'Death for Hire' or 'like a shadow on the roofs...'
Hy guys,
I recently finished a new project with a miniature I always admired.
Some may recognise the miniature, it's 'Shanys the Shadow' from Rackham. I think she came out around 2002 and was limited to 1000 pices if I remember correctly. Shure, she may not be 'up-to-date' with current sculptures, but I really love the dynamic pose and the exaggerated drapery.
As my last projects were all rather achromatic and dark I now wanted to paint something colorfull and with a more 'comic-effect' again. So Shanys was a perfekt match for me. In my opinion the pose of the miniature suggests, that she is balancing ontop of something. When you search Shanys on CMON you can see, that many painters arranged her on a pillar or a rock. This was a bit too boring in my eyes so I thought how and where she would strike her victims. With her mask and the long cloak I rather imagined her in an urban environment than in the wilderness. So the next best thing that came to my mind was a roof. I imagine her like a female Ezione from 'Assasins Creed' who runs and jumps from roof to roof, like a shadow in the night. But I could not build a whole house just for one miniature, so I had to show only a section of a roof. I sketched some possible roof sections of a house, but all seemed to strange, and not convincing. When I searched the internet for different old houses I found an image of a house with a small jutty. This was perfekt! The jutty was small enough for the diorama and looked convincing too.
The jutty was built from some sheets of plastic card and balsa wood. The bricks and the plastering was created with Milliput. You can find some WIP pictures at the bottom of this post. To add the impression of some hight, I decided to add a small banner at the bottom of it.
I also had two dove models left, which were build from Kevin Kosse some years ago for another project, I never finished. (Sorry Kevin!) They were perfect for this diorama now. I placed them behind Shanys so it seems she just landed on this jutty from the main roof and the doves are affraid and start to fly away.
As I said, I wanted something more colorfull in this diorama so I went with blue-purple for the cloak and a bright white for the mask (like the artwork). To get a nice contrast for the mini I gave the house a brown/yellow/red look. I think it worked quite well.
If you are still reading at this point, please go to my webpage and add '/thanks' to the url. Thanks!
To add a little 'special effekt' I added a small LED in the window. For this I bought a pack of small yellow LEDs and a pack of small batterys (the kind you use for wristwatches). I then built a small box out of black cardboard to fit in the house. Next, cut out a window in the exact spot, where the window in the house is located. Now I attached the LED in the box and connected the LED with the battery with some small wires. That's all. The LED is really weak so one battery should last some hours.
So, enough blah-blah for now, I hope you like the little, old lady. Comments and constructive criticism are very welcome.
You can vote here: CMON
WIP:
Hy guys,
I recently finished a new project with a miniature I always admired.
Some may recognise the miniature, it's 'Shanys the Shadow' from Rackham. I think she came out around 2002 and was limited to 1000 pices if I remember correctly. Shure, she may not be 'up-to-date' with current sculptures, but I really love the dynamic pose and the exaggerated drapery.
As my last projects were all rather achromatic and dark I now wanted to paint something colorfull and with a more 'comic-effect' again. So Shanys was a perfekt match for me. In my opinion the pose of the miniature suggests, that she is balancing ontop of something. When you search Shanys on CMON you can see, that many painters arranged her on a pillar or a rock. This was a bit too boring in my eyes so I thought how and where she would strike her victims. With her mask and the long cloak I rather imagined her in an urban environment than in the wilderness. So the next best thing that came to my mind was a roof. I imagine her like a female Ezione from 'Assasins Creed' who runs and jumps from roof to roof, like a shadow in the night. But I could not build a whole house just for one miniature, so I had to show only a section of a roof. I sketched some possible roof sections of a house, but all seemed to strange, and not convincing. When I searched the internet for different old houses I found an image of a house with a small jutty. This was perfekt! The jutty was small enough for the diorama and looked convincing too.
The jutty was built from some sheets of plastic card and balsa wood. The bricks and the plastering was created with Milliput. You can find some WIP pictures at the bottom of this post. To add the impression of some hight, I decided to add a small banner at the bottom of it.
I also had two dove models left, which were build from Kevin Kosse some years ago for another project, I never finished. (Sorry Kevin!) They were perfect for this diorama now. I placed them behind Shanys so it seems she just landed on this jutty from the main roof and the doves are affraid and start to fly away.
As I said, I wanted something more colorfull in this diorama so I went with blue-purple for the cloak and a bright white for the mask (like the artwork). To get a nice contrast for the mini I gave the house a brown/yellow/red look. I think it worked quite well.
If you are still reading at this point, please go to my webpage and add '/thanks' to the url. Thanks!
To add a little 'special effekt' I added a small LED in the window. For this I bought a pack of small yellow LEDs and a pack of small batterys (the kind you use for wristwatches). I then built a small box out of black cardboard to fit in the house. Next, cut out a window in the exact spot, where the window in the house is located. Now I attached the LED in the box and connected the LED with the battery with some small wires. That's all. The LED is really weak so one battery should last some hours.
So, enough blah-blah for now, I hope you like the little, old lady. Comments and constructive criticism are very welcome.
You can vote here: CMON
WIP:
