'Monstrous' from ByronM: Kingdom Death Dragon King

I had so many things to chose from this round but in the end I decided I had to finally get around to the monster from Kingdom Death that I have wanted to paint since it showed up 2+ years ago but just never felt I could do justice to, the Dragon King.

This thing is HUGE!!!  It is over 9" across, 9" front to back and 8" tall and sits on a 100mm base!  It is an amazing model, even more so for the price I paid in Kickstarter (I think when it was first announced we got it for $30 US?), hell even at retail pricing of $125 US for the Dragon, human version, 4x survivors, and 200+ cards and a book, its not a bad deal!  If GW did this kit it would be $400 and a kidney!

I wanted something dark, but not necessarily black, and not too dark as it would then just blend into the black / grey of the board.  I decided on a purple / blue look, which ended up morphing into more purple as I went along.  I darkened and tried to define all the scale edges, scars, and details with various shades of black, brown, and blue. Then added some highlights to the veins and scars.

In addition to plain washes for each step I also used the Forge World clear airbrush paints to feather in purples, blues, greens and even some reds into areas.  While not super obvious, it does show up in bright light and is visible in at least 2 of the pictures to some degree, especially this one which for some reason just pops with them.

 

 I kept the underbelly a dark purple/blue then washed it with multiple coats of black, blue and purlple until it is almost black, unless you look at it under light then you see the shades through it.

I then shaded the wings to get a fleshy colour as I wanted it to be very different.  I realize you can go with the same skin colour on the wings and it's probably more natural to go so, but I didn't want the overall model too dark so went with this.  I washed in sepia, browns, purples, blues, and greens to give it depth and contrast.

 

The horns are mainly bone coloured, but lightened are darkened to add curvature and contrast to them.  They do have a slight center ridge but are fairly flat, so I wanted to bring that out more with shadow and light.

I had planned to also do the human version of him, which stands at a mere 2" tall, but it is such a gorgeous model in its own right that I did not want to rush it, so he will come later. I have included a picture with the white lion and a survivor to help show how truly monstrous he really is.  Now picture having to fight him with nothing but weapons and armour you have made by killing and carving up lions and antelopes....  Never mind the figures, the game alone fits the monstrous theme.

This last size comparison picture was taken after I put all my lights and photo setup away and realized that I forgot to take it, hence the lower quality picture.  I am really happy with how all the other photos came out for a change though!  You can actually see some of the reflective hues in some of them from the washes and clear paints.