Raven evermore...

Time for some close ups!

Here's a few close in shots for you.  They are kind of fun, since the focal point of the camera blurs the background a bit, making the mini come forward even more. :-)

Fire!  I wish I knew about fluorescent paints at the time, but it's possible Vallejo was not making them yet...

Here she is!

The very distinct sculpting style of Denis Mize.  Very cool!

She surveys the landscape...

A few images of the miniature itself.

It took a little bit of jiggering to get it just in the right spot...

But there she stands!

Somewhere I have a shot of the little raven than I sculpted.  Can't find that just yet...

The Ravages of war

A while back I did a quick experiment to see what kind of colors I might want to use on the Marine version of the U.S. Memoir '44 figures.  I went with the lighter green uniforms, and the camo helmets.

I am going to try out a few different schemes.  That will be a bit less monotonous, and give us some fun variety for Western Front and Mediterranean Theatre as well.

I will work up at least two units in some kind of overall camo, so that they could be designated as special units.

Here are some potential Gurka figs, which would work as British units in either Med or Pacific theatres.

This just rolled across my facebook feed, courtesy of Elizabeth (that's her winning Rivet Wars diorama on the bottom).  From the pages of Ravage Magazine...

This is their Crystal Brush competition coverage, which shows that the Tomb Kings can actually win at something!!! Yea!!!

Still Happy with basing!

Time to finish off the Happy Seppuku and sprue bases!

I took a nice deep burgundy color and mixed than with an umber, creating a rust like color that had lots of 'sedimentation'.  This is a watercolor expression, referring to the way a color settles into crevices when the color is watered down slightly.  The 'heavier' matter sinks down into any texture that might exist.

Using sculpey as I did, that made some very nice semi-absorbent texture for this sediment effect to cling to.

I work this color in to each base design... sometimes even wiping away some of it with my fingers or the brush.

One by one, occasionally putting some pitting effects on the wide open surfaces.

The more complex the shapes, the more areas where you can drop in this sedimentation.  

It's a lot of fun to concentrate the rust around the rivets, and in the corners of the metal plates.

I don't know if you can see it here, but I did add a few darker splotches by adding some black in that mix.

More dark splotches... places for more corrosion! :-)

While I will do more details later, I thought I would toss in some rudimentary freehand.  Can't go wrong with a few numerals.

Adding some to all of the bases to unify the set...

I added some final highlights in spots.  You can see that along the edges of the plates, and on the deck texture...

A few views of the entire set!!

The view from above!!  Stay tuned for the next set!

From 2D to 3D...another dimension!

After I showed you guys the sketches of the miniatures, and the drawings that I had hoped to turn into miniatures someday, I thought you might have fun with this.

The miniature is from Dark Sword, and it is based on the Larry Elmore Raven Stone artwork.  Both painting and miniature are very cool!

I set about with my sculpey and my landscaping rocks to create the diorama.

I pressed my rocks into the unbaked sculpey, which gave me some fantastic texture!

It was a little difficult to translate the rocks perfectly to the image... and I had to figure out what the back might look like!  Remember how I said that in 2D, I never had to worry about such matters. :-)

I loved the sloping angles of the rocks... and creating the fire as well!

I enjoyed the story of this piece very much.  A wonderful vignette.

I carved the runes into the stone, and placed all the rocks together once they were baked.

I have some close up shots of the diorama coming, as well as individual pictures of the miniature itself, so stay tuned!!!!

The first wave of color

Before we head off on the working convention, I tried to get some color on those new bases!

Starting off with some primer from Badger.

The first layers involved getting some warmer brown/gray shades on the concrete and rock sections of the bases.

While many other colors of gray will be used, I started off with a blue gray.  You could create this by mixing sky blue with black.

The reason I like to go a little cooler with that color is the rust and weathering effects that I want to add later.  Those are much warmer, so I need to establish the color opposite as soon as possible.

I am lightening this with a few different light grays.

A bit lighter now, trying to get it more towards a neutral gray.

One last layer, adding an ivory color for the final lights.

Time to glaze and shade!  I have a collection of warm colors here... some more red, some more brownish gray.  Those will be used on the non-metal sections for the most part.

Nice contrast already.  It's hard to see what I did on the bottom section in these pics... sorry!

Now I bring out some blue and black to do some shading on the metal.

Preliminary glazes in.  These are very basic, just to establish the main value pattern.  Next, I will do some basic rust and weathering, and then move on to final highlights, freehand and such.

Stay tuned!!  Much more to come.