Dance the night away

Another fun Reaper Miniature.  This one was used for the Painting Dark Skin video for the Painting Pyramid series.

Painting this color of skin requires a lot of subtle transitions... making sure you balance warmer and cooler shades.  Also, a few higher saturation areas need to be added so that the skin color does not become too gray.

All in all, a very fun mini!

She is also here:

http://www.ebay.com/itm/321311366835?ssPageName=STRK:MESELX:IT&_trksid=p3984.m1555.l2649

Sometimes you just can't remember...

Well, there are those times when, even though you are staring the images straight in the face, you just can't recall when you painted a particular figure!

I know I painted this, but I have not been able to remember when.  Probably between 2008-2010.

I think it was a Sergeant figure that I did some conversions on... mostly involving the cloak.

I have also dug up some very interesting WIP images that have never been processed from long ago figures.  Those will be very fun!!!  Stay tuned!.

Fun with Freehand

Here's a new set of images of that Spartan Warrior from CMON that I used for the Freehand Cloaks bonus video for the Painting Pyramid.  Obviously, lots of great surfaces for freehand on this guy!!!

The Greek lettering actually says something... The Painting Pyramid!

I also had lots of fun with the base.  You can find him here now:

http://www.ebay.com/itm/321311356098?ssPageName=STRK:MESELX:IT&_trksid=p3984.m1558.l2649

Not at a snail's pace...

Yes, for a long time I have been promising you all images of the Warriors for the Nurgle Blood Bowl team.  So, pictures of the first one.  Each of them has a snail shell like this guy.

I looked up some images of snail shells, and also got a chance to see some real ones last Saturday, so that will be my reference!  More to come!

Little guy, Big Gun

Here's another Inquisitor from my old Demonhunters army.  Just like the previous piece, I sculpted the Psycannon out of sculpey.

Brown stuff for purity seals, a little plasticard, and ready for painting!

Here's the painted version!

The previous Inquisitor Lord was in terminator armor.  This was a regular Inquisitor that was part of a secondary retinue.

They did make great firebases back in the day... especially with the right retinue members.

Servo skulls!

My first Inquisitor

This will always be one of my favorite miniatures.  It was also one of the first elaborate conversions I had done.

It involved incorporating a Confrontation miniature with some Games Workshop bitz, and lots of little scratch built pieces.  The primary element was the psycannon that I made out of the grey sculpey, which is stronger and keeps an edge.

There was even a bit of plasticard and green stuff.  I used brown stuff on the purity seals so that they could have a more dramatic position... flowing in the breeze.

As you can see, this character had wracked up quite a few trophies!

And now for some color images of the painted piece.  This Inquisitor Lord eventually had an entire story written for him, as well as a few campaigns in which he was a central character.

As you can see, Slaneesh marines were the primary target of his wrath... and his trusty psycannon!

In his honor, I painted this at a Games Day.  It actually won an award for best artwork.  One of three awards (Stikki Wikkit also has one).

I think most of you have already seen all the finished retinue figures... but not these WIP images.  So, I have prepared a series of posts that will combine the finished and in progress photos!

Gathering the converts

OK, back to the first set of conversions I did that would serve as conscripts for the upcoming Imperial Guard army.  The original figures are Wargame Factory (corrected to Warlord Games)  Ancient Celts... or at least I think they are!

Obviously, I have added some actual GW I.G. bitz, such as the lasguns, grenades, and so on. The backpacks, however, are from Victoria Miniatures.

I used those on a set of regular GW guard a while back, and I thought they were fantastic.  When I had this project in mind, I figured they would just do the trick... making those Ancient Celts look a wee bit more like some raw recruits for the Guard.

Now that I have the Highland Moss Guard from Victoria, I won't have to add any more of these lads.  They will be nice to work into the whole mix, though. :-)

I think I will be going the striped pants look on them, which should be fun.  Also, plenty of tattoos and woad, which is an important element that will tie in the Sisters with the I.G. elements.

Interspersing some of these more primitive looking guys with the Highland Guard will make them look even more distinct from the 'regular' elements of the Guard force.

Can't wait to do a color test mini!

What I was saving it for...

Yea!  I finally got to use one of the Secret Weapon plinths for an actual miniature!

This is a Reaper special edition Sophie from 2010.  A very fun miniature to paint.

It fit just perfectly on the plinth.  Also, a nice counterbalance to the weight of the wings.

She is also here:

http://www.ebay.com/itm/321309022873?ssPageName=STRK:MESELX:IT&_trksid=p3984.m1558.l2649

The Swordsmen cometh...

I have been hammering away at the Greatswords for a while... doing all the 'grunt' work like painting the bases, movement tray, and the Shaded Basecoats.

Lately I have been doing some glazing across the unit as well.  Every so often, I just have to finish one completely to keep from going nuts :-)

So, one more joins the fray!  More to come...

A bit of practice here and there.

Back to the Reaper minis that were considered for some of the videos.  This one was a candidate for fur, since it was becoming very difficult to find any sort of critter that did not have a rider, or was not covered in armor.

I was also trying to stay away from much bigger miniatures as well.  This one had potential, since it had fur in a few different places.  I thought it could be a nice practical application for painting fur instructions.

The other reason for considering it was that I already had some here.  They were being saved for a Slaine Campaign.

Instead, it has served as a test for painting kilts on the Victoria Miniatures Highland Moss Guard!

He is also here:

http://www.ebay.com/itm/321308317804?ssPageName=STRK:MESELX:IT&_trksid=p3984.m1558.l2649

Blade Dancer

Here's another fun Reaper miniature... and yet another candidate for the skin color videos.  On this version, I was balancing the reflected color of the turquoise costume against the fairer skin colors.  That meant incorporating that shade with the skin colors as I was mixing them.

It was more challenging to do so without the skin color becoming too gray or dull.  I did add some elements of much warmer skin colors, using the Transparent red color in key spots.

Using the warm reds for the marble and the reddish brown hair meant that such brighter red skin tones would not be too out of place.  Also, I wanted the costume to be semi-transparent, so a bit of that grayed down skin tone could be used in the deepest folds of the outfit.

This allowed me to integrate those opposing colors even more.

Again, a fun little exercise!

She is also here:

http://www.ebay.com/itm/321307863536?ssPageName=STRK:MESELX:IT&_trksid=p3984.m1558.l2649