22 May, 2012

Bless the mailman

A nice thick envelope was waiting for me in the mail today. A packet of bitz:


Stuff for building some Astartes to go along with my =][= retinue hunting for heretics.
Bless the mailman...

18 May, 2012

Cape fabric effects

While occupied with paperwork I recieved a communiqué from the Spiky Rat Pack asking questions regarding my recent endavour with Inquisitor Velk. The Pack wanted knowledge about my dealings with the cape. Here is my return message in brief:


The cape was painted using airbrush over the zenith primed mini. The airbrushing work was done before any other areas were painted.

About 4 successive layers of grey going from dark grey towards light grey/Bleached Bone. The final two layers or so layers were sprayed on at an angle straight from above to get the zenith effect.

Over this I worked in some shades (using various browns, greens, reds) now and then as I was working on the other areas.

When most of the model was done I sponged on some almost pure black with a bit of blister foam. And over this I sponged a light colour - Bleached bone. I also did few "scratch"-highlights on some of the black spots using bleached bone. "Scratch"-highlights meaning that the black sponge marks were highlighted illusionistic by adding a highlight to the grey cape just under the black spot. This makes the black spots looks like tine holes in the fabric.

Finally, I worked in some more washes in certain areas - mainly to emphasize the folds and areas that are in the shadows.

*   *   *

I hope you can use the information provided above. I plan to bring this technique to good use on some Astartes within the year...




13 May, 2012

Thaddeus Velk - studio shots

Took the time to snap some studio style photographs of Thaddeus Velk:



The expressionism and aggressive painting style is showing very clear in these shots. Mood, colour, and contrast were main goals. Cape was painted using mainly sponge technique. On the head especially I took care to paint the right colours, but to leave the expressions open to be interpreted the viewer. I am quite happy with the overall look and feel of the character. 3 hours of painting. The style and speed might suit a future small army project...

Velk is not part of the yellow-based-up bunch of models painted over the Winther. Rather he is an enemy that they might be hunting to bring down.

12 May, 2012

06 May, 2012

Light for shooting

Created these little terrain pieces for fun:



But then I thought about the use of areas with light sources in the gameplay. A lamp on the gaming board might have influence on the gameplay. Maybe models operating near these should get bonus for the aim, or possibly some minus for shooting against the light if the enemy hides behind the light source,... and so on. Jumping from this mindset I was considering glowglobes hovering about in underground cityscapes constantly changing the odds by random movement from turn to turn. Might be fun for a necromunda campaign or some =I=munda setup...