Nazgrr's Painting Log

[nazgrr]

Howdy! I'm new to posting on the forum but I've spent a lot of time lurking around reading posts and admiring many examples of beautifully painted minis that are posted here. As for myself, I am a longtime 40k and Fantasy player. Most of my time with this hobby has been spent in Denver, CO but currently I've moved back home to Texas(I like the warm weather better!). Anyways, I just finished my Ork army and it has given me the ability to finally start painting my Vampire Counts. Before I started I wanted to establish a good scheme to base the whole army around. And let me also say I'm no pro painter I'm just trying to achieve a good looking table quality that won't take me too long to finish.

Started with an extra Vlad I had laying around and used an extra Blood Knight head:

I think I will use a scorched brown highlighted with a lighter brown for the bases...

Next I painted up my Wight King, wanted to put a crescent or full moon on all my banners. Hesitant to continue with the banner because I'm scared to freehand scrolls and pull off some calligraphy but I'll be trying that once I get some courage up hahaha...

I've had these Blood Knights laying around from when they first came out, they somehow survived the move from Colorado to Texas(THANK YOU EPOXY AND PINNING!!!!) And I know they deserve a lot of love during the painting process. This is how far I've gotten them so far:

Work immediately ahead of me(Some stripping, Basecoating, and lots of Blue and White paint...)

Also in the workshop:
-Mounted Mannfred(Will be swapping the head and weapon...)
-A Corpse Cart(Not assembled yet)
-30 Zombies(Not assembled yet)
-A Varghulf(Died in the move, needs some significant paint stripping and repair)
-A Black Coach(Died in the move, needs some significant paint stripping and repair)
-Winged Vampire Lord(Once I figure out what to do with that horrible wing...)

 

[Boo]

Welcome Carpe Noctem and to the Dark arts!

I'm delighted that you decided to share your army progress with us here.

And wow! Your blue scheme is working really well! I love the Vlad with the headswap!

It's a really great colour combination with blue, black and white. This in turn make the red rubies stand out even more. Nice!

The only complaint I have is the moon on the banner, which really stand out odd to me with the yellow edge. Don't know how you could pull it off otherwise... what you could have done is to make the banner black with a white moon. But that would perhaps been a bit boring.

You've got some strong colours that you can use in any way imaginable. Like blue on armour, black on clothes and banners with red and white details. But anyway, it looks really great the way you have painted it so far. Keep it up!

You really seem to have your work set out for you. I will follow your log closely!

Cheers,
Boo

 

[TMS]

I agree with Boo on your Vlad model, swapping his original head out for one from the Blood Knight box seems to have worked out quite well.

The blue colour scheme is to die for as well. I think I'm on the slippery slope of starting a new Warhammer army and I'm looking at mono-Khorne DoC with skintones painted in something like the blue you've used here.

Blue is awesome.

 

[Santawraith]

Howdy Neighbor Welcome to Carpe Noctem
We used to live closer to each other Casper wyoming here, But Im glad your models arrived in texas safely. They look great freehand banners are hard. What we do is practice on spare blank bases. It helps to refine things until you feel comfertable to do it. Look forward to seeing your army progress, and good luck.

 

[Nikos]

Like everyone else says, this is a very groovy colour scheme. l would definatley have a go at the scrolls, maybe a few practice runs first. Graveyard earth for the scroll with a little bit of watered down brown ink for the folds. You can always write any lettering in with a black fine liner for better control. Anyways, looking forward to seeing whats next

 

[nazgrr]

I do appreciate all the feedback and kind comments. I'm on the home stretch with the Blood Knights, will be taking my time on the finer points now, main thing left to do is the banner. Anyways expect pictures soon!

@Boo specifically I do agree on the banner I wasn't very happy with how it turned out but I knew I wanted a moon. Your comments about the color cordination on the Vlad model gave me an idea so I've cooked up a new banner scheme.

And again thanks for all the encouragement!

 

[nazgrr]

When I first picked up my VC's from the closet I was inspired to paint by the Winged Vampire Lord, I guess I always thought it was a very cool miniature...however nothing I could do could really change the fact that I had an ever present feeling of something wrong...Took me awhile but I figured it was the stupid wing (Good idea, just poorly executed I suppose). So I chopped it off and here's what I came up with:

I'll be fitting this new vampire into a group of 29 Ghouls...this is what I've come up with for the Ghoul paint scheme so far:

The Blood Knights are coming along just fine:

A sneak peak of my Vampire on Nightmare that I'm making out of Manfred:

And yes I really need to soak this guy and his horse in Purple Power because he's covered in a thick layer of gloss black paint...

Also I'm planning on a light brown base to offset the dark blue of the whole army. Anybody recommend a GW Color? Perhaps Bestial Brown or should I go lighter?

 

[Boo]

Great update! I like the winged vamp, is the huge weapon from the chaos knights sprue? The blue is well painted, good work.

Took me awhile but I figured it was the stupid wing (Good idea, just poorly executed I suppose).

