A fun little centaur from Chainmail

I discovered this guy the other day.  It's another one of those rare Chainmail miniatures.

What I enjoyed about this one is the sculpted transition from the torso to the horse body.  It was done relatively well, and that let me do some interesting things with the fleshtones.

Normally, there is some kind of belt or armor that completely slices the two apart from each other.  Here, even the hair blended nicely into the horse body.  It's a pretty dynamic pose for a centaur as well.

Painting the freehand designs was easy, since it was such a clean sculpt and cast.  It is always a bummer when I can't make freehand designs work due to a lack of detail and clean casting.

I don't get to do brown flesh tones very often at all, so this was very cool!

The last Grotesque finished!

OK!  The images of the last Grotesque for you.

As usual, when I get a method down pat for painting a particular kind of new miniature, it is at its peak on the last figure!  It would have been handy to know what I know now back when I painted the first one, but that's not quite how it goes. ;-)

In addition, this figure probably had the fewest F-Cast issues, which helped a lot!

As I mentioned in the previous post, I tried out a new material on this figure.  I was very pleased with the results.  There is one last figure related to this group, and that is the Haemunculous baby-sitter.  I will be using some of these techniques on that figure as well.

These top views give you a better look at the close combat weapons, as well as how the figure relates to the base...

I have some pictures of the squad coming as well, so stay tuned!

Experimenting with gloss mediums...

As I work my way through this Grotesque squad, I have been conducting all kinds of experiments in painting various blood effects.  It has evolved with each miniature.  

This current experiment involved a new gloss medium I had not tried before.  It was from Coat D'Arms.  I had won a set of Coat D'Arms years ago at Adepticon as prize support.

I was starting to run low on 'Ardcoat, so I wanted to see what I could do with this material.  Since I had the other Grotesques as a control comparison, I thought this would be a great time to experiment!

I used the same Vallejo Transparent red and Reaper blue liner color combo as I did on the previous Grotesque figure, but this time I added in the CDA gloss medium.

I was not sure what to expect.  It was much thinner than the 'Ardcoat.  However, it really worked well, and let me do some amazing things.  I didn't have to thin it down to do most of the blood effects, as I usually have to do with the 'Ardcoat.

I found that it was possible to get it thick enough to give that 'body' to the gore on the blade and claw, so it was a very good addition to the repertoire! 

My next experiment to be using regular Liquitex Acrylic gloss medium to see if I can create some extra thick effects, such as blood dripping from a blade, etc.

Here's a close up of the base for this final Grotesque.  Tomorrow I will post images of the finished mini, and some group shots, among other things!

You've got Chainmail...

I ran across a few old Chainmail figures that I painted back in the day.  I am pretty sure these have not been produced for some time.  These were made by the same folks that were making the D & D books, until they went to the pre-painted plastic figures.

I still have some unpainted Underdark figures.  Maybe someday!

Brunhilde joins her Sisters...

At long last, Brunhilde can join her Sisters!  She is part of the Special Edition Konigsmark sisters boxed set from Raging Heroes.

She has a few different options... sword, shield, etc., as do her sisters.

Lots of stuff going on with this mini!  Having those various options certainly is nice.

I figured the base should have the same design as the shield.

I have not painted Walter the dog yet, but here the girls are all together!

Looks like everybody wants to snuggle in the warmest blanket in the house!

Coming soon! Raging Heroes Kickstarter Previews

As you may already know, Raging Heroes is about to launch a new Kickstarter program.  The Toughest Girls in the Galaxy.  These are some preview images they have been posting on their website.

I certainly can't wait to see these!  You can check out the Kurgonavas on their website to see how these will look in reality...

Here's a little sneak preview of my own...

Ragnar Runecaster from Celtos

Here's one more vignette from Celtos.  The character is a dwarf named Ragnar Runecaster.  It was done with the same technique as the Cernunnos.  White sculpey was textured by pressing actual rocks into it prior to baking.

This allowed me to put one boulder on top of the other and build up the height of the formation.

I also sculpted the water texture with the sculpey.

Once it was baked and painted, I put some layers of gloss varnish over the water to give it some extra sparkle.

Some close ups of the mini...

I remember having lots of fun working with a whole range of blue/black colors on the raven the staff and the axe.