Demihuman's DemiWIP
- Thread starter Demihuman
- Start date
Hey Demi, I remembered a little tutorial on how to make a squad all in focus:
http://www.miniwargaming.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=8&t=111139
http://www.miniwargaming.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=8&t=111139
Zab
New member
Aperture Priority. Armour piercing... LOL. Too much Infinity on the mind
BloodFather of Kharnath
Active member
Haha, Digga getting called out! A little less post-y and a little more paint-y
Blending is pretty painstaking, but i do think there are a lot of different correct ways to do it. So it's not like there is some secret formula. I tried 2 brush blending and it didn't really work for me although I do quite a bit of wet blending in very small areas. Big wet blending is super fun and fast especially for those flowy fantasy robes. Glazing is a must have technique, if nothing else for the brush/paint control it gives you. A big break through for me was watching Sprokets work and reading his article on stipling:
http://sproketsmallworld.blogspot.com/2012/01/spots-before-your-eyes-guide-to.html
And then this exercise from chest of colors was key:
http://chestofcolors.com/about-driving-and-contrasts/
It turns out that if you put a spot of pure white and a spot of pure black at the respective ends of your crappy blends they look way better. Who knew?
Back to glazing, I did a workshop with Aaron Lovejoy and he had a really important point about blending: It's less about the color and thinning and more about how flat you can lay down your paint. So if you can lay down full strength paint but only have each layer one atom thick you can build up your layers slowly with control. Thinning paint a ton doesn't do anything if you can't then lay that paint down in a very controlled manner. Something to think about.
Also, you don't even have to have blends just paint in the lines, and keep the place where your paints border each other nice and tidy. Some of those super clean old school space marines are painted like that and they look awesome.
Okay. Back to Joany, Tackled the neck, which went way easier than I thought it would. Even with the weird orange glowy things... Setting me up to get my purple glazes goings... PURPLE GLAZE, ALL IN MY MINI'S EYE/ PAINTS ACTING FUNNY AND DON'T KNOW WHY/YEAAAAAHHHHH PURPLE GLAZE.
Ahem.
Also going to do a Giant Display Base™ for her. I think I am going to try and incorporate the base I already have going. Already took the heat gun to an old CD player in the awesome garage. That's why it smells like burnt plastic.
Ahhh, I was wondering what that smell was. Thanks for the explanation
Sorry for neglecting your WIP for the past two weeks. Looks like I've some catching up to do then. So without further ado:
I BEEN TO MOURNFANG MOUNTAIN/ONCE OR TWICE BUT WHOSE COUNTIN/THEY SAY ITS JUST A PHASE/THANK GOD FOR THAT PURPLE GLAZE
Thank you. I'm here every Thursday.
I have to comment on blending. This is such an important topic to me, and I just feel like I could teach anyone to do it if they were in front of me. Typing about it is challenging, especially when many people do to learn well as readers. Anyhow, blending is very intuitive to me. I actually blended on my first ever miniature without putting any thought to it. It was a marauder of chaos musician, and I blended his drum from red to purple. I used sort of a dabbing technique with the brush, but you have to forgive this as I'd done zero research on mini painting at the time and didn't even dilute the paint. But it came out great. As you say Demi, I also wet blend in small areas. I do the normal glazing as I go to blend, but if a transition is looking rough I'll just wet blend the area that needs a attention with whatever colors are used. TO ALL OF YOU THAT ARE HAVING TROUBLE BLENDING: The key is truly to keep the paint flat as has been discussed. But this probably doesn't compute very well in your head. The best way to achieve your blend is to simply paint towards the highlight and towards the shade. So, put down your basecoat using a mid tone. Let's say blue. Put down several coats until it's nice and smooth. You can do this step of course. Now, start with a darker blue and push the paint towards the area that will get darker. Add several coats, letting each dry. Then shrink the area and go darker blue. Keep painting your strokes towards the darker area. And so on. Repeat the opposite for your highlights. TA DA. You have blended. Literally impossible to screw this up. Now there may be some back and forth. Your transitions will need smoothed out, so just go back and forth, remembering at all times where to stroke it.
