While working on my Angels Sanguine, I decided to take a stab at using Iyaden Darksun to lay down my yellows for the helmets. I didn't want the deep dark yellow that comes out of the pot but also wanted the depth that working up to a highlight gives me. Yellow in almost every other fashion of paint is nothing but a pain to work with. I found myself enjoying working with Iyaden Darksun unlike anything previous and managed to get a nice bright looking yellow that has plenty of shade left after the final highlight!
To start off you'll need a few things, namely a model and the paints. For this exercise I've used a spare marine I had handy. I primed him with a white primer that will act as a good base color for the yellow to go over. Don't worry if what you're working on is darker, foundation paints are good for those areas, it might just take an extra coat or so. The basic color you already know, Iyaden Darksun. The shade I'm using for it is Devlan Mud, and to help highlight I've chosen VMC Ivory. You could easily substitute Skull White or some other slightly off white color.
A solid coat of Iyaden Darksun is applied. Take your time and get this coat smooth. When painting over white, this goes really really fast. I'll never get used to how easy foundation paints cover, especially colors that traditionally give painters fits.
Once the base coat is dry, and I can't emphasis that enough, Give the crevices a heavy wash of Devlan Mud. If you can, keep the wash off of larger flat surfaces. As you can see above, I've kept it from covering the greaves on the legs for the most part. Don't worry too much about it though, as the next step will take care of any mistakes you might make.
This step harkens back to Wash Basics as you are taking your base color and cleaning up the surfaces, leaving the wash in the crevices and getting back to a pure hue of Iyaden Darksun. Again, get this coat smooth and even. At this stage the model might feel a little muddy because of how deep the shadows go. This is why I decided to take the color a few steps further and brighten it up.
To help bring the yellow up and add more depth to the shade, I highlighted the majority of the model with a 50/50 mix of Iyaden Darksun/VMC Ivory. If you are looking to keep the yellow on the darker side, so I would suggest using this as an edge highlight and be finished here. This step really brightens the model up nicely and is more in line with what you would consider a more true yellow. It also benefits from the coverage that the foundation paint offers and as such will go on nice and easy. If you're planning on doing a lot of models in this color though, I suggest mixing an entire pot of this color so you have consistency.
To finish off the yellow and give it some more brightness, I went back in with a light highlight of pure VMC Ivory. I used some glazing here and there but for this step by step I kept it very basic in most areas and just used line highlights. This step helps to make the yellow stand out more.
In the end, I'm really enjoying the look of the yellow and I'm enjoying the ease at which it paints even more so! I suspect I'll be using this color more and more as different projects come up. Don't be afraid of yellow, or any other color for that matter! There are easy ways around difficult colors like this, it just takes some research and experimentation.
I'll be sure to share the inspiration for this tip sometime next week. Hopefully this finds someone that needs it this weekend! Get out there and paint something!
