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[Painting Miniatures] vs the unending tide of grey plastic
Dayspring
the PhoenicianRegistered User regular
the PhoenicianRegistered User regular
Unending tides of resin and/or metal are also accepted.
Hello friends!
If you have ever picked up a paint brush, touched a paint brush, looked at a paint brush, or maybe just thought about a paint brush one time, you are welcome here.
We have a lot of ridiculously good painters here, but don't get discouraged; practice will help everyone improve, and sharing your progress with the thread is a great way to keep motivation.
Here are some finished works, works in progress, and conversions that I plucked from the last few pages of the previous thread:
Hello friends!
If you have ever picked up a paint brush, touched a paint brush, looked at a paint brush, or maybe just thought about a paint brush one time, you are welcome here.
We have a lot of ridiculously good painters here, but don't get discouraged; practice will help everyone improve, and sharing your progress with the thread is a great way to keep motivation.
Here are some finished works, works in progress, and conversions that I plucked from the last few pages of the previous thread:
And a small bonus - testing macro rings on my camera again:
Group shot!
And a group shot of the current Bayou boys.
blue lenses or glowy green?
BreakfastPM wrote: »First thing I've painted in awhile, a Hero Forge mini for a friend's D&D character. I think I did alright but I can't take pictures for shit.
Halos Nach Tariff wrote: »Hunters and stuff:
And some Mournfang, which I am very pleased with, but it did take my, like, two months to get through four of them, so...
Now we're talking.
DiannaoChong wrote: »
Dayspring wrote:
+8
This discussion has been closed.
Posts
Tomorrow I'm going to start painting my Hybrid Iconward, and I'm determined to use Painting Buddha's 'loaded brush' wet blending technique.
I'm simultaneously excited and terrified.
Visit him at Monstrous Pigments' Instagram and Facebook pages!
How do you do your gold? It looks simple but somehow much nicer than whatever I'm able to achieve.
Perhaps I can interest you in my meager selection of pins?
Thanks!
The new GW high pigment metallics are really nice. Very shiny. 1.5 coats of brass, boltgun highlight, and a brown wash is all I did. Turned out great!
Let's make this another amazing thread! I'll try not to bring down the quality too much :P
Don't worry, I'll be sure to tank it for all of us shortly.
Just finish up the touching up of the basecoat and going to wash my Battletech minis and then I'll try some photos, first time I've painted anything with a brush in like a decade. Fingers crossed on decent results.
I am SO grateful for this commission. It's the first time someone requested a whole bunch of minis for level 2 out of the three I offer, and this squad is fantastic because each one is different so I get to try out new things. I've learned a lot about manipulating colour! And the fact that they're black allows me to REALLY go nuts on the coloured details, it's just super fun to paint!
"And this is his sofa, is it?" said Arthur.
This first image is from 2004-ish. It was when I thought drybrushing was da bomb, that rushing models for the tabletop was a must, and right before I abandoned WH40K in favour of World of Warcraft. Behold my awful Tyranids:
In 2014 I self-administered a huge health-check, cutting back on some bad habits and replacing them with, theoretically, something therapeutic. I figured I'd return to painting (as opposed to playing) Warhammer miniatures, and was amazed by the newest additions to the Tyranid army, in aesthetics if nothing else. I decided to buy the Tervigon/Tyrannofex kit, as well as a handful of paints, and proceeded to build the latter option.
Nearly three years on from that point, I've knuckled down a lot in terms of painting technique, mediums and patience. Earlier this year I repainted that Tyrannofex:
... and am continuing to improve my skills.
What's everyone else's progression like? Show yaw'salfs!
Visit him at Monstrous Pigments' Instagram and Facebook pages!
And here's the last thing I finished.
Visit him at Monstrous Pigments' Instagram and Facebook pages!
First mini I ever painted, I think it was grade 9? About 15 years ago now.
My first real army was Chaos, around 2001-2002.
I then had a small Salamanders army after the Armageddon Codex came out. 2002-2003?
Took about a year off after highschool. Started working for GW part time in my first two years of University and worked on random things.
