Swordwind Eldar: Preview Over the coming year I will be featuring elements of the first of these armies; the Swordwind, but in time I will cover units from at least three, possibly more, of the main Craftworlds. Compared to the simple bold colours of the Space Marines and the gritty weathered palette of the Imperial Guard and Orks, the Eldar present a different painting and modelling challenge altogether. The clean bright colours seen in a Craftworld force don’t lend themselves ideally to the dry brush and wash technique used extensively in some of my other armies to date. Eldar vehicles in particular are best painted using more classic layering or ‘feathering’ techniques, both of which better emphasise the crisp blended highlights. An Eldar army can be one of the most challenging to paint well in addition to time consuming, however the final result in my opinion is well worth the extra care and effort. The models shown here are only samples from my forthcoming Swordwind force and were painted at the end of 2003 with the exception of the Wraithlord and War Walker, which were more recent. Before I get too involved in an army I like to paint a few ‘test’ pieces first to see how the different colours in the palette work together. In the case of the Swordwind, the huge variety of colours in the Aspect Warriors makes this even more challenging. Guardian Warhost
The first few sample pieces for the Guardian Warhost I chose were a Guardian unit, Guardian Heavy Weapon Platform, Ranger unit, Farseer, Wraithlord and Wave Serpent. All models are from previous ranges with the exception of the Wave Serpent, which is one of Forge Worlds highly detailed resin variants. In all instances the bone white armour was achieved by starting with a base colour of space wolf grey over which a mix of ghostly grey and white was applied. A final pure skull white highlight was then painted over any raised armour details. For the green I began with a base colour of dark angels green to which I added increasing amounts of snot green for each successive highlight up until the final highlight for which I added badmoon yellow to the mix. All black detailing and weapons were then highlighted with either shadow grey or fortress grey depending upon the effect I wanted to achieve. Aspect Warhost
Compared to the simple green and white palette of the Guardians, the Biel-Tan Aspect Warriors are a riot of bright colours and contrasting armour. For my initial models I chose a unit from each of the following Aspects; Howling Banshees, Dark Reapers, Warp Spiders, Fire Dragons and Dire Avengers. In most cases I based each Aspect as five models to a stand on regular Epic infantry strips, however for the larger Dark Reapers and Warp Spiders I decided to reduce them to four models and mount them on larger 20mm x 40mm Warmaster bases to emphasise the rare nature and reduced numbers of these Aspects. It also allowed me more freedom to add a little more detail to each of the bases. I am not going to list the colours used for each Aspect as there are far too many to describe, but I will cover the painting of them in more detail later in the year when they are added to Dropship proper. I hadn’t originally intended to include any Eldar units until much later in the year, however I decided to reconsider after receiving a number of emails asking if I would post a few pictures in the meantime. As for the rest of the Biel-Tan, I am afraid you will have to wait a while yet as I still have a great deal of Imperial and Ork units to get through yet before fully covering the Eldar. Until then, I hope that the first few units have whetted your appetite for painting a few of the “pointy eared” ones. Oh go on then, here are a couple more!
War Walkers and Scorpion MkII's painted for Specialist Games to launch the Swordwind Supplement. Until next time, happy gaming. |
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