My first 40k style mini WIP

[kathrynloch]

Well, this is actually kinda sad. I've been working and working but still mucking it up in the fact I over-highlight. For some reason my brain thinks that medium gold color I'm using has to cover all of the armor.

Brain - "Missed a spot."
Me - "No I didn't."
Brain - "Yes you did. You can still see the dark brown."
Me - "But I need the dark brown for contrast."
Brain - "But it won't look like gold."
Me - "Yes it will, just be patient."
Brain - "No it won't. That's brown, not gold. If you want it to look like gold, you have to paint it gold."
Me - "No, I don't. That's not how it works."
Brain - "Yes you do."
Me - "No I don't."
Brain - "Yes, you do. Here if you won't fix it, I will" Hand moves."
Me - "Damn it! Now I have to paint brown there again."
Brain - "No you don't."
Me - "Yes, I do."

And it only gets worse.

Unfortunately, I've done that enough that I'm losing the fine detail. grrrr! I really need to strip it and start over. Here, let me show you - there's a little improvement but definitely the same problem of over highlighting and no contrast.

There's only one problem. I really like how the face and hair have started out. Eventually he's going to be almost a white-blond but that will take awhile. Still, it's a good foundation for the skin and hair.

Rats! I really don't want to strip that. I wonder if I can spot strip. lol! Hey, it's worth a shot. I can do it on the model horses but I've only tried it on the larger ones. If it doesn't work, I'll just strip the entire thing like normal. If I hadn't of lost so much of the fine detail, I wouldn't strip him but it's buried under paint, so i don't have much of a choice.

 

[marjedi]

Lmao...that first bit made me laugh, i think we all have that inner painting demon that sabotages us at times.

But too bad you have to strip him (pfft women!!) you have come such a long way.

 

[TomasP]

but too bad you have to strip him (pfft women!!)

run for cover!

 

[Benihana]

Oh gosh, I read the entire dialogue as "Brian" instead of brain, and then read marjedi's post and had to check if you named your inner demon Brian!

Show this to your brain (as if it is sitting on the table next to you):

http://www.google.com/search?q=man+...h=849&ie=UTF-8&tbm=isch&source=og&sa=N&tab=wi

 

[kathrynloch]

Lmao...that first bit made me laugh, i think we all have that inner painting demon that sabotages us at times.

But too bad you have to strip him (pfft women!!) you have come such a long way.

pffft men! Leave it to a man to ruin a perfectly good compliment by sticking his foot in his mouth at the same time. heehee!

run for cover!

Naw, I don't sweat the small stuff. Big stuff, yeah, people will run when I'm seriously pissed but normally it ain't no big thing.

Oh gosh, I read the entire dialogue as "Brian" instead of brain, and then read marjedi's post and had to check if you named your inner demon Brian!

Show this to your brain (as if it is sitting on the table next to you):

That's really cool! But I'm afraid it still won't convince my demon, Brian. lol! Too funny! It does still have a lot of yellow. But I absolutely love that picture!

I did find something though. It's really intriguing to me to find and examine the stuff that makes things click. What is it that makes the light bulb turn on and actual learning take place? The epiphany I guess you could say. For me it was something much more simple. I was on the GW site researching another mini I'm starting, Balthalzar Gelt and stumbled across this.

View attachment 7777

This one too:

View attachment 7778

But those are basic enough, and show enough of the dark brown and very little of that medium gold that I think I can convince Brian now to behave.

Ultimately, I'll have to wait until this thing is stripped and ready to go again. Hopefully it won't take forever. :waiting:

 

[TomasP]

was concerned about what your inner brian (lol) might say to the intimation that it'd be a light decision for you to strip something!

 

[johnynoi]

I've got the same problem as you Kathyrn, my limbs refuse to believe what my brains telling them, plus my brain keeps whispering "you've got a pot of gold paint there, go on use it, you know you want to! Slap that shiny stuff on thick and it'll all go away!"

I read the article on your blog, looks really usefull! I've got a wooden mannequin here that i'm going to try painting shiny gold and have some different shapes painted gold that I can tack to it so I can position it with a lightsource and hopefully copy the shades snd light from there until I get used to it. Might work, maybe!

 

[kathrynloch]

was concerned about what your inner brian (lol) might say to the intimation that it'd be a light decision for you to strip something!

lol! Benihana just started something. Well, at least my inner-demon has a name.

Well, when it comes to stripping minis or horses, I have one hard and fast rule that I follow. Most of my rules are just guidelines for me, everything and teaks now and then. This one has held up pretty solidly over the past couple of years.

