Hey everybody, I’m back today with a fiery hot How to Paint Everything: Marvel Crisis Protocol! This time featuring the mighty Phoenix! Not only do we get a model for Jean Grey as Phoenix, but we get another larger model for when she absolutely snaps and her powers get the best of her. Phoenix Unleashed also comes with two flaming pillars, which come out during gameplay.
I’ve decided to paint her with two different suit colors. The regular Phoenix model was painted with her standard green and yellow Phoenix costume, while the Unleashed model was given the red and yellow Dark Phoenix costume. Normally I don’t like doing a lot of palette swaps on my Crisis Protocol models, but it only seemed right to give her both outfits this time around.
For this one, I wanted to crank up the vibrancy of the flames and used a mix of Citadel colors and AK Interactive fluorescent inks to bump up the luminosity of the fire. This is something I’ve been playing with a lot recently and it makes for some interesting effects, and as a fun side effect – they are UV reactive. Unfortunately, they aren’t glow in the dark paints, so they don’t hold luminescence after being exposed to UV light.
Anyway, let’s get into it and I’ll explain as I go.
Skin
Basecoat – Reaper Master Series Rosey Skin
Shadows – Reaper Master Series Rosey Skin: Citadel Altdorf Guard Blue
Warm Tones – Reaper Master Series Rosey Skin: Citadel Bugman’s Glow
Highlight – Reaper Master Series Rosey Skin
Highlight – Reaper Master Series Rosey Skin: Vallejo Model Color White
The skin on both Jeans were painted the same way: I started with a basecoat of Rosey Skin. From there I added cool areas by mixing Rosey Skin and Altdorf Guard Blue and painted this mix on the lower half of her face. I then mixed Rosey Skin and Bugman’s Glow together and painted that mix on the upper half of her face. Then I went back over the forehead, nose, cheeks and chin with Rosey Skin and highlighted these areas with a mix of Rosey Skin and White.
Hair
Basecoat – Doombull Brown
Layer – Citadel Doombull Brown: Citadel Mournfang Brown
Layer – Previous Mix: Wazdakka Red
Highlight – Previous Mix: Fire Dragon Bright
I didn’t want to go too red for her hair, even though Jean is usually shown with bright red hair. I felt it would blend into the fire too much if it was bright red, plus my original Jean Grey model has a bit more brownish-red hair color.
With that said, I painted her hair with a basecoat of Doombull Brown, I then mixed in Mournfang Brown for the first layer. From there I mixed in Wazdakka Red to tint the brown a bit more red and then mixed in Fire Dragon Bright as a highlight color.
Eyes
Basecoat – Citadel Phalanx Yellow
Layer – Lethal Shadows Fluorescent Yellow
Much like Jean Grey, I wanted Phoenix’s eyes to be glowing with power. Unlike Jean Grey, who has pink glowing eyes, I decided to give Phoenix and Phoenix Unleashed yellow glowing eyes.
This was very simple, her eyes were painted Phalanx Yellow for a base color and the I gave them another layer of Fluorescent Yellow to make them pop.
Phoenix’s Green Suit
Basecoat – Army Painter Warpaints Fanatics Emerald Forest
Shadows – Army Painter Warpaints Fanatics Emerald Forest: Citadel Evil Sunz Scarlet
Clean Up – Army Painter Warpaints Fanatics Emerald Forest
Layer – Army Painter Warpaints Fanatics Leafy Green
Highlight – Army Painter Warpaints Fanatics Rainforest
For ease of painting, I HIGHLY recommend that you paint Phoenix’s model without her being glued into place. It is very tight between the flames and the back of her miniature. I attempted to do it all in one go and ended up popping her loose after the fire was painted, to make things easier on myself.
I wasn’t pleased with my options for green in my collection and instead picked up a few Army Painter colors. Her suit was first given a basecoat of Emerald Forest. I then mixed Emerald Forest with Evil Sunz Scarlet to create the shadows. After doing some clean up work, I then added a layer of Leafy Green and finally highlighted it with Rainforest.
Phoenix Unleashed’s Red Suit
Basecoat – Citadel Khorne Red
Shadows – Citadel Khorne Red: Citadel Caliban Green
Clean Up – Citadel Khorne Red
Layer – Citadel Mephiston Red
Layer – Citadel Evil Sunz Scarlet
Highlight – Citadel Wild Rider Red
As mentioned earlier, Phoenix Unleashed needed to be painted with her red Dark Phoenix suit. For this, I started with a dark red basecoat thanks to Khorne Red. I then created a shadow tone by mixing Caliban Green into Khorne Red. After clean up, I began highlighting it with Mephiston Red, Evil Sunz Scarlet and Wild Rider Red.
