Wash the blues away: Finishing the Dragonforge bases

You know what time it is!  Yes, time for glazing!

Here is an image of the bases as they were set up for this stage.  As usual with the shaded basecoat, I have gone lighter than normal, so that I can do the rest by shading darker.

For the metal sections, I used a blue.black glaze.  My first layers were more watered down.  Subsequent layers were more pure glaze, and much darker.

Now it is time for the stones.  I have a few colors out on the palette: a black, a green, a sepia, and a brown.  The idea is to alter my glaze colors in the same way as I did the original colors.

Here's a close up of the palette.  I also have a few batches of watered down glaze.  This is very helpful for doing those initial layers of lighter glaze.  Again, it is very important to think of this as more of a watercolor technique.  Shade lighter at first, since you can always go darker!  All it will take is a few more layers.

It is much faster to apply these transparent colors, as opposed to the same number of opaque layers.

Here is another trick I like to use on rough surfaces such as this.  See the paper towel on the left?  Yes, dabbing away the extra glaze works very well for creating interesting textures.

Here is an image that shows the completed glazes.

Now it is time to get some rust action on the metal sections.  On the left part of the image, I set down a blob of Calthan brown.  The foundation paints have an interesting quality when you water them down.  It tends to break down the paint, instead of thinning it.  This is very useful when you want to create some random looking washes.

In this image, you can see that I have applied the first layer of "rust glaze".  I focused on the crevices, as that is where the rust would occur most frequently.

I did the same for all of the bases.

I added some lighter layers of this rust by adding some orange to the Calthan Brown.  It was watered down again, so that it would sink into the recesses.

Here is where I left it off.  There are some more details I will add on once the miniatures are added.

I hope this little 'how to' was useful!!

Using the shaded basecoat to paint your sci fi bases

You saw me use the shaded basecoat technique a few days ago to paint the Groundwerks Mayan theme bases, so I thought I would do the same for some sci-fi bases from Dragonforge!

Here is a set of 40mm Dragonforge... very neat!  First, I brushed on some black primer.

I began with a little Vallejo German grey.  This looks like drybrushing, but it is a bit more 'controlled' than that.

I added some Vallejo intermediate blue (a blue/grey), and continued to do the controlled drybrushing.

I continued to work up to the lightest blue/grey...

Then I added some Vallejo pale green, and continued.  The idea is to set up my darker glazes, which will be more blue/black.

Then it was time for the non metal sections.  I started out with an olive green, mixed with some of the blue/grey.

Then I used a terracotta color for some variety...

Finally, a tan was used to complete the initial colors of the stones.

I mixed some pale flesh in with those 3 darker colors to lighten them.  Again, the whole idea is to set up the later glazes!

More lightening with the controlled drybrush...

So, everything is set for those glazes!  Stay tuned for the next exciting episode!!!

Goram the Dead from Stonehaven Miniatures

We have one more Dwarf from the Stonehaven kickstarter!

This is Goram the Dead.  In life, Goram had no desire to fight.  In death, he has more than one motivation.

First, he is bound to protect his master.  When his master is not around, he may get confused and choose a temporary master.  Second, he feels an insatiable hunger for carnage and gore.  Insatiable, but not irresistible!

More fun from Raging Heroes: Mantis demonette finished!

Here we have the finished result from my flesh tone test.  As I mentioned before, this was a test figure for one of my non-human flesh tone painting DVD's.

I will try one or two more of these tests, so that I get just the right figure for the DVD!

The base is a design that I created for Coolminiornot.  It is part of the Groundwerks series.

Mantis demonette from Raging Heroes: a step by step fleshtone

While I try to work out all the technical snags of the painting DVD kickstarter, I decided to go ahead with something I have more control of... painting!

This is actually a practice piece for a multi-part set of non-human flesh tone DVD's. The figure is from the Raging Heroes line.  A similar figure to this will be used to create the actual DVD.

I started this out by mixing a bit of pink with a greyish white for the flesh.  The claws and lower legs were painted with the pink and Reaper ash brown.

More of the pink is mixed in with the original flesh tone to lighten it.  

I mixed in some very pale elf flesh into that mix to lighten it further.

This all follows the 'shaded basecoat' principle, as you will see in the subsequent steps.  My goal was to set up my darker glazes.

Starting with the legs, I have a few glaze colors at the ready.  A violet, a dark blue, and a black.  The first glaze is a watered down violet, starting at the top of the section I want to shade.  As I move further down, the dark blue is mixed with the violet.  The black is added when I reach the feet, since I want that to be a bit warmer.

The same process is done on the claws.  I tried to leave the ends of them a little lighter, as I am considering putting a little bit of blood splatter on them.

This image shows that I treated the head the same way, as well as the little horns on the back.

I have also begun to work back into my middle tones at this point.  I mixed in some of my pink color with the dark glazes.  This is a favorite little trick of mine.  I end up with a semi-transparent lighter color.  This can be very helpful for subtle transitions!

Tomorrow I will show the shading of the flesh, as well as the freehand work.

Again, this is a practice run for one of the initial DVD's.  By practicing this a few times, I will be able to pass along more information in the relatively compressed time frame of 100 minutes :-)

Abelard Flintrock Mechanist from Stonehaven Miniatures

Tonight we have another member of the Stonehaven Miniatures Dwarf kickstarter!  This is Abelard Flintrock, Mechanist.

When he lost his left arm, he immediately designed a replacement, which he views as superior.  He has often considered removing his right arm to 'even things up'.  While convinced it would be more practical, he hesitates to make any permanent change.

Happy Birthday Blog! Eleven months and counting!!

I only noticed late last night that today was going to mark the 11th month of the Blog's existence!  It is hard to believe that it's been almost a year!

During that time, there have been 930 posts, 450,000 pageviews and thousands of comments... it has been quite a ride. :-)

I am also reminded to say thank you to everyone who has check out this crazy thing, and listened to my mad ramblings!  It is still the best way for me to take over the universe, though...

I am trying to plan out some sort if 1st birthday post for February.  That would be all about Lizardmen, which were the first set of posts.  I guess I will have to paint a few new lizzies for that!!!

The blog has certainly changed a lot in the last 11 months.  I cannot be certain what direction the blog will take in 2013, but I have a few ideas.  There will certainly be a lot more LOTR painting, but there will also be a hefty amount of Dark Eldar posts as I make the army ready for Adepticon!!

In any case, I will always try to keep it interesting!!!

OK... a few more group shots of the Knights of the Blood Rose riding off to war!