CUZ I STROKE IT TO THE EAST/AND I STROKE IT TO THE WEST/I STROKE IT TO THE AREA THAT GETS SHADED OR HIGHLIGHTED THE BEST/I BE STROKIN'
Remember this tune and you will make Yellow One look like a finger painting, glue-eating pre-schooler.
Any questions?
Zab
New member
Dude, the scary part is yellow one is a finger painting preschooler and he's that good. I'm afraid for when his fine motor skills develop more. So. Very. Afraid. :tremble:
Demihuman
Active member
And there it is:
http://www.coolminiornot.com/368496
I am actually really happy how the photos came out. Except for the group shot. That one looks a little funky. But I think my short depth of field brings some drama. And for a group shot I think it worked out. The montage could have been arranged a little better. But dammit Jim, I'm mini painter not a proctologist!
http://www.coolminiornot.com/368496
I am actually really happy how the photos came out. Except for the group shot. That one looks a little funky. But I think my short depth of field brings some drama. And for a group shot I think it worked out. The montage could have been arranged a little better. But dammit Jim, I'm mini painter not a proctologist!
BloodASmedium
[img]http://pnp
opted commented done 10/10
BloodFather of Kharnath
Active member
You just reminded me...recently saw Maleficent. What a movie! A lot inspiration can be gained from watching it, especially for base building.
Hey, the other week when I asked if you were interested in a friendly competition, and you
were all like, "With a loser like you? Eff no!"
. Well, what I meant to communicate but did not-because I left for the field the next day-was wondering if you wanted to see who scored higher once our current projects are finished and uploaded. The loser has to put a link to the winner's gallery in their signature section, with a statement like "if you like what you see here, Demihuman is a much better painter than me. Idk... Just an added thing to help push myself...no worries if you think it's dumb...
Demihuman
Active member
BFoK, I thought you were trying to recruit me for the Gokkan (?) Paint-along.
So let's see, whoever's next project scores lower has to link to the other persons project? Why don't we snooze that and do a WAMP contest after the new year. I have always wanted to do something over there. We could pick something that pushes us both, like maybe skin tones? or a mounted figure?
I was going to send you a link to WAMP, but I see you are already well acquainted with that site ...
So let's see, whoever's next project scores lower has to link to the other persons project? Why don't we snooze that and do a WAMP contest after the new year. I have always wanted to do something over there. We could pick something that pushes us both, like maybe skin tones? or a mounted figure?
I was going to send you a link to WAMP, but I see you are already well acquainted with that site ...
Zab
New member
Yeah, I clearly have some catching up to do on WAMP. I have no idea what a ladder is. I'm all about C'MON and have pretty much just dumped pics on WAMP not really knowing much about it. Now that i know what browser to use to actually get all the features I may have to explore a bit.
BloodFather of Kharnath
Active member
Yes, actually DarkLord ( the WAMP CEO) and myself actully just did a WAMP ladder. My last figure, Maagaan, well him and I both happened to start it at the same time so we decided to do a Ladder on it. Wish Incould give you a link to the vote, but something is up with DarkLord lately and he hasn't been around to post the voting thread. Anyway , I'll let u know when it's up so you can vote.
Zab, the WAMP ladder is way cool. Two artists pick a theme and go head to head on a project. Some themes are crazy creative and really push the artists. Anyway, find some of the threads to see what we are talking about. However, a disclaimer. WAMP has been hurting lately. In their hey day, they had a bunch of comps and all sorts of traffic and even a magazine. Lately, traffic is waaay slow over there. Just a warning so you do to get your hopes up.
Demi , will gladly do a ladder with you. Agree on some of the themes you mentioned. I have my next two projects planned out, so they'd likely have to coincide with them if you want to start it reasonably soon. I have Cannibal from Simon Minis, and of course Gokan. Would be happy to use either one in any way you see fit.
