First mini in 13 years-not bad!

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WhiteCrane

New member
Hi everyone, this is my first post here. About a year ago I got into running a D&D 4e campaign, but I've been into fantasy games and video games my whole life. I had an army of Tyranids when I was in high school that I'd battle my brother's Black Templar space marines with. It was a lot of fun, but I remember always being frustrated that my models wouldn't look anything like the pictures on the boxes or in the magazines I'd read.

As I've been getting more into 3D terrain for my games, using Dwarven Forge KS1 Dungeon Tiles, and with the new KS3 City Set already pledged, I wanted to get into miniature painting. I bought some of the D&D Adventure System games, which come with a good selection of decent minis, but with all the work I was putting into painting my dungeon tiles, and the work I knew was ahead to me to paint my future city, I wanted to invest some time and energy into making minis that would look as good as my terrain. I spent about $100 on Reaper Bones minis and the Learn to Paint Kit. They arrived this week and I was salivating over them until I could find the time to paint them.

Fast forward to last night, where I just sat down to paint my first mini the "right" way, trying to use the step-by-step techniques that I'd been reading about recently on this forum and other places. It took me approximately 3.5 hours to clean, de-flash, coat, wash, highlight, etc. I'm so happy with the result that I wanted to share, even though everything else I've seen on this forum blows this out of the water. Of course any comments and critiques would be welcomed, but I'm mostly just excited that it looks like the sample model in the picture!

Thanks for viewing, and I'm looking forward to learning a lot more from everyone here. Thanks for all the help so far! Presenting: my skeletal archer that my girlfriend has named Humphrey. Humphrey's gonna take some shots at PCs during our next game tomorrow night, so wish him luck!

WhiteCrane

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WhiteCrane

New member
Edited to fix broken pictures. And here's another guy I finished over the weekend to go with the archer. At around 3-3.5 hours so far per piece, this is turning into a pretty cheap form of entertainment! I'm really happy with how the shield turned out. I applied many washes of yellow, black, and a rust color to the shield. It really made it pop. I'm having a lot of fun with all these skeletal soldiers' shields. It's a great way to add color to a world of mostly dark hues. Thanks for looking!

WhiteCrane

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Webmonkey

Webmonkey

New member
agreed,... between models, paint, brushes, airbrushes, photo backdrops, transport cases,.. and a whole slough of other things I won't even bother to list,... I can't even begin to fathom the thousand of dollars that I've dumped into this hobby. (which is kinda depressing, considering how totally rubbish I am at it,.. even after all these years. You'd think I'd give up at some point. Guess I'm not that smart:rotfl:)
 
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WhiteCrane

New member
Haha, it's definitely expensive, but I was thinking more along the lines of money vs time it takes to finish a model. Broken down that way it's pretty cheap compared to going to the bar, skiing, movies, etc. Here's a shot of a rat swarm I'm working on. This was my first model I did from scratch, meaning I didn't use any painting guide or color mixing guide. Here's the one closest to completion, out of four swarms I'm painting. They're going to mess up the PCs in a room full of giant rats and traps. Muahahahaha!
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WhiteCrane

New member
Thanks for the encouragement and feedback, guys. Rothskin, you're right, I can definitely improve my shading on these guys. Here's a shot I took yesterday while enjoying the weather outside on my porch. Got some giant rats to go with the rat swarms now! Sorry it's such a big pic, but enjoy!

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Sicks

Sicks

Active member
looking good, i like the shields too, injects some colour into the models, as Rothskin said some shading would help make them pop more, for bone i tend to use a light brown (GW xv88 in my case) then build up the bone colour mixing a little into the brown and keep building up that way and gives a nice aged bone look, im by no means a master painter though but thought id share my tip there :)
 
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WhiteCrane

New member
Thanks Sicks, I appreciate the shading tip. I've tried not to go too overboard on these first couple guys, but as I'm learning more I'll try to apply better techniques to the future minis. I was afraid if I did too much on them, it would backfire and actually look worse. I just got a second batch of Bones to paint yesterday, so look for more updates! Thanks for the advice and feedback everyone!

WhiteCrane
 
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WhiteCrane

New member
Hey everyone, here's some more shots of my finished minis. I really like the way the rusty skeleton's shield turned out. I did several washes between rusty red, harvest brown, shadowed stone, variations of those, and then rubbed a bunch away with a synthetic brush for a really cool effect. It also looks like I need to remove some molding from his sword. I also like how the purple shield turned out, with that cool glowing effect. I might mess with it a little more but I don't want to overdo it. And the green shielded spearman is also an experiment in light-dark blending. I need to improve the light, top half of the shield, but it's starting to look pretty cool!


Enjoy, and can anyone tell me how to post pictures without the attachments showing?
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BloodFather of Kharnath

BloodFather of Kharnath

Active member
God job. The green and purple shield are experiments in shading that I daresay you did a great job on! Way to go!! You will look back one day and say that this is your first attempt at blending. Also, the rust effect is cool. That is a technique that many artists use with their verdigris: put down a watery layer and then soak it up as it dries so that it does what we normally try to avoid and leaves a mottled effect. You are on your way!
 
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