Confronting the Warp

While most of the figures I have been painting lately have been brand new Song of Ice and Fire minis, I still work on figures that have a much longer past.  This was certainly the case on the Confrontation minis!

This set goes back a long way... possibly 15-16 years ago.  What is interesting is the idea that in some ways, this style of sculpting did pave the way eventually to the kind of flowing, dynamic poses and sculpts that we see now.

I recall back in the day that Fimo was used a great deal in the sculpting process to create more intricate details that were not very common at the time.

Digital sculpting these days can allow for much more detail, but sometimes that alone is not enough.  It seems to be easier to get a more static looking figure than when you worked with physical materials.  When the priority is the tiny details, and the main pose is not the focus, a stiffer pose can happen.

Anyway, these guys were interesting, even if they were long in the tooth!

Hammer & Sickle

This very old hunk of metal really took me back to the early days of our painting experience.I remember when I first saw the old Confrontation figures, and noticed how different they were sculpted from everything else at that time.

I think the next transition which was that noticeable was the ZBrush phenomenon a few years back.  You can tell when something has been digitally sculpted quite easily, just by the flow of the lines, and how most organic surfaces are rendered.  I remember how intricate these Confrontation minis were when they first hit the scene.

There were many more details on those figures than you had typically seen on sculpts of that 2001-2003 period.  Now with the digital sculpting, it is commonplace. 

These solid metal figures are certainly a lot heavier than the resin and plastic figures you will see today.  It is so strange to think that metal figures are the least common materials nowadays!

Charging on with Oils!

You have heard me talking about the advantages of using oils, mostly in terms of working on very large amounts of figures all at once.  There are also some minor things, such as being able to get paint into very hard to reach areas... even blending it.

This figure brought to mind another way oils can be helpful.  As an old time Confrontation figure made of solid metal, it is very heavy.  By using oils to paint it, I had to "handle" it much less, since the colors are blended right on the surface of the figure.

Had I painted this with acrylics, I would have been working much harder on the skin blends, and even the sword blade.  Doing those blends with oils requires far fewer brush strokes, thus less holding onto the figure.  

Not only was the figure really heavy, it was on one foot!  Again, being able to use larger brushes and blending on the surface was a huge advantage.  To give you an idea of size, the base was at least 50mm.

Warp Your Mind with Oils!

We are on our way to Reapercon!  Or, by the time this is posted, we might be there already.

Once Fort Wappel is all set up, I look forward to doing hours of painting demos, and one medium I want to show off is oils!

They have proven to be so useful, especially when working on large amounts of figures all at once.  I am hoping to be able to demonstrate how you can still blend the paint on the surface of the figure, even hours after it has been first applied.

I will also show how to glaze over wet oils... yeah, you heard that right!  It was something that I have tried to show during the last few videos for the Patreon Page.  While it sounds crazy, it does not work all that differently than if you were glazing acrylics.

However, you have a much easier time feathering out the edges of the glazes.  Also, this will work just fine over dry oil paint as well.  In effect, you can "buff out" the edges of a glaze or a set of new brush strokes over the dry oil paint.

So be sure to head on over to Fort Wappel while you are there and paint along with us!

Some of the latest painting videos are on the Patreon page, available at the $5, $10 and $15 levels!

www.patreon.com/JamesWappel

Ogres Painted with Oils!

The oil paints have proven to be incredibly useful for so many projects in the last few years... and not just painting vehicles.  I have used them on everything, including terrain!

I have discussed the reasons why I have been using them so much... mostly because they make mass-painting projects easier for me.  Since I am painting dozens, if not hundreds of figures all at once, it is very easy to line up enough figures that have a similar set of colors.

Using that extended drying time, I am able to work wet into wet simultaneously on all these figures, which also helps to keep those colors as close to matching as possible!

You can also be more adventurous in your color choices, as you can manipulate them on the surface of the figure itself more easily.  Here's one of several Facebook live sessions that I did:

https://www.facebook.com/james.wappel/videos/vb.1056181987/10211515280171740/?type=2&video_source=user_video_tab

I will be posting several hours worth of oil painting tutorials to the Patreon Page as the month draws to a close.  There are a few different pledge levels for options, including the basic $5 pledge:

www.patreon.com/JamesWappel

Wild Ride

These centaurs from Confrontation are a reprise of some that I painted many years ago.  Just like the original batch, the 'tusks' had to turned into beards, which was a reminder of how much I liked sculpting!!

So, I am hoping at some point to try and do some sculpting videos for the patreon page, utilizing a number of different materials.  Sculpey, Apoxy sculpt, Brown Stuff and Green stuff are all on that list!

Some of those old sculpts have been pretty gigantic, like this Mastadon... probably my biggest scratch sculpt:

http://wappellious.blogspot.com/2012/12/scratch-sculpted-mastadon-for-celtos.html

A Bull By the Horns

It had been a very long time since I had done this much of a patina on a figure, so I had lots of fun on this guy!

I used the Secret Weapon Weathering paints for all of this figure... the bull, the axe, the armor, and so on.  They are very flexible, as you can go with a lot of glazing, and yet still use them in an opaque manner.

That element of glazing was very key, as most of the detail areas like the filigree were sculpted into the armor.  This meant that the patina would sink down into those areas, and look very natural!

I have used the Secret Weapon paints on a number of my live sessions... everything from tanks to beastmen to Dark Sword figures.

https://www.facebook.com/james.wappel/videos/vb.1056181987/10212119155668250/?type=2&video_source=user_video_tab

This Ain't no Bull

I think this might be my favorite of the old Confrontation minis.  This is a massive hunk of metal, but I love the pose!  The only other figures I can think of that I enjoyed this much would be the mounted characters (possibly the Lions of Alahan?).

This one was painted entirely in acrylics, while others have been done in oils.  While there were many practical reasons I used these mediums on different figures, I also wanted to show folks that figures painted with oils or acrylics (entirely, that is) look exactly the same.

I thought of this after a few queries and replies to some of my oil painting posts, where folks have said that the figures look different.  However, this was due to an entirely different photo setup rather than any difference of medium.  One batch of oil painted stuff was shot in a massive group shot, while most tend to be individual set ups like this figure.

We are in the early stages of Adepticon right now, so fatigue is already setting in.   It's been no stop prep for this convention for months, and it only accelerated as the date drew nearer and parameters seemed to change by the hour!

Slightly Mad

Back to the old Confrontation figures and some reminiscing about how different the sculpts and even the poses were at the time.

13-15 years ago, you didn't see the kinds of whimsical poses which became one of the trademarks of the line.

Even things that were supposed to be more aggressive or brutish (including goblins and orcs) were given this kind of pose.  Until then, most of the poses were very hulking and static.  This figure is actually ogre sized, on a 30mm base.

The Evil Twin

Into the way back machine to check out some more Confrontation minis!

I never realized that they did several sets of figures which showed a "normal" and "warped" side.  That became an interesting challenge to keep the two sides as close as possible, but still denote the 'changes'!

The shapes of the weapons were very unique, but still quite nice to execute some NMM... normally very odd shapes for weapons means having to mess around and fudge with the rendering, but not this time!

In other news, the next painting video link has been sent to all the $5 and above subscribers.  This is all about painting Lave Bases!  Among other things, it looks like March will be Basing Month on the Patreon page! :-)

I will be doing a live session on working with the Green Stuff World texture rollers late tonight, which will be fun!

Well Armed

The classic Confrontation figures continue with this  "Ogre" sized version.  This was a fairly large infantry style figure for that time period, and like many other miniatures from that line, the approach to posing and sculpting was quite different.

In 2002/2003, larger figures tended to be bulkier, mostly hunched over or with a stance that was more spread out.  I remember when I first saw these, and how the use of the Fimo material for sculpting had changed how you could approach a larger figure.

It was fun to get the chance to paint one of these at last!

At last!

I remember seeing this figure posted to various painting sites way back in 2003... part of the Rackham craze that had a major effect on sculpting and painting.

While today's big change in sculpting is ZBrush, at this time using additional materials that were not green stuff for sculpting was not very common.  I believe that Fimo was also used, which probably led to lots of exploding originals during vulcanization.

Having done a lot of stuff with sculpey, I know that you can get really fine details with it... and it can even be carved and sanded after the fact.

I believe that I used some Fimo as I was sculpting this giant Mastadon:

http://wappellious.blogspot.com/2012/12/scratch-sculpted-mastadon-for-celtos.html

It was very fun to get a chance to work on this figure myself, as I can still remember some of those pictures that I saw posted in the days of painting forums.  Almost past living memory! :-)