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Rollo, Duke of Normandy, a MPM  -  1° parte
Painting guide
Versione inglese     |     21.08.2022
Join us in this first painting guide that we will be publishing by episodes. Miniature courtesy of FeR Miniatures: https://ferminiatures.com/shop/magna-historica/rollo-duke-of-normandy/ .



Hi everybody!

We are really happy to publish the first tutorial of this initiative, and the subject is this recent release by a company called FeR Miniatures (maybe you’ve heard about them, they make more or less OK figures and busts :D). The subject is Rollo, Duke of Normandy and the scale is a big (actually huge!) 1/12. The sculpture was done by the always talented Pedro Fernández.
When you paint a boxart, and more if your intuition tells you that the piece is going to be popular, there is some sort of responsibility, as that paintjob is going to define greatly the way people sees that particular piece.
Also, you normally have the impulse of trying new things, but that sometimes is conditioned by convenience and schedule… All that initial planning influences greatly on the final result.
So, as a change, I decided to do most of the sketching work on the face with the airbrush and I used a different palette than usual. The colors used in this stage of the face were (from left to right and up to down) Light Flesh 70.928, Sunny Skintone 70.845, Beige Red 70.804, Black Red 70.859, Dark Sea Blue 70.898, and US Olive Drab 70.887.


After a primer coat with the new Vallejo’s Black Primer, I airbrushed the whole face with a mix of Beige Red 70.804 and a bit of Black Red 70.859. Note that I attached the hair optional piece to the head with a bit of blu-tack and painted the whole thing together.
Duke of Normandy
Next, I added more Black Red to the mix and airbrushed a shadow from below to get an initial idea of the volumes.
Duke of Normandy
Then I applied an additional shadow with pure Black Red and a final one mixing it with a bit of Dark Sea Blue 70.898 to get the final tonal depth. I insisted a bit more on the lower right side of the face with this final shadow, as the head is slightly tilted.
Duke of Normandy
Now it was the turn of the highlights. First, I worked in the overall surface with pure Beige Red 70.804 and then I added Sunny Skintone 70.845 to get more intensity, concentrating the final applications in the upper left side of the face. The result is a nice tonality that goes bright and sunny on the upper left and dark and cold in the lower right. The airbrush is the perfect tool for this kind of intentional work
Duke of Normandy
With all the previous tones, I started working on the left side of the face, now with the brush. As the blending is already done, most of the work consists of detailing and enhancing the saturation of the different tones in particular points.
Duke of Normandy
A bit more of work, adding some Light Flesh 70.928 to the highlights and pure Dark Sea Blue to the shadows to enhance the contrast a bit further.
Duke of Normandy
After I was more or less satisfied, I moved to the right side, keeping in mind the subtle change in tonality so I didn’t overwork it and obscure the effect.
Duke of Normandy
In order to frame all the work already done, I basecoated the hair with a mix of US Olive Drab 70.887 and Sunny Skintone. Everything started to take shape. Sometimes it is important to take a small detour and go a few steps ahead in order to see the global result.
Duke of Normandy
Ok, now, all that was left was to add the finishing touches to the face, painting the eyes and the hair. The colors used were, from left to right and up to down: Flat Red 70.957, Dark Sea Blue 70.898, Light Flesh 70.928, US Olive Drab 70.887, Sunny Skintone 70.845, Ice Yellow 70.858, Black Red 70.859, and Model Wash Light Rust 76.505.
Duke of Normandy
First of all, I glazed Flat Red 70.957, mixed with the basecoat color of the flesh, over all the fleshy mid-tone areas of the face. It just needed a bit, not too much. With a mix of Flat Red and Dark Sea Blue 70.898, I glazed the shadow areas to get a bit more of depth. Adding these new tonalities to the previous flesh palette, I added the final details and texture to the face.
Duke of Normandy
The eyes were painted in the usual way (we’ll do a really detailed SBS or video on this in the future, I promise) First, I painted first the eyeball with Light Flesh70.928. After that, I painted the iris in Dark Sea Blue, drawing also an outline with that tone between the upper eyelid and the eyeball. Finally, I did some highlights towards the lower part of the iris, adding small amounts of Light Flesh, adding a black dot to simulate the pupil and the reflection of the light with pure Light Flesh. The most important thing to mention is that you have to be sure that you align the look exactly to the point you need, in this case, I wanted him to look eye-to-eye to the viewer.
Duke of Normandy
The final part was the hair. I did first a test on a section to see if what I had in mind was going to work nicely. Over the previous base of US Olive Drab 70.887 and Sunny Skintone 70.845, I added highlights with Sunny Skintone and small amounts of Ice Yellow 70.858. For the shadows, I added Black Red 70.859 and finally small amounts of Dark Sea blue to the base color.
Duke of Normandy
Seeing that the result was what I wanted, I worked on the other side of the head and also the beard and eyebrows. To enhance a bit the color I added some controlled glazes with Model Wash Light Rust 76.505 in selected spots
Duke of Normandy
The hair might require some adjustment later, to add more intensity in the highlights depending on the result on the rest of the elements. I also painted the lower part of it in a simple way, as I planned to finish it when the rest of the surrounding elements were done.
Duke of Normandy
Let’s show some more work. Now it is the time of the gambeson and the decorated sleeves, central elements of the bust that I needed to sort before going for the outer parts. First, I did the gambeson, the central element and also the most hidden one. For it, I used the following tones: US Olive Drab 70.887, Dark Sea Blue 70.898, Black 70.950, Brown Sand 70.876, Chocolate Brown 70.872, and Orange Brown 70.981.
Duke of Normandy
Initially, I was going to paint the gambeson in a light worn tone but, in the last moment, I changed my mind and decided to make it black. That way, as it is the core part of the bust, it would be very easy to make the rest of elements stand out by comparison. First of all, I made a mix of US Olive Drab 70.887, Dark Sea Blue 70.898 and a bit of Black 70.950 for the basecoat. I normally use solid colors and simple mixes, but this time I wanted a bit of each tonality to be present in the mix from the beginning. It looks as black, but it isn’t black, trust me
Duke of Normandy
Then I applied an overall wash with pure Black over the whole thing and insisted in the lines were the gambeson sections are stitched forming a rhomboid pattern.
Duke of Normandy
Using the already applied shadows as an anchor, I added Brown Sand 70.876 to the basecoat mix and created two or three different tones of highlights. With these, I made a rough sketch of highlights, aiming always for the upper edges of the volumes, and intensifying the application towards the upper parts, logically more exposed to the light of the sun. Brown Sand is a good tone for highlighting black if you are aiming for a worn and a bit discolored look.

