Necron Army Advice Needed

Well my original plan was to make a CSM/Daemon army but an unforeseeable event happened…girlfriend realized she likes the Necrons. So because of that the whole Blood for the Blood God yay Chaos thing is being temporarily pushed to the side. Now I am perfectly fine with making a Necron Army for her in the colours that she wants but she wants to just simply stare at them and has no desire to actually try gaming with them. I was wondering since there is a lack of any sort of Necron Codex at the moment if I would be able to get some advice on where best to start on making the army functional and playable, not just pretty to look at. On the more artistic side, I am wondering what paints I would need to make the Necron Warscythes (and the various other staff like weapons) look like Illuminor Szeras' weapon here? Since orange is the colour she wants for the power signature.

http://www.games-workshop.com/en-CA/Necron-Illuminor-Szeras

Any help regarding either of these matters would be greatly appreciated.

looks like the bladed parts they primered black, then did 2 highlights;
first highlight was with a dull orange, looks like Jokaero Orange.
then a detailed line highlight using a brighter orange, either Troll Slayer Orange, or Fire Dragon Bright

the orb and crystal appear to be a full coat of Troll Slayer Orange, with a line highlight of Lugganath Orange

Thank you! I had a feeling I was missing something, need Jokaero and Lugganath

The effect used on that particular staff seems to imply heavy usage of washes. Fortunately for you, washes are awesome and are relatively easy to use.

To start all of this off, you'll probably want to base anywhere that will be orange with white. It might seem counter productive, but roll with it. If you primed the model black, a thin coat of a grey before applying your white will do sanity loads of favours. Administratum Grey and Pallid Wych Flesh from the GW line are both good buffer layers for this purpose. Thin layers are your friend, as always.



Now, if you're shooting to do the dark orange seen on most of the staff bits, you're likely be looking to do one coat of Agrax Earthshade (brown), followed by 2-3 coats of either Seraphim Sepia or Fuegan Orange, depending on the exact tone you are shooting for. Make sure each application has plenty of time to dry before applying the next, or anywhere that hasn't quite dried yet will simply come apart and look horrible. Also try to go easy with how much wash is applied at any given time. The reason I'm recommending washes for this is to get those tiny, tiny, smooth gradents in there that you see in the above screen shot. Washes will generally stay away from edges, giving you that almost glow effect, while simultaneously seeking out crevices to make them darker.



The brighter orange on the crystal could be done in a few ways. A base of white with 1-2 coats of Fuegan Orange finished with one coat of Casandora Yellow would be one way, to do it purely through washes. Another approach would be a base of Yriel Yellow or Flash Gitz Yellow (same rules for basing with while apply to basing with yellow, an undercoat of grey or off-white will save you much paint and thoughts of bridges), followed by 1-2 coats of Fuegan Orange. If desired, you can go back with the original yellow and a fine detail brush to pick out the edges of the crystal to make it really pop, but keep in mind how fine of a detail you are working on, as this isn't not a step for a shaky hand.



The glow on the orb can also be done with exclusively washes, it just takes a particular application. After basing white, just put a wee-little-bit of Fuegan Orange around where the orb connects to everything else. Once that is on the model, but before it has a chance to dry, take a different brush that is 100% dry, poke it into where you have placed the wash, and drag it up to where you haven't. This will bring some of the wash up, but not all of it, giving you a bit of a gradient. If you get adventurous, you can also use this to make "energy tendrils" on the orb, but again, this is a wee-little-orb we are talking about.

It is worth noting that all three of these methods can be scaled up, but there are points where using regular paints make more sense than washes exclusively. Vehicles, for example, should be painted with actual paints most of the time and accented with washes, just because of the sheer amount of surface area involved.

I hope this helps, I'm sure some of the other guys here have alternate methods of getting similar orange power effects, so keep an eye on this thread for a bit.

And while I was typing all that up an entirely different approach appears!

Wow, I was not expecting a step by step walkthrough but thanks! In either case I am missing a few paints and I will be experimenting with both but I do like the shade idea, I got more paints yesterday and was playing around with my Fuegan Orange and Nuln Oil which instantly made me start loving the shades. The more ideas for how to get that effect I can get the better, gives me more to play around with and experiment with. Thank you guys

another trick you can do with the shades is to mix them with lahmian medium. 1:3 drops of shade to medium.  this will make the shade pool less into the edges, and let you use it to actually tint the item you're painting.

here's an example of how this looks when you use Nuln Oil on something painted Khorne Red:

before:


After:


that was done with a single coating.  i did 2 drops of Nuln Oil mixed with 5 or 6 drops of Lahmian Medium.

You know I was just thinking about that before ordering my last set of paint but I decided not to get it because I had no idea what it would look like or if it would even work. I see now that I made a mistake because that looks really awesome and definitely will be something that I have to try out.

its essentially just a matte clearcoat paint, but it also works well as a mixing medium for the shades.  and if you take the time to experiment, it can be used to make your own shades if you need a specific tint they don't make.  its also used in making your decals look like they're freehand.  you start with a coat of 'ardcoat, place your decal, one more layer of 'ardcoat to seal the decal, and then lahmian medium over the area to matte it back again.  that's how you hide the decal into the paint surface so you don't see that clear outline when the light shines on it.

the effect you see there with the shade happens because the medium will break the surface tension of the shade and prevent it from pooling.  so instead, it will spread out evenly over the surface you use it on.  had i done the same thing with pure nuln oil, i would have still gotten a somewhat similar result, but instead of a darker, wine red color, i would have ended up with a dirty oily covered looking red armor plate.

you can use that to your advantage though if you want to do coloured metallics.  since you're painting necrons, you can start with a basecoat of leadbelcher.  then choose a shade color you like, let's say blue, and just give the entire model a heavy coat of it and let it dry. if you want a edge highlight, then take runefang steel and edge all of the armour plates at this point.  afterwards, you coat the model in the blue colored shade again.  this darkens up the metal and starts to make it take on the color more and seem like you're painting a metallic that has depth to the blue.  and, you'll have an edge highlight that's a lighter shade of blue because of the runefang steel step.  sometimes a 3rd coating is needed, but it all depends on how happy you are with the result after the 2nd coat, and how heavy you did coats 1 and 2.

if you wanted to steadily bring the color out in an even manner, and have an even matte look to it, then the shade:lahmian mix will let you control it better.

the added perk to using this method of pushing the color a certain direction if that you're also clearcoating the model as you do, and will be less likely to rub off the paint by mistake when you're trying to paint in the detailings on the model after all the main colors are done.

So many good ideas that I must try out. Thank you for that great explanation on how it can be used and how exactly it works. Just really can't wait to get this project started now and test out all of these ideas.