Closeups of Soccer Moms vs Undead Den Mother (Wyrd Contest)

[tzor]

Individual puctures of the figures in my entry for the Deadly Duel in the Wyrd Contest have been uploaded.

Soccer Moms and the Kids

HFH027 Rabbit killer Alice in boots (VOTE HERE)

HFA002 Jess (VOTE HERE)

HFA009 Peter and HFA010 Katie (VOTE HERE)

Undead Den Mother and her Munchkin Scouts

HFZ200 Zombie Ashlee Campbell (VOTE HERE)

SGZO003 Munchkins (VOTE HERE)

Footnotes

I haven\'t posted the full diaroma yet. Originally I had indended it to be a soccer feld (which had oddly placed stepping stones ... ) but I was faced with two different grass basing materials, one was too big, they covered a significant portion of the mini\'s feet and was hard to cut to fit. The other was too small. I think I found a more suitable size given the stone bases. (Another odd idea of mine using mosaic tiles from Michaels) So I should have the revised diaorama sometime next week.

Note: Jess is a mess. The kids don\'t have eyes. Alice needs to work on rapid application of lip stck. The effect of using green ink on black hair looks wicked cool but is mighty hard to capture in the photograph. And on my work computer everything looks too dark.

 

[Ogrebane]

The pics are a little dark. Did the vote thing.

 

[RedSevenBlue]

I know why the kids don\'t have eyes, the hills stole them, but forgot to bring a decent plot line along. :idea: the pictures are way dark, use a white background like posterboard and turn the flash on and try messing with the buttons on the front of your PC monitor.

 

[Shawn R. L.]

Love the duct tape on the hockey stick!!!!!!! Duct tape - the solution to many of life\'s problems.

 

[Stuntylover]

I have been looking at your whole portfolio on CMON and since your early days you are showing signs of improvement but slowly, your scores indicate well below tabletop quality. This current submission shows that you still have some way to go in technique. My suggestion is to slow down (you are turning out models too frequently) and practice basic techniques. You need more work on layering/blending, face painting, especially eyes, general neatness of paint application, a rethink on the use of ink and washes, shine, basing, brush control.... I could go on. Study tutorials on all these subjects then apply the ones that suit you. You can be better than your scores indicate but slow down and learn from the masters; you will be good one day as at least you have enthusiasm and a passion for miniatures.

 

[Avelorn]

Hey! don\'t we all love hasslefree! I\'m placing an order soon.. that\'s for sure. I like the dresscolour very much a the zombie looks really dead. I imagine you have to chase the flies away!

I\'ll give you some tips on brush control to see if it helps you in any way. Just some general tips that I think could or even should be covered (like a checklist), I know a lot of people don\'t have it this way and produce wonderful results! But this is what works best for me after some experimenting. And if anyone wants to be in this hobby for very long I think ergonomics is a keyword.

First position yourself comfortably on a chair that makes you think, hey I can paint for hours in this position. Be sure that you do not need to bend your neck and back very much to be able to apply or mix the paint. A hight adjustable chair is therefor a good idea. And something to support your arms and hands. I sometimes just use the arms of a chair and support my albows on them. I also have a stand on my desk that I can rest my hands on.

Secondly it\'s using a stand when painting. I often just use a blob of blu-tac under a base and then position it on an emty GW-bottle. Another common thing is just to use a pen-drill drilled into the mini. Often it is a good idea if you paint pieces sepparatly. Sometimes I also use wire which I drilled into a strategic position and then fastened it into cork.

Thirdly there\'s lighting. If you have strong lighting youare able to see mistakes better, a common mistake is to believe that \"natural lighting\" is best for painting, but it\'s not as it shifts too much. the temperature and properties of outdoor light both shift during a day and during seasons. So a nice fluorescent light with good amount of lumens and as full spectrum as possible. Right now I use a fluorescent light with 940 where 9 stands for the colour rendering and 40 for the light temperatur. There are even better ones on the market but this lighting setup lets me makes spot mistakes that aren\'t even visible in a normalsized miniaturephoto! There are bulbs that works nice too.. OSRAM has a bulb with daylight coating which has really good colour-rendering.. the downside is that they get warm. The old blue \"daylight bulbs\" are a bit crappy and more of a effectlight than really simulates daylighting. It\'s a good idea to use a a swing-desktop lamp that lets you position your light where you want it.

When you paint the mini put both of your hands together so that they shake at the same pace! Use only your fingers when moving the brush. And work from the deepest crevaces and go outwards so that everything is covered in paint.

When you\'ve covered an area with paint, turn the miniature upside down or adjust the lighting so it shines from in under.. you\'re probably going to discover more spots that needs to be covered.

And finally use thin layers, with little paint on the brush. Then it\'s easier to correct misstakes. How thin is one of those.. feeling things. It\'s very hard for me to describe how thin. But for a base coat it should cover in 2-3 goes (if it\'s a good paint). And for layering I tend to dilute the paint more as I go.

When painting eyes try this method instead: paint the eyes before the skin. Do the entire sockle black and do two white spots in either corner of the eye to simulate whites. It easier to adjust them then and redo the iris with black as you have something to point at. You can also use a skin colour later to adjust the size of the black border between the eyes and skin. Put very little paint on the brush while painting the eyes. Therefor it\'s a good idea to use a retarder so that the paint doesn\'t dry on the way.

Hope anything helps!

 

[tzor]

Thanks a lot, a million, a billion even, especially you Avellorn for all the good suggestions. Yes I\'m probably painting too fast. I will definitely try to slow down. (Priming on the other hand will still be a group activity, especially since I have to wait for a good day when I\'m not at work in order to do it.)

Meanwhile, I did two minor things to my diaorama. I got in a quick eye paint on the boy, and I applied some grass (GW but not everything GW is bad) between the stone frame of the diorama. Now the stones look at least somewhat reasonable.

Soccer Moms vs the Undead Den Mother
VOTE HERE

 

[supervike]

The addition of the diorama makes the triangle pieces make so much more sense.

I like it! I think Avelorn has passed on some great advice.

Good luck and keep at it.

Oh, voted!

 

[funnymouth]

cool diorama. averlorns advice is rock solid, but id add a bit more: try darklining, esp. on the girl with the hocky stuff, itll make those details pop. as for metallics, paint them with many layers too - hilight them! good creativity though, and that is really the most important thing.

edit: dont be afraid to go back and rework minis youve already \"finished.\" i rework minis alll the time as i improve - living art.