Painting an Imperial Knight - The Armour

Part two of my Imperial Knight project covers painting up the armour plates. None of the plates were fitted to the skeleton before painting. They were all painted individually then glued on at the end.

With a huge model like this zenithal highlighting with an airbrush isn't as important as a small model because it's large enough to self shadow effectively. I concentrated on recreating the effects of where the sunlight had faded the paint job and the effects of the materials rather than the lighting effects.

Here are all the armour plates painted blue (they still aren't attached it's just blutac). This was super easy to do as blue is a fairly translucent colour. All of the highlighting is purely from pre-shading with an airbrush.

First prime all parts black. Next I pre-shaded using Badger Minitaire Base Grey. I could have achieved more contrast using white but the Grey tends to flow more smoothly and I didn't want to mess about thinning the white down. Pre-shade just by highlighting the middle most part of the plates. Next mask off the areas that aren't going to be blue (or gold) with masking tape (I use Tamiya low-tack tape). Now just spray some Vallejo MA Blue over the area and you're done! Let the paint dry fully before removing the masking tape.

I then painted the red parts the same way. Mask off the non-red or trim areas with tape and then spray Vallejo Ferrari Red over the pre-shading (chosen as it's just slightly darker than scarlet). 

The light yellow/cream areas were harder. I had no paints that matched the colour so I improvised by spraying them with Badger Minitaire Yellow. This was horrible so I ended up mixing in some Badget Minitaire White and some Vallejo MA Sand Yellow until I got something that looked about right. I then highlighted up from the yellow to this new "Creamy Yellow". In this instance the pre-shading achieved nothing.

Next after all the paint was dry I got out some Vallejo Liquid Mask and started to flood the interior of the armour plates with it. If you load up a brush with this stuff and just hold the brush near an area of detail (such as the corners of the shoulder plates) then the liquid will eventually just flow into the oddly shaped area without you having to push it around.

Now this stuff is messy. You will destroy a brush with it so don't use a good one. Next leave it to dry for a couple of hours just to make sure. Once it's gone completely clear it's ready to be painted over.

Prime the armour plates black again and wait for it to dry. Next up is drybrushing Gold Rub n Buff (a tip I picked up from a Forgeworld book where they were painting a Reaver Titan). This stuff gets shinier the more you buff it. Be careful you don't just rub it entirely off the model though (unless you want a worn aged effect).

Now using a sharp knife cut along the edges of the trim where you masked. This ensures the mask doesn't pull any paint off the trim when you remove it. Use your thumb to pull the masking fluid off the model and a toothpick to get into the crevices.

Tada. Your Knight is mostly finished. Just the Heraldry and base to go!