Iron Wind Metals - Stalking Dragon

[BarstoolProphet]

This is the beginnings of my next project, which will ultimately be a diorama involving 4 or 5 miniatures, including this one. But, I have to begin somewhere.

So, I pulled my monster out of the \'monsters\' box pretty much at random, and got the Iron Wind Metals \'Stalking Dragon\', which looks pretty cool, I think. I\'ve spent the last two hours getting rid of mold lines and flash (while watching movies), and it now fits together pretty well, though I\'ll need to use some green stuff on one of his legs and his tail to make the joins look natural. (Wish me luck. I never used green stuff before.)

Here\'s the beginning. My next step will be pinning and making sure it all fits again. I\'ll be assembling all but the head and wings to begin, so that I can make sure I get all the highlights consistant on the body. Or at least as consistant as I\'m capable of.

 

[BarstoolProphet]

And I\'ve gotten it assembled and all. The green stuff was easier to work with for filling in the little gaps than I\'d hoped it would be, but I mixed too much and a bunch is going to go to waste. Live and learn, right?

It doesn\'t show in this picture at all, but after getting the gaps filled in, I used the tip of my sculpting tool to pock the green stuff so that it very closely resembles the texture of the mini, itself. On the whole, I\'m rather pleased with myself. Except for wasting a glob of green stuff big enough to make a 32mm torso.

Pinning it was a fairly routine thing, as I\'ve done it for most of the things I\'ve ever done, if it was at all possible. But alas and alack, my bit broke on the last piece, and my local hobby shop is closing down. I\'m not going to be able to replace it for a while.

Normally, I don\'t prime in black, but it worked so well on my Reaper mini (see Discuss Submissions section) that I decided to try it again with this one. I want it to look dark and sinister as much as I can, so this seemed the way to go with it.

I haven\'t yet decided if I\'m going to make this dragon red, blue, or green, but it\'s definitely going to be one of the chromatic evil dragons from the D&D system I grew up with. Not a white, though. I doubt I could blend white well enough, yet.

Actual painting will begin after I figure out how to hold it without having to handle it all over the place. Probably I\'ll have to use my broken bit to drill holes in his hind feet to attach something to, and hold that.

Does anyone have a better idea than that? He stands on three legs, with the left foreleg lifted and extended, and I\'m going to need to be able to access his underside to do a thorough job.

 

[Manus]

sounds like the pinning is what you want in this situation. I wouldn\'t start buildig stuff for him to lean on, unless you want it to be creeping up on someone.

 

[Dragonsreach]

I would suggest putting pins in it\'s right fore foot up through the leg and the rear left exactly the same, leaving a fair amout protruding below the flat of the foot.
That way you can use the pins to sit the model in a section of cork to hold and be able to work from different handholds without touching the model.

For something this big you might want to consider investing in some Masking Fluid for areas you want to keep differing colours. It\'s liquid Latex you paint on and allow to dry. When you\'ve finished you can then gently rub/peel off the latex.

 

[BarstoolProphet]

I actually got him mounted before I saw these replies. My batteries in my camera are dead, so I can\'t presently take a picture of him to show.

He\'s actually not a big dragon, only about 3 times longer than a 28mm mini is tall, and very short, only measuring 22mm to the shoulder. Wings aren\'t yet counted.

What I ended up doing is much like my Reaper Wizard, drilling a hole into his belly, where it won\'t be seen when he\'s on display, with the pin extending well over an inch and mounted into a Jolt Cola lid with green stuff underneath to keep it steady.

I may need to give it a longer shaft to reach under him in some places, still, though.

 

[BarstoolProphet]

I\'m running far, far behind on my originally intended schedule on this dragon. Work and the like has been keeping me away from any kind of regular painting work.

I\'m disappointed with these pictures, which don\'t show the highlights as well as I hoped they would, and tinkering with the lighting and all hasn\'t made it better. I think I\'m going to have to make them more extreme, so that they show up in photos.

As you can see, I finally decided to assemble him most of the way, because I\'m not confident of my ability to blend from the body into the wings (which won\'t be coloured the same way in the end) when they aren\'t attached. Also, I wanted to make sure shadows fell in the right places when I get to the OSL attempt.

Right now, it\'s highlighted from \'direct overhead\' light, but only dimly, and after some talk on the CHAT system with Antnol and diablofollower, I\'ve been convinced/decided to make the dragon breathing a bolt of lightning, which means a brilliant flash in front of it.

Big challenge. I\'ve been reading the OSL threads and articles over and over, preparing for it.

Also, making the lightning bolt will be a challenge, but I\'ve been shown a few good pictures, so I have at least a rough idea of what it will look like.

I\'m very pleased, though, with my construction and GSing of this mini. While it isn\'t completely seamless, it is at least very passable, considering my relative inexperience with such things. Hopefully, when it\'s all painted, it will look even closer to seamless.

Without further waffling on my part, I present the next pair of WIP pictures . . .