Yellow Sections of Both Suits
Basecoat – Citadel Yriel Yellow
Shadows – Citadel Yriel Yellow: Citadel Genestealer Purple
Clean Up – Citadel Yriel Yellow
Layer – Citadel Flash Gitz Yellow
Highlight – Citadel Phalanx Yellow
Highlight – Citadel Phalanx Yellow: Vallejo Model Color White
The yellow areas of both suits were painted the same way on both models. I started with Yriel Yellow as a base. For shadows I mixed in a tiny amount of Genestealer Purple to Yriel Yellow. After clean up, I began highlighting with Flash Gitz Yellow, Phalanx Yellow and Phalanx Yellow mixed with White.
Black Phoenix Emblem Outline
Basecoat – Vallejo Model Color Black
Layer – Vallejo Model Color Black: Vallejo Model Color White
Layer – Previous Mix: Vallejo Model Color White
The black areas of her suit were painted Black with a very fine tipped brush. Be very careful when applying black over the yellow areas, you’ll very much regret it if you do. All the highlighting was done by mixing White in, to create greys, and I used these to do two grey highlights.
Fire
Basecoat – Army Painter Daemonic Yellow Spray
Layer – Citadel Phalanx Yellow: AK Interactive Ink Fluorescent Yellow
Layer – Citadel Phalanx Yellow: AK Interactive Ink Fluorescent Orange
Layer – Citadel Fire Dragon Bright: AK Interactive Ink Fluorescent Orange
Layer – Citadel Fire Dragon Bright: AK Interactive Ink Fluorescent Red
Layer – Citadel Fire Dragon Bright: Citadel Evil Sunz Scarlet: AK Interactive Ink Fluorescent Red
Layer – Citadel Evil Sunz Scarlet: AK Interactive Ink Fluorescent Red
Ok, I’m going to try to explain this as best that I can. For the fire, I used the colors Phalanx Yellow, Fire Dragon Bright and Evil Sunz Scarlet for the flame colors. I also mixed into these colors AK Interactive Fluorescent Inks in Yellow, Orange and Red. These inks not only will thin down the paint, but it also cranks up the vibrancy of them – plus as a bonus, it makes them UV reactive. For each new step in color, I did at least two coats of paint and always kept a mix of the previous layer’s color on hand for blending. Also, make sure that each layer is completely dry before continuing, otherwise you risk pulling half-dry paint off the surface which could leave a pock mark in the paint.
I started with a basecoat of Daemonic Yellow spray paint over a White primer coat. From there I mixed Phalanx Yellow and Fluorescent Yellow ink together and painted a minimum of two coats on the entire fire area. Once this completely dry, I then mixed Phalanx Yellow with Fluorescent Orange ink and from the top down I did another two coats, blending the yellow and yellow orange as needed.
The orange of the fire was painted in a similar way. I mixed Fire Dragon Bright with Fluorescent Orange ink, worked it down from the top with two coats and blended it into the yellow orange as needed. I then followed that up with two coats of a mix of Fire Dragon Bright and Fluorescent Red ink.
Finally, I took this last mix and added a bit of Evil Sunz Scarlet to it to create a red hue. This was painted on the tops of the fire and blended into the orange red layer. If I needed the flames to be slightly more red, I did a very thin layer of Evil Sunz Scarlet mixed with Fluorescent Red ink to the very tip tops of the flames and blended that into the previous layer.
Overall, it was a lot of back and forth making sure things were blended between layers and reworking things here and there. It was time consuming, but the effect makes it worthwhile.
Concrete Bits
Basecoat – Citadel Stormvermin Fur
Stipple – Citadel Administratum Grey
Stipple – Citadel Ulthuan Grey
All of the concrete bits and the concrete of the bases were painted in my usual way. I start with a basecoat of Stormvermin Fur and then I stipple the surface with Administratum Grey and Ulthuan Grey.
Brickwork
Basecoat – Citadel Doombull Brown
Layer – Citadel Rhinox Hide
Layer – Citadel Tuskgor Fur
The brickwork within the Fire Pillar was given a basecoat of Doombull Brown. Then I picked out random bricks and painted them in either Rhinox Hide or Tuskgor Fur.
Tire
Basecoat – Vallejo Model Color Black
Layer – Dark Reaper
Wheel Drybrush – Citadel Administratum Grey
And with that, Phoenix and Phoenix Unleashed are ready for the game table! I want to say a huge thank to Atomic Mass Games for providing us with this character pack, it was a lot of fun to work on! The Phoenix Unleashed Character Pack will be hitting store shelves on June 13th, 2025, make sure to contact your friendly local gaming shop for pre-orders or you can also order it directly from Asmodee’s webstore.
Will you be getting this one for your X-Men? Or will you be finding other ways to sneak her into other Affiliations? As always, hit me up on the socials, you can find me over on Bluesky and Instagram, I love seeing what the community is working on and try to share what I see whenever possible. If you’re a member of the Goonhammer Discord server, be sure to share them on the Marvel: Crisis Protocol channel there as well.
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