I’ve had this Nightmaw (from Forge World’s Sayl the Faithless) primed and ready to paint for a long time. But recently I decided to do some experimenting and learn how to get better at painting skin and shadows. So Nightmaw was the perfect choice! Instead of his more purple depiction in the Tamurkhan book, he is now used as a Tzeentch Chaos Spawn.
Nightmaw is actually the result of 3 of Sayl’s fellow apprentices being melted together (disgusting, right?)
I kept the base very clean to highlight the skin on Nightmaw. I had to freehand a lot of the skin, as it was too plain without. But the details on this are amazing! Here he is from a few more angles:
I only used Reaper Paints for this which are “hands down” the best skin paints in the world. The darkest shadow is Tanned Shadow (using the whole triad with Tanned Skin and Tanned Highlight) Then went on to Fair Skin (and the Fair Highlight). I painted bloodshot eyes based with Redstone Highlight (which is perfect for painting lips and soft wounds without looking pink) and Fair Skin Highlight as the brightest (it’s almost white)
The wounds were painted using Imperial Purple and highlighted with Redstone Highlight mixed with the skin colours on my palette.
I used a little bit of Flesh Wash from Vallejo to make the shadows a bit darker. The wash has a very matte finish and is great in small amounts.
Teeth and claws were painted the same way as the skin but highlighted with Khaki Highlights (I always avoid bright white colours, as it gives a very cold and often chalky feel to the miniature)
I spent around two evenings on this one (not including preparations, basing and priming), and he looks really badass in my display cabinet! Oh and his master Sayl is patiently waiting for a paint job on my table (as he has done for the past two years)…