The Wargmaster Nippon army is still in full production on my painting table. I just finished some more Samurai and wanted to paint something a little bit easier to keep my motivation going. As it worked out, I recently received an order from Alternative Armies in the mail that included some Kitsume from their 15mm Sogaku line. I had already done three units using their 15mm Nekomata. As those models only had three poses, I decided to go with the Kitsume this time, to add to the model variation.
I am using these to represent Komainu in the army list. I have not been able to obtain Komainu models, so this was the next best thing. Kitsume are another type of Japanese Yokai, so I figured it would fit the bill. At 15mm, the model is a bit big, but I figured it was close enough. The models are available in three poses, so I got three of each.
I had a choice of colors, but decided I wanted to go with the white Kitsume for my units. These would then match the Nekomata I painted earlier and I could mix and match the figures. I sprayed the models white and later hit them with a GW contrast white for shading.
Once the shading dried, I drybrushed the figure with white and then hit the highlights with direct white painting. I hit the claws with a brown wash and painted the open mouths red. From the drawing, it looked like all the eyes of these were dark, so I just painted the pupils and lids black to represent this. I also used black on the noses. I hit the inner ears with pink. and hit the bases with some tan.
I then glued them to the bases with white glue. I then hit the bases with some wood filler to smooth out the large lip of the figure bases. Once that set, I hit all the bases with white glue and sprinkled on my flocking mix for the army. That set overnight and I hit the whole group with some Tamiya dull coat spray to finish them up. With that, I have filled out my Komainu units for my Nippon army. On to my next batch of troops!
- Manteuffel