WIP: Vampirella Skin Redaux

Hope you all had a Merry Christmas! I promised shades and glazes, right? I may have blown through those without any pictures. Apologies. When I get in a paint related funk I sometimes paint my way out, but forget the pictures because I'm just free-styling. The good news is you can see the secret of how I averted disaster and therefore the destruction of this lady o_O Yes. I came so very close to smashing the crap out of her in frustration, but I reigned it in and boy am I glad!

Future Projects

After the debacle with Vampirella's skin (which I may or may not still be bitter about) I needed a break. So let's look at a few future projects and purchases I have made to calm my jangled nerves. Above you can see what will eventually be my take on Veteran Sergeant Pausanius from the Ultramarines novels. Let's see what other crazy things I have in mind...

WIP: Vampirella - Blocking in the colors

Had trouble priming her and the air brushing of her skin was too subtle to show in pics so it looks like the primer coat did. Yay. This one is frustrating me. It'll be mainly pics of colors and the mini for this post...

WIP: More Vampirella Prep

Trying a new way to stain bases for Vampirella. Turned out nice. And yes, I am still prepping the big lady. This is a daunting scale to work in...

WIP: Large Scale Anime Style Vampirella

So this is a new genre for me. Large scale anime kit. I was taking part in a friendly online Halloween contest on C'MON. Much like Sleeping Chibi this was a good way to stretch my skills...

On Display: 2nd War For Armageddon

That was a fun little project! More pics and some voting links then?

WIP: RT era Mini Exchange

Last time we saw these guys they had been base coated and had decals applied. now it's time to make them look better, or worse...

On Display: Giant Squig

Voting links at the bottom for C'MON, WAMP and P&P... Now more pictures!

WIP: Shipping The Giant Squig

 So the Squig and base are done. Now we have to protect him during his travels...

WIP: Resin & Squig Shading

What?! Is that clear resin there to add bling to the base? Hell yeah! How about a few more angles...

WIP: Shading The Giant Squig Cave

Armed with a small pallet of colors and some big brushes I got to work shading my previous layers of airbrushed basecoats...

WIP: Airbrushing Various Display Bases

With the building process well behind me and a few quick confidence building paint jobs under my belt to warm up it was time to get busy painting...

On Display: Aurora Chapter Space Marine

He was a fun and fast little test. If you would like to own him there will be an eBay link at the end of this post for the auction :)

Teachable Moments: The 90 Minute Marine

90min Marine?! Yes really. What are you some kind of acolyte to The Lady Inquisitor? Lower that damned eyebrow! This whole mini was assembled and painted in 90 minutes - excluding the overnight drying of the primer - what? I like to sleep.

Teachable Moments: Climbing The Painting Pyramid

Not everything we try in life is a success. Above is my first attempt at trying out a new technique. It didn't end well. I kept at it though and things got better with each try. Let's explore a brief review of James Wappel's Painting Pyramid DVDs and my adventures with the shaded basecoat technique...

WIP: Display Bases - Final Details & Priming

Good news, this is the last basing post for a while and the painting will commence soon :) Above is the completed giant squig display base. After the break we'll take a look at the details more closely...

WIP: Display Bases - Details Part 2

So those twigs and rock and roots from last post? Added. Let take a closer look that the bone litter in the cave...

WIP: Display Bases - Ground Work Part 1

First we should protect those nicely stained bases then start building up the details...

WIP: Display Bases & Another Giveaway! PLUS, NOCF UPDATES ALL WEEK!!!!

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3 DAYS LEFT! GET THOSE RAFFLE TICKETS AND YOU COULD WIN THIS BEAUTIFUL ARMY!!!

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!!!NOCF UPDATE WEDNESDAY AUG 27:

4 DAYS LEFT! GET THOSE RAFFLE TICKETS!!!

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6 DAYS TO ARMY RAFFLE DRAWINGS! BUY YOUR TICKETS NOW FOR A CHANCE TO WIN THE FULLY PAINTED ARMIES PICTURED HERE:

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THEY WILL SHIP THEM TO ANYWHERE IN THE WORLD AND YOU DO NOT HAVE TO BE THERE IN PERSON TO WIN!!!

