On the painting table

 When painting miniatures, some people like to focus on a figure or two.  Some people like to batch paint a squad at a time.  I’m somewhere between the two.  I’m not painting a lot of army games right now so I usually try to paint figures that will use the similar colors. 

With the skirmish games I am painting right now, I find it helps to paint a squad at a time so I can get a cohesive look across the models. 

 

Right now, and for the last three months, my painting table has contained:

 

Ten figures from my Dracula’s America Crossroads Cult posse.  These ones have more of a generic cowboy look.

 

Nine figures from Dracula’s America for my Plains Indian posse.  I have to finish the weapons, and feathers.

 

A Blood Bowl Treeman.  I’m hung up on the shades of brown as well as the gold cup/trophy inside him.

 

The nine man Braves (Warriors) gang from Street Wars NYC.  I have to finish the shoes, vests, and weapons.  I’m not looking forward to painting the tags on the back of the vests.  I’ll probably end up using the decals provided.

 

The last Final Girl from Don’t Look Back.  I’m struggling on deciding what to paint on her skateboard deck and what color to paint her hair and hat.  I also have the Supporting Characters, and Curse on Oak Hill sitting there.  I started painting the priest but not the demon ballerina.

 

The Ghost Rider from Unmatched Redemption Row.  The flames are giving me trouble right now.  I also have to paint the metallics – chains and spikes.

 

From Marvel Universe I have Thor, Captain America, Iron Patriot, and Pyro.

 

 

Just off my table, I have the Blood Bowl Ork team waiting to be painted next.

 

 

Painting – Lead it Be

I popped in to one of my local stores last weekend to pick up a pin vise. I’ve been assembling the Marvel/DC Universe figures over the last while and some of the limbs are so thin that they need to be pinned. The weather had warmed up enough that I was also able to prime a bunch of the ones I’ve already assembled.

While there, the owner showed me some figures that he had painted. He knew I used to paint (a lot more than my recent figure painting totals would reflect). These were the first figures that he had painted, having mostly been a card gamer. He had painted some of the Rebel Legion figures in a light green color. He was going for an ‘army men’ look.

I congratulated him a bit for painting but then mentioned that if he hit them with a wash, the details would really pop. We discussed drybrushing a bit as well.


Later, upon reflection, I realized that I had done him a disservice in this. While I would apply a wash and then highlights, as well as basing, he may not want to take these extra steps. In fact, in doing these extra details, it might even take away from his design aesthetic.

I messaged him later and pointed out my error. I circled back and welcomed him into the painting fold, advising him that he had taken his first steps into a larger world. I stressed that he did not need to make any other changes to what he had done, unless he wanted to. I blamed my years of Games Workshop 3-color-standard.

Just a reminder to us to think back to when we first started out painting. We need to celebrate what has been accomplished, and point out the good. If asked, we can give advice to nudge the new painters along the path but they don’t ever have to get to the same destination that we are at or heading to.

I remember seeing a 40K battle at a convention in Regina back in the late 90s. One player had painted his Tyranid army in pastel colors – blue, pink, yellow. A lot of the people walking by did not like it, but I found his sherbet-colored forces quite striking on the table.

Painting with liquid gold

I popped by the local Games Workshop on Sunday. Shan came with me so I pre-warned her about the ‘red shirts’. For those of you who haven’t encountered one of these yet, they are a hyper-enthusiastic sales staff that most GW stores have to push product. Luckily, he wasn’t in – but Shan still found the regular manager pretty pushy.

I was in to pick up some paints for D3’s Space Wolves. I got a Fenris Grey Foundation paint, Boltgun metallic, Space Wolf Grey, and the Asurmen Blue ink. I was looking for Space Wolf Blue Grey but they no longer sell it.
These should let me see how the new foundation paints work and get a good base of the colors so that I can look for cheaper equivalents. The three paints and inks cost about twenty dollars. However, these should be the main one I need to paint up his figures. I finally shook out a Great Company from him and a design for the other shoulders squad markings, so it’s all just a matter of me actually painting them.

Pre Paint

I’d hoped to get more painted the week before last but didn’t. I was able to get D3’s Rhino, Dread, and Captain as well as my Drop Pod and AoBR Ork Nobs primed.

I’m using very old Armory primer. I love the way it covers and dries but have been hearing bad things about the new cans being more prone to spitting. If I get on a painting kick again and run out, I’m not looking forward to finding a good replacement that isn’t crazy expensive.

Prepaint

We’ve mostly finished assembling the Rhino/Razorback as well as the Drop Pod. The Dreadnought is ready to paint as are the Ork Nobs, Stormboyz, and Defkopters. It’s just a matter of being able to prime them.

As well, I’m looking to paint some of the cowboy figures for an upsized Rules With No Name. Hopefully, I can paint them without having to prime them but we’ll see soon enough.