Stripping is still very much a last resort. But my rule is, if the paint is thick enough that I start losing detail, it get's stripped. Period. Do not pass go, do not collect $200. Problems with color or other situations, I'll work as long as I can until it builds up enough that the detail goes and the rule kicks in. With me and the hand tremors, I'm always going back and fixing over-paint. It's not me going back over a mistake, hoping I won't make more, but me going back over it again and again until I get more things right than I got wrong. So with my bad habit of over-highlighting, and constantly repairing the boo-boos from my Richter Scale brush, I can pack on the layers of paint pretty rapidly.

I've got the same problem as you Kathyrn, my limbs refuse to believe what my brains telling them, plus my brain keeps whispering "you've got a pot of gold paint there, go on use it, you know you want to! Slap that shiny stuff on thick and it'll all go away!"

I read the article on your blog, looks really usefull! I've got a wooden mannequin here that i'm going to try painting shiny gold and have some different shapes painted gold that I can tack to it so I can position it with a lightsource and hopefully copy the shades snd light from there until I get used to it. Might work, maybe!

Cool johny! I hope you found the article helpful, if you have any questions, just let me know. And convincing my inner-demon, Brian, that this will turn into gold is the hard part. (Maybe I ought to rename it Brianne because it seems really strange referring to it as a HE. lol!) Brianne just can't see the steps. She can see the results like on Elly's NMM but can't see the steps and has to sit there and argue with me.

And yup, she does the same thing. Grab that little metallic pot o'paint right there. That will fix it in a jiffy. Besides, you already like Matt's technique of painting metallics. Why torture yourself with something you dislike?

Because I don't know how to do it, that's why. When I get this thing kicked in the teeth and can paint NMM consistently, that's when I'll really allow myself the choice.

Oh another thing that I think might help with the NMM.

This is Balthalzar Gelt's staff. I couldn't tell what that little creature is at the top so I took some pics but with the glare, still can't tell. Is it a horse or a lion? So I hit it with a very thin coat of black glaze.

It might be a horse, but the back legs and the snarl don't quite work. I think it's a lion, although the mane is really weird and looks like a horse's mane, holding a key, and the lion is sitting on top of a sea serpent of some kind. What do you guys think? Right or wrong? But back to my point, look at the highlights and shadows. With the black glaze, it helps pick them out a little more without glare.

In a bit here, I'm going to pull these pics into my photo editing software and tweak it a little bit to see if I can get those highlights and shadows more defined. Hopefully that will help me see the NMM.

Okay now here's where angel stands now.

Unfortunately the spot stripping didn't work, too many little nooks and crannies. I couldn't get my pointed cotton swabs into the corners. So a full strip it had to be. And in about 45 minutes the Dawn Power Dissolver had the paint off. That's record time for my stuff. But usually the horses have several layers of sealer for it to go through so it can take a lot longer. After that, I decided to keep everything as thin as possible. I just got some Vallejo Game Color White Primer - brush on. So I thinned that with water and applied. Went on like a dream, no brush strokes, great coverage and it's a nice thin layer.

Base coat on armor, extremely thinned dark brown and here it is.

Now that's really thin and really makes that filigree detail pop.

So now, here's hoping I can get Brian or Brianne whatever the hell her name is too cooperate this time.

DING! DING! Round three begins!!!!

 

[khavor]

Oh well, too bad you had to resort to the ol' stripper bath, but I agree totally. If the paint's gotten thick enough to start hiding detail your better off starting over.

But sheesh, you and Brian are definitely gluttons for punishment. All that filigree certainly makes for one complicated model to paint. Throw in learning nmm and a couple hand tremors at the same time and you've got a challenge there! BUT, what's life without a good challenge from time to time right? And you're learning a bit each try.

BTW: I vote for lion, holding key, standing on snake's head. (I was going to say "sea lion" ha!), but it looks like the lion definitely has some little back legs.

 

[marjedi]

Well good luck with it, im crossing my fingers for you....and my Brian calls himself Timmy btw

 

[kathrynloch]

Oh well, too bad you had to resort to the ol' stripper bath, but I agree totally. If the paint's gotten thick enough to start hiding detail your better off starting over.

But sheesh, you and Brian are definitely gluttons for punishment. All that filigree certainly makes for one complicated model to paint. Throw in learning nmm and a couple hand tremors at the same time and you've got a challenge there! BUT, what's life without a good challenge from time to time right? And you're learning a bit each try.

BTW: I vote for lion, holding key, standing on snake's head. (I was going to say "sea lion" ha!), but it looks like the lion definitely has some little back legs.

Thank khavor! Yeah, like I said, I knew better than to try NMM on this one but I went and did it anyway. I guess the devil's in the details...or is that inner demon, or daemon? hehe No, I can't use this one for GD but it's darn good practice.