!!! NOCF UPDATE, SUNDAY AUG 24: 

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THEY WILL SHIP THEM TO ANYWHERE IN THE WORLD TOO!!!

Okay time to play with some wood! Hmm.. again I think I may have lost some readers with that opening statement o_O

On Display: NOCF Ultramarines Sniper Scouts

More pretty pics! These guys and other great minis are up for grabs by purchasing your raffle tickets for the NOCF Charity armies here. Support a great cause and win a well painted, ready to play army too!!!

On Display: NOCF Ultramarines Scouts

Lots of pretty pictures ahead. Keep in mind these and other great minis are up for grabs by purchasing your raffle tickets for the NOCF Charity armies here. Support a great cause and maybe win a well painted, ready to play army too!!!

On Display: NOCF Torias Telion & Ultramarines Scouts

The Eye Of Vengeance. Sounds cool, but he stole it from The Lady Inquisitor. That's the look I get when I say something dumb - What?! I don't get it that often! ~sigh~ Onto the pics...

NOCF WIP: Assembly & Basing

Tools of the trade for pinning minis to resin bases pictured above. Scouts on bases below...

NOCF WIP: Scouts - Chipping & Streaking

Now I can't stress this enough: Always test weathering techniques on a spare mini or something else before putting them onto well painted minis. Also, less is always more. Above you can see my tests for chipping with various sponge mediums. After the break: streaks o_O I feel like I may have just lost some squeamish readers...

WIP: Giant Squig and Dwarves - Airbrushing the basic tones

Every one starts with a different base tone and then we see what happens...

WIP: Squig & Dwarves - Prep

Man do I need a break from scouts, scouts and more scouts. Too help keep me in a painting mood I decided to start work on the Squig and dwarves from last post. I started with some very bad sketches of what I want each too be based with...

WIP: Helion Rain - Scout Basecoats & More Future Projects

Time to start laying down the mid tones. Colors for picture above after the break...

WIP: Helion Rain - Colors & Painting Begins!

Ready for painting with a sloppy two toned priming! Now let's see what colors we should use...

WIP: Helion Rain - Prepping The Minis & Setting The Scene

Time to prep the minis for that lovely base from last week. Into the drink for a bit and then some ultra sonic bath time for the eBay lictor :) While that goes on I'll prep the scouts...

WIP: Helion Rain - Laying the foundation

Inspiration is great, but progress is better. The picture frame above needs a solid base for the minis to anchor, but it can't be too heavy. Foam isn't a very tough anchor though is it...

Inspiration & upcoming projects

We all like to blue sky ideas for minis and such. It's a huge part of our hobby - the creative part. Thought I would share the beginnings of a few future projects with you. Above you can see the start of such a project inspired by the audio drama Helion Rain and a box of scouts I got from a guy named HotPanda. Let's see how this develops (or snowballs out of control)...

On Display: Speed Painted Dwarf & Liebster Awards

 So this is the other mini I painted with washes. Where the Night Goblin was done in just around an hour this guy was done in about 20 minutes. I just wanted to see how fast a decent mini could be done just for fun. Not bad. The NMM is a bit sloppy, but hey - 20 MINUTES?! Not bad at all...

On Display: Night Goblin & NOCF BREAKING NEWS!!!

Just some display pics of the mini from the video tutorial. I think he turned out quite well for a mini painted in under an hour with basically only the Secret Weapon Washes. I particularly like the stone, wood, leather, ropes and skin...

Video: Painting with Secret Weapon Washes

A while ago someone commented that they would like to see how a mini painted with the Secret Weapon washes would turn out. I thought that would be a fun exercise and decide to make it into a video...

On Display: Project Alice

Done and done! This was a really fun project form the base work and limited palette all the way through to the stenciling and blood effects.  Enjoy the display pics below...

