Medic!!!

I think this is one of my favorite figures from the Winter German set from Warlord Games.  Both of the soldiers have great posing, and their is enough detail on the faces to give them some interesting expressions.

As with all limited palette exercises, finding interesting and subtle color changes in the mid tone areas is always a fun challenge!

I couldn't help myself, so some blood spatter had to be put into the snow!

Short on Magic?

I have painted a number of Dwarf characters over the years, mostly in the form of fighters or clerics.  Without a doubt, this Reaper Dwarf wizard is a first for me!

He's a BONES figure (not sure which campaign it's from), which meant I was glad to discover the effectiveness of emery boards in removing mould lines.

I enjoyed how all the vintage wizard features were translated to a Dwarf frame.  The hat, staff, pipe and other details are what you would expect to see in a wizard, but each has a dwarf twist.  This is typified by the staff, which has a distinctly Dwarven look.

I have painted a few dozen BONES figures now, mostly regular 28mm sized characters.  I have painted some ogre sized monsters, but I am still hoping to paint up some of the big beasties!

He's also here:

http://www.ebay.com/itm/222438088688?ssPageName=STRK:MESELX:IT&_trksid=p3984.m1558.l2649

Winter is really Hell

After a few facebook live painting sessions, we have the finished version of the Trenchworx M18 Hellcat.

As you saw in the original unboxing post, these kits are very easy to assemble, and they even have magnets for the turrets!  That is a fantastic feature.

This version was winterized to go along with the winter American army for the Bolt Action Battle of the Bulge book which has just been released.

I tried out a number of brand new materials on this vehicle, such as the Wilder oil paints, and the Secret Weapon mud kits.  That involved mixing sand, realistic water and weathering powders.  I also mixed static grass into this to create grass tufts hanging out of the treads.

Here's a link to that live video:

https://www.facebook.com/james.wappel/videos/10209626582475478/?pnref=story

The views from above show some of the variations in the greens, as some areas have a little more blue, while other spots are more yellowish.  Also, you can see the leaves that were added that had been cut with the Green Stuff World leaf cutters.

The stowage was mostly sculpted, although I used a few extra bits from the American Bolt Action sprues too.

One winterized American tank ready to take the field!!!

Alien Nation

Another Facebook live video session in the books!

This one was a little more complex, trying to demonstrate my favorite alien pattern freehand.  The session lasted about 100 minutes, which is nearly as long as the original freehand designs video that I created as part of the Painting Pyramid kickstarter campaign.

I tried to show the fluorescent paints as well, mostly in the form of the little diodes around the ship.  I wanted to show how those could be used as a form of contrast to the oranges in the freehand pattern, especially where the greenish diodes intersected with the brightest parts of the freehand.

Another key element was the composition of the pattern, and emphasizing how asymetrical I wanted it to be.  This meant changing the pattern, and making sure that it was not repeated precisely on each side of the hull.

Here's a link to the video.  I am hoping to do many more sessions like this, ideally every day!  That will require a phone upgrade at the very least, since the one I am using right now is quite ancient.

For the moment, you cannot use a webcam for these broadcasts without the OBS software and a very powerful machine.  I have tested the OBS with everything that's available to us right now, but there's way too much lag time.

https://www.facebook.com/james.wappel/videos/10209626582475478/

Law of the Jungle

The Algoryn invade a jungle world in this latest episode of Gates of Antares.  I had to come up with as many different themes and color schemes as possible for this faction, which is always the most interesting phase of creating any army!

Thus far, I have done the Ice World, the Spartan theme, and a few others.  I wanted to have some of these interacting with their environment as much as possible!

The leaves are a special paper kit, which also comes with very fine wire to support them.  They can be bent and shaped, and painting them doesn't warp the leaves, which is quite amazing!

I will have this guy, as well as all the other color test figures at Adepticon in just a few short days!  I will be in the Hobby Lounge, which we have named Fort Wappel.  Come and see me there, since I will be doing lots of impromptu demos!!

That Man is a Beast!

Back to Mierce Miniatures, and a return to the beastman line.  There are a number of interesting factions that cover just about any kind of creature you can imagine.  Birds, Bears, Octopus, Rats, Dragons, Demons and sooo many beasties.

These beastmen are from the "human" sized set, which is the first of several sizes.  Usually you will find this size, and ogre size, followed by a monstrous infantry and even a colossal beast.

Units of the human sized always have command figures, with banners, extra weapons, and so on,

There are also a number of mounted units as well, but the monstrous mounts are among my favorites!

Clowning Around

Here's another Reaper BONES figure for you, with a very different color theme than the previous version!

Cathy had suggested a clownfish motif after we looked at some of the unpainted Reapercon examples that were sitting around.  They had been used as subject matter for the class on Clear Reaper paints.

In fact, I will be doing a set of that class at Nova Open this year, showing how the clear paints can be thinned down to great effect for glazing!

In this example, I worked in the Clear Red, Clear Yellow (both very intense and highly pigmented colors), with mixtures of the Green, Purple and Blue for the darks.  You can even use the liner paints as I did to enhance those dark colors even more.