Well good luck with it, im crossing my fingers for you....and my Brian calls himself Timmy btw

Thank you marjedi! lol! Timmy? Just hope he doesn't fall into any wells and take you with him...unless Lassie is around of course. Isn't it funny how most of us have that inner voice that tries to muck everything up when we paint? I don't know if it's the logical, non-creative side of the brain getting in the way or the creative side interfering because it's uneducated.

It's sorta like this I guess....

View attachment 7787
but one needs to be :brushwave: and the other :brushlick:

 

[marjedi]

So true, i know i have 2 inner voices when it comes to miniatures and painting. Timmy my "here let me do that...uuups" painting deamon, and Bekky " i just HAVE to have, can we buy it PLLZZZ!!" purchase deamon

 

[Noddwyr]

Too bad you had to strip him Kath. Anyway NMM is hard so dont give up, I know you can do it. Maybe it would help to just take a midtone, highlight and shadow and outline where those go to start and then start blending and addign further highlights and such. Anyway, looking forward to seeing your next attempt.

 

[kathrynloch]

So true, i know i have 2 inner voices when it comes to miniatures and painting. Timmy my "here let me do that...uuups" painting deamon, and Bekky " i just HAVE to have, can we buy it PLLZZZ!!" purchase deamon

Oh crimenies I got one of them too. Fortunately, I hate shopping so I can pretty much keep her controlled when it comes to clothes and shoes and all that other crap many women like buying.

But if it's a miniature or medieval historical model or a model horse, holy heck look out! It's even worse when it comes to supplies. If Hobby Lobby has a sale or a big discount coupon on something I need, or Ace Hardware, then the Sale Gene that's embedded in my DNA kicks into high gear. When Sale Gene and Susie Spend-It team up against me, I don't have a prayer. I hate shopping at Walmart (worked on a crew that did Walmart Inventory for a year so now I can't stand setting foot in one) but I guarantee you if Sale Gene and Susie tag-team me, I will walk out of there with SOMETHING for the hobby. A cheap pack of brushes for pigments, a bunch of sanding sponges, pointed cotton swabs, or anything similar, I'll buy the crap. And if I decide to get creative you'll be surprised what I can tweak to work for the hobby. But right now is that darn Forgeworld Dragon that Susie keeps screaming about.

Too bad you had to strip him Kath. Anyway NMM is hard so dont give up, I know you can do it. Maybe it would help to just take a midtone, highlight and shadow and outline where those go to start and then start blending and addign further highlights and such. Anyway, looking forward to seeing your next attempt.

Thanks for the vote of confidence Nodd! I'm sorta doing that. I'm trying to shift to just highlighting the very top points of the armor and the filligree. The hand tremors help take care of any gaps. lol! That's one major reason why I struggle with over-highlighting, I hit the areas that need it but Richter Scale brush takes it over the top many times.

We shall see how this round goes.

 

[kathrynloch]

Okay quick update - he still looks like crap. My software kept crashing so I couldn't run him through the noise filters and my super macro just really makes him look way too sharp and pixilated. But no biggie, I can retake photos tomorrow when I'm not so tired.

The good news is, I made it through my medium gold color (it's actually VGC Bronzed Flesh) and I STILL HAVE CONTRAST! Whoo hoo! I only had to go back and touch up a few areas and that was because of hand tremors. They were bad today so he's really sloppy but I didn't over highlight!

So I'm going to do some clean up tomorrow and see how it goes with a lighter color and if I can keep the contrast and not cover it all up.

 

[marjedi]

Good going Kath, looking forward to better pics but i like the dark colours:laugh:

Sleep tight lol:sleepy:

 

[cassar]

bit late i know but did you look up matts "How to do NMM for dummies" Mattsterbenz that is lol on a more serious note Kath he's the chap to look up if its NMM, what he doesnt know isnt worth knowing in that regard.

 

[kathrynloch]

Hi Cass

I found his article on using real metallics. I didn't realize he had one on NMM. I'll have to go dig.

Well, I've gotten to the point where I'm going to leave the NMM alone for a little while. They say the definition of insanity is doing the same things over and over and expecting a different result. Well, I was doing the same things over and over, so decided to work on another part of the mini. Besides with my shaking hands and my marvelous ability to over-paint, I figured I'd better work on the red armor. It would really suck to get the NMM decent then ruin it with red paint. So I'm working on that for right now.

And will somebody please explain to me why in the hell I chose to paint his hair that color? I have no clue what I was thinking! He was supposed to be blond. Sheesh!

 

[marjedi]

Well first off i dont think he is a disaster, he is just playing hard to get. As for the hair cant it be salvaged with some brown and yellow washes?

 

[kathrynloch]

lol! Thanks Mar! More than likely the hair can be salvaged without a problem. I just have no idea why I grabbed the gray paint instead of the yellow. It was just one of those things. lol!