The final group shot

Here we go!  The last group picture.

A very interesting squad to paint, to say the least.

A very fun little project.  As I have mentioned before, painting 'neutral' white on anything is a massive rarity for me.

This makes a fair amount of White Scar marines that I have painted thus far.

Drivin' along...

Comin' right at you!

Along the way...

To create the setting for the 'Weathering and Battle damage' video, I had to carefully prepare another Secret Weapon APV so that I could show several aspects of that technique on one mini.  Many thanks to the good folks at Secret Weapon once again for allowing me to use such a great product!

I wanted to show how to do some of the physical effects, not just the painting.  So, I designed some plasticard armor skirts that would not only give more surfaces to paint, but much more to chop up with an exacto knife!

After doing some damage effects on those plasticard pieces, I did do a few little bits of chipping and cutting on the main resin vehicle.

Everything was set up pretty nicely, so then I had to paint the vehicle itself, so that I could spend as much time as possible on the effects.

These subsequent images will show the 'shaded basecoat' process.  Yes, I do that, even on vehicles :-)

That means, of course, working lighter than normal, with the plan of adding more darks via glazing.

This was just about the end of that phase.  It sure looked a lot different from the white and grey object I had seen for so long!

I added some more very bright highlights, and then started to plan out where the freehand would go.  That was an important thing I wanted to show with the weathering.  Having some weathering on top of freehand work makes both things look even more realistic.

The other idea was to do the weathering using a different set of materials on either side of the vehicle.  In other words, one side done with only paint, the other side with weathering powders!

Stay tuned for the next set of images that I shot of the freehand and the glazing process.  There were so many images from each part of this individual project, I had to break it up into several posts.

Those terrible terradons

With the new Lizard book and a batch of new Terradon/Rippers in hand (as well as some new totems for them to use as aeries), I resurrected the scratch building program of Terradons that was under way years ago.

The painted version on the left was the first completed sculpt.  I used a majority of Apoxy sculpt, with green stuff and brown stuff for details.

In these next few images, you see that I am just getting to that final detail phase.

Showing the underside of the sculpt...

From the side.  I will be adding many more details to the faces with green stuff, such as a tongue, teeth and some eyes.

This next batch never even got that far.  That is good news, since I have 3 sets of Terradon bits that I can use to complete them!  Heads, legs with rocks hanging from them... flaming bolas... you name it!

Here are some more views of the painted scratch sculpt.

I will probably use regular skinks again, but substitute the flaming bola arms for the javelin.

I loved the base on this one!  I think the subsequent bases will reflect the new terrain that I have been building.  I might even have some pieces of the top of a temple pyramid, etc.

These pictures of that first sculpt in its last stages shows you what is to come for the 3 WIP Terradons in progress.

At long last... last bike

Last of the bikes!

As I have mentioned before, the odd phenomena of getting the routine of these down pact just in time for the squad to be finished strikes again. :-)

With each bike, I was able to 'cut to the chase' more and more.  You really learn to break down each piece, no matter how small, and learn the best and most efficient way to reduce it.

Since I had never painted any sort of space marine bike at all, or hardly even seen a finished one in person, it was yet another challenge.

There have been lots of challenges over the last many months, and I have had to adapt and learn very new concepts on the fly day after day.  It has fried my brain a bit, since I managed to lose a half dozen things in the last 24 hours. 

They were all ultimately found, but it was driving me berserk!  Ask Cathy :-)

Lending a free hand...

Everybody's favorite... freehand cloaks!  Oh, and a shield, and some tattoos for good measure :-)

I tried to spend as much time as I could on all the 'preliminary' work, such as the design sketches and such things.

By the way, that is Greek for The Painting Pyramid.

Time to see what this will look like in color!

So, a color sketch to better work out the design, and plan ahead.

It is really handy to have a guide like this right next to the piece you will be working on.  Cathy gave me the idea for that!

Time to lay out the design on the cloak...

And the back as well.

Lettering!  My favorite, since I am a 'closet calligrapher'.  At least that is what I have been told.

The design quickly shaded...

And then placed on the base.

Don't forget the shield!

I got your back!

A box from Germany made the Taters think that a new spaceship had arrived.

Powdering one's nose...

I am pretty sure the one qualifies as the most 'exotic' of the videos.  Essentially, it is a very extreme version of painting with the weathering powders (these were Secret Weapon pigments).  I did this to show how far you could take them, even though most people will use them for something far more basic.

While you can simply 'dust' on the pigments like pastels, I discovered that you can actually 'paint' with them, due to the new Pigment Fixer developed by Secret Weapon.

This means that you can secure the powders quickly as you paint, and not have to spray between layers, etc.  That had been an impediment to me trying this sooner.

I painted the base as the first example.  Doing this reminded me of just how much I enjoyed painting bases with the powders.  I think I will be doing a LOT more of that in the future!

It is very tricky doing this on a miniature.  My primary thought was to use this technique on bigger figures, where it might be more difficult to blend colors, etc.

When you use rubbing alcohol to turn the powders into liquid paints, you can blend the colors on the figure, since they are not sealed yet.

That makes it a little like oil painting, except you have complete control over the drying process!

Again, this is not something for beginners, or even intermediate painters.

Still, for those that want to try this out, I think you will find some useful things that you can adapt to your painting style.