Painting blood

[Soleman]

I am painting an assault squad. Things are going pretty well for my first three models so far, but as I am thinking of what to do with the details, I've been thinking about how this unit might look in life.

I imagine that close combat with a chain sword would be a messy business. I'd like to capture this mood in my squad. To do this I was thinking of making them look "splattered" with blood.

I had been thinking of splattering the paint on them from an old toothbrush. Ranger Dude suggested using a paint brush to do the splattering.

Has anyone here tried something similar and if so, how did it work? Does anyone have another suggestion?

[Iron Warrior]

Well I do it one of two ways. If you want wet blood, red ink is the way to go. If you want sploches a tooth brush is good or an firm brush which you and flick or brush.

Dry blood I do with drybrushing blood red. works good. Some of my orks have drybrushed red on thier choppas. And some of the power klaws have the ink effect.

[Soleman]

I hadn't thought of the ink. Good idea. Would you do the splattering with the brush, or is there a better approach in your opinion?

[Garou24]

Think it depends on how big an area you want covered. A paint brush will splatter a smaller area, where the tooth brush if loaded with paint can cover almost the whole model.

If you have a small eye dropped from some old medicine, you can dip it in ink or paint and give a quick squeeze to slatter it out the end. Just takes a small bit but gives a good effect. Try it or the brush flick on some napkins or paper first.

[Soleman]

garou24 said:

Think it depends on how big an area you want covered. A paint brush will splatter a smaller area, where the tooth brush if loaded with paint can cover almost the whole model.

If you have a small eye dropped from some old medicine, you can dip it in ink or paint and give a quick squeeze to slatter it out the end. Just takes a small bit but gives a good effect. Try it or the brush flick on some napkins or paper first.

Another good idea! I definitely plan to practice and play around with it a bit before committing it to the models I've put several hours into. ;D

[MajorSoB]

Dried blood goes dark as well, almost black in some cases. Also when painting blood remember less is more, don't get carried away.

[Soleman]

majorsob said:

Also when painting blood remember less is more, don't get carried away.

Agreed. I'm looking more for the PG 13 LOTR look rather than the low budget splatter film look.

Does anyone have models with blood on them, that seems to match what I'm looking for that you could post or even know of one on cool mini that you could link for me? I seem to see mostly parade gloss armies, so I'm hoping I can find an example or two of what others have done.

[Iron Dragon]

if you are looking to gore up your chainswords with a little fresh squeezed human juice...

i used super glue that was mixed with red ink, applied it so it would run down the (hand) and hit it with zip kicker. the accelerator will also make it glob up a little and look more realistic/chunky.

i was working on an Eldar Avatar, but i think some gored up chainswords and a little spatter on your bracers would look quite imposing.

i'd try it on a few old/ bad minis or spare chainswords if you have them, before i hit my assault squad. it's a neat trick though.

[ccourtney]

As always all your answers will come from the superior 40K race of the Eldar:

members.optusnet.com.au/eldar40k/diy_avatar_conversion.htm

If you did this off of the chain swords it would look really cool, If you wanted to put in the time.

I probably just use green stuff to make the drips since you wont need them to be as big as the avatars.

As far as the painting I would prime it white then Red Gore, Highlighted with blood red, and then to a Pink. After that if you use a red ink wash (maybe 2 coats) over it you will bring the pink back to a red highlight and "wetting" the rest of the reds.

The other thing you might consider is green blood? To signify your marines killing aliens (green blooded nids and orks?....eldar don't bleed) You could make it really bright green just by using green ink over white paint. Might look very cool and stand out on the model more than red would.