How to Paint Horus Heresy ALPHA LEGION

[@AsbestosMuffins]

"bro, why are you playing imperial fists, I thought you were alpha legion." "Bro those are alpha legion."

[@cultofpaint]

accurate

[@kirbyball97]

If you do the citadel way. Just a reminder that they Definitely used massive drops of the contrast medium and a regular drop of the akhelian green. A 2-1 as they recommend is super dark

[@toml7119]

Awesome as always! Can't wait for Iron Warriors and Iron Hands tutorials!

[@cultofpaint]

Thanks Tom, looking forward to doing those two as well.

[@Sephvion]

Stunning. Here comes Alpha Legion Primaris.

[@cultofpaint]

Nice!

[@irishwristwatch2487]

You can also use Terradon turquoise contrast paint with a drop of thinner - Vallejo game colour inks are also great for this and for mixing. I made a great Word Bearers colour with a 5:1 ratio of red and blue. Painting metallics like this is my favourite

[@Zagrantha]

The timing of this couldn't have been better! The part about the paint clearing much more solid than how it looks wet seems to be what I was doing wrong, thank you for posting this.

[@cultofpaint]

Glad it was useful, hope that means you're painting Alphas!

[@Zagrantha]

@@cultofpaint Most definitely! It's a small 40k warband for a client. Feel like he's going to like the rest even more than the test piece all thank to you! Personally, still torn between Sons of Horus and Alpha Legion after finishing my Rout, but this tutorial might have swayed it. :)

[@Wijkert]

Turquoise and rusty colors go so well together!

[@UR-025_STC]

He looks amazing!!!!! That's a great recipe. It's an absolute treat that you guys teach us how to achieve such a great finish in an efficient way. Thx Henry!

[@frankdanysh6772]

Was going to use the contrast paints but this paint job has opened my eyes

[@chrisalner194]

Love the Lucky varnish from mig, its great stuff.

[@cultofpaint]

Big fan, have ordered full set

[@brianv769]

I am going to try a similar scheme as this but using Pro Acryl transparent paints.

[@lazyfimfim]

Oh my 😍 I personally enjoy more the contrast akhelian green way, but I'm always impressed when somebody's using the clear paints. The weathering part with oil is something I never thought, and it looks really good. Because of you, I have to try it 😄 Great job!

[@cultofpaint]

Yeah i think the contrast paint is probably the way to go nowadays, but it was nice todo a real OG FW scheme, and you do get a slightly deeper colour using the tamiyas.

[@wiggy5209]

Beautiful painting, thanks for showing this.

[@cultofpaint]

Thanks for watching and commenting.

[@MichaelAlthauser]

Very cool seeing you tackle this using the original FW scheme. I didn't want to mess with Tamiya clears, so I use Minitaire Ghost Tints instead for a similar look, specifically the Blue and the Plasma Fluid. And it's still strange to me to get compliments on my army whenever it's on the table, but it really does look super impressive in that scheme lol.

[@cultofpaint]

The ghost tints work well. As do the gw contrast. But I do love the OG clears.

[@greywanderer5935]

Love these, I don’t use an airbrush and probably never will but these are really relaxing and lovely to watch.

[@stephanhecht3913]

You could build up the metallic highlights with stippling and apply tamiya clear with a brush and achieve a similar scheme

[@somnitek]

I love that AO color soo much I'm almost tempted to play em them openly. Hmmm

[@cultofpaint]

Do it!!

[@TetsugakuSan]

I am going to use this on some Aeronautica Flyers to use in Legions!!

[@TheIndigoEclipse]

The sponge weathering towards the end, could you just use the burnt Umber Oils that you later use for streaking?

[@furiyen4890]

Excellent video, keep them coming!

[@cultofpaint]

Thanks, will do!

[@tombrand236]

Great video! I’ve been using a similar scheme on my primaris founding the Omega Sentinels. I have been using a mix of GW Akhellian green and Terradon turquoise over a metallic base for a similar effect.

[@cultofpaint]

Yep the GW contrasts work very well.

[@Alf_Hairy-arse]

Hi, do you mind telling me what mix of green and turquoise you use? How much impact does adding the turquoise make? I have seen on WarCom they just used the green on it's own over silver. I was thinking of spraying a base of leadbelcher then drybrushing a lighter silver before the contrast to see if it created better highlights. Have you tried anything like this?