Also, I faked some small tension wrinkles on the edges of the rhomboid patches to add more interest to the area
Duke of Normandy
Working on one patch at a time, I finished every one of them, blending just a bit the tones to maintain that rough appearance, adding small details like additional wrinkles, imperfections and holes and intensifying the final highlights and shadows with pure Brown Sand and Black. To finish, I added some subtle glazing with Dark Sea Blue towards the lower parts and shadows, enhancing that way the tonal variation between the upper and lower areas
Duke of Normandy
The leather trimming of the gambeson was very simple, I started with a basecoat of Chocolate Brown 70.872, added Dark Sea Blue for the shadows and added Orange Brown 70.981 and Brown Sand for the highlights. I decided to keep it simple as it would be perceived as a background under later more prominent details.
Duke of Normandy
Next bit were going to be the sleeves, which I had decided to paint in some light blue with a nice trimming I had seen on a Viking reenactor shirt. These are the colors used in this step: GC Electric Blue 72.023, GC Sombre Grey 72.048, Sunny Skintone 70.845, Dark Sea Blue 70.898, Black Red 70.859, Stone Grey 70.884, Chocolate Brown 70.872 and Black 70.950
Duke of Normandy
Sometimes, when you have a very particular tone in mind, you need to mix a bit to get it. In this case, GC Electric Blue 72.023 was very similar to my idea, but a bit too intense, so I mixed it a bit with GC Sombre Grey 72.048. When trying to obtain a certain tone, it is always important to keep in mind how the highlights and shadows are going to affect it, as sometimes that particular final look you are thinking on will be easier to replicate in later stages, in example making it paler, or warmer, or more worn out depending on the color used in the highlights, or modulating the shadows to add an extra shade that would affect the whole thing. I used that mix for the basecoat.
Duke of Normandy
After that, I added Sunny Skintone 70.845 and Dark Sea Blue 70.898 for the highlights and shadows respectively and sketched them over the surface. The Game Color range is a bit shinny sometimes, but nothing that cannot be mended with some matt varnish after the job is done.
Duke of Normandy
I blended the whole thing together and varnished matt the sleeves with the airbrush. As I explained above, you can see how the highlights and shadows have affected the basecoat, getting it warmer towards the highlights and colder towards the shadows
Duke of Normandy
As in any other freehand painted detail, planning and order is key to success! For the trimming of the sleeves I started with some thin lines in Dark Sea Blue to define the area where the trimming would be.
Duke of Normandy
Inside those lines, I painted lines with Stone Grey 70.884
Duke of Normandy
Again, I painted more lines inside those, this time with Black Red 70.859. When doing it, I reduce the width of the previous ones as desired
Duke of Normandy
Another set of lines with Stone Grey
Duke of Normandy
And another set of lines, this time with Dark Sea Blue
Duke of Normandy
I covered the remaining space with Stone Grey
Duke of Normandy
And finally did the inner detailing bit by bit with Dark Sea Blue. First some perpendicular double lines, then some triangles on each side of the square that would form a thin diagonal cross, and finally some small applications to finish the pattern
Duke of Normandy
Of course, it needed highlights and shadows. For the first, I added Sunny Skintone (as in the light blue tone) to all the previously used colors and highlighted carefully every detail. For the shadows, I applied controlled washes of a mix of Dark Sea Blue, Chocolate Brown and Black towards the lower parts and shadow areas, to mute it down as a whole
Duke of Normandy
I repeated the whole process in the other sleeve. This is the result so far, more advances soon!
Duke of Normandy
Here are some fresh updates on this SBS to help you get through the week ;)I’m going to show now how I finished all the remaining bits on the torso. Keep in mind that the logic sequence when painting miniatures area by area is to go from inside to outside and from up to down to make things easier. The colors I used in this step: GC Charred Brown 72.045, Orange Brown 70.981, Sunny Skintone 70.845, Dark Sea Blue 70.898, Saddle Brown 70.940, GC Violet Ink 72.087, English Uniform 70.921, GC Glorious Gold 72.056, MC Gold 77.725, and GC Green Ink 72.089
Duke of Normandy
The first thing I did was to paint the Shield’s belt, that I had imagined as new orange toned leather that would be quite detached from the background. I started with a basecoat of GC Charred Brown 72.045 and Orange Brown 70.981 and worked mainly on highlighting it without too much texture adding Orange Brown and some Sunny Skintone 70.845 for the final touches. The few shadow points and outlining were done simply adding pure Charred Brown.

