Painting Guide: Balin

Balin is the next dwarf arrive for tea of Games Workshop's Escape From Goblin Town set miniatures and is Dwalin’s brother.  Balin was an absolute joy to paint.  Once again, the face sculpt was uncannily accurate and captured the actor well.  The pose shows off Balin’s role well, that of the wise counselor of Thorin, yet more than capable of drawing his sword in action.      

1.   Paint the flesh using Tanned Flesh.

1a. Wash the skin with Red Tone to get the ruddier tone of the Dwarfs.

1b. Wash the skin again in Flesh Tone.

1c. Highlight using Barbarian Flesh.

2.   Paint Balin’s hair with Uniform Grey.

2a. Highlight with Ash Grey.

2b. Highlight the hair again using Matt White. Use a 5/0 or 10/0 brush to paint fine lines for this.

3.   Paint his boots Leather Brown.

3a. Highlight the boots with a 1:1 mix of Fur Brown and Skeleton Bone.

4.   Paint sword blade in Plate Mail.

4a. Paint the sword pommel and hilt in Weapon Bronze.

4b. Wash the entire sword in Strong Tone. Make sure enough stays in the center groove to bring out the detail.

5.   Paint the mantel and overcoat in a 6:1 mix of Oak Brown and Matt Black.

6.   Paint the tunic and overcoat in Chaotic Red.

7.   Using your finest brush (10/0 or 5/0) heavily thin down Matt Black so it slides of the brush and paint the details along the trim of the overcoat.  This takes a steady hand and is all freehand so take your time here.

8.   Last, wash over the mantel, overcoat, and tunic with Dark Tone.

Some last notes:  

A. The eyes were painted between the Flesh Tone Wash and the Barbarian Flesh Highlight.  The eyes are done with a 5/0 brush.  First paint a horizontal white line and then place a black dot in the center.

B. AP Soft Tone is a good wash for flesh and other light colored items.

C. AP Strong Tone is a good general brown wash similar to Citadel's Agrax Earth Shade. 

D. AP Dark Tone is a good black wash similar to Citadel's Nuln Oil.

I based the miniature with coral beach sand for the rocky/sandy caves of Goblin Town and added some Highland Tufts from The Army Painter Battlefields range.  I then painted the edge of the base in Pure Red. 

Next week the elf maidens’ favorite dwarf arrives.

I have to thank TALE OF TWO PAINTERS for the inspiration for these tutorials.  Unfortunately, I do not have step by step photos like they do as I found their site after I was a quarter of the way complete.  They painted the miniatures using Citadel paints.  I felt a guide using The Army Painter brand was warranted, especially as there is no readily available conversion chart for Citadel and AP brands like the other major miniature paint brands (Vallejo, P3, Reaper, etc.).  I currently only have the 42 bottle 2015 Mega Paint Set II, so there is a lot of mixing of paints to get the right color. (I’m hoping to get the Veteran Warpainter Upgrade Set with an additional 82 paints that just came out on the First of February).