When the new Leviathan box was announced, bringing in the new edition of Warhammer: 40,000, the community was riddled with excitement for how the game, world and lore would evolve in its next stage.
I, however, saw the announcement of this box as a great opportunity to challenge myself, and possibly cause me to never pick up a brush ever again. As a painter and not a player, I was unbothered by every element of this big release, other than the potential painting bliss to be found within.
I had put off the idea of buying the box, as space marines really provide me no inspiration or motivation to paint, and they made up half of it. Release day arrived, and suddenly my rationality and wallet went out the window. And so, like a good little consumer, I caved in and bought it.
I gave myself the challenge of attempting to completely finish building and painting the entire contents within a month of starting. However, a few weeks in, this was extended by a month. And now, after countless hours and pained fingers, I've finally finished it all. And I couldn't be more relieved.
For the space marines, I decided to go with a colour scheme loosely based on the black Templars, with some of my own changes. I always thought the black armour looked much cooler than the poster boy blue. In hindsight, I would never do this ever again, because I've found I'm not very good at painting black, and space marines are perhaps the most boring miniature to ever paint. I wanted to use a dirty yellow instead of the typical beige, so that alongside the red, there could be some pops of colour. Whilst I think this colour scheme looked great on a few models, overall, it's one of my least favourite paint jobs that I've completed all year. Maybe if all of the marines were enrobed in cloaks and soft garments, I may have had a bit more fun.
This is in stark contrast to the other half of the box; the Tyranids. Upon building the copius amount of models for these guys, I could already feel the excitement brewing to paint them, due to how different they varied from one another. I could also see how my painting style was going to perfectly compliment the weird organic shapes, bumps and details of the Tyranids. Coming up with one colour scheme was the hardest part, quite simply due to the fact that almost any combination of colour would work amazingly. Finally settling on a blue and fleshy scheme, I was able to paint them up much quicker than the space marines, finding affinity with my vision for them, as well as the models being so much more interesting to paint.
I would say I've always enjoyed painting a larger force than an individual model, as I love seeing how a freshly crafted colour recipe applies across a range of different miniatures. I find the process a lot more satisfying too, especially once they're all finished sitting peacefully next to one another. However the risk here, is that you realise you actually resent every plastic fiber on these plastic people, and suddenly the act of something fun and fulfilling, becomes an act of hard work and misery.
I guess the conclusion to this piece, is to find balance in everything you do, appreciate the good so you can work through the bad. I had to find that balance, to fight though painting the meh marines, so I could enjoy painting the alien bug freaks. Thank you for reading this article and for checking out my painted work. As a reward for making it this far, please enjoy some cinematic pictures of these paintjobs that have stolen many hours of my life from the past couple of months.
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