Saturday, December 27, 2014

The progress... it progresses...


Quick update before I head off to bed. Haven't gotten the new photo set up ready yet, but I plan to before New Year's.
  • Scarecrow is progressing along nicely. Finished up the Trousers and did some touch up on his shirt... mainly to clean up some of the shadows. I also gave the base it's initial coat and is now ready for drybrushing. I plan to use gray rather than brown to give the appearance of fallow earth and should work nice with my Wasteland Tufts from Army Painter.
  • Viktor got some metallic paint added, but not much more than that. His replacement arm showed up Wednesday along with a bunch of 40mm lipped bases.
  • Far right you will another Wargames Factory Viking. I'm painting him up for use with Saga and will attempt to give him a really nice high end paint job.
Going to be prepping a half giant model this weekend.

Sunday, December 21, 2014

Pre Holidays Painting Extravaganza...


Only a few more days until my new photography rig shows up. Eager to see how using a proper set up will affect things. Once that is all set up, I'll be posting fancy versions of all the finished stuff from 2014... including Hellakin as I just wrapped him up this evening. He's been on the table for about four months now getting all the left over paint and any time I had while stuff dried... so kind of a momentous occasion.

Pictured above are the Pathfinder Scarecrow who is nearing the half way point, Viktor Pendrak who is eeking into the 65% done zone, and a Bones Rat which is about at 75% (they are pretty easy to paint once you have a process down).

Spent a fair chunk of Saturday on the Scarecrow's shirt as there is about 8 layers and glazes in that thing. I also added a glaze of Bugman's Glow to the stitched areas on the arm to kinda give them an swollen and infected look. Can't really see it in the photo, but it does give them a little more definition.

Viktor has had his armor and flesh finished. I don't paint the eyes on this model as they barely visible behind the glasses. Next up on him is to finish his boots and start on the critter head.

Rat #2 has had the basic dark basecoat and the first round of drybrushing on him. He'll get a couple more rounds of drybrushing, a quick glaze and then I'll pick out the details. Again, gonna say how great Reaper's Bones are for padding out your monsters and encounters, but not so much for Player Characters or any sort of Boss model.

Monday, December 15, 2014

Some progress is better than no progress at all I guess...


Things have sort of slowed down a bit since the Thanksgiving holidays due to a hectic work schedule and a lot of other varying sorts of "time thiefs". Right now, my workbench consists of the Pathfinder Scarecrow Flesh Golem, Viktor Pendrake, and Hellakin Goregutter (kind of an odd name for halfling).

The Scarecrow is in the early stages although I've gotten his arm and torso almost done. Holding off on adding fine details until I get the shirt painted as I'm sure I'll end up doing a touch up or two. Have to admit, I am not a fan of the pose... profile type poses are the worst to paint and to photograph.

Viktor is a little further along than the last time you saw him. The flesh on the face is done as is the black armor. I did notice that I was wrong in assuming is books were in holsters... they are in pockets in his overcoat. So, I will be painting those before I progress any further. ou can also see I've started to undercoat the gold areas with brown. Much happier with this version of Viktor than the previous version.

Hellakin is one of my Bones miniatures I bought on Ebay earlier in the year. The model isn't too far off from the metal version although there is some funkiness with the hair and face. Thus far, Hellakin has been my paint bitch for the last couple of months... he gets painted with left over colors from various other models... the browns are from the Half Orc's leathers, the flesh left over from Viktor, I think the green was from a pirate model I started in October. It's a nice way for paint to not go to waste and for you to get another model painted at the same time. I have to admit I'm rather pleased with him... not something I'd sell on eBay, but definitely a model worthy to be used as a PC or NPC. As always, I advise using a the Foundry Painting Style or "layering" for these as washing and glazing don't always work well with the casting of Bones models.

Tuesday, December 2, 2014

Half Orc is done and I can't seem to take a decent photo of him...

Gonna set up the fancy photography set-up out this weekend so I can snap a decent photo. The camera on my phone does in a pinch though for WIPs most of the time.

The big difference between this photo and the last is the addition of metallics. I kept it simple, Boltgun Metal was used on the blades while Vallejo Old Gold was used on his "loot". The gold was shaded using Golden Burnt Umber applied in two thin washes while the Boltgun Metal was shaded with Nuln Oil. The gold was higlighted by adding small amounts of Folk Art Pearl White to the Vallejo Gold. I didn't highlight all the way to silver as that would have been too shiny and out of place on the model. The Boltgun Metal was highlighted with Folk Art Silver and then an additional wash of Vallejo Rust gave the blades a weathered look.

You might also notice the crazy amount of leather and hides on this guy. I used five different browns for the various leathers and Rakarth Flesh for the exposed hides. These contrast very nicely with the reddish fleshtone but don't clash with it. My rule of thumb, if it has a sort of warm glow you are on the right track.