For this tutorial we are going to be painting his fur by doing a lot of drybrushing. His fur has a decent amount of texture to it and we can pick it out with a drybrush technique instead of painstakingly painting hair texture onto him. It’ll be a pretty easy going model, let’s get to it!
credit: Brushwizard
Painting the Fur
We are going to go very simple on Ursa Major and drybrush his fur, rather than paint individual hair lines like we did on Black Panther, Chosen of Bast’s panther companion. We’ll start with a basecoat of Rhinox Hide and then work up brown tones with Doombull Brown, Gorthor Brown and XV-88.
- Basecoat: Citadel Rhinox Hide
- Drybrush: Citadel Doombull Brown
- Drybrush: Citadel Gorthor Brown
- Drybrush: Citadel XV-88
Painting the Mouth, Eyes and Ears
I decided to paint the mouth, eyes and ears in one go and cover them all simultaneously. We’re going to paint the eyes, ears and Mouth with Bugman’s Glow, then we’ll wash them with Agrax Earthshade. The Tongue will be painted with Wazdakka Red and for eyes I usually like to go with Ulthuan Grey and teeth Screaming Skull, instead of pure white. Then we’ll wash the mouth again with Agrax and add some pupils to his eyes with Black.
- Basecoat: Citadel Bugman’s Glow
- Wash: Citadel Agrax Earthshade
- Tongue: Citadel Wazdakka Red
- Teeth: Citadel Screaming Skull
- Eyes: Citadel Ulthuan Grey
- Wash: Citadel Agrax Earthshade
- Pupils: Vallejo Model Color Black
Painting the Paw Pads
For his toe beans we are going to paint them with Bugman’s Glow and Screaming Skull, they are going to be pretty easy 3 step process. Well start with a basecoat of Bugman’s Glow and then mix in some Screaming Skull for a middle layer and then highlight it a bit with Screaming Skull.
- Basecoat: Citadel Bugman’s Glow
- Layer: Citadel Bugman’s Glow: Screaming Skull
- Highlight: Citadel Screaming Skull
Painting the Claws
Claws can be a myriad of colors, for Usra Major’s claws we are going to go with some brown and white tones. We’ll start with Mournfang Brown, layer on Zandri Dust and add some highlights with Screaming Skull and Ulthuan Grey. Finishing it all off with Agrax Earthshade to tie the layers all together a bit more.
- Basecoat: Citadel Mournfang Brown
- Layer: Citadel Zandri Dust
- Highlight: Citadel Screaming Skull
- Edge Highlight: Citadel Ulthuan Grey
- Wash: Citadel Agrax Earthshade
Once you finish off his base, Ursa Major will be all set to go join the rest of the Winter Guard in battle! Have you painted up Ursa Major for your collection? If you have, find me on social media, hit me up on Twitter/X (@brushwizard), Instagram (@brushwizardry), or Goonhammer’s own Crisis Protocol channel on the Discord server and share your work! I’m always interested to see what the MCP community has been working on.
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