Naughty or Nice? Nurgle Demon Prince

OK folks, here's the first set of imagesof the Demon Prince!

I have more top views coming later, which will show all the little tricksey Nurglings playing in the slime pool.

Little Harry... Nurgle Herald

OK, heres's the Herald for starters!  As usual, lots of wild color transitions.

These Nurgle figures were real experiments in color theory!

Bases for the Nurgle Prince and Herald

For those of you familiar with the other Nurgle figures that I have done, you wail recognize this style of basing.  The essentials are relatively simple... some cork, some gravel, some bitz, oxide paste and a touch of green stuff.

A view of the palette gives you a good idea of how I approached the painting.  In many respects, it is very similar to how I painted the figures.  You can see the olive green and reddish browns that were mixed together, as well as the tan color that was mixed in to lighten it.

Some sky blue was mixed in for the rhino door, creating a greenish grey in the end.  I also started putting some green on the slimy water section...

Obviously this stage was all about adding rust.  I started with a Calthan brown, moving on to a parasite brown from Vallejo.  Finally, vomit brown was added for the lightest shades.

The slime section was done by adding Vallejo deep yellow to that olive green, lightening along the way.  Once the highlighting was done, I mixed some of the fluorescent yellow in with 'hardcoat and applied that over the slime.  It is a nice textural contrast to the rocks.

Stay tuned for more!

Prince Harry, Nurgle style

OK, more from the archives.  This is a Demon Prince and herald combo, shown here in a few work in progress images.  Here they are prior to painting...

And then some views of shaded basecoat, just as it was done on the Plague Hulk

You can see all those preliminary color transitions a bit better here than on the plague hulk.  The surfaces are a little less obscured.  Just like the other figure, I had a basic olive green that would be mixed with a variety of lighter colors.  For instance, you can see that I mixed sky blue in some areas, and yellow in others.

I mixed a magenta in some places, a brown in others, and even a pinkish flesh tone.  That's what made these pieces so fun!

I also have some step by step images of the painting of the bases for both other miniatures, so I think that will be the next post!  Until then, enjoy this Nurgly goodness. :-)

Stonehaven Miniatures: Rockin' Alec Stormwind Bard

OK folks!  Here's another very fun dwarf character from the Stonehaven Miniatures kickstarter.  This time it's Alec Stormwind, and he knows how to rock!

He's comin' to your village, gonna sing you a mining saga.

Sorry about that.  It is pretty neat to see a dwarf bard.  I am pretty sure I have never seen one before...  Very cool!

Get ready for a jam session!

The second rank takes aim... some more SE-NMM training

Now I am getting deeper into the second rank, and that means some of the standing figures.  There's a bit of a difference in the armor, so some changes in the approach to the SE-NMM will be necessary.

This is a little more practice in this technique before I develop the NMM DVD's using those Urban Mammoth figures.

Here are some views of how he fits with the unit as a whole...

At this stage, it is nice to see how the bases are starting to mesh with the movement tray.

I had to do the movement tray colors "blind" in a manner of speaking, making assumptions on what each part of the tray would look like (the individual bases) before they were ever painted.

This is where the shaded basecoat method helps.  I took the same lighter colors, and then tinted and shaded them all darker with glazes.  This meant that I could color match by sight, instead of relying on pre-set color mixes that I could either forget, or run out of the colors themselves...

More to come!!!

Raging Heroes Orc for a kickstarter video

I thought I would put up some images today of the first test for the Shaded Basecoat "how to" DVD.  These were taken after the first stage of the technique.  It is now ready for the darker shading and tinting.  This particular DVD is the first of the Painting Pyramid Kickstarter videos to be created.

I had chosen this figure from Raging Heroes for a few reasons.  The surfaces are pretty large, and the detail is incredibly fine, which would in turn make it easier for viewers to see what I am trying to do.

Also, there are a variety of surface textures... flesh, metal, cloth, and so on.

I was worried that using a figure which was mostly a cloak, or flesh would not offer enough information on a video that introduces painters to this kind of painting philosophy.

I have been waiting for a chance to film the rest of the painting process, but between the craziness encountered writing the initial proposal and the very dark skies here, I have focused on other elements of the process.  For those of you who have seen images of the film setup in previous posts, you can see a huge difference in the overall lighting when I film during bright daylight.

That ambient light cuts down on the glare of the lights dramatically.  I paint very rapidly, so if I only use the lights in a darkened room, they tend to reflect way too much on the wet paint.  It's no big deal for me, since I know what it is supposed to look like!  For someone who is trying to see exactly what I am doing, those reflections might be a real impediment.

As I have said before, I am trying to make these the very best they can be.  I have also been reminded not to rush foolhardily into production, because there are 20 different subjects that have to be covered!!  Just so you know, this is only the painting DVD's.  There are make more on basing and sculpting.

Should goals be met, etc. there are 10 much more highly specialized DVD's that I could create.

It's a bit scary to realize just how many of these there are!!!