Orlygg on Orcs and Inks

The holiday's have arrived and the thick dust that settled across our home has been borne away. We've had the builders in this week to rip out the homemade fireplace we inherited with the house and replace it with a modern log burner. It is nice to make progress with our run down house. The bathroom is next and I had to spend an eye watering amount of money to purchase all of the fixtures and fittings for that task. MFM is of course happy that after so many trials and tribulations we have begun work in earnest.

Secretly, I'd love to be spending the money on 1980s Citadel and retro inspired goodies galore. But I refrained, sensibly. I have however been getting the paints out and found myself in a conundrum. Just how do you paint an orc?

You might recall, I was sent a bunch of sticky, stinking models a while back. One of them was the green-skinned chap you can see atop this blog. The others were all riders and without any mounts they will have to go back into my lead scatter (its too small to be called a pile) until suitable models can be found. 

I must admit to finding him a challenging model to paint. Not because of any real detail, or lack of skill... but because I couldn't fathom why it didn't look like an '80s orc. Part of the problem is that I don't have a huge amount of greens to choose from. My proxy Goblin Green is on its last legs and I don't have much Ork Flesh kicking about to squander. I'm kicking myself now, considering I was standing in front of the Coat d'Arms range last month and didn't do anything about it, save my Bleached Bone. Lessons learned for the future. Anyone know a reliable website that sells Coat D'Arms paints?

In the end, I used Scorpion Green - a '90s classic still in its hexagonal paint pot. It was way too much of a vibrant colour to use without mixing in a little brown and yellow. But with this as a base I worked up the figure trying to improve the quality of my flesh painting skills. In the end, I think I added one highlight too many, judging by the photo above. But I knew there was till much work to be done to produce more consistent models. But still, he didn't look right. I knew what I wanted, a orc who'd fit alongside the ranks of White Dwarf circa 1989 but just couldn't achieve it. 

So he sat on my painting area for a while. Fast forwards today, and I was up in the attic sorting stuff once more. Near the last box full of bits and pieces I found the other half of my final painting set up from my old life. Much like before, it had been very evidently just tipped into a box and dumped into storage. There were a number of broken and half-finished models from summer 2020 all of which I can now complete but there were also a selection of my old inks!

Here is my old school ink collection as it stands now. I've managed to rebuild most of the set with only Chestnut Brown missing. I've even begun some boring comparison work comparing the '80s shades with the ones I got in the early 2000s. You can see them here in the hinged black top pots. Some a wildly different but others, especially the blues, match closely. Thanks to Chris sending me quite a few stopper bottles of ink I can compare those too. I remembered Andy Craig telling me that they used Windsor and Newton inks in the Design Studio during our era so I've got a couple of bottles of those too. I've not ever used them but I'm happy to try anything these days. Have a sepia ink that will be a good proxy for Chestnut Brown and I hope to test this colour out on some plastic skellies soon. 

Returning to our friend the orc, as soon as I splashed on a bit of '80s green ink he came together. I used it to shade various parts of his body and even added it to a little purple mix to highlight his lip. I'd clearly forgotten how important the inks were to getting the look I'm after. 

Going forwards, I'm going to try out this mix for my next goblinoid. Goblin Green/Ork Flesh base coat, shaded with class Green Ink with the darker areas touched up with a green and black in mix. I'll then add yellow and bone to the base in stages and then work up the flesh, trying not to over highlight the muscles. Do any of you have a preferred process for orcs and goblins... I'd love to know because I'm not satisfied with what I have at the moment.

Also, this orc gave me the opportunity to play around with armour as well and I used blue and black ink washes to stain the chainmail and give some lived in grit to his helmet. I think they are helping me reached back to my old style. The trouble is, without the actual old painted figures in front of me it is hard to make comparisons and remember what I did in the past. I'm certain I've painted figures I've forgotten about now.

I did find an old photograph of my painted stuff. 

Look...

This picture must be from 2015. So ten years ago and I know I painted much more than this. I cannot see any of my beloved McDeath project that I was so close to finishing either so perhaps it was taken before I began that project. 

I do know that this cabinet was emptied of my belongings and then used outside to hold plants. It was rained on throughout the winter of 2020 and I last saw it looking rather saggy and decrepit a few years back as I was collecting my kids. A sad end for a cabinet that house my figures for so end. 

But where are the figures themselves? Anyone seen them for sale?  

Here's to building a new collection of figures, and perhaps one day, getting a bigger cabinet.

Orlygg