Should I attempt a diamond checker pattern on these minis?

[inkpwn]

I have these awesome minis on the way and I was thinking of having some fun breaking fun by trying to paint that really cool diamond pattern.

(+2 additonal guards)
I'm going to be using them as dark elves, some slight conversion on the throwers to turn them into Witch Elves and the team will have a light, pale skin tone. So which checker pattern wold complement pale skin best? And should I use block colours for the armor? Or maybe checkered armour and solid colour 'fabric'?

Nazgobs fantastic Interlopers provides some inspiring colour samples=

There's also the option to Harley Quinn this up by having solid colour with diamonds in key places.=


Any ideas? Any and all thoughts appreciated.

[velvet mark]

Yeah go for it! The biltzers and linewomen have plenty of room on their trousers to do it.

A Harley Quinn scheme would be ace, or even the Gil Elvgren joker...
http://www.flickr.com/photos/velvet_mar ... otostream/

[Norse]

honestly art I wouldn't bother.. stripes are hard enough.. the patience required to paint chequers is beyond most mortals. I think you'll get fed up very quickly or disheartened very easily..

now, cutting out a tiny diamond shape from a piece of plasticard and using it as a mask for an airbrush I could see working quite well and quite quickly.. that would give you a Harley Quinn type effect with limited investment of time..

but to do it by hand?? fuggetaboutit!

[Heff]

Diamonds are a mare hence l went for squares, which was also a pain

[inkpwn]

@Norse I was thinking exactly that but with lots of time on my hands and a limited budget stopping me from buying any more teams for a good long while I can't say I'm not extremely tempted, well I did start this thread after all.

[Norse]

then expect to invest a lot of time in each mini if you want it to look good.. trying to do it fast will just look like shit...

I've done square chequers before a few times, but never even attempted diamonds.. some things (like climbing Everest or finding the G-spot) are for others I'm afraid..

[velvet mark]

As Norse says dont rush it. Keep the point on your brush sharp , keep the paint thin, keep the corners as crisp as you can and pay attention to the subtle curves which will shrink or elongate the size of the diamond. You can’t go wrong. IIt might take longer than the usual wash/highlight style but youll have a very striking team at the end of it. And a new painting trick up your sleeve.

Start with one mini to get accustomed to the unfamiliar technique. Dont be disheartened if it takes 4 hours to do one leg. You ll learn the most efficient way through the process of painting the team. The last mini of the team wont take anyway near as long as the first.

If you have decided on red/black colour scheme. This will tie the team together nicely. You could even use squares or a combination of diamonds/squares/stripes in different scales on different minis. The brain initially registers colour over form.

Im really interested in how this shadow forge team turns out. Keep us posted!

Heff, any more pics of your team? They look very interesting and cool. Cant beat a bit of black, white and red! Looks great on those minis

[the solitaire]

I´m painting checkers on a miniature right now and did my fair share of painting checkers on my Harlequin army.

It´s possible, it takes time but it looks great when done

After having painted a few miniatures this way you´ll actually get the hang of it and painting the checkered pattern will take about as much time as a good gradient would

[Darkson]

I've done square chequers before a few times, but never even attempted diamonds..

As a non-painter, can someone explain why it's harder to do diamonds over checks? I'd have thought they'd be as difficult as each other?

[Heff]

Not a clue but it just is.

As to my team they are on here somewhere but i cannot find them.

Yes I can

viewtopic.php?f=23&t=36185&p=637542&hil ... in#p637542

[Steam Ball]

Visual references. Checkers are parallel to many things in the miniature and around, and the 4 angles are all 90. With diamonds you don't get those "helpers".

[Norse]

Visual references. Checkers are parallel to many things in the miniature and around, and the 4 angles are all 90. With diamonds you don't get those "helpers".

+1

painting (or drawing) a square on a flat, straight surface isn't too tricky.. now rotate that square by 45 degrees and try to paint a diamond on it's point with all sides being the same length and all angles being 90 degrees...

heck, I'd rather paint tartan (which I'm pretty good at ironically ) than diamond chequers..

[juck101]

Maybe next time do a single shoulder in a pattern and get more practice doing it. Its very hard and wont be much fun the first few times im afriad, but practice makes perfect

[the solitaire]

When deciding to paint some checkers or diamond patterns on a miniature you can decide on one of two approaches.

Perfect mathematically correct checkers or diamonds or, and this particularly goes for flowing shreds of clothing that need diamond patterns, the best possible approximation of such.

I just took a miniature from my shelf and decided to paint a diamond pattern and see how long it takes.

This is the result of 24m of painting checkers

It´s far from perfect, but I think it could almost pass for tablet quality already.
I still need to trace some edges, clean some surfaces and of course paint the rest of the miniature but the diamond pattern is certainly a viable option if you are willing to spend a bit of time painting the miniatures.





My apologies for the bad photo quality btw. My cellphone broke down so I´m on a backu and it makes lousy quality pictures

[progwolff]

I never tried diamond, but ordinary checker patterns on my space orks when I was playing W40k.

Not that I'd be a good painter, but I might just give you some tips I learned in a german miniature painting forum:

Start with the lighter color, shade and highlight as usual
then slightly draw lines with a pencil oder with your brush in a light color (so you can easily correct mistakes)
a piece of paper may help as kind of a flexible "ruler" that takes the shape of the surface you're drawing on.
after that fill the darker patterns.
very important is that you use thinned paint, so that your lines will turn out smooth and thin.

Here also a mini with a very impressing diamond checker pattern:
http://www.coolminiornot.com/313040