"...Perhaps here, in the depths of Ulgu we might find peace Markov. And with such peace, I shall have time to study the force dynamic away from the prying gaze of the Lord of Death. In his ignorance, that fool would turn all the realms to bones and dust, but I have a far grander design in mind..."
Deintalos the Exile
Finishing Coyl and Ione a couple of weeks ago, meant that there were only two further fighters of The Exiled Dead remaining to paint up to complete the warband: Prentice Markov and his master, the soulblight Deintalos. Thankfully, Markov was fairly quick to do and Deintalos, well, we'll get to him...
As with the rest of the characters, I painted up Markov and Deintalos' bases separately as I found this made it much easier to work on them without the models getting in the way. Deintalos' base is pretty much the same as the others, but Markov has a raised wooden platform or stair to accommodate his pose, upon which lies a vicious looking bone saw...
The wood was painted with Dryad Bark before being shaded with Agrax Earth. From here, I began to layer up the planks, starting by applying fairly rough streaks of Dryad Bark that were then refined with Gorthor Brown. I avoided creating too prominent an appearance of grain in the wood though as I wanted it to look worn smooth with time. Once I was happy with things, I used Baneblade Brown to apply some edge highlights before using Rakarth Flesh to add pin highlights to the sharp corners of each plank.
The patina of age on the wood was the result of glazing the planks with a combination of Mortarion Grime and Athonian Camo which was done at the same time as doing the same to the flagstones (to help tie them together) but before the blood on the bonesaw as I wanted that to look fresher. Speaking of blood, a mix of Blood for the Blood God and Typhus Corrosion gave a satisfyingly clotted shade which was carefully glooped on to the blade of the saw as well as onto and between the planks beneath it.
Like the Arcwalkers that make up the majority of the warband, Markov isn't really one for clothing - wearing little more than a pair of ragged trousers which were painted up in the same fashion as Ione's blouse. Where he differs most significantly from the other minions that Deintalos has gathered about him though is in the unhealthy green of his skin. This was achieved by starting out with a Death Guard Green basecoat which was shaded with Coelia Green. Once the shade had dried, I used some thinned Death Guard Green to layer up the skin before applying some fairly muted highlights of Nurgling Green. Some selective extreme highlights of Krieg Khaki were then added in a few places, before a glaze of Coelia Green was applied to tie everything together.
The sutures across Markov's scalp and mouth were basecoated with Steel Legion Drab before being shaded with Agrax Earth. I then highlighted them with Tallarn Sand and Karak Stone before carfully glazing the flesh around them with some thinned Targor Rage to give it a more bruised, partially healed look.
And so we come to Deintalos at last. There are some elements of him that I'm really happy with and others I'm less so, but overall, I think
he's come out quite well.
Many of the elements of Deintalos' staff, such as the copper wiring, grimy wood and what the Citadel Painting App calls 'Aelven Metal' (the green tinged silver) are shared with the Arcwalkers he has created, but the gemstone it is crowned with is unique to him. After a bit of background reading, I reasoned that it would probably be made from vitrified Grave-sand, which is the coalescence of amethyst magic and the realmstone of Shyish, so I wanted to give it a slightly purple tone. I started out but basecoating the gem with Abaddon Black before applying progressively finer highlights to the cut edges with Dawnstone, followed by Administratum Grey and then finally Grey Seer. From here, I applied two or three glazes of Druchii Violet thinned with a little Lahmian Medium. The highlights I'd added previously had become a bit too muted though, so I added some pin highlights of White Scar to the angles where the cut faces meet at the centre and the edges of the gemstone before using one last glaze of Druchii Violet to tie everything together.
