MOAR Terrain!

Lord help me I like painting buildings now. Not sure why, maybe it's the jump from miniatures and it's such a different type of painting that it's been apealing in a form of new expression? Perhaps it's the desire to not have to leave my house to play games on nice boards covered in nice terrain pieces with fully painted armies?

Either way.... Here is the latest block of resin I've painted up from Table Top World. I belive this is the humble Cottage II. It was a lot of fun, I tried to do a bit of OSL coming from the window onto the sack of some sort of fruit things. I think it came out well. I'm not gonna list the paints used, as they are the same as the last buliding I did (so if you are that interest just keep scrolling down the screen and you will find it).

Up next is the BIG ONE. So stay tuned.....

Let's talk Terrain.

Over the last few years, some tabletop games have been moving over to using 2D terrain for wargaming. While I think it's a great for tournament organizers in so much that it's much cheaper, faster to setup and frankly less taxing on your painted models, I feel that it just looks and feels less immersive in the world that we create through our games. With this in mind, I set about trying to find great looking pieces of terrain that were also budget friendly.  If you have ever searched for resin terrain you will know just how expensive it can be, I stumbled upon Table Top World and I was just blown away. Their pricing is actually quite reasonable and the pieces are incredibly detailed (even the insides had details added!).

I chose the Inn as my first piece, mostly because I really like the look, and secondly because it was half off on Black Friday.

So here is what the resin looked liked naked. I found no mold lines and the only bubbles were tiny and on the bottom where no one will ever see them.

After a nice bath in warm water and Dawn dish soap to remove any leftover mold release, it was time to prime. I used Badger Stylrenze black primer on this (like everything else really), and let the primer cure for 24 hours. I then used Vallejo - Game Color Pure White to zenithal highlight before painting. I love this technique as it shows you right were your highlights and shadows need to be.

I started with the roof. I wanted to achieve an almost thatch feel to it, even though it's set up as wooden boards I figured the same type of coloration would really add to the overall look. For this, I started with Vallejo Model Color - German Camo - Medium Brown. for the exposed boards under the roof I used P3 Bloodstone. I carried the same color for the exposed wood on the sides of the house in these same colors. For the stone, I started with 3:1 Vallejo Model Color - Black Grey: to Vallejo Game Color - Stone Grey. I worked it up from there to a dry brush of 1:1 in the same colors.

After that t was time for the first wash. I used a basic wash of GW - Agrax Eathshade. On a model I'd generally use an oil wash, but this is a terrain piece and frankly, I didn't feel like varnishing and waiting and redoing the varnish etc.

After that, it basically became a matter of finishing up the details. I do want to speak to the windows as this was something completely new to me. I wanted to give it a reflective look but knew a metallic paint would not work. I found a solution by starting with P3 - Menoth White Highlight, and then glazing with Army Painter - Blue ink. I am really happy with the result. I think it gives it a good depth of color and a bit of a reflective look without overpowering the metal details in the windows. The windows metals and the door hinges were done with P3 - Pig Iron.

And here is the final product. I am really happy with this one. Please leave a comment and let me know what you think.

Company of Iron - The Start of Something Fun and Interesting.

For those that don't know CoI is a new skirmish level game from Privateer Press. It looks like a ton of fun and only uses about 10-15 models per side.

I've been pining for a game like this and the best part is that most of the existing models in the PP line up are legal to use in game. I'm hoping that with as low as the model count is I will see many more fully painted armies (well squads really) across the table.

With that in mind I picked up the box set and the special model that came in the new No Quarter magazine. The model is Eilish (something or other) and it's a pretty cool model. It's got a very D&D type feel to it and I wanted to play with colors like Purple.

For a free with magazine model the thing was fairly good quality casting. Think better than Bones and not quite GW hard plastic. It primed well and I was off to the races.

I also decided to use a resin base on this one as I wanted to play a bit with clear resin. I chose a swamp base for this and I think it came out well. I'm really happy with the color scheme I used. The main colors were P3 Pig Iron, Reaper - Russian WWII Olive, and Vallejo Game Color Warlock Purple.

Well Borka is finally done!

