Skeleton Cavarly... that's NOT Tomb Kings :-)

You have seen these skeleton cavalry in the prep stage for quite a while, but now here is the finished color test piece!  It was really odd to be painting a skeletal horse that was not one of the old plastic GW figures.

There are definitely a lot more complicated things going on with each of the joints.  Many more tiny bones!

After working with this one, I am glad that I chose it for the painting bone video.  There are lots of different things going on, and you have just enough items like straps and armor to provide opportunities for color and shading contrasts.

It really was the ideal figure for what I needed which is very cool!  I could get all sorts of fun color variations.  Subtle green and reddish tints, even some greyish blue in places.  All this provides for much more interesting colors to look at besides bleached bone and brown wash.  In fact, there was no bleached bone used. :-)

On the flip side, it is not so complicated that it will require a frenzied pace to get it all finished in the time limit.

I hope that you all enjoy following the video of this guy!

Some color test Sisters

Time for more Sisters!  Let's start out with a color test mini.  There are more things that will be done on the 'real' figs, such as the tattoos and face paint, along with freehand designs on the cloaks.

The idea here was to see what some of the brass/gold might look like.

The big base you see in these images was meant for the Inquisitor Karamazov giant walker.  The character in the mural is the Living Saint mentioned in the army story, which I posted the other day.

I chose all the green and brass to get away from all the red, black and white that you see all the time!  It also fit perfectly with the story I created!  Double bonus. :-)

The original army was going to have lots of Immolators and heavy flamers, but 6th edition pretty much wipes all that out.  I am pretty sure a multi-flyer list or Tau gunline can destroy them by turn 2.

That's why I am striving for as many bodies on the board as possible.  At least 160.  Hopefully more!

Mass basing

Here is something from last week.  I needed to get a good chunk of the bases painted for the video miniatures, since most of those instructions don't involve the base itself.  

If it's a video about painting reds, I won't be wasting precious time on painting a base. :-)  That's why I have videos covering that topic!

This was some quick 'down and dirty' base painting.  I had mixed up a few lighter colors to brush over the generic brown.  One was a little more green, another more yellow, and so on.  That had to do with what colors might be on the figure.  For instance, if the miniature was going to have lots of warm colors on it, I trend towards cooler colors on the base.

As you can see, dozens of figures were done all at once.

The lighter colors were taken even farther than normal, in order set up the subsequent glazes and shading.

They are all just about ready for glazing!

When I get down to the glazing, I will set up a few standard colors...

You can see a sepia tone, a black, and the concrete wash from Secret Weapon that I talked about in the painting of the sci-fi base.

I use a larger brush, but one that still has a fairly sharp tip.  Varying the glazes on each part of the base to create interest, I darkened and shaded one base at a time.

I did at least 2 -3 layers of this glaze in certain parts of each base, trying to create and interesting pattern of lights and darks.  Also, I tried to keep in mind where the miniature would be, and if there would be a lighter or darker set of colors touching the base.

Time to paint the edges black, and call them done for now!!

On a wing and a prayer...

I think a few of you might recognize this color scheme from somewhere :-)

As I said over and over again at Adepticon, I would work in the Dark Eldar freehand into one of the videos!  I had these in mind from the start, because they were the closest thing to the jetbikes as a non-GW figure.

The idea is to do as many kinds of freehand over as many surface shapes as possible.  That's why just about every square millimeter has some fashion of design on it.

The good folks at Urban Mammoth gave me the OK to use a few of their minis for the videos, and the Archangels have always been favorites of mine.

I tried to work in as many different types of freehand as I could, even on the base itself.  There will also be a 'side session' or two showing how I work out potential designs in a two dimensional form first.

The gals in the video are the 'flying' versions of the Vasa Archangels.

Be sure to check out the Urban Warfare figures and the game.  They do some amazing art, which leads to fantastic minis!

Unboxing the Finecast Gwaihir

As I was clipping many pieces of resin from vents, gates and sprues, I thought I would get this guy in the mix as well.  I need a second eagle for my expanded LOTR Knights of the Blood Rose army.  While my original eagle will serve as Gwaihir, the Finecast version would be OK for that second 'regular'eagle.

The plastic eagles will be used when we do our really big 1000 point games. :-)

So, here is how it comes out of the box:

Everything clipped, scraped and filed.  Washed with dish soap as well!

Gluing the pieces into place, using the same glue/green stuff/glue technique...

As it is with all resin eagles (or anything with feathered wings for that matter), you will need to do some green stuff feathers to hide the joints.  I did pretty much the same kind of feather additions that I made on the CMON birds...

I mixed up some of the brown craft paint and some black primer to see how that would work.  it actually worked pretty well!  That's cool!  I don't think I will be able to do the painting on this until after our next journey...

The ranks nearly filled

Look out Sebastian!  More spiders headed your way! :-)  While my original thoughts regarding the use of these beasties during my games centered on having them popping out of terrain, I see that they can do something else, if need be.

There have been many games where there was simply no way for me to effectively get at archers ensconced inside buildings, or at least standing on walls.  Very frustrating.  At least now I have something that is guaranteed to get up there and go after them!

This is just about it for the regular spiders.  I need to sculpt myself a spider queen and some broodlings at some point...

A little color, a little freehand...

I snapped a few pictures as I painted the sci fi base of sculpey and polystyrene tubing.  The colors were very basic.  I began with a dark brown/blue mix, and lightened it with a greenish grey, until it was almost white.

Then I dug out 2 washes from Secret Weapon.  Soft body black and concrete.  The concrete was is especially interesting, since it is semi opaque, and lighter.  It is very fun for bases!

You can see here that I have put down a few layers of the glazes on the base, choosing certain areas to darken more than others.  Aside from regular shading, I am trying to create just enough contrast for a bit of the freehand to show.

Now for some rust, using my normal watered down Calthan brown...

Then the freehand designs, making sure that they don't get too bright.  I water down the colors to help insure this happens!

And your final base!  The miniature on this is coming soon!