Rivet Wars at the CMON Expo!

Ted Terranova, the creator of Rivet Wars, was kind enough to allow me to use some of his images that he took at CMON Expo last weekend.  Here we have a few of the images he snapped of the sample Rivet Wars figures I painted for the kickstarter.

It was very interesting to see them in a new context after a few months!

Some Blighter vehicles...

And then there were these shots!  Don't they look nifty in this terrain?!

So cool!

Ted did a great photography job on these :-)

Here is something fun as well, a dice tower!

There were lots of intro games going for Rivet Wars... here are a few images to give you an idea what it looks like.

It is very fast paced, and quite deadly.

It also looks great.

I was bummed that I didn't get a chance to try it out.  Perhaps next time around...

The cards are filled with Ted's fantastic artwork!

An there he is on the left!  Ted is a great guy, and you will enjoy his game... he's worked very hard on it, and continues to do so.  Many thanks to Ted for allowing me to try out Z Brush on his setup this Monday.  What a fantastic program.  It made me very jealous!  It has some incredible possibilities.  Ted has certainly done some great things with it!

A How To video for Rivet Wars

As the Rivet Wars Kickstarter draws to a close, I wanted to create one more 'how to' video for the last big frenzy!  I'm sure it will be a crazy 48 hours!

Just like the video of the Ally Rivet, this was designed to be around an hour long, with not a lot of frills.  There are no chapter breaks, and no inserted text or images.  It was all about showing what was possible in that limited time frame.

Here is the setup.  Since it was very dark and cloudy, it affected how I did my lighting.  In an ideal world, I am filming these during the day, with lots of sunlight streaming in.  With time  an issue, I had to just push through.

This is one of the reasons why I tried to give myself as much of the spring to work on the videos, since we will be getting more and more of that precious sunlight ;-)

Once I had all the various segments shot, it was time to import it all and start editing!

This was made a lot easier by the 'template' created for the first video.  

I was able to copy and paste the opening credits, and the other effects from the Ally video.

This will be crucial to making the Painting Pyramid videos!

I was getting a little more used to controlling the fades this time around.  Zooming in and out is still tricky on this tiny screen.  One of the pieces to the puzzle we need to secure when the funds come in is that second large monitor.

This will lead to far fewer 'accidental' button clicks, and less swearing by me.

Fortunately, I was able to leave a nice long blank segment on every piece of video, which made all my transitions so much easier.

You can see a little glimpse of those transitions in the lower left hand corner.  You can do some very interesting manipulations of the curves for both the video and the sound.

It gets even more interesting with each 'layer' you add.  For the credits, there are 4 layers you are trying to control.  Extending the fades, getting just the right curve, is all very interesting!

Well, I hope that was not too boring!

It's all just another step in the Pyramid!!

Less than 9 days left now...

http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/891905985/discover-the-painting-pyramid-with-james-wappel

Painting your Rivet Wars Blighter

OK Rivet Warriors!  We went through a step by step on the Ally, so now it's time for their adversaries!!

The principles in painting this guy were the same as the Ally.  I used a #4 flat brush, a #8 round, and a small liner brush.

Instead of priming this NATO green as I did with the Ally, I mixed by black and white brush on primer to create a grey, seen in the far left of the image.  I took Vallejo German Grey and intermediate blue, and put that color on the helmet and coat.  More intermediate was added, until it was time to get it a bight lighter.  I did this by adding on some GW Deneb Stone.

For the flesh tones, I mixed the Vallejo brown rose with my grey (similar to how I mixed that same color with the camo green on the Ally), so that the flesh would reflect the grey.  Once the Brown rose needed to by lightened, I used a pale flesh color to get those last bits of highlights.

The approach to painting the eyes was the same as well, trying to keep the area around the eye e bit darker. The eye itself was an off white, to which the iris was added, followed by the little dot highlight.

As I was doing this, I used Vallajo Game Color earth to start the brass on the helmet.  I mixed in a tiny bit of  Reaper pale saffron to keep it more greenish than yellow/orange.  I used the pale flesh color to highlight the brass, with a bit of very pale seafoam green.  I kept using my flat brush during that whole process.  

You can also see the first dark red layer on the end of the grenade launcher was painted.

That initial color (Vallejo cavalry brown was then lightened with a bit of flat red, and then lightened further by adding GW vomit brown.  This kept the lighter reds from getting either too pink, or too orange.

The hair, coat trim and belts were painted in with some GW Dryad brown.

Towards the end of this stage, I took my glazes and shaded the coat, helmet, and grenade launchers darker with a blue/black glaze.

I used some Reaper liner colors, such as the dark brown and blue, with my fine liner brush, to clean up any areas by enhancing the shadows along the belts and trim.  I did the same for the helmet and the extra grenades.  The hair was lightened by adding the light seafoam green to the dryad brown.

More lights were added to the  belts and trim, as well as the brass on the helmet, mixing white with the light green.  I lightened the coat a little more by adding even more deneb stone to the grey mix...

