49. Painting zombies

The second easiest to paint miniatures are (after skeletons) probably zombies. They don’t need too many colors, can be dirty, so the basics of painting them are pretty easy. But unlike skeletons, where bone is bone, so the colors are pretty similar for everybody, zombies can be imagined in much greater variation. I would like to present here my interpretation, which fits my picture of them, but as said, the process could be used with other colors to.

I don’t want to detail again, why drybrushing works here exceptionally well, just a short summary of my skeleton painting guide. The surfaces are big, so no need to worry about hitting everything with the brush, details can be painted later, the light texture, what drybrushing can leave behind wont bother anything, because zombies are dirty, and I don’t think, that zombie skin would be very smooth…

Lets get into the process:

1. Priming with a light color (Skeleton tone is my lighter primer, so I used it)
2. Basecoating with the desired zombie-color, or if You have the right colored primer, this can be skipped (I mixed a sick looking pale tone from of green, white and skin-tone)
3. Wash with a brownish wash (I used Reikland Fleshshade, but no need to be afraid, that it will look too alive, next step will take care of it)
4. Full body drybrushing with the original base coat color (its important to make the drybrushing after the wash here, because the wash would act like a filter and change the color, which comes sometimes handy, but not here)
5. Zenital drybrushing (so the brushing movements should only be from top to bottom, and not cross or reverse) with a lighter version of the basecoat, to highlight the upper parts
6. Painting the exposed flesh and bone parts (I used carmine red and ivory)
7. Wash the exposed parts with a diluted, purplish-red paint (It should be denser than a wash, but thinner than a paint, and should only go in the recesses of the exposed parts, so it gives nice contours to them)
8. Paint the rest (clothes, eyes, teeth, weapons, etc.) as wished
9. Varnish (its not a must, but it protects the paint, and so the invested work)

In my opinion the right base color, the drybrushing and the purplish-red wash gives zombies a really good look, and it’s a pretty quick process to. A small additional hint: pale colored skin with pale colored clothes (I used light gray) gives the zombies an almost monochrome look, where the exposed parts (contoured with the heavy wash) really pop out! Here are my results with Mantic zombies/ghouls (yes I know, I should be more careful with removing the mold lines…):

I still have an undead painting tutorial in my mind, so maybe next time...