I’m nearing the end of my Zombicide Invader journey, just a couple of hurdles to go. The smaller of these hurdles is the Kabuki Gang. I’d put off painting these as the bold colours, near white skin and patterning was an anathema to my slapchop adjacent painting style. Nevertheless, I was going to try and make it work. And so I cleaned up the mould lines, glued down a few bits of slate and primed the models with Colour Forge Standard Grey. 

I knew I was going to use yellow on various parts of the gang so the first step was to block in any areas that I did want to be yellow with Vallejo Game Air Squid Pink. As I had learned from painting the Leagues of Votann the pink undercoat turns yellow Contrast Paint a rich orange colour. Combined with a zenithal highlight of white the resulting shifts between bright yellow and orange is one of my favourite effects in all of painting. Although it did make me curious, the effect of painting yellow over pink is well known, but does it work for other colours? No harm in finding out, or at least trying to. With that in mind I painted any areas on the clothing that would later be red with Macragge Blue. 

Before I could break out the white ink and Contrast Paints there were a few more base coats that I needed to do. A couple of them are shown in the artwork wearing white clothing, namely Iemon who has a white top. As white doesn’t really work with this slapchop adjacent method of painting I needed to basecoat these areas with Ulthuan Grey. Similarly, the skin in the artwork is shown as a very pale blue-grey. So with that in mind I painted any of the exposed skin with Fenrisian Grey, a quite bold blue-grey that I use for my Space Wolves Space Marines. 

With all the base coats done I tidied up any spillage with Two Thin Coats Dungeon Stone and gave each model a zenithal highlight with Liquitex Titanium White acrylic ink.

For the most part all I had to do now was apply the contrast paint over its corresponding colour. So anything pink got a coat of Imperial Fist. Anything blue got a coat of Blood Angels Red. Unfortunately the blue undercoat didn’t make a difference, perhaps I should have used a darker or stronger blue. Something to think about. Unperturbed, I pressed on giving anything Ulthuan Grey a coat of Apothecary White and any skin a coat of Army Painter Speedpaint Runic Grey. From there anything that looked like a pouch or leather, like the sandals, I painted with Gore-Grunta Fur. For the remaining clothing details I painted any overcoats with Black Templar and any unpainted trousers with Army Painter Speedpaint Highlords Blue. And while I had it out, I painted any hair with Black Templar. Lastly, I painted Army Painter Speedpaint Broadsword Silver on Oiwa’s bionic arm. 

From there I turned to more traditional paints for the final details. To start with I layered the skin with Pallid Wych Flesh, this meant I applied the paint to the raised areas and left the recesses blue-grey. I chose Pallid Wych Flesh as although it is near white it does have an ever so slight amount of warm tones to it, especially compared to Ulthuan Grey. Moving onto the metallics, bionic arm notwithstanding, I painted the masks with Scale75 Dwarven Gold whilst any gun barrels and sword blades I painted with Scale75 Thrash Metal. To bring out the detail of the gold I then gave these areas a wash with Army Painter Strong Tone. 

With the models done I moved onto the bases, doing them in the same scheme that I did for all the Zombicide Invader miniatures. I started by covering the bases in Vallejo Red Oxide texture paste and once that was dry I tidied up any missed areas and painted the rocks with Vallejo Fire Red. To really take advantage of that texture I then gave the bases a wash of Reikland Fleshshade followed by a drybrush of Kindle Flame. Finally, I painted the rims of the bases with a matt black. 

Turns out with the undercoats that these models basically paint themselves. They might lack the intricate designs on their clothes that they do in the artwork but I achieved the bright and bold look that I was going for with my Kabuki Gang. With the conclusion of the gang it means I have just one more group of Zombicide Invader miniatures to do. And it is not a small group…