38 replies to this topic

[buglips*the*goblin]

In the Show-Off section, at the end of my RAFM/Partha thread, I asked if anybody wanted to see a WIP. The answer was yes, so I offered a choice of one out of four. #3 won, so here we are.

More to follow.

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[TaleSpinner]

Oooh, OSL.

[buglips*the*goblin]

Oooh, OSL.

Ha ha ha, no. :-p

I probably could, and I have a miniature destined for that experiment (Siobhana, Vampiress), but no OSL for this lady. She's getting the "Partha Catalog" treatment with a few tweaks.


Right, then, on with this thing. I'll be committing some possible blasphemies along the way in this project and where I do I'll try to note them so new people will know where I've deviated, why I've deviated, and why the standard method might work better for them and is worth a try.

Blasphemy the First is that I do not mount my miniatures to cork, or bottles, or vice grips, or anything. I'll be using the top of her hair, the top of the torch, and the sword as grab points for my fingers and resting the base in my palm. I do it this way because I have incredibly jittery hands and this is the only way for me to contort myself so the mini is steady. I tried holding onto a piece of cork with the mini on top and it was like trying to paint an easter egg in a washing machine. Mounting the miniature is recommended, so I wouldn't do it my way unless you had no other choice.

Ok, so here she is primed up. I used Reaper New Pro Paint brush-on white for this, because I bought a zillion bottles of it. I prefer it over a spray because it reacts less poorly to varied temperature and humidity, and I can use it year-round.

[buglips*the*goblin]

Time for some skin. This basecoat is 3 parts Reaper Pro Paint Fair Maiden to one part RPP Chestnut Brown. (I kind of feel like I'm teasing by using OOP paints, but it's what I've got in quantity - you can find equivalents in the HD and MSP lines). My 'gunk' mix is 1/4 future and the rest bottled water. I have a secondary gunk bottle that's the same ratio, only with reaper flow improver in place of future.

For basecoats I always used the future mix. It thins it to manageable (so long as you keep your bristles moist) but also makes it just a little bit gooey so it sticks better, stays in place, and has the advantage of conferring a little extra protection with each layer.


As you can see, I'm none too particular about being neat at this stage. This is actually a lot neater than usual for me, because she's small enough that I'm using a semi-retired 00 Series 7 for the job.

You'll also notice the leg is only part-done. That's because I got that far before I realized: "hey, wait a minute - this isn't leg, these are pants!"

[buglips*the*goblin]

Activate the cloak!

Ok, another thing I seldom use is a palette. I do have one, and I do use it sometimes, but most of the time I just use standard ratios I create and mix them up in this:



That's a white soda pop plastic cap. I've got a drawer full of them. This mix was actually a bit heavy on the shade so I dumped it and made a new batch for the cloak.

This is 3 parts MSP Highland Moss to 1 part RPP Walnut. Not sure if it's quite dark enough, or maybe Highland Moss isn't quite light enough on its own for the next layer. Find out when I get there.


Now she has some paint on the back, too.

[buglips*the*goblin]

Got her shirt and trousers done. This is 50/50 RPP Shield Brown and Griffon Tan. Noticed at this stage that the brush lost a bit of bristle to the side of her lips. I'll get rid of that when I do my touch-up after darklining.

[buglips*the*goblin]

Painted her cloth. This is just straight RPP Aged Red Brick. I used to mix my red shade until I looked at ARB one day and thought it looked similar. So I put some on next to my mix, and it was exactly the same. Since then I just use it instead. Well, until it runs out anyway.

[buglips*the*goblin]

Next come the leathers. 3 Shield Brown to 1 Walnut. Not so sure about that colour on the belt. Was thining Chestnut instead, but it is pretty close to the red part so not sure if it'll look better that way, or better if it's dark and more differentiated.

[buglips*the*goblin]

And then I did the rest of the first stage basecoat before blacklining. Hair is straight walnut. Those aren't eyebrows, either, just sloppy work. You'll notice I didn't fill in the eyes here. I'm going to use black for that. Walnut is recommended for more realism, I use black for the cartoonish effect.

Torch handle is straight Shield Brown.

The base, though you can't see it well, is my "dungeon tile" I give all minis who either have tile molded in or a smooth base. It's Rainy Gray, Granite, Dove Gray, and Stone Gray.

This concludes the first round of basecoating. Now I'll do my blacks and then re-do these coats to work in so the lining is nice and neat. When all that's done, it'll be time to highlight.

[chaosscorpion]

Buglips

It seems we work a lot a like. I hold my figs while painting as well, and use a shot glass for mixing colors.

[buglips*the*goblin]

Now things are getting ugly! The blacklining is done, and it should be immediately apparent why I do it at this stage and not at the end. This is black. Not just any ordinary black, this is Coat D'Arms black. I've never seen such black. It's the consumer of all light!

A bit glossy when it goes on, but that'll change. What's important is that it gives me that stark cartoonish look.

[buglips*the*goblin]

I also do the eyes at this stage. Again, cartoonish is the key so I use bright white and a simple black dot. For more realism, do the eyes in walnut and then a nice off-white. Make the dot color with a little tiny black dot inside. Add a tiny drop of white in a corner for fancy reflection.

But all that is beyond the scope of this WIP. Here I'm disposing of all that neat stuff in order to pursue a certain look.

Not quite this look, as she appears horrified now that she can see what I've done. Not quite screaming and railing against the cruel god that would bring her into the world so. Not like the cyclops did. But close. She's clearly skeptical.

Pish, little metal adventurer. Have some faith. This ought to clean up in the next step. Or might need a re-do. Find out when I get there!

[buglips*the*goblin]

Cleaned up the lining. Tried to fix the schmutz on her face, only succeeded in making it significantly worse. I'm going to press on and hope the highlighting and dullcoat at the end will cover it up. I've been here before, and I'm pretty lazy.

Eyes are better. Might need some more work. I'll see how it looks with some other stuff done on the face. I've lived with worse, and this level of macro shows the model looking way worse than it does when I'm squinting at it under light.

[buglips*the*goblin]

Now I have the first layers done.











Aware that at this magnification she looks . . . well, rather a bit hideous, I thought it might be illustrative to include a picture closer to what I'm seeing. Because I'm sitting there thinking she looks pretty neat, then I see the blow-up and it's all like "recoil in horror".

[buglips*the*goblin]

Also, I checked the submission guidelines and I didn't see anything telling me to take the finished final picture and put it in Show-Off. So, unless anybody objects I'm going to put it here when I get to it - because nothing annoys me more than reading a WIP and then having to link off (or worse, go find) the end result.

Not sure if I'm breaking a board protocol there, but if I have a choice I'm putting it at the end of this.