Astorath the Grim – High Chaplain of the Blood Angels

Astorath is one of my favorite Blood Angel models and is one of the models that originally drew me to the army. The black wings, trailing scrolls and the weird Bram Stoker muscle armor combined with the Ozzy Osborn face and the flying overhead axe pose just make for an amazing over the top model. His fluffy insight into the Black Rage and the buffs he gives to the Death Company have left me wanting to field him since I started. The time is finally close at hand too.

I don’t rightly recall exactly how much time I spent painting this model. After finishing the armor I took about a month off from painting and only got back to it last week. Suffice it to say, though, that I spent quite a long time on it though. I’m really happy with the armor and scrolls turn out.

The wings were pretty tedious to paint. I haven’t painted this much black before, and I wanted it to pop, but still look black. I think the illusion is pretty convincing at table distance, but a two shade edging would have made it look a lot better up close. Essentially my method was base black, then a light dusting with VMC Black Gray, then edge with VMA Light Gray.

The armor took a lot of work. I used my usual red procedure I’ve discussed in other posts for the most part, but I had to do it on each ridge. I primed with Vallejo Red Brown Primer, then hit nearly the whole ridge with VMA Fire Red, then a bit less with VMA Ferrari Red, then hit the highest points with VMA Light Red. I’m really happy with the result.

The scrolls were based with P3 Kardic Flesh, then covered with two coats of thin P3 Jack Bone. I then hit the edges with P3 Menoth White Highlight. This gave a decent base, but it felt a little bland. I decided to go back and make light stripes back and forth with a very dilute Menoth White Highlight. I followed this with a Sepia Awesome Wash. I debated about writing on the scrolls. According to the fluff its supposed to contain all the names of the Chapter members that have fallen to the Black Rage, so I felt compelled. On the other hand though, the parchment effect was good enough, and my micro-writing poor enough that I decided to hold off on any attempt for the time being.