The reimagined Be’lakor is an amazing model packed with incredible details. The Dark Master is equally suited to receiving a stunning display-grade paint job as he is leading your army on the tabletop. We love sending these centrepiece models to folks in the community, and this time we went searching for someone with an unusual painting style to inspire you to try new things.
Terry Pike’s a full-time model painter and painting tutor, and he caught our attention with his penchant for unexpected colour schemes. Here’s what he had to say about this project.
Terry: As soon as I saw the teaser for the new Be’lakor model, I knew I had to paint him to match the colour scheme of my daemons. The new miniature captures the evil feel of the original, with a similar pose and the classic daemonic wings, but it has a more imposing presence. There was just one small issue with this project – I’d not long finished converting my own Dark Master…
When the Ogroid Myrmidon was released, I wanted to include it in my Chaos army in some form. It occurred to me that, with some minor conversion work, it would make a great Be’lakor. I added a pair of Crypt Flayer wings, which were a pretty good size and fit for the model. All they needed was some putty to smooth out the back of the model where they joined.
I removed the Myrmidon’s spear and replaced it with a sword from the Daemon Prince kit. While the original Be’lakor doesn’t have a shield, I really liked this one, so I kept it as part of the model.
Despite having put in this work, I was eager to paint the new Be’lakor. He’s truly stunning, and I couldn’t wait to get started!
I built up his (already huge) base with a layer of cork for height and added plenty of skulls of all shapes and sizes from the Citadel Skulls kit. I finished it off with my signature putty tentacles and bubbles for the slime area at the front.
The base has some interesting lava sculpted throughout the rock formations, which tied in nicely to my colour scheme – but I painted these areas as pink and purple slime instead of lava.
Be’lakor suits a dark, sinister colour scheme, but I like to use brighter, more unusual colour combinations. For my converted Be’lakor, I decided on a pale blue-green with hints of purple for the skin, alongside cream and purple for the wings. I felt this scheme would transfer well to the new model, and it gave me a chance to further experiment with stippling and texture on the skin.
I started with the wings and the skin as I knew these would take the majority of the time. I used the soft pastel colour palette and some shiny metallics to get a good contrast between the elements of the model.
I built the skin up by painting thousands of individual dots of varying tones to create shapes and shadows on the muscles. This stippling effect gives Be’lakor’s skin a textured look while remaining smooth to the touch. It’s a time-consuming process but a fairly simple one, and it works particularly well on creatures that have tough, leathery skin or hides.
I’m very happy with how the scheme came out, and can’t wait to field Be’lakor in games. Although it’s a large sculpt that’s packed full of detail, this model was fairly straightforward to paint.
Having painted this glorious model, and seeing the updated Lord Kroak and the stunning new Slaaneshi daemons, I’m super excited about what could be on the way for the Age of Sigmar’s Monsters.
Thanks for showing us your work, Terry – we love what you’ve done with Be’lakor. Does this unusual colour scheme give you some inspiration for your own painting? Visit the Warhammer 40,000 or Warhammer Age of Sigmar Facebook pages and tell us how you plan to paint the Dark Master.