The Twin Dances of Death: Sisters of Slaughter

Produced by: Games Workshop

Line: Warhammer Fantasy

Find it: Ebay

Summary

I call the whole piece The Twin Dances of Death… The actual miniatures used are Warhammer Fantasy Sisters of Slaughter… And a poor, unfortunate 40K Harlequin. If you want more images check out the small imgur album.

This has to be the most complicated mini I’ve done so far… Which was the idea! I entered this contest with every intention of pushing my limits and learning a few things. Boy did I!

I had never really done any violent pieces before. A few flecks of blood spray on one or two miniatures in the past but not much. To do that I basically followed this technique, but with a 1:2 mix of Bloody Red and Skin Wash instead of Blood for the Blood God. As for the gore however, I used the same mixture and Uhu glue all stirred together (use a tooth pick or paper clip to stir and apply it. Some of the bits (like the ones hanging off the whips) I had to clump up and hang with the miniature sticky tacked and mounted sideways while the glue dried… That was nerve wracking.

With that out of the way, lets go through my modifications to the miniature from the ground up.First off, the base itself. I wanted the base to elevate the miniatures off the battlefield and I already noticed the Sisters of Slaughter were standing on rocks (literally attached to their legs) so I figured a small bolder would be great for that. But the 40mm base I had was kind of bland, just enough texture to get super glue to adhear. I wanted something muddy. Something like what you see in all those medieval war movies or Game of Thrones where it takes no time for the ground to turn to a pulpy mass from all the feet trampling over it and the blood mixing in. So to give the base more of that look, I used some Uhu glue before I even started painting it. I just applied one layer and let it dry, then on the spots I wanted to be more raised, used another.

For the gibs, I had a recently stripped 40K Harlequin and some left over bits from the Sisters of Slaughter sprue. Decided to get rid of the gun hand for the Harlequin and replace it with a dagger holding one from the Sisters of Slaughter. Also added an extra mask on the ground because, why not?

After that it was a matter of carefully choosing where to cut apart the already assembled Harlequin with my normal flush cut nippers. It wasn’t until after I painted the Sisters and stuck them on the rock and base that I figured out where the corpse parts should go and arranged them as best I could. Before gluing them down, and after painting them, I used a needle file to make some of the body parts flatter on one side and look more like they were embedded in the blood soaked mud of a wet, boot trampled battlefield.

I also decided to embed a broken blade in the rock just for added cool factor.

The rock the Sisters are standing on is just some thin quark board, broken up and painted, but it looks good and allows me to embed things into it and pin the miniatures down securely.

Continuing the trend of recycling old bits, I took a whip from one of the other Sisters of Slaughter I used for a Blood Bowl project and attached it to the back of one’s head as a braided ponytail with a hook on the end. Had to use a round file to make sure it had enough purchase to adhere to on her rounded head.

Paints

Vellejo

Black Heavy Purple Gunmetal Silver Polished Gold Black Ink Stonewall Grey Violet Ink Beasty Brown White Flesh (Nocturna Special) Dead White Heavy Blue Heavy Bluegrey Skin Wash Bloody Red

Reaper

Rosy Shadow Rosy Skin Fair Highlight

Citidel

Balthasar Gold Agrax Earthshade Drakenhoff Nightshade

Techniques

Skin Base in Rosy Shadow Layer up to a 2:1 ratio of Rosy Shadow and Rosy Skin Layer up to a 1:1 ratio of the same Layer up to a 1:2 ratio of the same Layer up to straight Rosy Skin Fine highlight with 1:1 mix of Rosy Skin to Fair Highlight

Leather Base in Black Highlight with Heavy Purple

Silver (Sisters) Base with Gunmetal Highlight with Silver

Gold Base in Balthasar Gold Highlight with Polished Gold Use a small amount of Black Ink in the deep Eye and Mouth cavities

Purple Cloth Base in 2:1 mix of Heavy Purple to Stonewall Grey Wash with Violet Ink Highlight with the original base mix

White Hair Base in White Flesh (Nocturna Special) Highlight with Dead White

Corpse Uniform Heavy Blue base Wash with Drakenhoff Nightshade Highlight back up with Heavy Blue

Silver (Corpse) Base in Gunmetal Wash with Black Ink Highlight back with Gunmetal

Base Stone Base with Gunmetal Cover with 1:1:2 ratio of Black:Heavy Bluegrey:water (the water is just enough to thin it so you don’t lose the sheen of metallic underneath) Wash with Black Ink Drybrush Stonewall Grey

Base Mud Beasty Brown base Agrax Earthshade wash

Blood 2:1 mix of Skin Wash and Bloody Red

Gore Blood mixture with Uhu glue



What I Learned/What I’d Do Differently

Most of the preamble actually covered the things I learned. As I said a lot of this was new to me and I really like the way it’s turned out. I think if I had to do it again, I would just try to find a way to make it a little less busy… Not that that is specific… Or easy to do… Then again, violence is certainly chaos, no?