My SCE warband is really coming on nicely. Actually two of the models are complete to a table top standard. But I want to push them a bit beyond that so today is about painting freehand skulls.
How to paint freehand skulls
So, I’ve actually got a really simple step by step guide to painting freehand skulls on 28mm miniatures:
Step 1. Sign up to follow Richard Gray on Patreon and watch some of his freehand videos, especially the one about Adeptus Titanicus freehand skulls.
Step 2. Thank me later.
Seriously now…
So I kind of am serious about that. Every now and again I’ve found things (techniques or products) or people that have really levelled up my painting. However, nothing has had as big an impact on my painting as following and trying to learn from Richard Gray.
I’ve got no formal art training, I’m just a dickhead with some paintbrushes, but following what he does has meant some good results so far:
Actually I thought I’d painted more freehand skulls than this but turns out these are the only ones. Not bad for a first try I guess.
Why paint freehand skulls?
I actually don’t just paint freehand skulls. My three core freehand competencies are skulls (all two of them I’ve painted, see above), flowers and feathers. I’m sure I’ll branch out (maybe that’s something for a future blog post) but actually I feel like flowers and skulls can get you a long way in 28mm miniature painting. We all know the GW skulls meme and they’re key to that quite camp ’80’s aesthetic inherent in their IP (no matter how grimdark they claim to be!) Feathers, not so much.
How difficult is it?
Here’s another great reason to paint freehand skulls – it’s super easy. Trust me, if I can do it, you can do it. It’s like anything else in miniature painting, if you rush it, miss steps out or think ‘good enough is good enough,’ then your freehand skulls are going to look shit. That’s a fact. But have some references handy and absorb some video tutorials and you’ll be fine. The skull you’re about to see took me 20 minutes (they take longer the bigger they are but enjoy it, you’re creating something cool).
Painting freehand skulls on a SCE pauldron.
Here’s old mate’s shoulder…
His other shoulder is a moulded pad with a hammer and some lightning bolts but this is just crying out for some freehand for two reasons. Firstly it’s a big flat space and very boring without some extra detail and secondly I’m not too thrilled with that blend of the highest highlight in the blue so something to cover that is nice.
My paints
You can paint freehand skulls in any colour you like, it’s your free time, but I’m going for a classical look here (and following the RG recipe fairly closely) so here are my paints. They’re very similar to the paints for my NMM gold so that should tie everything together nicely. To reiterate, as long as you have a range of paint from black to white with some mid tones you can paint a skull.
My brush
I like to use a big(gish) brush where I can. I like that they hold more paint, I find them easier to blend with and the way that they discharge paint is more consistent than small brushes. However, old mate’s shoulder is so small that there’s no real room for a size 1 (the brush I’ve used for everything else on these miniatures). So today I’ll be painting freehand skulls with a size 00. I’ve not used this brush before and, actually, I’m not that happy with it. The point is very fragile and splits under any kind of pressure so actually it covers more area than a large brush, with a lot less control, unless I’m really careful. Best be really careful then I guess
Painting freehand skulls step 1
Get your basic shape down with your mid tone. Mine changed slightly after this photo was taken but not by much. This pauldron is an awkward shape – it’s not square so whilst my skull fills the shape vertically, there’s still a lot of blank space on either horizontal side. I’ll fill those with some different freehand separately.
The key thing with this step is to start small and increase the size. If you start too big it’s much harder to patch the background colour back in, especially if it’s got several different layers and glazes on.
Painting freehand skulls step 2
Once the basic outside shape is in place, add the shapes of the internal structures. The darkest areas (eye sockets and nose hole) in black, the sides of the skull in a colour darker than the mid tone but not black (in my case, Rhinox Hide).
Don’t expect to get this right straight off the bat, especially in this size. Take some time to go back and forth and refine these shapes and their size. Eye sockets are always lower and larger than one would instinctively think. Keep your reference material handy.
Painting freehand skulls step 3
Once the basic shape and the internal structures are in place it’s a case of laying down the first highlights in a colour lighter than the mid tone (I had my light source coming from the middle of the top) and finishing with the highest highlights in white.
That’s it actually.
Don’t think it can be that easy? It really is. Is this winning me a Slayer Sword? No. Am I looking forward to working really hard on my freehand every day and getting a Sword eventually? Also no. This is pretty good though, especially in this size. There’s still a lot of blue space around and I’ll be filling that with some flowers when I do the flower freehand on the cloak of another mini in this warband.
Still can’t be bothered?
Want to fill the space without the freehand? Well have a look at decals. I’ve mentioned how much I used decals for my 30K Emperor’s Children (here). Don’t just stick to decals made by gaming companies either. Most of the decals I have used have come from nail art suppliers. Once you get past the ‘Live, Laugh, Love’ and teddy bear stuff there are some cool products out there. You can even add to decals with some very simple freehand to really bed them into your miniature. This guy is all nail art decals and I still have a real soft spot for him…
Anyway, I hope you enjoyed this. Comments always welcome!
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