Hot off the Desk: Derelict Ship Autoturrets

Pew Pew Pew

Editor's Note:  HotD is intended to be a series of pics as things come off my painting table.  They're posted not as a "look how great I can paint" but as a future resource to other SoB painters.  My standard of painting is "decently boardgame" and will win no contests.

"Hot" is a relative term.  These have been done for about a week, but I wasn't happy with some of the battle damage and decided to set the brush down.  I came back this morning and did 15 minutes of touch up and am happy with the results.

But I'm getting ahead of myself.  Here's a bit of background:

• Assembly was straightforward with no issues.  I opted to let the seams between the parts go unfilled.  See editor's note about my standard of painting. 
• For some variety, I altered the angle on the turrets position to have one shooting straight, one Left, and one Right.  This took some trial and error dry fitting to make sure the hose would still fit.  I used marks on my workspace to make sure the angles Left and Right are (about) the same.  
• I have been painting a TON of black/silver so I diverged from the recommended color scheme to go with the blue.  
• Color selection:  I chose to go with all 'cool' colors of blue, silver, black, and gray.  I actually basecoated the tank with P3 Brass Balls (a somewhat 'warm' color) but it came off oddly so I repainted.
• Primer:  I primed with Vallejo black and then did the zenithal highlights per my earlier Airbrushing post.  I like the effect, though the deep blue muted the differences quite a bit.
• Basecoat:  Portal Blue with Pistol Silver for the barrels, tank, rear 'spine,' and connectors.  
• The hose was based over the primer with Matt Black.  
• Before the wash, I dry brushed the hoses/wires in the lower back with P3 Brass Balls (after washing, the 'warmness' of this was muted sufficiently).
• Wash:  Dark tone ink.  The lore of the Derelict Ship is that it is very ancient. I didn't want these looking factory new.  Dark Tone has undertones of Black, so I used it instead of the brown (warm) tones of the other AP washes.  I used the ink unthinned and then brought back the color to the desired brightness during dry brushing.
• Dry Brushing:  Portal Blue all over and then some additional highlighting with Crystal Blue.  I did more dry brushing on the top surfaces and did very little to no Crystal Blue on the lower surfaces.
• The hose was dry brushed with Necromancer Cloak.
• All silver surfaces were dry brushed with Plate Mail. The top and tips of the gun barrels got a heavy dose of Plate Mail.
• Details:  
• The ventilation holes of the gun barrels needed some Matt Black touch up to be fully opaque.
• I decided to paint the wedge on top as if it were some sort of targeting sensor.  I backed this area with Pistol Silver, then Crimson Hand Red, and then finally a glaze of Saloon Red.
• Battle Damage was sketched with Pistol Silver before the wash, then highlighted with Plate mail.  As I mentioned, I was unhappy with the brightness of the silver as it really caught the eye (and highlighted my poor freehand).  To correct this, I dry brushed over the top with Portal Blue. The silver caught enough of the blue pigment to mute it down several shades to let your eyeballs focus on the silver gun barrels where they belong.

Rear view. The Zenithal highlighting and selective dry brushing provides the bright to dim gradient top to bottom.

Add caption, showing the Left, Right, and Center aim.

The 'cool' color scheme seems to work well for these.