I had a rare few hours today to actually get some painting done. I know it was strange being able to sit down, clear my mind, clean my brushes and actually paint!.

I'd love to give you my normal breakdown on what paints I used/mixed to get the colors I did. I honestly didn't take the time to write them down. I will say that I broke out the Scale 75 paints to do the leathers. This is the first time I've used them, and I am happy to report that the do live up to the hype.


So with out further ado....... I give you Borka!

Borka Bust 2.0

Well I finally had a little bit of time to work on this one. I love the simplicity of the sculpt. It's not that it lacks detail, it just does the job without an inane amount of filigree and other silly stuff like ropes made out of skulls and other non-sense we tend to see on models.

Anywho.... For this model I've used the SOTAR 20/20 and the more I use it the more I fall in love with the thing, but that's a story for another blog post. I started the skin tone with P3 -Troll Blood Base. Then moved on to the leather and fur collar. I set down a base of Scale 75 - Red Leather. This is the first time I have had a chance to use the Scale 75 paints and they are just smooth and cover well through the airbrush. For the fur on the coat I used Scale 75 - Blond.  For the shoulder armor I covered it in Vallejo Model Air - Steel. I had hoped that was gonna be a bit darker but it shines so bright, so I'll have to knock that down a bit.

Well ya made it through all words, so have some pictures.

Borka Kegslayer.

Well Privateer Press did it again. Another fantastic bust came out at Gen Con. This time a Troll Blood. Well I've never actually painted a troll so I figured why not? It's a bust, it's a troll, it seems like a really fun sculpt..... and Bob's yer uncle!


For those unfamiliar with the Bust here is the box art.

The resin is the normal PP stuff, its hell to remove mold lines from with anything other than file rods (those awesome things from Tamiya).  There was a good bit of flash and vent resin left over on this one. 

Sadly There was also a bit of mold slip, which I apparently did not manage to get a picture of... and a few small bubbles on the back of the head behind the quills (which will fill in just fine with primer).

I did set a pin in the shoulder for the armor, more out of habit than anything else. Ok to be honest I started drilling before thinking....

Well now it's all primed up and ready to get going. Just gotta wait for the primer to cure.

Nemo 5.0

Well It was more work time on the Nemo bust. I continued to work on the skin, more and more glazing to get the shading and highlighting right. I'm happy with where the skin tone is now. I tried something different and funky with the eyes on this one. I went all "Storm" and tried to get a glow from the eyes, like there was some kind of magic happening. I'm not sure if I like it or not, so we shall see if it stays of if I blow it out and redo it normally.

Other than that, highlights were added to the golds, the purple and the silvers. a bit of wash was applied strategically on the armor. and well here are the pics.

Nemo 4.0

This one is slowly coming along. Tonight I was able to put a bit of time in on the face, hair, and metals.

The skin tones are coming along, I think I may have over did the highlights a bit, so I will have to go back and blend them in so that it becomes a smooth transition. Also looks like I need to add higher highlights on the hair based on the pictures it looks to be blending in. Aside from that I'm really happy with how the metals are turning out. The P3 pig iron on the screws looks really good with the rust. I still need to highlight up and blend into black in spots. The rust and metal mix looks better than I had imagined it would at this stage.

So yea lots more to do before school starts back up in a few weeks.

Nemo part 3.

Well things are moving along with this bust. I'm still happily surprised with how smooth and almost easy it is to paint this thing. The lines are just nice and crisp, the edges are defined well. I kinda wish everything was as nice to paint as this one.

With that all out of the way, lets get down to some painting.

I started by grabbing the silly putty to mask off the face. I used a sculpting tool to push the putty away from the face and into the crevasses so that I had a clear shot to the face with the airbrush. It's almost funny how much it looks like a shroud.

After that I used Reaper Masters Series Olive Drab as the base color for the skin tone. Then moved on to a glaze of Reaper Masters Series Tanned Flesh. After that dried I hit it with the Tanned Flesh Highlight (again watered down to a glaze). 

Up next will be to darken the shaded parts of the face and bring up the highlights a bit more, but that's all for the next installment.