[@tombrand236]

@@Alf_Hairy-arse I use more of the Akhelian green - I usually mix 50:50 with contrast medium and do two coats

[@Alf_Hairy-arse]

@@tombrand236 thanks for the reply!

[@tombrand236]

@@Alf_Hairy-arse let me know how you get on. One extra thing I’d add: - after basing in a metallic primer, I’d highlight using brighter metallics (I dry bush using Artis Opus brushes from leadbelcher up to a bright chrome - I then wash the whole model with nuln oil gloss. This really helps the contrast go on smoothly and combined with the above, gives great depth and smokers highlights

[@CocoaBadger]

Lovely video! The difficulty of getting this scheme consistent across an army, makes me hesitate trying it out.

[@robertblack1446]

Waiting for your Thousand Sons video before I start painting mine. These videos are phenomenal.

[@cultofpaint]

Hmm might need a couple for them I think, a clear and and a flat scheme!

[@robertblack1446]

@@cultofpaint Hahaha. That would be amazing! Looking forward to it.

[@15andersh]

Excellent scheme!

[@cultofpaint]

Thank you!

[@brothergregorius9385]

Awesome tutorial! Will take a few ideas from it for sure.

[@cultofpaint]

Cheers!

[@AshBlat]

Did you give the model a final varnish? I'm struggling to get the armour to "shine" and everything else to be Matt.

[@rodrigomarquesruiz9836]

Looks amazing !! Thx for the vídeo 🤓

[@cultofpaint]

Thanks for watching and commenting!

[@kaibe5241]

Looks sooooo good

[@MrGufalo]

Thank you! How you would paint FW Alpharius?

[@cultofpaint]

I'd start like this and then all that extra detail will make him look more elaborate anyway. I like painting characters the same way as the rest of the army.

[@Capamaru78]

Really really nice mate. I tried it on TAU and guess we are Alpharious now :P

[@cultofpaint]

We always were.

[@pgabrieli]

awesome!! please do the horus heresy thousand sons!! :-)

[@cultofpaint]

On it!

[@rapha6245]

Now the world eaters tutorial :p Can't wait your version of them.

[@cultofpaint]

It will be........bloody.

[@killroy255]

You guys planning on getting the alpharius limited edition book whenever it releases?

[@cultofpaint]

Wasn't it out this morning? I've given up on the ltd edition, they go so quick.

[@killroy255]

@@cultofpaint I was on both the black library and games workshop site at 10gmt and nothing showed up so...I hope they weren't supposed to release today!

[@Sinz890]

Thank you! How you would paint metallic night lords?

[@cultofpaint]

I'd check out some of the contrast blue paints from GW.

[@elliottreadings8029]

If you don't mind me asking, what airbrush and accessories did you use for this vid? I'd like to do this too, and thus would like to get into airbrushing.

[@MLaak86]

Will you be making a Thousands Sons vid? I presume the same sorta method?

[@cultofpaint]

Correct. Will be blue and red versions.

[@ellisowendaniel]

I've got some gold mechanicum i'm working on but really don't want to use silver to highlight or whether the gold. Would rhinox hide or another opaque normal colour work on that? I've not seen a metallic highlight with a non-metallic colour before.

[@cultofpaint]

Yes absolutely. Chipping doesn't stand out as much on metallic minis, which is fine. The pin washing and basing is a good way to get a bit more weathering done that shows up.

[@jf7231]

Amazing work as always! When you id the last bit of oil grime at the end, did you varnish over it again or was that the final layer?

[@jwhitehouse]

Love these videos Henry. Do you thin the gloss varnish before your oil washes at all?

[@cultofpaint]

Cheers Jim, I thin the polyurethane one, approx 2:1 thinner to varnish.

[@jwhitehouse]

@@cultofpaint Thanks very much

[@GarethS998]

Any suggestions on pushing this further for characters or do you find the pre-shade gives enough detail for larger models and/or those deserving more time (aka I have a Contemptor and Leviathan to paint before I tackle the REAL characters/HQ/LoW for my army 😉)

[@cultofpaint]

The characters will often havea bunch more detail/extras on them as a sculpt anyway, so you'll find they naturally look more impressive.

[@GarethS998]

@@cultofpaint this is true, even just the sheer amount of scales on Dynat's armour. Well, airbrush arrives Monday and I've got some spare 40k Primaris marines to practice on first 🤣

[@GarethS998]

Also when you say about the thinner to paint mix do you mean 3 drops thinner to 1 drop of mixed paint, so if your paint is 7:2 then you'll also add 27 drops of thinner rather than 7:2:3?

