Here is a step by step tutorial on how to paint a great looking Cadian Guardsmen in a minimum of time. It took me about 60 minutes to finish, so with assembly-line style of painting and a little bit of practice you should be able to pump out guard squads in days!
Notice that the paint scheme in fact is a simplified version of the one I used for my Vostroyans.

1. Prime with Army Painter Matt Black. Cover the sand of the Base with Charadon Granite, then drybrush heavily with Formula P3 Trollblood Highlight and Menoth White Highlight.

2. Paint the uniform with P3 Thornwood Green, then wash with slightly thinned Badab Black. When dry, drybrush heavily with Thornwood Green and lightly with Traitor Green. Then pick out the most extreme folds and edges with Traitor Green. Because of the light drybrush before the transition won’t be that harsh.
Paint the skin with Tallarn Flesh and wash with Ogryn Flesh. Highlight with P3 Midlund and Ryn Flesh. I didn’t paint the eyes in order to save time, plus they are barely visible under the helmet anyways. But you should take the time on your characters.
Paint the leather with Scorched Brown, generously wash with Badab Black, then highlight with Scorched Brown and P3 Bootstrap Leather.
Cover the armour with black again.


3. Paint the metal with Boltgun Metal, then wash with Badab Black and when dry, glaze with thinned Devlan Mud. Highlight with Boltgun Metal.
Paint the brass areas with VGC Brassy Brass, wash with Devlan Mud and highlight with P3 Radiant Platinum.
Add battle damage with Chainmail as a highlight to the black armour.
Finish off with glueing some snow flock to the base and varnish with your favourite matte varnish (I used Genius Pro Universalsprühlack Seidenmatt, really matte finish, you can get it in German hardware store Toom Baumarkt).
Have fun!
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Stahly
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I like those chainmail highlights, easy to do and awesome effect … sadly this doesn't really work for my kahki coloured stuff.
Yeah, it's a really cool and quick effect. For your khaki coloured armour I suggest a two step technique like shown in stage 5 and 6 in this tutorial: http://www.games-workshop.com/gws/content/article.jsp?catId=&categoryId=cat400003a§ion=&pIndex=4&aId=8000033a&start=5 Start with a very dark colour for contrast, Charadon Granite would probably go well with Khaki, and then highlight with silver.
Great Tutorial here mate, love the overall look of them. Just wondering what (if any) you could compare the "P3 Thornwood Green" and "Traitor Green" 's with on the Citadel Line. I was thinking Dark Angels and Camo green respectively, put it's coming out a little off.
Any ideas?
Nah, your Citadel greens are far too bright. The P3 colours are really different from any Citadel Colour, much more drab. But I've I had to say two colours for a similar effect I'd say Charadon Granite and Catachan Green.
Wow mate, I really love your stuff! I have 40 Cadians waiting to get painted, and I have been looking for a color scheme. And this is spot on!
Btw, I love your Vostroyans they look fantastic.
hi there i really love the cadians but what are p3 paints? and where would i get them from? also when comparing citadel paints are you mixing the catachan green and the charadon granite together? or just on there own? do you have any vehicles/special characters painted this way?
many thanks and i look forward to hearing from you
very very nice look. wish I hadn't just finished my squad. your cloth and armour is a far better look than my citadel choices.
Nice, will be using this for my new IG force.