Painting Contest Progress #1

So as I posted a little while ago, I have been working on two models for an upcoming paint contest. I generally don't enter paint contests with delusions of winning, but I find that each time my painting gets a little bit better. As such, I enter the contests to see if I can't place a little higher or try out a new painting technique. These pictures are about a week old, and much more progress has occurred, but I have been busy. And without further ado, here is my progress so far:


Chaos Space Marine Champion
I started by painting the entire body and armor Khorne Red and then washing the model with Secret Weapon's Armor Wash to give it a dirty/gritty feel.































After that dried, I then started on a small area to test the armor highlighting colors that I wanted. I slowly worked my way up from Khorne Red to Blood Gore to Evil Sunz Red to finally Wild Rider as the final line highlight color. The pictures are not great (as I really need a light box), but the right arm and glove are done and look really good all finished.






























Lizardmen Saurus Old-Blood
So for the lizard character, I really wanted to test out my skin blending technique and my line highlighting on the scales. I went with a light skin color contrasted by dark red scales. The color choice is striking and will really make this model stand out on the battlefield (assuming I ever get around to playing Lizardmen).

I started with a flesh base (I can't remember which one - Dwarf maybe?) and then washed the whole model with Reickland Fleshwash (including the scale areas which were painted Khorne Red). I then slowly started working on the skin level with another iteration of the flesh color.













Here, I have added another highlight of a middle flesh color (Elf Flesh and Dwarf Flesh I believe) and have repainted the head Khorne Red as I didn't like the flesh color for the entire face.













Finally, I added a final highlight of Elf Flesh to the skin along the sinewy parts to make the flesh differences really stand out and make the skin look old and word as would befit an older saurus.














Next time, hopefully I will have finished the armor on the Chaos Champion and the scales of the Lizardmen. And maybe even started on the Lizardmen's armor. I am trying out various metallic paints to see how they work with each other.