Painting Nathavarr The White (part 1)

Nathavarr is the dragon from the Dragons Don't Share II set from Reaper. I'm using these post to not only share the progress I make on him, but also to record what exactly I'm doing, how I'm doing it, and most importantly why I'm making the choices I am.

Let's start with what others have done. This is the box art, showing him painted up as a red dragon.


Since I'm painting up this set to work for Frostgrave, I figured that a red dragon maybe wasn't the best choice for a frozen city. So, a white dragon is the obvious choice. Painting white is hard, especially if you want it to look good. I've never been all that good at it, and I didn't just want to plop a dragon on the table that looks like unpainted Bonseum.

Aka Boring!

Now about the same time I was contemplating Nathavarr I received the Halloween paint color Spectral White in an order from Reaper. It's a just ever so slightly pinkish white, and that got me thinking. Since I'm doing most of my Frostgrave terrain in cool grey, a warm white might make a nice contrast. Not wanting to commit myself to painting the whole dragon, I decided to do a test paint using one of it's arms.


I started with a base coat of Dusky Skin, then a 50/50 mix of Dusky Skin & Spectral White. Then I gave the scales a wash of GW's Baal Red wash.


The scales got a couple of watery layers of spectral white.


And while it's hard to see in the pic, the edges of the scales got a bit of Warpaint's White. I really like how both the Dusky Skin sets off the white, and the Baal Red Wash looks between the scales.


I then painted the rest of Nathavarr with Dusky Skin, and stuck the arm on. It works... And you can really see the contrast between the cool stone and the warm of the dragon.

The next part is going to be the head... I certainly can't leave most of it Dusky Skin colored, even though there aren't actually very many plates/scales. Stay tuned for part 2!