Really got my groove in 2007-2008 when I did a fully custom Death Guard army. Won my first and only painting award at a large Canadian Tournament (Astronomi-con)
Since then I've worked on stuff steadily.
My latest large project was my Dark Eldar Coven army I painted 2 years ago.
Thing I'm working on now is a set of Chaos Daemon Princes, painting the Khorne one right now!
FFffffuck's sake, this is the third time within a month, at this rate I'm gonna ascend within a week.
Anyway, when I first started using acrylics, I was...not good.
I was using craft paints, not actual model paints. I started coming here for help and I learned a lot!
But I got better. And started playing with conversions!
And I posted some of it here, and everyone was really awesome at helping me learn and grow. And I kept getting better for it.
And I just finished a pretty sizeable Word Bearers 30k army because of everything I learned here (and semi-constant prodding from @Dr_Keenbean).
And still, after all these years of painting and getting incrementally better, I am still not as good as I want to be.
I actually did the progression thing a while ago in the last thread, but that just means I have a nice little image to link already standing by~
The first bits were my original painting foray from high school. Grade 10 or 11, with paint straight from the pot like a goddamn boss.
The second pictures are from a few years later when I was in university and decided I wanted to change the colour scheme. Still painting from the pot. *thumbs up*
The next go was two or three years later when I was on my last leg for 40k. There are some subtle highlights on the red completely lost in that photo, but the fire warrior and crisis suit there were when people first talked to me about commissions. While cool, I think that also shows what a low bar we have to shoot for sometimes. :P
Then I moved onto Warmachine because I had some friends who got me to give it a whirl. Call those the first minis I really put proper work into, going to town with layered highlights and thinning my paint on a palate (those Styrofoam trays you get meat in are totally palates).
The MERCS come from only a couple of years ago now, when I got back into painting in force. They're still probably my favourite thing I've painted to date.
Finally, more Warmachine from when I was still painting my stuff because I hadn't grown completely cold and bitter towards the game. ;P
And the bonus image of the commissions I did this summer that I severely undercharged for, because life is a constant lesson in how you do everything wrong the first time.
Perhaps I can interest you in my meager selection of pins?
Perhaps I can interest you in my meager selection of pins?
But I have a bones giant spider monster thing I need to paint for a competition on saturday. Also I got a light box and 2 lights so hopefully my pictures wont be complete shit anymore!
edit: I'll get pictures of that mini on friday, hopefully he turns out well, I'm running out of motivation on him at the moment.
As always, I'm having trouble capturing the red gradients on photos. Might need to work on some better lighting.
I wonder if a more neutral colored background may help? Rather than white paper go for a beige or other neutral color.
I may be misremembering, but I thought I read somewhere that bright backgrounds tend to mute foreground colors by fiddling with the way your brain reads contrast.
Time to go and walk into the ocean I guess :P
Nightshade / Imperial / Amethyst is what I have, though I think I only used Imperial and Amethyst on there. Even then, it was a glaze outside of the original bit of the palms. Again, something else that appeared much better in the pictures than on the model. I had a nice gradient at one point that I botched when I did some other cleanup.
Perhaps I can interest you in my meager selection of pins?
Figure this may be the best place to ask as it doesn't relate to any specific game system. I am looking for a range of Aztec style miniatures (preferably 28mm and in plastic) - does anyone know of anything?
In-between in the spoilers for more.
A year later.
Later still
These are probably my fav finished pieces from the past year or so.
I reckon 20 or so years of on/off has done me wonders. Even if I still paint straight from the pot now and again. Posting all this has made me realise clearly I have a small selection of go to colours.
Eureka Miniatures has a range in metal.
The Assault Group also has a range in metal.
Outpost Wargames has a range in metal.
Just at a first cut. Not plastics, I know, but there's a litany of smaller companies out there that have ranges or one-off models. An old thread at The Miniatures Page led me to those above. The thread's from 2011, so some of it may be defunct, but they're out there.
I have this weird feeling I've seen something in plastic in the last year, but the memory escapes me.
Perhaps I can interest you in my meager selection of pins?
How do people find these sites to buy $60 amazing models I have never seen before in my years of this hobby? My mind was blown.