Quad\'s WIPs (some nudity :P )

[quadrille]

Just having finished a big painting project (Varghar) I really felt like sculpting a little again. So I decided to do another 28mm empire-inspired sculpt, this time just a normal halberdier though. I\'ve had this guy in my mind for some time, so I had a relatively good idea what I wanted to do with him. Never having been a huge fan of many of GWs poses, I wanted to try and create a more natural, relaxed, yet not uninteresting pose. So I figured I\'d use a strong contra-posto, much like the ones that can be found in many old sculptures. Tricky part, of course, is to find balance in the pose. I\'m relatively happy with how it looks so far.

I also wanted to practise sculpting anatomy, hence the rather detailed musculature. One might argue I went a tad over the top spending about 6 hours on it seing as how most of it\'ll be covered in clothes anyway But I see it as really useful practise to sculpt some muscle definition on each figure I do.

Well, here it is so far:

 

[Arma]

I train a lot so I err, spend time looking at muscles n shit.. wow that sounds a little gay.

His calves look great imo, knees look a little bit crazy though, no clear definition on the knee cap joint.

He has love handles! lol

 

[penguin]

That is looking awesome so far. And I just checked out Varghar Straight on my Favourites List. Amazing.

 

[Torn blue sky]

Looks great! The kneecaps do look like they\'re down to the bare bone, although i\'m not sure if this is intentional for later sculpting. I really need to practice a bit more, i\'d love to be able to scratch-sculpt unique minis!

 

[quadrille]

Thanks guys! Yeah now that you say it I agree about the knees. The rather poor photo makes it worse too. I gotta learn how to take pictures of greens! It\'s darn difficult getting the detail to show correctly, without everything turning too shiny and stuff.

@Bill: Thanks, glad you like Varghar

 

[Thecadian]

brill work the muscles look cool.post more pics soon

 

[quadrille]

Thanks, here\'s the concept sketch. I\'m not sure If I\'m going for a halberd or a standard, I\'d prefer the latter but I realize a lot of people will think I just copied Jeremie\'s fantastic ogre if I do that. I can honestly say this concept has not been inspired by that model - I just happen to like landsknechts and freehand painting and i assume the same goes for mr Bonamant.

 

[penguin]

That\'s an awesome little sketch I would go for the halberd. Codpeice is a useful feature here\'s another empire guy, a 54mm scratchbuilt dude (complete with chequered codpeice), by which Mike Anderson won Gold at GD UK \'05:

That\'s pretty awesome too, thought that might come in useful.

Good luck packing all that detail into 28mm, although you probably won\'t need it!

~Bill

 

[frenchkid]

Well if you want to practice anatomy and do things correcttly here are a few things that seem to stand for me:
The clavicules are at a wrong angle, both shouldn\' be tilted the sam way.
The torso is leaning the wrong way, if you do the concept pose you\'ll see that the torso bends to the left not to the right
Out going leg should have the knee slightly on the outisde of the leg and not in the front, right now the leg pose is close to impossible and not very conforable at the least.
Looking at the pic it would seem the hip is horizontal when it should be lower on the outstrecht leg side. This also means you probably have a leg longer then the other (easy to check with a compasse).
The spine seams to only have three curves when it should have 4.
and not sure from the pic, but looks like the front of the lower part of the leg have muscle which don\'t exist.

Small tip ( not from me): when you do a contra posture, put the feets on the mini, then you\'ll be able to put the mini on a flat surface, iff it stands alone then the posture is most probably correct, if not, then it\'s wrong

And I\'m only saying all that because you said you wanted to practtice anatomy, The sculpt definetly dosn\'t look bad and I\'d never be able to do as good

 

[quadrille]

Hehe wow thanks for the crits! Unfortunately I can\'t say I agree fully with you. Note this is not just my ego defending my work But rather me trying to look as objectively as I can on the sculpt.

@Collar bones: Can you elaborate on this? I\'m not really sure what you mean. Do you mean that the pose would cause the left collar bone to end up more to the front of the model?I could agree to that. I think the difference would be very minor though.

@Torso leaning: Actually no it\'s not leaning the wrong way. The very definition of a contraposto is that the shoulders and hips lean in opposite angles. I did try out the pose myself. Heck I took pictures of myself in only underwear with a broom over my shoulder for reference! lol The hips lean left, the shoulders lean right. What\'s the problem?

@Out going leg: I see what you mean, but I still think the knee can be on front of the leg even in this pose. Take a look at Michelangelos David, it has a similar pose with the knee to the front. Mine is almost pointing inwards though, so you have a point no doubt.

@Horizontal hip: Damn. I tried really hard not to make them horizontal and I don\'t think they are but maybe my eyes are biased. Take another look at the back view, I think in that one you can clearly see the hips being angled. I\'ll try to fix so that the front too shows more obviously angled hips.

@Spine curve: AFAIK the four curves of the spine refers to those you can see from a side view, and since I didn\'t take a sideview picture I don\'t really know where you\'re coming from here?

I think the shape of the lower legs should be relatively correct, please point out more precisely what\'s bothering you.

And good tip about the balance test, but I wouldn\'t be able to attach it to the cork if I did that.

Again thanks for taking the time to offer critique, I do appreciate it. Hope my reply didn\'t turn out too defensive. That was not the intention.