As you might realize in the picture, the tone was a bit too similar to the leather I had done in the gambeson’s trimming, so I toned down that one a bit to enhance further the new belt
Duke of Normandy
For the sword belt, I wanted a dark reddish leather finish with some violet hue. I applied a really dark basecoat with a mix of Charred Brown and Dark Sea Blue 70.898 that I highlighted adding Saddle Brown 70.940 and some Sunny Skintone 70.845 for the final touches. That way I got a colder tone, which I enhanced with shadows in pure Dark Sea Blue and some precise washes of GC Violet Ink 72.087
Duke of Normandy
I had painted the non-metallic parts of the sword with the previous tones used in other areas. For the brass pommel and hilt, I applied a basecoat with a mix of English Uniform 70.921 and GC Glorious Gold 72.056. That way I took advantage of the rich tonality of the Game Color tone but reducing its grainy look a bit. For the shadows, I simply added some Charred Brown and enhanced the highlights adding Metal Color Gold 77.725, which has a superfine pigment and works really nice for these final touches. I also added some green tonalities with controlled washes of GC Green Ink 72.089. As you might have noticed, when you try to incorporate the same tones with just some variations in each area of the project, the whole thing gains a lot of coherence.
Duke of Normandy
Now it was time to finish the piece of the axe with the hands, as I really wanted to see how it looked once finished. For this step I used: Glossy Black 70.861, GC Charred Brown 72.045, Dark Sea Blue 70.898, Orange Brown 70.981, Black Red 70.859, MC Jet Exhaust 77.713, MC Silver 77.724, Sunny Skintone 70.845, Ice Yellow 70.858, and English Uniform 70.921
Duke of Normandy
I started with a couple of coats of Glossy Black 70.861 in the head of the axe
Duke of Normandy
Next, I applied some random touches of GC Charred Brown 72.045, applied with a sponge over the whole surface.
Duke of Normandy
And I repeated that step again but using Dark Sea Blue 70.898 this time.
Duke of Normandy
After that, I carefully enhanced a rusty effect in some points, using Orange Brown 70.981 and Black Red 70.859. The effect I was looking for the main body of the axe’s head was rough iron, not cared for, but not really rusted either.
Duke of Normandy
I painted the sharpened edge and the edges of the whole head with MC Jet Exhaust 77.713
Duke of Normandy
And I added the last touch with some MC Silver 77.724 highlights and precise edges.
Duke of Normandy
For the shaft, I wanted a new natural wood look. First I painted it with Sunny Skintone 70.845
Duke of Normandy
And next, I covered it completely adding thin lines of Ice Yellow 70.858 to get a nice wooden pattern



Articolo Proposto da:
Miniature Painting Masterclass
Sculpted by Ramón Martínez
painted by Fernando Ruiz
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