I just recently started into the the game by buying some shock troops and a basilisk. I didn't really care for the basic Cadian 8th green-scheme, so I decided to adapt one of the schemes from the codex and make my own.
My scheme is based loosely off of the Cadian 122nd - Battle of Vogen, M41. My favorite number is 111 and one of my favorite colors is a subdued blue. So I am presenting my test model (and first paint job):

Cadian 111th, A.K.A. - The Twilight Guard
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v388/ozdragonfyre/FrontResized.jpg
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v388/ozdragonfyre/BackResized.jpg
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v388/ozdragonfyre/RightResized.jpg
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v388/ozdragonfyre/LeftResized.jpg




Again, as the title says, I would love to get some constructive criticism on this scheme. Being that it's my first painting, I am fairly pleased, though there are some spots I really want to touch up. Some of my highlights are too light, I blotched paint in a couple areas (like on the left fingers), I over inked the shadows on the clothing a bit, and a few other things. Anyway, I'd like to hear what you all think.

Dear All Concerned,

Well Ozmer, color scheme looks fantastic! I only have one gripe. The armour looks very cool, black with blue outline, but I would suggest going over the cloth with the blue you are using, and then do a few highlight in the lighter color. This will cover the bit of black that is showing through the blue cloth!


Other than that, looks great!

-ythc

They look really good. The only thing I see is your highlights look too "painted on". Try drybrushing them lightly to try to blend them in better.

Overall they look nice.

Thanks for the quick replies. I've been so busy since posting that this was my first time to come in and check the responses.

The highlights were one of my major concerns as well. Not only do they look painted on, they seem a bit bright for my liking. So I'll probably remix some a dash darker and try to paint over the highlights, especially the bottom of the jacket and the sleeves.

Too, while it looks like there is black primer showing through it's actually something I did accidentally - I had given it two coats of shadow grey over the primer as a base coat and had entirely covered it, which looked too bright, so I washed it with some black and rather than making shadows it made it look like I didn't cover the primer. For the rest of them I still plan on doing this, but thinning out the wash a bit more and adding a dash of the shadow grey into it to make it look closer to the original color rather than a primer color.

Any other suggestions?

they look pretty good! perhaps a few lighter highlights, but other than that, nice :)

It looks good. You've managed to do the face look really good and the colours picked are great, a bit biased as I have this thing for black armies (AIK:D)
There is really only two things I'd like to comment as in how to improve at the moment.

The first is the model it self. When you put such an effort in on painting the models it's well worth it to be a bit more careful when assembling them. When you take the pieces from the sprue you should take some time to clean them from moldlines (like on his legs) and sprue leftovers (like on the ammothingie on the las gun). If you just rush an army forth it doesn't really matter, but you seem to spend quite some time painting and then it's really important.

The second is how black he is. I know he is supposed to be black, but when everything is black it might look a bit to uniform (hi hi). I think he'd look even better if you painted his belt and such in brown. That'd make him look more...complete.

Oh, and welcome aboard :)

Nice for first time!
Tip: When it comes to IG (or other armies with lots of troops) it's the overall apperance that matters, so don't spend hours painting every single guardsman to GD-standard (unless you have lots of time to do so...).

Nice work! I wouldn't second guess myself on the highlight shade. What looks too bright held 4 inches from your face will be great on the table. You may even find yourself going back and lightly drybrushing an even lighter shade to give them more contrast at table height. Could also try painting some gloss varnish onto the armor plates to set them off from the cloth.

What's your plan for bases?

ooh I like the gloss idea Affe. Too, for bases I am probably going to go pretty simple - a dark sand with touches of flock. I am going to have a 10 man squad of ratling snipers as an elite as well, they will probably be mostly flock, dark green.

I was thinking too of completing the 'twilight guard' theme by putting a star inside the structure of the army badges. I'll probably try and make a tiny stencil for it. But I figured I'd get a few models under my belt before worrying about army badges and unit numbers