 

[frenchkid]

My bad about the torso, you are right looked at the pic a bit fast on that one :redface:

For the spine I was looking at the back picture were there seems to be only three bends: butt middle of the back and then top. But pics are what they are so like I said only pointing out things that seem to be wrong on the pic.

Colar bone (if that\'s the name) seem to both be at the same angle going upward, like a V were both branch have the same upward angle. I don\'t think it should be that way in this pose.

And for the balance test. Just ad a blob for the head it\'ll give you some perspecctive for height and such and a place to hold the mini then you can remove it when you do the head (tip from jeremie not me).

 

[alexholmen]

banner

In SWEDISH: Hej - gud vad kul med en till svensk - älskade din varghar figur - jättekul att du börjar göra större projekt - hade varit kul att träffa några svenskar som håller på med samma sak - är från göteborg o känner ingen som håller på med det:no:

IN ENGLISH: I definately think you should go with the banner - a relatively undetailed figure like this should have something to \"pop\" it - just my opinion - just an idea: give it swedish heraldry - would be very cool - and promise me to do a casting of this sculpt when it is finished -

I am very happy to see another great swedish painter

Best wishes,

//ALEX

 

[penguin]

The collar bones are fine; they are made of bone, not cartilage, so are inflexible. I tried that position in front of the mirror, they stay in that V shape.

 

[quadrille]

@frenchkid: Actually you might be onto something about the spine. I\'ll be sure to add the neck bend when sculpting the neck and head. The lower bends will be more apparent when I add some more clothes and more volume to the butt.

@alexhomen: Om du skulle råka ha vägarna förbi Umeå nån gång D) kan du droppa in på vår studiecirkel som vi har varje torsdag, förutom jag så är bl.a. Sven (Avelorn) och Sebastian (SebastianRushworth) med. Vi träffas och målar och snackar målning osv. Är ju en bit från gbg förstås..

I would love to do a banner as well but wouldn\'t that take it really close to jeremie\'s ogre? Would I get away with that? ??? I\'m planning some freehand on the clothing though.

@Bill: That\'s how it seemed to me as well.. Oh well they\'ll soon be covered with clothes anyway

 

[alexholmen]

banner

I don´t think you should limit yourself just because someone else has done a similar thing - if you browse some historical forums you will se that there are alot of similar figures that Jeremie probably has taken inspiration from - there is always someone who has done it before! The figure will look better with a banner and you should therefore make one for it. I am sure that Jeremie will just think of it as a hommage to his great work - he is afterall a very nice guy

BTW - will you make a copy of it when finished? And what about the swedish heraldry - if you decide to cast it, it would be great if the swedish painters could buy a cast each and paint their version of it (I certainly would like to since there aren´t that many historical figures in this scale).

Appropå Umeå så är det ju en bit lol men det hade varit trevligt om vi hade försökt att skapa lite nationalkänsla på den här punkten - det känns ju lite konstigt att jag pratar mer med fransmän än med svenskar om ämnet??? även om jag måste säga att det är trevligt att prata med Anders när det verkligen kniper - tack Anders Vi skulle kanske kunna bestämma att träffas ngn gång allihopa - på ngt konvent eller liknande:idea:
Ställer ni upp i tävlingar eller målar ni bara för nöjet? Jag kom till skott förra våren och började måla och har försökt att ställa upp i så många tävlingar som möjligt - det hade varit kul och vi hade åkt på en tävling tillsammans - jag åker till paris nu i september för ravage och kommer att åka tillbaka i april för GD - det hade varit kul om ngn hade åkt med - vi hade kunnat skicka WIP till varandra och skapat lite sammanhållning som nation

 

[Ritual]

@alex
Jag funderar på att åka till Paris nästa år om det blir en ny Ravage Mix Open då...

@quad
Ser bra ut. Anatomin ser ut att vara hyfsat korrekt (även om ryggen ser lite diffus ut... men du ska ju ändå sätta dit kläder). Han ser en smula biffigare ut än konceptskissen, men det kanske inte gör något?

Sorry everyone for this sudden Swedish outburst... :innocent:

 

[alexholmen]

Anders

@Anders: gud va roligt - jag lovar att ta hur mkt kort som helst - får en kamera om 2 veckor (slipper åka tvärs över stan för att låna en) - så kan du se vad du tycker men jag är övertygad om att det kommer bli en grym tävling - Jeremie trodde att kvaliten skulle vara bättre än franska GD
Det kommer bli en nästa år med!

 

[quadrille]

@Alex: I didn\'t plan to cast it (right now I don\'t even know if I\'ll manage to finish it) but if I do I\'ll let you know. Concerning swedish heraldry and stuff maybe I\'ll do some \"karoliner\" one day. Mike blanc has sculpted some really nice karolins but I dunno if he cast them.

@Anders thanks for the input, yeah I got a little carried away with those muscles lol Backs are the most difficult part IMO, they look very different in different positions and also on different people.


No new updates on the landsknecht dude, but a new sculpting project

It\'s for a sculpting/conversion contest over at warhammer-empire.com

My first try with fimo. Yes, she\'s going to get clothes (and armour)

 

[Sonnyslayer]

looks great Nils you have to find someone who can cast your miniatures

 

[quadrille]

Yeah that would be great, I don\'t know of anyone in Sweden who does it though (if anybody would happen to know of one, please tell me).

Anyway, a little update. I\'m afraid I won\'t make the competion, seing as how the deadline is september 30 and it\'s supposed to be painted too.. But I\'ll still try and finish it.


(Pics removed)