The average painter WIP / Log

[ElderMind]

Most of these WIP threads are awesome. Full of mind-blowingly, award-winningly good paint jobs and sculpts. I love following along.

This is not one of those.

I'm a mid-40's guy who used to paint this stuff as a kid, and got back into the hobby a few months ago. This is a log for all of us "average painters" to share and learn from. Feel free to comment, suggest, ask, whatever...

For me, this is a lot of trial and error and "make it up as I go along"; and this is also the results of all those tutorials scattered across the web.

For consolidation:

Here's an earlier thread with some other WIPs.

Here's the Ikea lightbox thread

This is a guy I only got to practice on. Everything about him is a study of some sort, getting ready to do This Ranger from DarkSword

Aside from reinforcing the need for a light box (especially to get a decent shot of metallics), this is really all about the leather bits. Everything is different base and shade. What I liked: The brass studded piece on the left arm, which is Vallejo Flat Brown with a black wash. It'll probably become my go-to recipe for boiled leather armor. I also like the wrapping on the axe, which is Vallejo Cavalry Brown with a black wash. I used black in both cases only to get a strong outline (for the studs on the armor and for the definition of the straps on the axe wrapping). I would have used a dark brown otherwise.

I also discovered that there's no need for 1/2 a dozen different silvers. The armor is Vallejo Model Air Gun Grey and the axe head is Model Air Aluminum. Once you put a black wash on it, it doesn't make any difference what it started as.

 

[ElderMind]

Oh, while searching for stuff to make a light box at Ikea, I ran across This chest of drawers at Ikea. It was on sale for 59 euros, so what the heck... It holds all my stuff, and I can wheel it around the house and paint wherever I want.

 

[ElderMind]

Next up - this old Grenadier dwarf from the 80's, for fun. I don't know how he escaped painting!

I may try my hand at NMM with him. I always try to take a couple of reference photos "in the white", to rely on when shading.

 

[Dragonsreach]

Age is no limit, I'm looking at 60 creeping over the horizon at a helluva rate of knots, but I understand what you mean about returning to things.
I've looked at your ranger and it's not bad, there are areas which time practise and comparing other peoples work and asking bucket loads of questions will get you pushing your boundaries. But the most common thing people will tell you is that in 28mm scale contrast is king. What I see on the Ranger is that the shadows need additional development, but slow graduation is the key.

I've recently watched the DVD that Jen Haley did for Coolminiornot (long train journey & iPad) and it's well worth the money, time and effort that she put into it as well as the time to watch. While it may seem, or feel weird at first to watch someone else's painting I have learnt a lot from it.

 

[ElderMind]

Age shouldn't be a limit, but I didn't need magnification to paint before, and my hands sure aren't as steady! :shock:

It's weird, no matter how much contrast I start with I always seem to tone it back down. In hand, it looks a little too "comic book" to me. I dunno.

Meg Maples posted on it in her blog, using the descriptors: "American" and "European". In that context, I lean more "European"... although I'm American... although I'm currently living in Europe... AAAAGGHHH It's all so confusing!!! :nailbiting!:

The same is the case (for me) with NMM. This is as good as it gets, but at the end of the day I always go back to This Look

 

[Zab]

It took me ages to break from my comfort zone so don't sweat it

 

[ElderMind]

I don't know if it's "comfort zone" as much as preference. I'll try to turn up the contrast knob and see what I think of the finished piece a week later.

 

[ElderMind]

It's been a while since I updated this thread. I did a relatively quick job on the dwarf with the axe. I was just trying to get back to the "fun" part of painting, and not worrying about how good of a job I could or couldn't do. I also just realized I don't have a picture of the completed mini... lol

Anyway, I found the 2nd and 3rd dwarves from the original set of 3. One needed stripping, but they both got painted too. Really a lot of fun.

Now that I had the 3 of them done, I had no idea what to do with them. Pose the trio on a base? Have them fighting something? The problem was that their poses were so different, and the one with the axe overhead didn't really seem clear on what he was doing.

So I rummaged around in my stash of stuff and found this:

Hmmm, dwarf shield as a belt-buckle. Hands with rings as a necklace (dwarf-lords, ala Tolkien?). I'm sure he's been terrorizing dwarves for a while. It would only make sense that they fight him, and set up an ambush. With some fiddling, the scene became clear:

The dwarf with the raised axe now makes sense as a distraction, while the dwarf with the longer axe sneaks up behind the ettin.

Waiting on the miliput to dry, and a lot of work ahead with the basing and terrain...

 

[Mr. Biggles]

If you want to make a really cheap light box, take a square cardboard box about 12" to a side and remove two sides - the front and top. Line the inside with white paper or just paint it. A creamy off-white works better as it doesn't reflect light so harshly. You can still use your extension light shown above to shine into the top of the open box. If you want to make your pics look more professional, take a longer sheet of paper like legal size, and curve it down the back of the box (on the inside) and under the mini - this will make a seamless backdrop as seen in pro fashion, advertising, etc. photos. Some careful dry-brushing on the edges of leather wrapping (as well as everything else) will really make them stand out. :beerwave: