The Boys (da orcish ones)

Sacks don't start themselves, ma bois! 

Cunning SEO placement wit da title, isn't it?

The start of the Old World Army Challenge and my first, ever, greenskin force/horde/band/rabble. I have been tempted since the first days watching my hobby store with a collection of old wallpaper including the 3rd Edition Warhammer Fantasy Battles rulebook cover. 

The old orcs are the best orcs. I really wanted to portray that mix of savagery, goofiness and wacky chaotic rabble of the oldest times of Warhammer and some classic illustrations of fantasy/LoTR from the seventies and eighties. 

The miniatures also invite to paint them with mixed skin tonnes and some darker or dead-ish colours. I decided that the orc boys will be in greyish green tonnes, the Big Un’s portray a mix of saturated greens and more brownish colours. The black orcs will be… the darkest, obviously. 

But first thing, first: DA BOSS 

I converted an orc champion to meet the Blood Bath at Orc’s Drift because at some point I want to recreate the forces of the scneario but I am not going to take a loan to pay for that bad boy.

(Probably Bromedir, the orc lieutenants or the dwarf lords. I do not know, characters start going bollocks at some point in this particular collection)

Really fun and easy to sculpt the cape, and the horns are from 6th edition dwarves. Easy piece. 

Next come the orc rabble, ready to cause some trouble. 

The skins are made from the starting VMC Rot Braun. 

This helps a lot for the rusty armour effect with some light metal layers. Also, it defines the darkest areas of the shadow as I go for light additions of greenish or greyish colours. 

-VMC Flat green 

-VMC light blue 

And whether I gwentfor the greenish or greyish path, I end with VMC pale flesh 

Added carefully and some slight drops to the final ligths. Remember that the normal orc boys are not saturated green, well, the least the better. So the last layers/tips of the green boys cannot end completely in the Flat Green. 

The shields were superfun to paint, adding glyphs or the evil faces of the old Fantasy. I mix the motifs in earlier versions in which I started playing. It is usually hard to paint motifs in the shields or armours with precision, but in the end the practice pays itself. The shields in my era were much duller compared to some old WD miniatures, especially from the pre-4th edition era, when things start to go everywhere in styles. I tried to recreate the chaotic style in every shield.

Lastly, one of the most fun things in the entire challenge which I always enjoy: the banners.

Six damn months and I didn't retake the pictures without the ugly glossy background. Shame on me.

I love to paint complex banners for my units, but in this case it was some kind of rediscover when trying to replicate the messy and dirty style of WHF-3rd edition. 

I kept some order at first in the chaos, only starting to create the mess when the last bone lights were finished. The I Added the dirt and painted the evil runes and glyphs with the tip of fine detail brush. Quite repetitive, point by point with wash thinned down almost to a glaze, creating the darker halo. 

 And that’s it for now. Next entry will be a summary of the lesser orcs while presenting my orc archer unit.