Annual Running of the Bull(gor)s, starring an Aurox Minotaur Slaughterhorn Chieftain

Oh dear, it seems I'm on a bit of a painting streak these days (sorry for overposting). Last night I finished weathering this fascinating 3D-print by Bestiarum Games. Part of their Aurox Minotaurs Collection, it is called the Slaughterhorn Chieftain. Personally, I call it the 'nicely sculpted Doombull'. The model has an amazing, intimidating pose, begging for a proper vignette photo. Let's go for it...

Stop! Printing! Monsters! AAAAAAAAAH!!!!!

Games Workshop makes many models, some of them are amazing, a lot of them are cool, some adequate and then there's the occasional 'nice try, but it didn't work' category. (There's also the never talked about 'did not age well' group. I shall not talk about that group :) ). For me the core of the Beasts of Chaos line is not working. I like the Dragon Ogres Ogors and the Tzaangor (don't get me started about painting these though...), I still crave a Jabberslythe in my collection and the Cockatrice looks ok. But the current collection of Cygors, Bestigors, Centigors, Gors and Ungors is just not clicking for me. Still, when you put these next to their Minotaurs Bullgors and Doombull models they suddenly look amazing. The half-bull, half-man line of models fall under the 'nice try' category if you ask me. Luckily Bestiarum Games seems to agree on that count (or they just really, really like Minotaurs). They have a full line-up of awesome looking Minotaur models. This is the big boss. I had to print it first.

It's quite interesting how fast you can paint if you just let go, relax and think of happy little squirrels.

This monster of a model comes in three parts: legs, body and axe. I had a bit of a learning experience printing the body. I did not clean it properly on the first go and resin leaked out while I was curing it, causing the spill to harden inside my curing station. So here's a pro-tip amateur-hour-tip: wash your fresh print, allow it too leak out for an hour or so (if hollow), then wash it again and give it more time to leak. It'll save you trouble in the end. I actually made huge holes in the leg portion ease washing that part (they are covered by the body now). All in all, the model did come out looking cracking and (after a zenithal prime) I was honestly a bit intimidated by the prospect of painting it. 

After years of ignoring weathering powders, I'm quite happy I've learned how to use them. You just can't get that dusty effect with paint (at least not easily).

A few evenings back I decided to just 'Bob Ross' the model. In other words: play with paint, have fun, and follow your instincts (while happily chatting about friendly squirrels and their friends). As I wanted a brown, rusted look I airbrushed the entire model with a thin coat of (VMC) Hull Red. Hull Red is always a nice start for painting deep rusted things (or going full Blanchitsu I guess). I mixed the Hull Red with Tan Earth and started to pick out exposed (hairless) skin. I  lightened this mix with drops of White Ink (my current 'new tool that works so nicely, I can't stop using it'). 

One small annoyance was that I broke both the axe front and back while painting, my 3D-prints seem to be a bit brittle (perhaps I'm overcuring) and they break when I clumsily drop the model. Luckily it was nothing a pin and a bit of superglue wouldn't fix.

With the flesh starting to show, I moved on to the metal bits. Aside from Liquitex Inks I'm also in a bit of a drybrushing revival. It can look so good if properly applied (and you paint things up at such wonderful speeds). I carefully drybrushed all the metal bits with Vallejo Metal Color Steel. After this dried, I went for a second drybrush of GW Ironbreaker. I painted the loincloth Khorne Red to keep the reddish/brown color of the model going (and overbrushed a bit of Evil Sunz Scarlet onto it). With these colors applied, I used watered down Reikland Fleshshade to pick more detail out of the skin areas. Then I washed all the metal and cloth with Agrax Earthshade. I also washed a bit of Agrax in the deeper skin folds to push up the contrast there. After the washes dried, I switched to 'lazy mode', picking up Wyldwood contrast paint for any leather belts I spotted. All the fur I could find was similarly dabbed with Aggaros Dunes contrast paint.

Now there's an Annual Running of the Bulls that takes guts (or was it 'that takes your guts', best check before applying). 

With all the washes and contrast paints dry (it's what the  hairdryer is for) I reworked the colors a bit, applying some highlights here and there. Then I moved on to the axe haft. Painting more interesting (and better looking) variants of wood is high on my 'to learn'-list for the coming months. On this axe I applied a VMA paint called Wood (I know, very creative *cough* *cough*). It is very, very orange-yellow looking paint. After waking up from a shock induced coma at this horrid dab of brightness crossing the center of my model, I applied watered down Agrax Earthsahde followed by Athonian Camoshade. This got rid of the brightness and makes the axe haft look really old (in my opinion). A quick drybrush with Ushabti Bone picked out the wood grain. 

I ran out of pictures, so here's one of the Slaughterhorn Chieftain in his zenithal primed coat.

With all this down I went for another new staple of mine and covered the model in gloss coat, followed by streaking grime (brush applied, as I didn't feel like washing it out of my airbrush). After removing excess grime I spent quite a joyful hour applying Rust Streaks and more localized Streaking Grime (both by AK) to metal recesses. I finished up by applying rust colored weathering powder (fixed with white spirit), followed by an edge highlight of Stormhost Silver. A mat coat later (and a bit of old school basing) and the end result is the towering monstrosity above. Now there's a Doombull you would be proud to run away from (or something like that, best call Theseus for safety's sake ;).