Tuesday, July 28, 2015

Pinned Down, Taking Fire! - Complete!


Pinned Down, Taking Fire! is now done! I had a lot of fun with this one. I got to shoot it with a bb gun, I learned how to paint camouflage and best of all I finally got to paint up some Hasslefree Miniatures figures! The whole process has been a blast to work on and I really got a lot of energy from folks complementing the project while it was in the WIP stages.

WIP: Pinned Down, Taking Fire! - Painting Urban Camouflauge

With the base painted and done (for the time being), it was time to get Woody and Badger painted! As I mentioned in the previous post I struggled with the camouflage pattern and coloring. Finally after a bunch of great suggestions from the folks on Twitter I decided on grey Urban camo.

Painting camouflage boggled my mind though. I've never attempted camo before, because I was always worried that it'd come out looking like I had just slapped random splotches of color all over it. But thanks to the internets and especially Kujo Painting's Painting Camo video, I felt confident enough to get started on Woody and Badger.

I knew I didn't want to mix paint. With the heat over the last few days it would dry out too quick. Plus if I had to stop, I didn't want to worry about mixing paint and color matching later. So I went with a palette of Vallejo's grey Model Color paints. These and their layers are:
  • Base Coat: Neutral Grey
  • Layer 1: White
  • Layer 2: Grey Green
  • Layer 3: German Grey
While Urban camo has black in it, I decided to go with German Grey instead. This was because I am using Black for the other pieces of clothing and didn't want the camo pattern to blend into it.

I followed the steps in Kujo's video, but with some minor changes. My process was like this:


Base Coat: Neutral Grey
Wash #1: Wash crevasses with thinned Gray Green
Layer #1: Paint random splotches of White on all Neutral Grey surfaces
Layer #2: Paint random splotches of Grey Green, slighly overlapping and connecting between white splotches.
Layer #3: Paint random splotches of German Grey on top of white and grey splotches, trying to go along the edge of the grey splotches and keeping lines thinner than the others.
Wash #2: Wash all areas with thinned GW Nuln Oil.


The camo turned out great! I surprised myself with it and have gotten a ton of compliments from everyone
that sees it. Not bad for my first ever attempt at it. But I do think I'll follow up with another wash of Nuln Oil in the creases, just to help give the fabric a bit more dimension.
 
Next up are the black sections of clothing. I'll need to simulate leather on the gloves and boots, while the straps, masks and other bits need to look like fabric. Also, the guns need to look like painted metal, which means edge highlighting. Other than that, it's details, details, details.

I should have it finished up soon. But, as always, you can watch it progress in a more up-to-date fashion via Twitter. Hopefully it will be done this week, I don't see any reason why it wouldn't be.

Sunday, July 26, 2015

WIP: Pinned Down, Taking Fire! - Painting the Wall


The wall is built and exploded, the minis are assembled and ready for battle. It's time for paint y'all!

I came to an impasse for most of the day after the wall was assembled. I needed to decide on the ground, wall and camo colors. I spent a lot of time looking at camo patterns, trying to decide on what to go with. I made it especially difficult on myself, because I originally planned on a red brick wall.

This left me with a limited number of camo choices and it was brought to my attention that Urban Camo against red bricks might look off. So, after a bit of debating I finally decided on grey bricks for the wall and a blacktop ground with the soldiers clad in grey urban camo.

Saturday, July 25, 2015

Project Announcement: Pinned Down, Taking Fire! - Building the Wall, and then Exploding it.

It's time to start a new project and that project is something I've been looking forward to for a while now. This new project is titled "Pinned Down, Taking Fire!" and it's a departure from my usual fantasy based pieces, instead being modern military.

Saturday, July 18, 2015

WIP: SDE: Von Drakk Manor - Rusting Armor

Now that The Great Cyclopean Gemstone Heist! is finished, I was able to get started on the Super Dungeon Explore: Von Drakk Manor expansion pack. I've been looking forward to starting on this set for awhile now, but I wasn't sure how to get started on them. After priming them, I base coated all of their eyes. But then I realized that the armor was going to be a messy endeavor , so I started on that first.

Special thanks to @3dgreg, @OPwizardbeard and @40kChris for helping me out with the rust technique.

Thursday, July 16, 2015

Super Dungeon Explore: Forgotten King Arrives! - Wave 2


Wave 2 of Super Dungeon Explore has finally arrived! Wave 1 came in back in April, and I did an unboxing write up on the set. Now, three months later and with the rest of it in hand, it's time to go around again! It's been a long week, I got my tracking number on Saturday and have been madly refreshing it for the last 5 days.

Sunday, July 12, 2015

The Great Cyclopean Gemstone Heist! - Complete!

It took awhile, but I can finally say that The Great Cyclopean Gemstone Heist! is finished! There were lots of ups and downs and starts and stops to this project and at one point it looked like it was never going to get done.

I couldn't have done this without the support of @minisbytree and @paintsandstuff on Twitter. Both of them helped to push me to make this project better. Especially when it came to the painting in the background. Also, this project would never have been drempt up if it wasn't for @blue_cadet and his LED tea candle Warhammer 40k objective markers.

So now, I give you, The Great Cyclopean Gemstone Heist!, complete with a video of the eye in action!

Saturday, July 11, 2015

WIP: The Great Cyclopean Heist! - Reworking the Base


This project stalled for a bit, mainly because I grew tired of copying the Ravenloft painting and after I cut the base down I decided that I didn't like the originally flooring I put on it. I knew I'd need to rebuild the base, but didn't feel up to working on it, so I distracted myself with Space Hulk and Super Dungeon Explore until I was ready to start up again. But now, with some 1/2" MDF in hand it was time to work on this again, and rebuild the new base!

Monday, July 6, 2015

SDE: Caverns of Roxor - Completed!

It was a long road, but I have finally escaped the firey domain of Roxor and his minions. Originally purchased when it first released in 2012, Caverns of Roxor was left unpainted thanks to SDE painting burnout and the long process of painting the base set. But it is now complete and I can move on to Von Drakk Manor (before dying under a tidal wave of Forgotten King plastic).