Mephisto, the Devil of the Marvel Universe. An often enemy of Ghost Rider, Doctor Strange and Spider-Man. He rules from his hellish dimension, appearing in the Marvel universe to make faustian bargains with the heroes solely for his own benefit.
Painting Mephisto gave a great opportunity to perfect my glowing and flame effects. I wanted to do this without the use of an airbrush because I wanted to show that you can get good strong effects just using basic techniques.
The paints I used were primarily from the Scale 75 essentials basic colours set with a couple of other extras.
Paints Used
- Scale 75 Sol Yellow
- Scale 75 Blood Red
- Scale 75 Mediterranian Blue
- Scale 75 Black
- Scale 75 White
- Scale 75 Dubai Brown
- Golden High Flow Carbon Black (Can be replaced with any highly pigmented black Ink)
- Golden High Flow Phthalo Blue (Can be replaced with a dark blue contrast paint)
- Titanium white ink from AK Interactive
I started by priming with Hyrax Brown from the Colour Forge. I find that base coating with a dark brown makes the next layers appear more saturated. This brown having a lot of red hues made it particularly good as a base coat.
Cloak
I wanted the cloak to be a transition between dark red and purple. I base coated the entire cloak with Golden High Flow Acrylic Phthalo Blue ensuring that the recesses had the most blue. While still wet I used a 70:30 mix of Scale 75 Blood Red and Phthalo Blue on all the raised areas. By working wet I could get an easier blend and the reason I used the high flow paint is that it is particularly good for wet blending like this. If you don’t have this paint a dark blue contrast would achieve a similar result.
I used this same technique on his loin cloth.
For his boots and hand wraps I used a 70:30 mix of Scalecolor Black and Mediterrainian Blue.
Body
For his skin I base coated everything with a mix of Scale 75 Blood Red, Mediterranian Blue and a little Scale 75 Black. Something like a 60 : 30 : 10 ratio. Importantly, in this step I wanted everything to be a dark purple under coat. I then added more and more Blood Red into the mix to brighten it up to the fiery red final appearance.
To get the proper shade for his skin it was important to work in multiple thin layers to slowly work up to the lightest colour.
Fire
For all the fire on the model, including the lava base I did everything using the same basic methodology.
First, I base coated all the areas that would be fire or lava white. For the lava on the base I used a mixture of Titanium White Ink from AK Interactive and Scalecolor White paint. This required multiple thin layers, especially on the lava areas, as I was painting over that dark brown colour.
When painting fire I like to tackle it in stages after the white is dry. What we are trying to achieve is a transition from white through yellow, orange, dark red and finally dark brown/black. It’s important in these next stages to work relatively quickly. You can use acrylic retarder to make wet blending easier but I prefer to work in small areas of the model at a time.
Once all the flames are white do the following for each section of flame.
- Paint three-quarters of the flame with pure Sol Yellow.
- The final quarter with Blood Red
- Wet blend the yellow and the red together
- Wash the brush and add a tiny amount of black to the final 10% of the flame to give a smokey effect.
The lava had the same basic transitions between the colours, keeping more toward the orange spectrum.
For the ground itself, I used a 50:50 mix of Scale 75 Dubai Brown and Black.
Reflections and Lighting
The light from the model generally comes from the fire on the base. I wanted to try to get the dancing light from the flames reflected on the cloak and body. I used a mix of Sol Yellow and Blood Red to make a bold orange colour as my primary reflections. Usually I would do more of a redddy orange light emanating from fire, but as his skin is red, I decided to go more towards the yellow side of orange. This gave a slightly better contrast. I used very thin coats with the brush for these reflections, more toward a glaze consistency to ensure that you could still get an idea of the colours underneath.
To give the idea of dancing flames I tried to use more of a stabbing / stippling motion with the brush rather than clean lines.
As a very final step, because all my Marvel: Crisis Prototol minis are in a comic book style, I used Golden High Flow Carbon Black in the deepest shadow areas. I find that even if you aren’t doing a comic book style it’s a good idea to recess shade in the very darkest areas with a thin black or brown wash, as that contrast will help your colours appear more vibrant.
And there he is finished. Mephisto the lord of Hel. If you need any more tips or advice on this style of painting or anything related to Marvel: Crisis Protocol feel free to reach out to me on Discord or instagram @alfred_pharius. Happy Hobbying!
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