance to work on my DE for awhile, real life can be a cruel mistress but I have done a little work on my raiders. Not quite the effect I was going for, the clear green that I was using was not as clear as I thought!
 

Here is my second attempt at a marbling effect

Love the marbling effect. How did you achieve them?