Practice on flesh

Over the weekend I went to Knoxville TN with Dave to a Pathfinder event for charity. We were not there for the game, we were there for the painting classes run by the awesome Rhonda Bender. Alot of the class was for true beginners who had never painted before, but I enjoyed going over the basics again. You have to have a strong foundation to build upon.

The class I got the most out of was on skin tones. We were given a choice of some Reaper Bones mini to practice on so I chose the Clay Golem.  It was a little rough at first and when we added purple to the shadows I was thinking I was about to ruin this figure. But you can tell me if it worked.

Paint Club - Night #1

Tonight my buddy Dave (http://grey-wolf-studio.blogspot.com/) and I had our first night of starting a paint club. We met up at ThroughTheDecadesSportsCardsGaming, which is not a miniature game store at all but they do carry board and card games. Magic the Gathering is a big thing there. Dave had approached the owner about possibly hosting a paint club there and the owner liked the idea so.....

Dave working on some Sedition Wars figures. Even though there was a Magic tourny going on we could barely tell and Dave and I enjoyed a few hours chatting and painting together. I opted to work on some of my Malifaux figures and chose my Ten Thunder Archers,

This is after 2 coats of red.

Looks like 3 coats was the magic number.

Here they are with the shadows put in. The rest are some close ups.

All in all a decent progress for a few hours while trying to start a weekly paint club. The holidays coming up will put a hiccup in the routine, but hopefully we can get some more people involved.

Stay tuned for more!

Sedition Wars and a Present

Sorry to be late with my latest update but last week there was a death in the family. My wife's uncle passed very suddenly and we will just say that it was far from the best circumstances. Lately when this kind of tragedy happens I find myself thinking about my dad who passed 2 years ago. He was a model car builder and in the last few years before he passed we grew closer over different modeling techniques. One of my many regrets was never getting around to have him teach me how to airbrush the right way. Everytime I sit down to paint I think of him, bittersweet, I know.

Anyway, right before this bomb dropped my awesome wife got me my Christmas present and told me I could have it early!

That is my new Badger Krome Airbrush! I was doing a little kid happy dance when I got it. I have used it once and I love how it feels in my hand. The double action is really nice and smooth and it has a needle limiter so you can set your paint flow to be consistent every spray. I still have a lot to learn about using it beyond basic priming and basecoating, but I will get there. Here are 8 Strain models that I primed and basecoated with the airbrush then I finished them off with the brush.

I tried several different color washes as you can tell before picking out some details. I am not super happy with them, but these are ok for a board game. Just need to finish up a bit on the bases and paint in the rim with black. This will put me up to 12 minis done for the #6MMRC. Hopefully I will get some more done this week/weekend.

A Few More Done...And a Surprise!

Managed to get some paint time this week and I decided to bust out my 3 Guild Riflemen for Malifaux. I really like the fluff for these guys and as usual for Wyrd the models look fantastic. Now I just need to get them in play!

Good enough for the tabletop I think. One of the big reasons for doing the 6MMRC is to get as many models painted without adding to pile. So far that makes a total of 4 done (Just need to seal them) and the whole Sedition Wars set assembled and primed. I know many people have a list or spread sheet keeping track of the models they own and what progress has been made on them. I think if I did that I would just get depressed, so I just take my small victories as they come.

As for the surprise, I found out this week that this little blog has now passed 2500 page views! That is quite a shock to me to say the least. I want to thank everyone to happens to stop by this crazy little space in my head and I guess I am going to have to come up with something as a give away or contest. Until then keep on painting!

#6MMRC Week 3

This week I ordered and received a new airbrush hose and adapter. Luckily supplies do not count in the reduction challenge. Last week I tried out the Harbor Freight Deluxe Airbrush when priming my Sedition Wars figures. I learned a few things:

1. I like the double action airbrushes for the way you can control the paint flow.
2. A water trap is a necessity, not an option.
3. I do not like the Harbour Freight Airbrush. This is more about how it feels in my hand than anything. I have larger hands and the airbrush was uncomfortable.

So I inherited my dad's modelling supplies when he passed away, which included two Paasche Model H airbrushes. They are single action, bottom feed airbrushes. I know they are not the "best" for our line of modelling, but for priming and base coating it will do just fine. I had ordered a Badger brand airhose with an inline water trap and the adapter to fit the Paasche brush to the airhose. There will be more airbrushing this coming week!

What I did manage to finish were 2 miniatures, 1 for Malifaux and a very basic repaint of a Heroscape figure for a client. Here we have the Lone Marshall for the Guild. In the fluff he is a Death Marshall that has managed to absorb the taint of the evil magic he fights instead of being corrupted by it like most are. I went the "Death rides a Pale Horse" theme for him. He is mounted on a Dark Ages base insert.

I feel I did an ok job for the first time ever painting a horse. Not very realistic, but neither is Malifaux....

 Here are the before and after shots of the Heroscape figure repaint. The colors were chosen by the client based on a community approved custom figure.

Major Progress! Thanks Mr Airbrush!

So I managed to get a good chunk of the day to work on some hobby stuff and I decided to bust out the airbrush. I currently have a few airbrushes at my disposal and I have hardly used any of them. Today I used the Harbor Freight deluxe airbrush. It is a bottom feed brush with both a bottle and a cup attachment. Since I was planning to prime a lot of figures I used the bottle.

So this makes a complete set of Sedition Wars and the Kickstarter extras all primed up with zenithal highlights. I hope this counts as my zombies for Zomtober with the crew at #6MMRC. Now it is time to airbrush on some base colors and then pick out details and call them done. The character models will get more attention, but the "rank and file" guys will get just enough to be decent on the table. On a side note I was in a Family Dollar store the other day and as I was wondering around I found this:

It is a silicone pot holder, but I immediately thought I could use it for a stamp for bases. Here is the first test:

Not too bad. I am not sure but I think my green stuff is getting too old. I will try again with some softer air dry clay I picked up. Keep picking at those mountains!

Conquering the Lead Mountain - Late Start

Ok folks, I have decided to join some fellow bloggers in a personal challenge to "Conquer the Lead Mountain." The goal is for six months you work to finish as many models as you can without adding to the pile. Most everyone who is participating in this started on Sept 1, so I am a month late, but this is still a great idea and I am hoping it will help motivate me to paint more and to blog more. You can check out all the rules and the other people joining the challenge HERE
As for my start I am currently working on my Lone Marshall for Malifaux:

Plus I am learning to play with and airbrush so I am practicing on my box of Sedition Wars:

So here is to a hopeful (re)start to my blog and my painting queue!

First mini of 2014

Here is the first mini I have finished this year. It is the Angel of Shadows from Reaper. I got this as a present several years ago and she was lost in mountain for a good while. At least she is finished and I think a good start to the year!