Almost there!  I did the weathering on the helmet just as I did for the Ally.  I indicated some paint chips with a dark brown, which was highlighted along the bottom edge with some light grey, while the top edge was given a shadow line of black.  Some rust was added as well by using a watered down GW calthan brown.

The rust on the base as also doe using the watered down calthan brown.  The old GW foundation paints break down very nicely when thinned down, where the pigment will really sink into crevices, almost like a glaze! 

And here is the finished product!!!  Ready for action.

By the way, I am very happy today, as the Painting Pyramid has reached its second stretch goal level!  You can check it out here:

http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/891905985/discover-the-painting-pyramid-with-james-wappel

Painting your Rivet Warrior: A step by step

Here is a little 'how to' on painting one of your Ally Rivet Wars miniatures.  I started out with the usual prep work, and got them on pins...

I want to emphasize that I tried to use as limited a palette as possible to paint this, so that it was a little easier to absorb the information!

It was then primed with Vallejo Nato Green primer.  My first layer of paint was Reaper Field Grey, but a typical olive green could be used instead.

These images show the figure as I mixed in some Reaper tan, little by little.  I was using a #4 flat acrylic brush, by the way, with relatively dry paint.

I did't want to focus in on just the uniform, so it was time to work on the face.  I took some Vallejo brown rose and mixed that with a bit of the lighter field grey/tan mixture, so there would be more color consistency. With each layer (still working with that flat brush, by the way), I introduced more of the rose.

I used some dark brown for the hair, and then added some Vallejo parasite brown.  The lights were created by adding some of the reaper tan.  I added some lights to the face by mixing in some pale flesh with the brown rose.  The leather items, such as belts and cartridge cases, remained the darker brown.

Once all the areas have at least gotten a few layers of colors, I start to work in the final highlights.  This is done on the helmet, the arms (shoulders), the face and the hair.  Some lighter colors are added to the leather surfaces by mixing in some tan with the dark brown.

Here's a closer view on the highlights, and a bit of the gun.  I mixed Vallejo intermediate blue with highlight USMC.

Now for the most important part.  The eyes!  I tried to make sure that the areas around the eyes were somewhat darker, so that they would stand out.  These faces are tricky, for obvious reasons.  You are trying to superimpose one shape onto a completely unrelated shape, so you have to 'fudge' things a bit.

Once the whites of the eyes were placed, I put in the iris, and then painted the upper eyelid.  I mixed a little of the dark eyelid color with the brown rose, and shaded under the eyes.  I then highlighted the iris with a dot of white

The eyes are big enough to put color in the iris if you wish, and even paint in a pupil if you want!  However, this image is about the little insignia, and the rust effects.

I took a brown/blue mix and painted a few paint chips around the edges of the helmet, as well as the top.  The 'bottom' of these paint chips are highlighted with a tiny bit of tan, while the 'upper' edge is shaded with black.  I painted some rust streaks using that Vallejo Parasite brown.

Here's the base.  Basic grey with a blue/black shading wash.  The rust was done the same way as the helmet.

Here he is!!!

I will be filming the painting of one of these as yet another test video for my painting kickstarter... go check it out!

http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/891905985/discover-the-painting-pyramid-with-james-wappel

Making a base for your Rivet Warriors!

Today we have a little treat for all you Rivet Warriors participating in the Kickstarter by Cool Mini.

You have seen my painted versions of the regular bases.  However, I wanted to present something new to you.  Making a specialized base for your figures.

I started out by cutting a piece of thick plasticard to the same size as the original base.  A piece of cork was added to that, extending the overall surface just a bit.

To create the sandbags, it was time to break out the Apoxy sculpt!

I folded out the clay in shapes that looked a lot like pillows.  I made sure to have the ends pinched down, so they would look more like sealed bags.

Then it was time to add more sandbags, just as if I were laying bricks.  I made sure to have any overhanging ends sagging downwards.  After they had set up for a few minutes, I used a sculpting tool to create a bit of a seam.

With the bags complete, it was time to get some rocks and gravel onto the base.  I took out my trusty oxide paste...

And applied it to the base.  Then I put on the heavier rocks, followed by the smaller and finer grains.

Time to see what the figure will look like!!

The painting was done with just a few colors, a light greenish grey, a chocolate brown, and a darker blue/brown.  I worked quickly with my larger #8 brush to get pigment everywhere.  The bags had more of the light greenish grey to distinguish them from the ground.

All surfaces covered.  Time to work lighter!

The light Green/grey is added to the chocolate brown on the bags, getting a bit lighter each time.

This is as light as I need to get, so now the glazing and shading begins!

I had a reddish brown glaze, a muddy brown, and a black.  These were alternated over various areas to get some differences in the colors.

OK, the glazes are done!  Time to let this dry...

And then add the miniature!

This is a basing tutorial that I want to create for my Kickstarter series of painting videos.