My quest to paint every model in the DeeZee range continues, albeit at glacial pace. I have too many other distractions to focus on finishing this project! However, there are two Smilodons in the DeeZee range; DZ13 Smilodon or Sabre Tooth attacking and DZ15 Smilodon or Sabre tooth stalking, so it made sense to paint them as a pair and knock another two models off of my list!
Although these big cats from the Pleistocine epoch are more familiarly known as Sabre tooth tigers, they are not closely related to either Tigers or modern cats and were inhabitants of the North and South America’s, rather than Asia. It is thought that they hunted large herbivores such as Camels and Bison. Although no record of the coat patterns exist, it is thought that the Smilodon had either plain coats or spotted ones, resembling leopards.
You can read more about the Smilodon on the Wikipedia page here:
So when it came to choosing a colour scheme for my models, I decide to go for the leopard variant. I did consider starting with a grey base for the fur and even using Tiger markings in grey/black but settled on the leopard scheme, using browns to get the darker look that I was after.
After priming the models in Army painter leather brown, I painted the top half of the models with Vallejo Flat Earth 70983. I used cork brown 70843 for the undersides. I then blended and highlighted using Iraqi Sand 70819.
To get the rosettes, I used German Camo Black Brown 70822 and dabbed the paint on to make rough circles, and then went back and filled in the middle of the rosettes with Burnt Umber 70941. I used Off white 70820 for further highlights on the belly and to outline the eyes and ears. The open mouth was painted with Beige red 70804 and the teeth in Ivory 70918. The claws and paw pads were picked out in Black, 70951
Everything was then given a wash of Army painter soft tone to bring it all together.
The basing was completed to my usual formula using oval bases – I had considered basing them as a pair but decided that separate bases were a better idea. I finished the bases with Gamers grass tufts. A mixture of dense beige and standard beige tufts to contrast against the scatter.
So another two DeeZee models to add to my collection for posterity! I still have an idea of combining the two models with the cavemen that we sell and making a small diorama. May be that will be a project for the future but for now it’s back to painting Samurai!
THE COMMERCIAL BIT
I hope that you all enjoy your hobby as much as I do – our web site will have much of what you need! Click here to see our shop.
To see the full range of DeeZee animals, click here:
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You can find Gamers grass here:
Happy modelling!