Zab, the WAMP ladder is way cool. Two artists pick a theme and go head to head on a project. Some themes are crazy creative and really push the artists. Anyway, find some of the threads to see what we are talking about. However, a disclaimer. WAMP has been hurting lately. In their hey day, they had a bunch of comps and all sorts of traffic and even a magazine. Lately, traffic is waaay slow over there. Just a warning so you do to get your hopes up.
Demi , will gladly do a ladder with you. Agree on some of the themes you mentioned. I have my next two projects planned out, so they'd likely have to coincide with them if you want to start it reasonably soon. I have Cannibal from Simon Minis, and of course Gokan. Would be happy to use either one in any way you see fit.
Demihuman
Active member
Yeah, I was wondering if WAMP might be slowing down a little. It's got to be tough keeping something like that going. I guess if it's a feeder for a retail business or a commission painting business it makes sense but if it's just a labor of love it has to be really hard to keep it going.
After the log-in glitch here a few weeks ago, I backed up my WIP. I would hate lose it. It got me thinking about content and how the forum works and what not. I run my company's Facebook page and I would run our forum, or blog, if we ever invested enough energy in getting one going, so I think about generating content a lot. Since I am under the gun to produce it every week I also put a pretty high value it. Which got me thinking about a blog or some other place, that I own, to store my hobby musings. A blog seems like an obvious answer, but also seems like it might be a second hobby, which is the last thing I need.
So, maybe we can paint the last two minis on WAMP. Or, maybe we can find a contest to both enter, or something. ..
After the log-in glitch here a few weeks ago, I backed up my WIP. I would hate lose it. It got me thinking about content and how the forum works and what not. I run my company's Facebook page and I would run our forum, or blog, if we ever invested enough energy in getting one going, so I think about generating content a lot. Since I am under the gun to produce it every week I also put a pretty high value it. Which got me thinking about a blog or some other place, that I own, to store my hobby musings. A blog seems like an obvious answer, but also seems like it might be a second hobby, which is the last thing I need.
So, maybe we can paint the last two minis on WAMP. Or, maybe we can find a contest to both enter, or something. ..
Demihuman
Active member
Oh, duh, good question. I used an app called Pocket. It basically takes a snap shot of an entire web page and saves it where ever you like. I think most people use it on their phones, so when they lose service they can keep reading their stuff. I bet there is a better solution out there if you were going to archive a bunch pf stuff. But for me it worked great
BloodFather of Kharnath
Active member
Oh, duh, good question. I used an app called Pocket. It basically takes a snap shot of an entire web page and saves it where ever you like. I think most people use it on their phones, so when they lose service they can keep reading their stuff. I bet there is a better solution out there if you were going to archive a bunch pf stuff. But for me it worked great
Incredibly useful app, thanks for that!!!! Wow, thanks a ton...
Regarding a blog, I totally think you should go for it. You know how I feel about your creativity bro...you need an outlet for it. I bet if you just had a place to record your brainstorming sessions, and show them put to work, you'd attract a ton of followers. But yes, you don't want it taking up more time than the actual hobby.
If you look at, say Dave Powell's or Sprocket's blogs, they don't look too labor intensive. In fact, you could just treat the blog as your primary forum, and just copy paste things from there to here. That way it doesn't take anymore time than you are currently spending online. For me, if I can't be painting I love to either research or take part in online discussions here on CMON. It makes me feel like I am at least getting some hobby time in.
But if you truly don't want it taking up all your time, you could always start this blog up with a couple of homies. I don't want to mention any names (BloodFather) but you could totally just contribute sometimes as part of a painting crew (6th Dimension... Lol). Three or four of us could really have something special.
If you look into it, not surprisingly Zab probably has the most successful blog of anyone here on CMON. I can't google anything miniature related without getting a link to his web page. He has a ton of visitors everyday. He really did well by sourcing into the Sci if gaming community, which draws a ton of fans. A simple blog that doesn't address things outside of painting alone is much harder to draw subscribers.
Anyway, just some thoughts. Oh and insofar as a friendly competition...the WAMP ladder is on my friend. Next project or our current ones?