WIP: Project Alice - Final Details

Welcome back! I went ahead and did all the fiddly touch ups and tweaks on Alice so that she was ready for her base.  So there she is above, ready for a stroll in the desert...

WIP: Project Alice - Guns N' Hair

Okay, we are close to done! This SBS will be shorter than the last one, promise.  Base coat her hair with a 1:1 mix of the colors above and then will get into highlights after the jump...

WIP: Project Alice - Boots, Scarf & Tights

Hey! Back for more, huh? Okay, let's tackle her boots and trendy cut off gloves ;) Base coat above, more after the break...

WIP: Project Alice - Skin & Coat

Welcome back. Similar to how I painted the base I will paint Alice starting from some of the areas "under" everything else. So I start with the eyes and then begin to base coat the skin with the color above. The skin was all wet blending so very thin paint and LOTS of layers with back and forth, but I'll lay out the basic colors and progression below. Let's see where this goes...

WIP: Project Alice - Base ***UPDATE: First eBay Item***

On this project I am knocking out the base first and the mini second. Then I will tie them together with some dry pigments. Let's tackle this base. Above is the base coat, after the jump some shading...

On Display: Stabby Dark Vengeance Cultists

Well, Spring is finally here! And you know what that means... Apparently it means it's time for display pictures of the rest of the chaos cultists from the Dark Vengeance box o_O  Weird....

On Display: Dark Vengeance Shooty Cultists

After watching The Agent Of Chaos & The Lady Inquisitor suffer through the stomach flu for five days it was finally my turn on Wednesday. Forgive my brevity here as I am still somewhat gun shy of diarrhea - even if it is only the verbal kind ;)  Pictures then? Yes...

WIP: Project Alice - Prepping & Priming

I'll be brief on this one as the stomach flu has finally made it's way into our house this winter...don't barf, don't barf, don't barf... Above is Alice from Tale of War and a little base I knocked out with the citadel basing kit, a 1"x1" block from Micheals and a piece of slate. Let's follow the rabbit down the rabbit hole shall we? Sorry. Wrong Alice...

On Display: Dark vengeance Cultist Leaders & Heavy Weapons

So there was a bit of frosting when I sprayed these guys :(  Some day I'll go back and fix that with some gloss and some flat. For now though, they are good enough for table top level minis. More pictures...

Dark Vengeance Cultists WIP: Final Details.

This'll be a short one as I'm a bit under the weather still. I finished up each of the heavy weapon to make me feel like I was getting somewhere. This one was beginning to drag a  bit for me...

WIP: Dark Vengeance Cultists - Shading and highlights

Okay, so we left off here last week. A brief review of the Secret Weapon Washes: They are very interesting. Somewhere between a GW type wash and a Vallejo ink. You could paint with them if you so desired. Shake well and get some glass or ceramic beads for agitators as the pigments do tend to settle out quite  a bit. Let's see them in action...

WIP: Dark Vengeance Cultists - Basecoats & Highlights

What the hell?! 40k on my blog again?! Weird. Remember when I converted up the duplicate models in these guys way back in the sands of time? Me neither. Let's finally put some paint on them shall we...

On Display: Sleeping Chibi

All done! Let us NEVER speak of dioramas or OSL again - until the next one o_O Taking nice photos of this one was a real pain. For the wide shots I had to under expose them to make sure the orange OSL wasn't washed out. I think I added three layers of wax paper to the sides of my photo tent to diffuse the light enough to get there too. Then, when I went in for the close up details I had to add more light from different angles so everything would register, but not get washed out!!! It was a "challenge" and let's leave it at that -_- ONTO THE PRETTY PICTURES...

WIP: Sleeping Chibi Final Details

Final WIP post on this one! Above you can see my marking for positioning the knight. Took a few tries, but eventually found the right distance. Using a bright color to mark where to drill on the pins in his feet ensures accuracy and easy touch ups later! Let's look how it all finally came together...

On Display: Rackham Fianna

Here she is all done and pretty (trying like hell not to pee herself)! I had something to say, but let's just look at the pretty pictures, eh?