A great Case

The large Carrying case from TableWar has proven to be handy for a number of things.  I thought that the larger size would let me carry the bigger Creature Caster demons more safely at conventions...

The front door is transparent as usual, which means it is better at airports (the contents can be seen by looking at them as opposed to rummaging through them!).  It also has the side benefit of knowing who it belongs to by looking at the minis inside!

I didn't even notice the large try on the bottom when I first looked at it, but once I did, I put a bunch of different supplies in there to see how much it would hold.

I also thought that the Song of Ice and Fire movement trays might fit perfectly on the shelves, and that was correct.  Fitting three units on each level would be more than enough to get an army somewhere for a game... perhaps even some terrain included!

You can blue tack the trays to the shelves, or have the metal inserts and magnetize them.

Looks like the Free Folk are heading somewhere!

The bottom tray was more than large enough to howl all the terrain pieces, cards, dice, etc. that I would need for SoIaF.

It was even handy for a batch of Black Heart Models busts!  As I mentioned before, it would be no problem to blue tac these to the shelves, and get them where they needed to be safely.  Here's a link to the TableWar site: http://www.tablewar.com/towercase/

I am King

I had a lot of fun working on the Jeoffrey Baratheon figure from the Song of Ice and Fire Miniatures Game!  He was painted in one of my "On the Workbench" episodes that you can watch here: https://youtu.be/501jT53hFd4

I try to break down the painting of all the miniatures into simpler steps... typically 5 sections.  The first discusses what materials are involved, and then it moves on to the initial glazing and Shaded Basecoat phase in part 2.

I want to work in the sketching of the Freehand design as early in the process as possible, for a few reasons.  If that design is sketched in at an earlier point, I have a lot more room to make adjustments!  Painting a complex freehand pattern over a surface that you have spent a lot of time working on can be daunting.

It can be so daunting, many folks don't even attempt the freehand, because they don't want to "mess up the figure"

I am the King!

This image also shows the basing of the figure, which was done with the Green Stuff World Texture rollers.

And a peek at the freehand design!

I will be doing tutorials on the rest of the King's Guard for the Patreon Page.

Even pledging at the $5 level can set you up with some very fun tutorials each month, and you also get a TON of content right away when you do sign up.  You can check that out here:  www.patreon.com/JamesWappel

Made in the USA

A very special day indeed, as I get a loo inside the Badger Airbrush factory!  This is where many of my favorite things are made, such as the Stynlrez Primer!!!

Gilbert was kind enough to schlep me up to the factory, and Ken played host.  The murals in the office area start to lead you inside...

You start to run into tooling areas right away, and you immediately learn what a family business Badger is.  You can very easily bump into multiple generations of the same family working in different departments.

This device might have been the most exotic... a way to check out nozzles to determine if there any flaws, or simply work on shape.

The factory was much like a Tardis, a whole lot bigger on the inside than it appeared from without.

Airbrushes of every type were under way, and it was really neat to see familiar end products in their earliest stages.  In an age of plastic, digital printing and such, I was struck over and over again by all the machine parts and metal shavings!

...and miles of hoses!  There were racks of hoses being cut, with connectors, water traps, etc., being added along the way.

An unexpected surprise was a rack of nail painting stencils.  I will definitely have to fool around with these to see what happens on cloaks, vehicles, shoulder pads, etc.

It goes without says that there were Plenty of jars of paint and primer!  When we showed up, the all important Stynlrez primer was being relocated to a new area where it would be easier to access.  It has become the go to primer for so many across the globe.

The shipping department made you realize that when you saw the destinations of the boxes, heading to 3 different continents :)

Here was have the compressor area, where quality control, testing, repairs, etc, are done.  This is only a part of the area!

More machine tools.  Each of those machines creates various needle sizes.  To see those in person gives you an all new respect for the needles!  

As we moved along, we started to see final assembly areas, more quality control, etc.  No brush leaves the factory without a battery of tests!

Seeing the Sanctuary of Stynlrez in person was a near religious experience!  After seeing all the machines needed to create all those finely tooled parts, the racks of airbrushes were all the more impressive.  It takes a number of individuals working on each phase to make those brushes come to life.

