Wow. These are fantastic paint jobs. Like, really. Of a standard that I'd see in a White Dwarf.
Are you self taught or did you youtube video? In which case, which ones? I'm always looking for how to improve my skills.
This seriously isn't white dwarf stuff, but thanks a lot for compliment. And as for process, this is basically what I described on last two pages of blog:
Black vallejo primer, heavy drybrush of vallejo grey, light drybrush of vallejo pale sand. I am using make up brush.
I have been using this preshading method since I started watching Dana Howl's glazing videos. I actually bought glazing medium and tried it couple of times in past.
After that I just slap speedpaints on all surfaces I want matt (skin, clothes), correct mistakes by pale sand and apply speedpaint again. All surfaces I want to be metallic, I brush with vallejo platemail and apply speedpaint. On these last four, I added scratches of the same vallejo platemail.
As for improving, I basically painted around 120 soviets for Bolt action game, all with contrasts, so I gained some feeling of how those paints work and flow. Speedpaints are the same, but better (less splotches of pooled paint).
As for this specific side project, I recently saw Miniature Hobbyist's video where he uses method called "slap-chop", which is basically what Dana is doing and he uses contrasts on top. I wanted some distraction from lizards and as I have 5 kill teams still on sprue, I chose orks as he was painting them in (at that time) most recent video.