WIP: Blood Angels tactical squad (first half progress)

Blood Angels tacitcal marines (one with a heavy flamer)

You may remember from one of my earlier updates that I planned to split my Blood Angels tactical squad into smaller groups while I paint them. I've started to do that now. At the moment, I'm painting four space marines together in a mini production line (painting the armour on each, then the metal, then the black areas...). With the test model finished, this will mean I'll be halfway through the squad when they're done, which is a good milestone. I've made two deliberate choices with this batch: firstly that I'm doing all the weapons I haven't already finished (the heavy flamer and plasma gun) and secondly that I'm leaving some of the models I've been looking forward to for the later batches as a kind of mini-reward...

These models are mostly there in terms of the red armour. Given that the armour is the bulk of the model, what's left is all the details. As you see them here, I'm working on the basecoats and washes. I've done most of the (silver) metal and purple (not including the gems) and have basecoated the gold. I still have to do the parchment and robes as well as the gems. All of these details will then need highlighting to get the models finished. One thing I noticed when painting these is that it's important to get the edge highlights on the armour really sharp and crisp. Because I apply a glaze of Bloodletter over the whole model when I'm done, faint highlights tend to get lost. I'll remember that for future models.

Blood Angels tacitcal marines (one with a plasma gun)

It can seem time-consuming to paint models in batches like this. Because you're doing the same thing over and over again, it can feel like you're not making much progress. If I was working on an individual model, I'd be several stages ahead, and perhaps even finished, but I'd still have lots of models left to do. These ones are just starting to come together now. When I've basecoated the rest of the details, I'll be a few highlight stages away from them all being done. That's something I'm looking forward to seeing.