How to paint Primaris Space Marines Blood Ravens chapter
Priming
For this color scheme I think a basic spray coat with black primer is easiest to work with. I used Citadel Chaos Black.
Basecoat
I start with applying a basecoat of 50/50 Mephiston Red/Rhinox Hide. I always water down the colors and put on a couple of thin layers otherwise you risk getting a grainy surface and we don’t want that.
Evil highlight
Apply Evil Sunz Scarlett directly over the base coat. The contrast difference is high so you will need to put it on in thin diluted layers and try to blend it into highlights toward the hard edges of the armor.
Troll highlight
Continue building up the highlight with Troll Slayer Orange. Apply it in thin lines along the edges. I find that it helps keeping the brush at an angle and apply the paint with the side of the brush instead of the actual tip of it.
Fire highlight
Same as last step. Build up that highlight so it really pops with Fire Dragon Bright. Don’t add this color to all edges, only the most prominent ones.
Black highlight layers
Start with Abaddon Black for the basecoat then highlight with the following three colors, Eshin Grey, Dawnstone, Administratum Grey.
I paint the bolter, belt, pouches, joints, edges of the shoulder pad and the right knee with black.
The bolter is partly painted with Leadbelcher and washed with Nuln Oil.
Shoulder pads and face mask
I chose to paint the face mask in a contrasting color, Ushabti Bone, and matching it with the shoulder pads. I used Mornfang Brown as recess shade for the mask and pads.
Recess shade: Adding the recess shade to the shoulder pads without making a mess was the hardest technical part of the whole model because it becomes very clear if those lines are anything but straight. Skipping them completely wouldn’t make a huge difference but it adds a that little extra finesse.
Highlight: The pads and mask was highlighted with Screaming Skull. If you feel it needs more highlights you can always add another layer with White Scar.
Eyes
I started by painting them with the same highlights used for my black areas but realized it would look nicer with some color and added a Moot Green highlight at the end.
Sigill and paper
For the paper I used the same set of colors as for the shoulder pads. The sigill was painted with Screamer Pink and highlighted by adding white to Screamer Pink in one or two steps, can’t remember.
Basing
Glued on some small rocks and bricks with superglue as rubble. Then added Woodland Scenic, Scenic Cement to the whole base and dipped it in a sand mix followed by more Scenic Cement on top to… well… cement it in place.
I wanted a simple but contrasting base that works well with the brown/red/orange style of the space marine. I chose to make a 50/50 mix of Eshin Grey and Castellan Green as basecoat followed by drybrushing the base with Nurgling Green.
To make it less homogenous in color I added a thin wash to the rocks with Kantor Blue followed by a Dawnstone drybrush.
Final result
And here it is in all its glory, my first Primaris and my first Blood Raven.
Big thanks to Paul Norton for the inspiration, or to be more honest, I pretty much stole his color scheme straight up.
Please follow me on instagram, aintnodollhouse, for updates on my painting projects and I’m always happy to receive crits and comments. So shoot!