If the collection of severed hands Deintalos possesses is anything to go by, he has something of a fetish for talismans. I'm not one to judge though, we all have our foibles! For the most part, they're all painted using the colours I've made use of on the rest of the warband, with the green ones using Markov's skin tone and the ones on Deintalos' hips using the more waxen skin I used for the Arcwalkers. But the remaining one looked more 'dirty' in the photos of the studio model I was using for reference and I wanted to try and replicate that. After some back and forth about how best to do this, I eventually settled on using Mortarion Grime as a secondary shade after Targor Rage and it worked just as I'd planned. A quick glaze off Mortarion Grime once I'd applied the highlights finished it of nicely
Continuing the creepy, unsettling theme of Deintalos accoutrements, he seems to have literally adopted the appearance of someone else by wearing their face as a mask. I'm not sure such a disguise will help him avoid the ire of Nagash, but it certainly adds a bit more character to the model. I began painting the mask by basecoating it with Rakarth Flesh, which was shaded all over with Targor Rage. Once this was dry, I went back with some slightly thinned down Druchii Violet and shaded around the hooks holding the mask in place as well as the eye sockets and the area around the surgical staples on the forehead. From here I layered back in some thinned Rakarth Flesh before using Deepkin Flesh to add some highlights. To finish off, I glazed a little more Druchii Violet back around some areas to help soften the highlights and add a bit more definition to the face overall.
Perhaps Deintalos' most defining feature is his 'trench coat' and this is the aspect of the miniature that gave me the most difficulty while painting him. The collar was actually fairly quick and easy to do, as it was just a case of adding some chunky highlights of Incubi Darkness before the Dark Reaper in my usual 'cold' black painting sequence (which is Abaddon Black > Dark Reaper > Thunderhawk Blue > Fenrisian Grey for reference) it was everything else that was more challenging. The presence of sutured seams in Warhammer sculpts is usually a design keying towards the material being some form of flayed skin - but in the studio images of Deintalos that used to be on the Warhammer webstore, his coat looked more 'gray-gold' than anything else (or in equestrian parlance: dun coloured), but I couldn't figure out how it had been achieved at all.
After a quite a bit of searching for inspiration, I finally settled on going down a route similar to the way that the new(er) sculpt of Fabius Bile has been painted by the studio team and began by basecoating the whole overcoat with several thin layers of Cadian Fleshtone. Up next was a shade of a 2:1 mix of Targor Rage and Lahmian Medium all over the skin. Once this was dry, I added Druchii Violet to the previous mix (at about a 3:2:1 ratio) and applied a much more selective shade to all of the creases, folds and seams as well as around the buttons on the breast of the coat. I added a second layer of this mix around the buttons and in the deepest folds to help give them a little more definition. While that was drying, I took some neat Druchii Violet and shaded the arms of the coat from just below the elbow to the wrist. I repeated doing this until I'd built up a 'bruised flesh' tone that I was happy with before using some Nuln Oil around the cuffs of the sleeves to really darken them down and with that, the 'skin coat' was ready to be worked back up.
I began by layering back in some thinned Cadian Fleshtone before using Kislev Flesh to begin adding initial highlights to the sharp folds and edges of the coat and cuffs. Some extreme highlights of Deepkin Flesh on the very edges of the hems and between the surgical staples holding the coat together helped to add a very slight greenish tone to the skin which was perfect for it no longer being attached to a living being. The staples and buttons were basecoated with Leadbelcher before being shaded with Nuln Oil and then highlighted with Ironbreaker. At this point, everything was painted, but it wasn't quite working for me, so I set about playing with glazes of Targor Rage and Druchii Violet around the folds and seams and staples until things were more to my liking.
I think what I've ended up with definitely looks like a coat made of flayed flesh, but there's a part of me that feels that unlike with the other fighters in the warband, with Deintalos I've 'failed' to capture the look of the studio miniature completely and as a result he stands out too much. A silly thought perhaps, especially as he's the leader, but it's one that's still proving a little tricky to silence.
Painting The Exiled Dead brings my tally of Death warbands to three and I'm more than a little tempted to look at painting up Zondara's Gravebreakers next, but I have a sneaking suspicion that there might be another Death warband inbound to round out the new warbands of Underworlds 2.0 as every other Grand Alliance has seen at least one warband released since the updated game appeared last autumn - I guess we'll see what James Workshop fancies doing next soon enough.
In the mean time though, as always, thanks for reading and happy hobbying.
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