The resident artist's studio.  You will probably be seeing me wear one of those Badger hats at a convention soon enough!

The Ken 'O Meter, which tells everyone if it's a sunny day, or storm clouds on the horizon...

We finished off the tour by checking out art pieces made over the years by various artists.  The painting of JFK was made 50 years ago with the very first Badger Airbrush!

Once again, many thanks to Gilbert (be sure to check out Reddragon's Model Werks) and to Ken.  It was amazing to see what it takes just to make a single airbrush, or even a single jar of Stynlrez.  

In just a matter of weeks, the Band reunites at GenCon, where once again I will be doing airbrush demos in the Badger booth.  That has become an annual tradition, and this year we have some very special things planned!

Be sure to stop by and enjoy the amazing work of the great folks we met at the Badger Airbrush factory!!

Compare and Contrast

With all the furor and frenzy over the Contrast Paints, it seemed wise to make a change in the schedule for my Army Painting series.  I had another Oil Painting series set up but everyone wants to know about these paints.

So I grabbed some classic Khore Bloodletters and got those prepped for Series 10, which will focus on various ways to use those Contrast Paints!

I have been mixing them with a variety of "regular" paints, but this was the first time I got to see what they would do with the fluorescent paint!

As I have mentioned many times now, I have been asked repeatedly for options on the Reaper Clear and Liner paints, which can be difficult to obtain outside the US.  I have already done 3 live sessions on the mixing of regular paint with Contrast Paints: https://youtu.be/r4e9b03jgdk

Ironically, this is nothing different than techniques that used many years ago when I filmed the original Painting Pyramid series.  Here's another live session showing how I used the Contrast Medium to make my own lighter skin tone contrast paint... https://youtu.be/AyUAj05Xevo

I chose to do a classic color scheme on these classic Bloodletters, which seemed to suit them well.  As with all Army Painting series, I begin with creating bases for the unit.  In this case, working with the Green Stuff World texture rollers and the flaming skulls.  The second episode is always the Color Test Figure, which is where you figure out how long a given effect or color scheme might take on each figure.

This is very important because what seems like a small amount of time on one figure can become a LOT of time once you multiply that across an entire unit or army!  That is why I discuss the point over and over again during the subsequent episodes.  Each series is normally 5 episodes, and around 12-13 hours total running time.  These are designed to tie into the Painting Dark Sword episodes and other videos that are posted to the patreon page each month.  The $15 pledge level means you will be able to see every series that has been done, and I am working on series 10 and 11 right now!

The Army Painting pledge level will provide access to all previous series and tutorials at all the other levels, so that means close to 100 various tutorials at your fingertips in an instant!  You can find that here on the Patreon Page: www.patreon.com/JamesWappel

Snow and Ice

Yet another episode of Painting Dark Sword is complete!  This had a few interesting twists, starting with the miniature itself.  There is an entire line of Game of Thrones figures withing the Dark Sword stable of sculpts, and this Spearwife is the very first!

I was also trying to show what it is like to match a color scheme that you have never seen before.

Finally, I wanted to present an alternative to my usual Crushed Glass method, because it can be difficult to get those materials outside of the US.  I used a combination of Woodland Scenics snow flock and Vallejo Snow texture.  

I have used this method on my Bolt Action figures, and it is a nice way to get some snow with texture and even tinted with some color!

Here's the finished result.  I think that I will have to try an replicated this on a few of my own Spearwives from the Song of Ice and Fire miniatures game!

There was also a freehand pattern which needed to be matched, which was one more challenge.  I show a quick way to figure out a pattern on a separate piece of sculpey in order to familiarize myself with that design.  It makes it MUCH easier to paint it on the figure itself.

Finally, I wanted to discuss putting some of your own personality or look on the figure, even though you are replicating a scheme done by someone else.  It can be very subtle, or very dramatic.  It is very important to think through something like that before you get too involved in painting the figure.

More Dark Sword videos are under way right now!  The $10 pledge will provide you with all previous episodes, as I try to make these "build" off each other.  You can find that here on the patreon page: www.patreon.com/JamesWappel