Eyes down, Spartan.
Having done a couple of guides on some fantasy painting, I’m going down a different route and giving a quick run through on how to get your Spartans table ready for Halo: Flashpoint, which B3’s lovely Aaron Jones enjoyed quite considerably. Whilst having things fully painted is necessary, it certainly makes the tabletop look more impressive during a game, and here I’ll give you a quick way to make your models look nice enough to battle it out.
This isn’t nearly as intricate as some of the paint guides I’ve written before, so if you haven’t done much painting before, this should do you well. The method we’re going to use today is nicknamed “double slapchop”. Slapchop is a popular painting technique that involves you dry brushing white paint on a black undercoat to generate light and shadow, then using contrast paints in individual places. It’s a method that can get solid results quickly, and you can absolutely use that here.
Double slapchop has you, surprisingly, do this twice. We’re going to paint our first contrast paint on, then dry brush white again, before applying another contrast paint over it. The first contrast paint you use will complement the second, giving a richer, more interesting colour tone than using just one colour. The fact that Spartan armour doesn’t have a huge number of colours to it means you won’t even need many paints for this.
Undercoat: Chaos Black spray
Contrast Paints: Iyanden Yellow, Shyish Purple, Black Legion, Guilliman Flesh
Base Paints: Corax White, Mechanicus Standard Grey, Retributor Armour
Layer Paints: Kakophoni Purple
Shades: Nuln Oil
Optional Extras: Iron Warriors, Abaddon Black, Cygor Brown, Stirland Mud (Technical), Grass flock and grass tufts.
Brushes: Size 00, Size 3, base brushes, Army Painter Small and medium Dry Brush, and Games Workshop Texture Spreader (optional)
Priming the models
Use your Chaos Black spray can to get good coverage all over the model. Don’t miss the underside of arms and weapons as you really do need that darker tone to generate the light and shadow from the contrast paint.
Once primed, you’ll need to do a heavy dry brush using Corax White. Use your medium dry brush and get some of the paint on it, then rub most of it off onto a piece of tissue paper so that there’s only a little paint left on the brush. Now brush up and down on the model using that brush, and you should get a layer of white paint appearing on the raised edges, leaving a darker colour underneath. You’ll want to do this from the top of the model, working down, as you’ll want sections that are further down to be darker than the upper regions.
First Contrast
Now for the easy bit. Take your Iyanden Yellow and your size 3 brush (which you’ll use for all your contrast paints) and paint the whole model, avoiding the weapon if possible. Don’t worry too much about getting it on the body suit or even the weapon, as we’ll fix those bits later. Try not to let the paint pool in places, as big blobs of yellow will spoil the next layer. You should notice that the regions that stayed black after your dry brush should look like a much darker yellow than the white parts. This is good and will continue to work on the next layer.
Make sure it’s fully dry, and then do another white dry brush. This one should be a bit lighter than the last one, and some of the yellow should still be visible. This will make the purple look bolder in the next stage, so don’t go for complete coverage as you’ll just be undoing all your good work.
Second Contrast
Next, we’re going to paint over the whole armour again using Shyish Purple. Just like before, avoid the gun if possible, but don’t fret too much. Still try to avoid pooling so there aren’t blobs of colour where you don’t want them. Once dry, we’ll fix the body suit and gun by using Black Legion. This is a fairly thick contrast paint and will cover up the purple quite nicely. Paint over the gun and anything that you would consider to be the suit underneath the armour. This isn’t the same for all the models, but the middle of the back, parts of the shoulders, between thighs, gloves, and parts of the boots are good bets.
Final Details
Aside from the base, you could argue that this is fairly finished, but adding a few details will make the model look more detailed. First, some more dry brushing, but this time use your small dry brush to keep things a little more accurate. Use Kakophoni Purple and lightly dry brush parts of the purple armour. This will provide a little highlight on the raised edges and give a little more interest to the model. We’ll do the same with Mechanicus Standard Grey on the weapon and black body suit. Be careful doing this as you want to avoid getting it on the purple. If you want to avoid risk, just focus on the gun so it can appear more detailed, but take your time and be gentle.
Lastly, use your Retributor Armour with a size 00 brush and paint the visor on the helmet. Depending on which model you’re painting, this could be a very small area, so a steady hand small movements help. The model I’ve used has a larger visor, so I also added some Guilliman Flesh on after to give a little more detail. Optionally, You can use Cygor Brown on any leather pouches you see attached to the models legs, and perhaps apply a little Iron Warriors on some little raised parts of the armour to add interest. This latter part is purely optional, and I only did a little on the model to suggest where it could go.
Now, you can call your model done here, but I like a nice base to set things off. I used Stirland Mud and a texture spreader tool. Give the Stirland Mud a good shake and spread the paint across the base. If you have grass flock, which is very fine bits of green fabric, you can sprinkle this over the base whilst the paint is still wet which will give you a nice base with little effort once dry. You can even add an extra grass tuft once you’re done. To finish, paint the rim of the base black to get your complete piece.
The choice of colours here is heavily up to you, but choosing the right colour combinations and which contrast paints to apply is quite important. In terms of combinations, opposite colours on a colour wheel which work well, but you need to ensure you get a thick enough paint, and that comes with experience. I initially tried the above model using Magos Purple, but this was much too thin and showed far more of the yellow than I wanted. If you want to try out some different paints, I’d recommend going into a Warhammer store and speaking to someone there who will be able to help you out.
As always if you’ve enjoyed this guide then please leave a comment below, and don’t forget to check out our Painting Guide Hub for more Let’s Paint! tutorials and content.
