Wednesday 17 June 2015

Having a bash...

I've been busy lately making a mess and generally being covered in glue/glued to something that should be attached to a model rather than the side of my thumb...

I'll be frank, I don't much enjoy scratch building bases, and kit bashing can quickly become tedious to me too. I know that some absolutely love the "messy play" part, but for me, I can't wait to get to that primed stage where everything is tidy and my desk is no longer covered in shavings, saw dust and sand/tea leaves/off cuts of wood and cork/plasticard/sculptiboard.
What I'm also not keen on is waiting for stuff to dry. I guess that most people assemble more than one thing at a time and just move on, but I usually can't work with more than one, two at most things on the desk at once.
With that in mind, I'm breaking all of my own rules with 2 unfinished commissions, a painted but non-based piece (Virago), a diorama and what has become 6 individual kit bashes standing on or around my desk!! And I'm really not enjoying the mess and lack of focus.

So what am I doing?

Virago and her beau are sat waiting for their bases before final touches.
I've prepped the next commission piece ready for priming, but I can't reveal that yet.
The diorama is largely "built". It needs the floor to be finished and a load of flora will be added once the base is painted, and the models are built ready for priming.
And while I wait for putty, filler, caulking, PVA, superglue and sandy paste to dry, I decided to start putting together the prototype Kingdom Death: Monster survivor armour kits that I've had for a while with a view to seeing how I might go about some table top level painted models to go with the game when I lands *this summer*.

I'll start with the gang...














I was quietly impressed with the differently expressive dynamism I could make from the kits. There is still some tidying to do, particularly with the last girl who is a partial bash from an Architect Pinup too. I plan to add some more brass etch here and there too (Etchmaster brass etch) to further individualise them, but they make an interesting rag-tag bunch! ^_^

Expect sporadic progress with them when I'm in the mood or have some paint mixed up that is going spare...

The diorama of doom is already a heavy old lump...



There was quite a lot of filling and fixing on the Nightmare Ram - not a kit for the inexperienced modeller - but the sheer quantity of stuff to make the cave is silly, especially because I'm trying to keep it "lightweight"! lol

It's in that "looks crap" stage right now, so I fully expect you, the viewer, to be less than impressed, so I'm fine with that, and that's also part of why I am not enjoying this phase of the project either.
The other thing is that so much of this will be obscured with foliage when painted that it's kind of pointless to show this stage, but there you go! lol

Hopefully the next episode will have paint!

Fingers crossed ^_^

Friday 5 June 2015

New Faces...

Since my last post quite a lot has happened, painting and social media wise that is...

First of all, I did the *final* touches to Virago - I actually need to add blood and pigments, but that will be done when I do the bases for the two of them. The second thing is that I moved onto the big guy and painted his skin and essentially *finished* him too.

The micro updates were shared on the FB page - https://www.facebook.com/theblackhandsblog - and I'll go through them again shortly, and in turn what I shared got shared around some more, and before I knew it my little page got rather busy! As a result, I have a healthy crop of new friends on the FB page, and hopefully here too soon. So, thanks for looking and sharing. Hopefully you'll stay around, and at this rate I shall be looking at another give away when I reach 1000 likes sooner than I expected! ^_^

So, the big guy got painted. The pics below show him from two nights ago, but I decided to repaint his hair to be similar to Virago last night. I would have taken photos, but I decided to move quickly onto some assembly work for a personal project that I've had in mind for a good few months, and some other assembly work for a commission which I can't show at the moment.

Anyway... Big guy...





Some newer shots of Virago with a re-tweaked face...





And the happy couple!


Aside from feeling quite pleased with myself over how the two of them have turned out, I'm most pleased about getting the subtle difference between the painting of the skin *right*. What I mean by this is that the big guy has massive muscles with deep furrows, poking out sinews, and his pose is more bent over, so I've increased the contrast and made a feature of the muscle groups and his angry expression. Virago in contrast has a much subtler, smoother look to her skin. She looks athletic, and her intense, angry expression meant that she was more than capable of removing the poor victim's head, but she still has a feminine feel to her. The exact same colours were used on both models, just a different method.

Now, since these photos, like I said I decided that I didn't like his red hair, so I repainted it in the same colours and hers. I then put a quick coat of matt varnish on the pair of them and popped them aside in the cupboard until I get the materials for the bases in. I'm currently waiting on some wood to make up the plinths, which will form a part of the bases. I will also add pigments and blood effects once they are installed on their bases.

And speaking of wood, I was out with the family at the local country park last weekend and I came across something that was absolutely ideal for a diorama idea that I've had in my head for a while now. What I found was a piece from a huge old oak tree that at sometime in its history had been destroyed and now makes a nice climbing space for children. What it looks like is a perfect cave mouth for a fantasy monster, and my diorama plan fell into place...



The models aren't in the right place yet, and the wood itself needs to be trimmed at the bottom to form the cave mouth, plus I'll do more to put Pan, the model on the right out of the Nightmare Ram's (on the left)  field of view.
The idea of the story is that the Ram eats fairies by luring them in using the lantern in its hands - like moths to a flame... - and Pan has tracked the Ram to its lair to hunt it.
I plan to create a full cave in the space and back the Ram partially into the space, with Pan hiding behind the cave mouth. There is every likelihood that I will mess around with levels and which direction the models will be facing. I also want to add lots of insect wings to the area around the mouth of the cave to back up the idea of the Ram as the Fairy Eater...
Lots to do, but I think that this will be fun! ^_^

Until next time, happy painting!