Hi all,
I get asked a lot about painting non metallic metals, also
known as NMM. In this post I hope to explain the theory behind the technique
and also how I go about rendering this technique on a miniature.
To start with it's worth saying that the non metallic metal
technique is basically a way of painting convincing metal effects on to a 2D
surface. You will see this used on a lot of art when the artist has to paint
metallic areas without the aid of metallic paints. This Blood Angel art by Dave
Gallagher is a good example of this.
So with this in mind technically NMM should not really be
applied to miniature painting as it is a 2D technique and miniature painting is
a 3D art form. This certainly doesn't stop miniature painters from applying non
metallic metals to miniatures because if done well it can create a pleasing
finish.
Painting NMM is all about tricking the viewer into thinking
that what they are seeing is real metals, to do this you need to observe how
light reflects and reacts to different metallic surfaces. A great way to start
to lean this is to look at art work. You can pretty much transfer what the
artist has done onto your miniature, when I started learning NMM I painted a
few sword blades and copied what I saw on the art onto the blade. My Death
master Snikch is a good example.
When I approach painting a miniature in non metallics I
first imaging 4 points of light around the top of the model. This help me to
place my initial guide highlights over the model. I've found that imagining
these four spots of light at each corner of the miniature gives me a good
indication of where the light will be as I paint the model, it's easy to get
confused and a bit lost when painting NMM so this keeps it simple for me. The
amazing diagram below should help :).
Another trick when painting NMM is to change the tone of the
colour when the surface you are painting changes angles. So if you are painting
some gold armour and it has a corner change the tone from extreme light to
extreme dark at this point. You can see in the image below how much the
contrast changes in the armour surface as it changes shape, the foot is a good
example of the colour going from light to dark to light again giving the illusion
of a reflective surface.
What I've found helps a lot in achieving a realistic shiny
metallic finish is a the last stage of reflection highlights that are added.
When trying to learn this technique I observed that many painters didn't add
this effect to their NMM and I started to experiment with it. The stages below
on the Sanguinor which I painted show how this last stage can really give you
that shiny reflective effect to the surface. Adding these reflection lines and
hot spots over the surface in the correct places and on the edges can give you
a nice effect.
Here are the paints that I use when painting non metallic
metals-
Gold NMM
·
Basecoat Snakebite leather (Balor Brown)
·
Highlight by mixing in Bubonic brown (Zamesi
Desert)
·
Highlight by mixing in Bleached bone (Ushabti
Bone)
·
Shade with Terracotta (Doombull Brown)
·
Shade with Terracotta and Black mix
·
Highlight with Bleached bone and white mix
·
Glaze the area with Lhamian medium and yellow
ink mix
·
Glaze into the recesses with Lhamian medium and
red ink mix
·
Pick out the reflection points with pure white
The stage that you add the glazes
is quite important as until this stage they are can appear very wooden and
lacking in colour. The glazes add a lot of richness to the surface and punch a
lot of colour in for you. Doing it at the end of the highlight and shade process
gives you a lot of control over the desired finish.
For NMM silver I tend to change
the colours I use depending on the miniature. shades of grey, black and white
will do you for pretty much any of this and once again you can add the colour
you like with glazes of blues, browns at the end stages
The image of Ikit Claw is a good
example of a few different NMM colours on one model, I wanted to give him copper armour with steel
claws and brass detailing. It was all painted using the same technique but by
changing the colours I used.
The image of the Dwarf Lord shows
the steel NMM technique next to the gold one. Notice the white hot spot
highlights placed within the extreme dark areas.
The image of the Stormcast Lord
shows the use of the glazes to add colour and then the use white to add the
reflection points and final highlights.
Here are a few close ups of some
of my miniatures showing the techniques I have described. I don't usually post
such large pictures but I think it's important to see how the NMM technique is
applied.
I hope this post has been useful
for you and if you are thinking of trying NMM then hopefully it will help you
along the way!
Thanks for reading, Daz
