An Orange Daemonette of Slaanesh

This model is the first of a set of daemonettes of Slaanesh from the new (2008) plastic range.

Aims & Model.

The model is a throw-back to the Rogue Trader era daemonettes, much like the bloodletters of Khorne, but in plastic form. I'm unashamedly a fan of the new plastic range; including the new bloodletters. I suspect that many folks of my generation share this view (that's not to say I didn't like the previous, circa 2002, incarnation of daemonettes -- I do). The only drawback here is the fiddly nature of the delicate arms of the daemonettes. Attaching the arms and keeping them in place whilst the glue sets is occasionally tricky - particularly for daemonettes with the larger claws which may require pinning in place as gravity tends to win if they're not held in position for at least a little time.

My general aim for the daemonettes is to avoid (what appears to be) the new in-vogue painting style! I simply don't like the purple with greystone / white over-layer that is prevalent. So, I want different colours for the skin, harking back to the traditional pastels seen in Slaves to Darkness. I'll explore other skin tones in future posts, but for this one I've elected to try an orange theme and simply see how it works out.

Painting.

On top of the black undercoat, an even application of cream / bleached bone was applied. Once dry, a strong layer of orange & chestnut ink was applied over the cream base coat. At this stage, the final form of the daemonette can start to be seen. A light drybrush of orange & cream was then applied to the skin to give the final look to the tone. More drybrusing was applied to the (bald) scalp of the miniature to draw attention to the head & (eventually) eyes.

The claws and vestments were painted next in parallel. For the claws, a base coat of brown was inked over with chestnut and highlighted by a lighter brown tone. Fine detail on the claws was painted with off-white to pure white. The lower part of the vestment was drybrushed with metallic silver before any other parts of it were painted to prevent overspill (as usual, the water pot needs to be changed after using metallic paint to prevent contamination). The corset & leg garment is basecoated in blue, inked & stained in deep blue, and highlighted with a lighter blue.

Final details then included going around the edges of the corset in bronze / gold; painting the necklace blue to match the corset highlight colour; creating eyes as pupil-less white orbs; painting claws on the feet & tail spikes in pure white; and lastly applying a Slaaneshi tattoo design in black to the upper right thigh and left-hand side of the face.

Although unfinished, the base has got part of an Imperial Dark Angel wing embedded on it. I plan to add an urban wasteland finish to this later.

Evaluation.
Positives: I'm much happier with this painting scheme than the ones that are primarily suggested in the codex (etc.). The gold & blue on the corset particularly make the daemon stand out from the crowd -- it is certainly a colour combination I'll come back & use once again. I'm also fond of the head -- I get the feeling this daemonette is transfixing distant prey. Making the head slightly lighter in tone than the body seems to have worked well.

Negatives: The claws don't quite look right. It could be a result of highlighting only the sharp pointy bits with pure white. Still, I'm not certain. The tattoo designs also took a long time to paint on.