Chicago Games Day Skaven Warlord

[Tinweasel]

I finally got a chance to compile a set of pictures in order to post a submission for this guy. I\'m very happy to say he won a Bronze Demon in the Warhammer Single Mini category at the 2008 Chicago Golden Demon competition - at the same time, I\'m somewhat surprised, as there really were a ton of excellent entries in a very competitive category.

Here\'s my entry on CMON:
http://www.coolminiornot.com/198298

For the sake of completeness, here\'s the full spread of final photographs I took before packing him off to his home away from home in the display case at the local GW Hobby Center:

I\'d really appreciate comments on the entry itself as to what you guys think of the figure. Like I said in the writeup, this was my first effort at a new and different style of painting, and I\'m genuinely curious as to what you guys think of the figure.

 

[freakinacage]

nice work.a lovely clean job

 

[hakoMike]

I was very impressed with the subtle palette and clean painting. Great work, all around!

I tired the same fig and didn\'t even make first cut! That hand full of rats is a confusing mess to paint, isn\'t it?

 

[Tinweasel]

Thanks!

Originally posted by hakoMike
I tired the same fig and didn\'t even make first cut! That hand full of rats is a confusing mess to paint, isn\'t it?

That ratbandangle, for lack of a better word, is pretty convoluted, yeah. That\'s one of the cooler parts of the figure, though - that he\'s holding this string of tied together rats screaming at the topmost one! What had me confused was the tail - if you look closely, the \"tip\" is separated into two \"ridges\" - I had a heck of a time deciding which one to paint as his fleshy tail and which to paint as a blade attached to the spiked metal band on his tail. They\'re both offset a little, so it basically came down to aesthetics that I painted the fleshy tail part as the narrowed \"ridge\" in the front.

I really liked your Skaven, but I had no idea you had painted it. Of course, when we ran into each other, I was just on my way over to check out the figures in the cases for the first time, I believe. (I left a reply in your \"Lustrian Warlord\" forums thread and voted on your mini, by the way. I thought it was a good job, at least enough to make First Cut... then again, I never would\'ve guessed that my own entry would\'ve won Bronze - I was hoping at least First Cut, but to beat out some of the other entries - like Akaranseth\'s Vampire Lord, for example - that was a helluva thing and completely unexpected.

Anyhow, what I really loved about this figure is just the sheer amount of tiny details: from the boils on his belly and tail, the studs on his headdress, the tiny rat perched on his book on his back, right up to the patchy fur on the Skaven himself and the patchy fur and the boil/tumor on the innermost rat in the tangle.

 

[darklord]

congrats on the demon, love the soft pallette you used then the bright green on the bell, one small niggle for me is the last pic with the full base, it kind of looks \'sunk in the middle, but its maybe just the camera angle, still a very nice piece

 

[Tinweasel]

Originally posted by darklord
congrats on the demon, love the soft pallette you used then the bright green on the bell, one small niggle for me is the last pic with the full base, it kind of looks \'sunk in the middle, but its maybe just the camera angle, still a very nice piece

Thanks!

One of the things I tried to do was make the green of the Warpstone a vibrant color - it\'s in such small quantities, though, on the figure. I figgered if I added somewhat of a reflected glow effect on the bell behind it, it would stand out a bit more.

As to the rest of the color being more \"soft,\" with the intentional exception of the skin, it just sort of turned out like that. I started out with white primer and built up to more or less solid colors over most of the figure using thinned paints. I think the reason it looks the way it does is due to the painting style I used - I mean, even though all the shading is done with blue and green and brown glazes, the coloration never ended up very striking (maybe with the exception of the Warpstone on the bell.) The skin was one area that I intentionally worked a lot of light greyish-yellow into all the way up to the highlights, since I kinda wanted him to have a \"sickly\" sort of feel, given that he\'s painted in Clan Pestilens colors.


As for the base, I tried to downplay the gap around the base as much as I could. It used to really look dark with the black base edging and a black interior to the depression, but I went back over the inset with light earth tones to match the rest of the display basing. The gap around the figure base is slightly wider, too, because he\'s mounted to it by a fairly strong magnet and I didn\'t want him catching any edges of the display base when \"snapping\" him into place - I did that once accidentally early in the display base painting process and ended up with a large chunk of the ground cover being ripped off...

 

[mattsterbenz]

The metallics are great and I like the plants on the base too. Good stuff. Congrats on the demon!

-Matt

 

[Celthulhu]

Congrats, Tinweasel.
I don\'t think I ran into you at Chicago GD.