Agreed.

Also I'm planning on a light brown base to offset the dark blue of the whole army. Anybody recommend a GW Color? Perhaps Bestial Brown or should I go lighter?

I would recommend graveyard earth. It's like one step brighter than Bestial Brown.

 

[nazgrr]

Yes the mace is one of the chaos knight arms. And definetly will try graveyard earth, many thanks.

 

[nazgrr]

Ok I've been lazy! OK, I LIED! I've been defecting back to my Orks. Just got me a bunch of Forgeworld Kommando conversion kits! Needless to say I'm a happy git!

However, on the Vampire side of things I've gotten a few things done:

Spirit hosts, just need to base them:

This isn't done yet but this is the Black Coach so far:

Here's 3 examples of my Skeleton Regiment, have about 15 done so far. Will post the full block once they are all finished and based:

Now the real purpose of my post was to show off my new converted Necrarch!

The story with this mini is that I acquired a mounted Necrarch from a friend awhile back, however, its feet had been unfortunately chewed off as well as the horse that he previously road on. It's sat in my bitz box for a very long time and I always wanted to do something. I finally did. This is made out of the upper half of the Mounted Necrarch Body, and the lower half of a LOTR Black Numenorien. A lot of green stuff was used to create more robes, used two pieces of one of the Corpse Cart Necromancers to supplement the robes(Because I'm not that great at sculpting). So what do you guys think?

 

[Nikos]

Nice update, your skeletons and spirit hosts are looking very good. The black coach is also coming on nicely, i think the horses could do with a little highlight on the bone. And your Necrach looks cool aswell, good work on the cloak. How are you going to paint him?

 

[nazgrr]

Definetly going to run some skull white on the horses. As for the necrarch I want him to be primarily dark colors. Will throw in some pull somehow to unify him with the whole army.

 

[Santawraith]

the necharch looks better then the normal ones that is for sure you did a great job converting him. well done.

 

[Carlisle]

the Necrarch model looks sweet. i considered using LOTR bits but always though they looked a little to small compared to the warhammer size. were the legs a nice fit or did it take some work to align the torso and the legs?

 

[Boo]

Great update! The skeletons and spirits are looking good. This army is going to be very very blue when done.

The necrarch is awesome. The bits go very well together, first when I saw it I tried to figure out what model it was, I've never seen that vamp on foot before! That was before I read what you wrote. hehe

 

[nazgrr]

@Carlisle Depends on the LOTR model in question. The plastics are usually smaller and don't align to well with Warhammer models in most cases. The Metals however are a little bigger and work pretty well in most cases. The Black Numenoriens and the Castellen models work well with VC models. (Excuse those LOTR misspellings)

@Boo I like bright colors hahaha

 

[TobinRoss89]

Your conversions look great, I may just have to borrow your idea on the vlad model fro my helm of commandment vampire.

 

[nazgrr]

Feel free to, I was surprised how well it came out. I just realized that I end up converting more heroes than I do actually painting the army... /facepalm Need to drybrush more skeletons...

 

[nazgrr]

Resurrecting my Paint Log. Just headed back to college and got all the painting supplies and miniatures unpacked.

Currently I'm assembling a lot of Zombies!!!! Going to do a block of 100 and started assembling last night. Also have a 10 more Grave Guard to boost my current block to 40.

Expect some more updates soon!

 

[sploitz]

even though i think your bones need some tweaking i LOVE your bluish Theme how did you do it? What colors have you used?

 

[Santawraith]

zombieism it isnt just for vidio games called resident evil. A wonderful start to a long project. I am doing close to 200 but am doing them using empire bretonnian and other races models. A collective undead feel. look forward to future updates.

 

[nazgrr]

even though i think your bones need some tweaking i LOVE your bluish Theme how did you do it? What colors have you used?

I use Ultramarine Blue with a coat of Asurmen Blue Ink followed by a light drybrush of 50% Ultramarine and 50% Skull White.

 

[nazgrr]

I'm going to try and cheat with some dipping. Not sure if I want my zombies to be Greyish or if I want them to be Greenish. I'm thinking the greyish with light blue glowing eyes would be best for my scheme.

 

[Disciple of Nagash]

First time I have looked through this plog, but I like it. It's very interesting to see the conversions, though they may be simple things like head swaps they do make a huge difference and create some very unique models. I also like the blue armour, the theme I will be doing for my army is going to be very similar, though it will be darker.

 

[nazgrr]

Ok so my buddies camera is much better than mine, took a lot better snapshots this time!

Finished my Wight King BSB, re-based him as well:

Re-based my Vampire Lord:

Finished the Banner for the Blood Knights, re-based, possible finishing touches to come, haven't decided yet:

Spirit Hosts:

Still Working on the skeletons but have added a lot more to the painting queue...

A bunch of Graveguard for my Lord and Wight King to hang out with:

And a lot of Zombies...this is a unit of 64(8x8):

Some of the filler units:

I have another unit of Zombies in the works ~40 Zombies give or take...