“He wondered what the man’s name was and where he came from; and if he was really evil of heart, or what lies or threats had led him on the long march from his home; and if he would not really rather have stayed there in peace…”
Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers Book 4 Ch. 3 “Of Herbs and Stewed Rabbit”
Amongst my many projects that are theoretically on the go at any given time are usually a bunch of “one at a time”-type things, where I have randomly gotten enthusiastic about a model or even a unit from an army that I haven’t really even begun on, and started painting them. These Harad Abrakhân Guard are an example of that. They took me about 6 months, on and off to get painted – mostly because I’m easily distracted and small amounts of indecision on how to paint an accoutrement can result in literally months of delay before getting back to a model.
The colour scheme was pretty simple. I wanted to avoid the purple and turquoise seen in GW’s scheme entirely, and instead go for black with a splash of bright red on the sash. I think black keffiyeh/shemaghs always look sharp, so again, that was a no-brainer for me. A bit of gold retained for bling, and the clothing looks pretty good. I painted the flesh tones in a light brown tone, similar to people of Lebanese and Jordanian descent that I work with, since unlike GW until just a couple of years ago, I don’t think everyone in the world has caucasian skin pigmentation. My Tallarn (if I ever finish them) have similar skin colouration to my Haradrim. (I get the TE Lawrence/SAS reference, but I prefer the Bedouin one for them.)
As with a lot of the LotR metal range, these figures do suffer a bit from GW’s “three poses only!” policy, but mixed together in a unit they still manage to look decent.
Finally, the Kings of War-oriented unit shots. Until I get a lot more Haradrim painted – which won’t be anytime soon – these guys will get shoved into one KoW force or another as a unit of some sort of elite humans who hit hard but have light armour. I may also be able to use them as proxies for something in games of SAGA – Crescent and the Cross. Honestly, I haven’t looked hard at that since I’ve got very little Crusade-Era stuff painted right now.
But hey – these guys are done, and I think they turned out pretty well, so it’s all good!
Love, love, love these! That skintone is brilliant, care to give a recipe?
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Uh… I really should have written it down. There’s a mix of these key colours – VMC Brown Sand & AP Leather Brown & a Reaper paint that I can’t remember or find (I’ll let you know when I find it) along with VMC Sunny Skintone mixed into the highlights.
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Very nice mate – great skin tone, and the clothing colour is perfect!
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Thanks Alex. Now I’m quite keen to start on the Watchers – once I make some space!
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You’re right, mixed together you don’t notice the lack of posing. Very nice me old chestnut. Very nice indeed.
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Cheers mate! I’m happier with this finished unit than I’d expected to be. Always a nice outcome!
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Ooooh so cool painting some these myself
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Sounds good – I look forward to seeing your take on them. 🙂
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Good stuff, mate 🙂
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cheers!
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I like these a lot. They don’t seem to have missed too many meals along the way!
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I think it’s implied that those guy are eunuchs …so there’s a price to being well fed.
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Very nice! getting ready to paint mine now!
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