SHOWCASE: Necron Catacomb Command Barge

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Manical from an eternity of stasis-slumber, the Phaeron of a long-forgotten dynasty rides to war. Behind him, vast and implacable hordes of machine-vassals march in unison. Once again the galaxy will face the wrath of the Necrontyr!

Time for the second installment of our collaborative project – The Necrons of the Derelict Planet – inspired by the fantastic artwork of Pascal Blanché! It’s back to 40K this week as we present the superb Necron Catacomb Command Barge. If you’re into vehicles then this is a real joy to paint. It has organic curves – perfect for fades and blends – as well as crisp edges for sharp highlighting.


As with the Necron Warriors we painted the Command Barge together over a few sittings. The colours are intense and vibrant, built up in successive layers initially using sponge and drybrush, with more controlled glazes and edge highlights deployed towards the end.

The underside of the Command Barge is left the dark teal green colours of the basecoat and picked out with Sotek Green. The style is inspired by the bold colours of Pascal Blanché’s Derelict Planet art, but we hypothesise that the underglow is from the craft’s grav-repulsor force-field. (That or it’s just a pimped out ride, fitting of an insane Terminator Space-Pharaoh!)

The Necron Phaeron was a perfect opportunity to try out some advanced painting techniques. His War-Scythe and Ressurection Orb were embellished with glowing blue non-metallic metal effects. We’re pretty happy with how they turned out. We used the iPhone app Snapseed to work out how to light the War-Scythe before painting it, to ensure the lighting looked correct. We’ll feature this in a future blog, but here are some close ups.

 

As ever we’d love to know what you think of our work, your feedback sustains us! 

Also, we’d like to thank Pascal for tweeting our blog last time – great to have some engagement from such an inspirational guy! We highly recommend you check out Pascal Blanché’s art on his blog or excellent art book Derelict Planet. 

SHOWCASE: Necrons of the Derelict Planet!

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Under the glare of a blood red sun a legion of immortal warriors march through the remnants of a derelict planet…

Sometimes all it takes to inspire a project is one idea. In the case of our Necrons, that seed of inspiration came from stumbling across the beautiful art of Pascal Blanché – art director at Ubisoft. His blend of post-apocalyptic and mythological themes, vibrant use of colour and techniques that span CG and digital artforms are beautiful to behold.

“Danu” ©Pascal Blanché. Used without permission. See more at http://derelictplanet.blogspot.co.uk/

“Sanctuary” © Pascal Blanché. Used without permission. See more at http://pascalblanche.deviantart.com/

Struck by bold, three-dimensionality of his work an the transition of contrasting colours we realised that this had to be applied to miniatures. And what better faction than Necrons to capture the alien marriage of corroded machine and organic shapes!

These Necron Warriors were painted surprisingly quickly. Keen to emulate the transition from dark teal green to oxide red we sketched the colours in with drybrush and sponging techniques. We began with a blue basecoat of Necron Abyss, working up through Stegadon Scale Green to Sotek Green. Successive red layers were then applied from above to simulate a vibrant red light-source. The final layers of orange were applied using thin glazes instead, and edge highlights picked out to give definition. We picked a cold blue as a contrasting splash colour for the glowing eyes and energy canals on their Gauss Rifles.

We’d love to know what you think of our Necrons. Have you been inspired by the art or ideas of another in the same way? Tell us in the comments below.

Also, we highly recommend you check out Pascal Blanché’s art on his blog or excellent art book Derelict Planet. Maybe you’ll find your next inspiration there!