Ben Komets

Painting a Helamite Queen, - or Nutbug II

Added 2025-08-29 10:49:16 +0000 UTC

Hi Folks,

Here is another episode of Straight from the Desk!

In this episode, we will paint our wonderful Helamite Queen!

Something technical before we start!
I have split up the video into 3 chapters to enable the new YouTube feature to auto-generate dubs

for the videos, new videos. The new feature automatically translates videos into 13 languages!

..if it works ;)
Although it is a little alien to hear yourself in a language that you don´t even speak yourself, this might be a helpful feature for some of you who don't speak English all that well.

The auto-dubbings are being generated and added to the video bit by bit (currently, video part 1 is still only in English, while parts 2 and 3 already have all languages available)

If you are also a creator and are familiar with the topic, please reach out to me!

Let´s speak about the paint job of our Helamite Queen!

The first video chapter will cover the initial airbrush work and the manual highlighting process, showcasing all the wonderful details of the nut carapace and the first subtle color variations.

The second chapter will begin with a rather unusual step for me: We will use the airbrush again to tint the whole surface. In the initial highlighting phase, we lost quite a bit of that wonderful saturation of the burnt umber ink. We are also maximizing the color variations, turning the monochrome, almost boring brown, into something that looks almost iridescent.

The third chapter will cover the fantastic facette eyes, the patterns, and the last finishing touches!

I am super proud of how the eyes have turned out! They really add an incredible level of detail to the model

I first thought I could work with a mesh, like a mosquito net or something similar, to use it as a stencil with the airbrush. But all the meshes that I had in the studio did not look good and were surprisingly large for the eye.

I scrapped that idea and hoped to find a solution in Nail-art supplies: Decals,stencils, gel printing stamps...

I found a woman doing her nails in a Honeycomb pattern using glitter... and I love the result.
So I ordered a multi-colored set of Hex-Glitter, the coolest thing is they glow in the dark!! Wahoooo

The set contained 12 boxes of glitter with 3 sizes of glitter mixed in each box.
In the nail video, she was using the medium sized glitter, but after testing it on the bugs eye, it did not work because of the curvature of the eye.

So the only (slightly insane) glitter solution was to use the smallest glitter particles and place them bit by bit, particle by particle.

I have used 3 colors of glitter: fluorescent yellow for the main highlight, dark green for the body of the eye, and a small line of magenta glitter particles as a small refracting light, similar to a classic GW gemstone.

In real life, the result is really mesmerizing, from maybe a foot away it almost seems like metallic paint.

If you go closer, your eye suddenly picks up the reflection and the shape of the separate glitter bits.