[@StroggRU]

Sons of Horus please next

[@cultofpaint]

Soon!

[@genericalias6307]

Always remember that you can always use the Alpha Legion rules for any space marine army. Hydra Dominatus.

[@sq99999]

When you say 7:2 and then 3 drops of thinner? is that 3 drops for each 9 drops of color or 3 drops of thinner to 9 drops of paint? Hope that makes sense, thanks for the great video

[@cultofpaint]

It's just a couple of drops of thinner to the overall mix, it just seems to help the contrast s behave a bit better through the airbrush

[@sq99999]

@@cultofpaint Thank you for the clarification, my Tamiya paints should be here Saturday, can't wait to try it.

[@cultofpaint]

@@sq99999 sorry, I forgot I did these with Tamiya. In which case you want plenty of thinner. So it's 3 drops of thinner per one drop of the colour ( the big pot you've mixed up).

[@sq99999]

@@cultofpaint Awesome, thank you for the clarification!

[@NateVHVT]

When you say you set your psi to 25; is that when the airbrush is sitting ready or when you're pressing the airbrush action down?

[@cultofpaint]

When the trigger is depressed

[@alexjohansson1476]

Really good video and a fantastic colour for the alpha legion! Just wondering, what kind of W&N oil paint are you using? I checked the W&N homepage and realised that there are diffrent types and it varies in price.

[@cultofpaint]

I use Artists Oil colour. It’s the more expensive. But i find it much better for making the wash with. I’ve had a tube that’s lasted me 5+ years

[@warhounds]

nice video!!! do you think i could get same result if i mix all the non metallic colours with silver then paint with (air)brush?

[@cultofpaint]

Most likely yes. I also suspect you could find the coloured metallics already, check out the Scale75 Alchemy range.

[@geteavnroc2250]

Is it possible to get a similar finish with airbrushing Akhelian Green (GW Contrast paint) over the same silver zenethil?

[@cultofpaint]

Yes

[@geteavnroc2250]

@@cultofpaint Did it turn out similar?

[@davidmills6203]

I have black templars, would I be able to achieve a similar result with black? are the tamiya clear... special paints or just the name of the colour?

[@cultofpaint]

The are a "special" paint, but you thin them the same as other tamiya acrylics with Tamiya X20a thinner. If you wanted to do this for Black Templars you'd be better using the GW contrast paint Black Templar.

[@haroldmechly1776]

How much thinner do you add to the clears. Still need it that 'milk' consistency? or thinned more.

[@cultofpaint]

We don't think milk consistency is a helpful term. You're thinning your clears so that one layer will ever so slightly change the colour. Try 4:1 thinner to paint and adjust from there.

[@haroldmechly1776]

@@cultofpaint Thanks, and yeah, the whole 'milk' term has never really made sense to me anyway.

[@ewylinlinsi5423]

hello do you used violett primer ? does it work with a black primer

[@cultofpaint]

It’s GW Chaos Black primer.

[@vitorzelao]

does it work with brushes ? no spray or air brush ? thank you.

[@cultofpaint]

I would recommend using the GW contrast paints instead if you want to do it with just brush

[@vitorzelao]

@@cultofpaint thanks. and the silver base coat would that be fine with a brsh or the results would change a lot ?

[@echunouchi]

This is completely awesome! Thanks for this guide, will use it today with a friend for his Thousand Sons! BTW and this is completely friendly: Vallejo is pronounced like Vayeho. Keep up this work, Subbing now :D

[@cultofpaint]

Thanks glad you liked it. We’ll try to get better with our pronunciation!

[@echunouchi]

@@cultofpaint we just tried it and looks awesome! Thank you again

[@lewiscollyer8092]

This should be paid content. I followed the blood angels guide for my dark angels and it worked brilliantly.

[@Sephvion]

Agreed. I would have paid for this lol.

[@cultofpaint]

hah thanks guys! We have paid content over on the Patreon, and a tip jar for youtube vids. But we want to provide plenty of this for free.

[@tpernler]

Very cool! Now, if you could be so kind and stop dodging the legion that got the whole thing started, and bring us some Word bearers :-) Would be cool to see you tackle both the pre-heresy gray and the red scheme!

[@cultofpaint]

We owe Erebus so much. Good point though, hadn't thought about the grey version too.

[@GooglyEyedSkull]

We're... We're the baddies!? :P

[@cultofpaint]

Most certainly not!

[@murkymurka3337]

first!