Figuring out how to paint the House Clegane heraldry

One challenge facing me as I attempt to paint Game of Throne's Ser Gregor Clegane is to find a way to paint the House Clegane heraldry in miniature form. With that in mind, I sought inspiration from three main sources - a vector design of the official heraldry, a picture of Ser Gregor on HBO Watch and an actual miniature painting by Jen Haley which was done for Dark Sword Miniatures.

House Clegane heraldry by Thomas Gately of liquidsouldesign

A vector design of the House Clegane heraldry by Thomas Gately of liquidsouldesign gave me some insight on how the official heraldry design looks. While the complicated looking design could be painted on the larger 1/28th scale Nocturna Models Crusader XIII C miniature model, it would be significantly more difficult to do so on the smaller 28-mm scale Bretonnian Knight. Luckily, I managed to find a much simpler design on HBO Watch which meant that the House Clegane heraldry can still be successfully painted on the smaller scale of 12mm by 15mm. 

Ser Gregor Clegane as depicted in HBO Watch

Meanwhile, a painter I have always admired - Jen Haley - had also done a fantastic version of the House Clegane heraldry on a miniature she painted for Dark Sword Miniatures. I noticed that due to the shape of the shield, Jen Haley's painted hounds became gradually smaller towards the bottom. This is something I also experienced when practising to draw and paint the House Clegane heraldry.  

As painted by Jen Haley for Dark Sword Miniatures

So using all three designs as a foundation to work from, I settled upon an amalgamation of sorts of all three designs to come up with what worked best for me based on my style of painting. Below are pictures of  some doodles and test paint jobs of the House Clegane heraldry that I did to instill some muscle memory into my hands before I attempted the real thing on the warhorse.

Repeated drawings and paintings of House Clegane heraldry to instill muscle memory

How to paint the House Clegane heraldry ala FourEyedMonster's noob friendly technique

As for progress on my Game of Thrones project, I have managed to finish painting most of the Clegane warhorse so the canvas is set for the freehand heraldry paintings. Hopefully, I have properly prepared myself to do a good job and not mess up the work I have done on the warhorse until now.

Warhorse awaiting freehand painting of House Clegane's heraldry

Getting practice on blending a smooth transition of colours for the yellow cloth

Up next will be the warhorse complete with freehand heraldry designs. Till then stay well and happy.