Monday, May 19, 2014

Painting White Dark Eldar

Lots of painters out there have been enthused by the idea of Dark Eldar in white armor. There is some irony in it. People mostly associate white with cleanliness and purity. While Dark Eldar might appreciate a good tidying up, they certainly aren't clean.

Let's take a look at some Dark Eldar from the internet and see what other painters have come up with. I put 'white dark eldar' in a google image search and picked out a few interesting ones. I'll be judging the color choices more so than the painting skills here.

Check out Bushido's Dark Eldar on Dakka.
Short thread and I don't know if this army ever got done. He had a good thing going. He used an overall warm white with accents of cool blues. There is a good range of contrast on the model. It goes from the darkest black up all the white to ivory. Plus the color modulation adds visual interest. Totally works. Anyone know if this army is showcased somewhere?

Next example is one from _Kettu on Warseer.
This guy has used an off-white color rather than straight white. He's added battle damage to the armor which adds interest to the model. This model is essentially four colors - white, black, purple, and brown. I can't say I'm a big fan of purple, especially these kinds of purple. But this one is not bad.

I think the idea of battle damage on Dark Eldar is pretty fitting. These aren't your pure Craftworld Eldar are they? And battle damage goes so well on whites because you can see them. It's tough to carry this through an entire army.

I think mine might benefit from some battle damage and it helps cover up mistakes. But it might make the models too busy and cluttered. They already have a lot of visual detail due to the color modulation and other details.

I'll have to put together a step by step showing you all the process for painting the white. I've had a couple requests, but I think showing it might be better.






2 comments:

Ornithid said...

Battle damage is fine and all... but my Real recommendation is "torture damage". A little blood spatter on that white canvas is exactly the kind of juxtaposition that I feel the Dark Eldar would really be aiming for with a white uniform decision.

Anonymous said...

I really like how you did the white armor on your own dark eldar. Would you share your technique?