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.

Warmachine Weekend will be shortly upon us!

WMW is kinda my Christmas. It's the one convention I get to go to per year. It's small enough to not be completely overwhelming (under 1000 people) and big enough to have that con feel.

This year we have an amazing array of painters, modelers, airbrush artists and yours truly lined up to add a ton of value to the Hobby Lounge.

Not to mention the main gaming hall will be filled with games and at night the board games and booze will be a flowing. So if your in the St Louis area come on down and say high!

Oh and for those that want to know more. Here is the link to the con.

http://warmachineweekend.com/

Nursing School blues.....

It's just not fun when there is no time to paint. So last night I made an executive decision and took an our out of my schedule to slap something onto a model. I wanted to actually finish something and found a single pose model that had a decent amount of detail that would be easy to do up real quick without spending hours on minutia.

And with that I give you Kovnik Joseph, fondly referred to as Uncle Joe.

Time.....

Well school is still just hammering me in the no-no square, but I managed to get a bit of painting in today. I got to work a bit more on the Strider Death Stalkers. I was able to start blending on the cape, worked on the feathers and got the blues started on the armor. That and the first layers of silver. 

Also the snow bases are done!

Moar Conquest WIP.

Well I was a good boy and got a bunch of my reading done for class, so I decided to treat myself with a few hours of painting. As I am still waiting on my next commission project to get here I chose to keep working on the Conquest.

I started by working on the fire in the boilers. Of course this thing is so big that it has three! Then it was on to working on the blacks, and let me tell you...... there is a lot of black on this guy, not to mention the black needed for undercoating the metalics that are yet to come.

So have some WIP shots and keep painting!

Lady Aiyana from Privateer Press.

I had some time while waiting on the oil washes for the Blind Walker I am currently doing for a commission. I decided to be productive. In keeping with my "under three hour per model rule (for my own mini's at least)". I wanted to work on something I had set aside and had not really wanted to paint. This young lady stood on the shelf  mocking me in silence. As that would just not do, she was plucked down and the painting began. I have seen some super detailed amazing work on this model in the past, and she is truly deserving of the time and attention that it takes if she is going to be used as a competition piece. She has all the elements that go into producing something quite amazing. I however will be using her in table top army, and she will be seeing a lot of time in battle foam. With that in mind I set out do make something.....nice.

I decided on a very non-traditional paint scheme. I went with Vallejo Game Color - Gory Red for the cape to tie in with the red of my Khador army. The complementary color for red is of course green but I did not want to go all "Christmas" on it. I used a Reaper master series green (which name escapes me right now). And the rest just fell into place. As you can see from the pictures I over exaggerated the highlights a bit. This is to make her stand out on the table top (think three foot rule). Which looks fantastic on the table but not so much in close up pictures.

So here ya go. I nice clean table top quality model that would up taking about two hours in total. Sadly the oil wash was still drying by the time this was done.

Odds and Ends.

I just noticed that it had been a over a week since my last blog post. As many of you know it's the time of year that those of us with kids love so much. It's been two weeks of getting children ready for the school year, getting my wife ready to go back to school to change careers and as many of you know I'm starting my Junior year of Nursing School (cuz you know life isn't hectic enough).

I guess what I am saying is that my posting schedule will be slowing down over the next few months. That's not to say that I am going away as I am not. I just wont be producing as much content as I have been. Basically I still love you and need you, I sadly don't have as much time to dedicate to you. So I figure when I am able to post I will really want to make it count......

Ok enough of that noise. So this week I am working on several things at once. I have a commission that is in progress on the Minions Blind Walker from Privateer Press. This thing is a huge gator with a crap-ton of bones and candles on it, and for fun they threw on what looks like the Olympic torch. I mean really how can you say no to painting something like that? I am also working on a throw back project of an old metal Khador Destroyer. This is just a nostalgia piece for me, and it will even be based like we did back in the early 2000's (no I'm not going back to the 90s with the horrible green bases!).

So here are some WIP pics. more to follow.

First some very early WIP of the Blind Walker

And here is some later stage WIP on the Destroyer. 

Karchev Completed.

My God, what a fun model to paint. I loved every bit of working on this one.

So without further ado (and a wall of text).......

The Model!

Kharchev 1.0

I was debating holding my next post for a finished model, but I have been having so much fun working on this one that I just wanted to share.

If you are not familiar with the Privater Press War Machine Line. This is Kharchev. He is both a big stompy robot (aka War Jack) and a War Caster. Basically he is all the cool things that draws one to the game.

First things first. The model is all metal and big with a capital B for something in all metal. Think about the same size as the old GW Daemon Prince big metal model for reference.

With that in mind, I started of course by removing all the flash and mold lines from each piece of the model. Then it was on to pinning, a lot of pinning.....

With that done I moved on to pinning the model to the base and primed with Vallejo Surface Primer - Grey. Once the primer was cured I coated the model with Vallejo Model Color Grey/Black, Then did the first under highlights using stone grey. I then shot the first red inks using FW - Red. Once that was dry I did the second under highlight using a mix of Vallejo Model Color - Flat Flesh and Vallejo Game Color - Red at a ratio of 10:1. Then I shot the second ink using P3 - Red ink.

It was then time to gloss coat to seal in the freshness. Once the gloss coat was cured I started working on the blacks that would both be on the finished model and for an undercoat to the silvers. Again I used Vallejo Model Color - Black/Grey. Once the tedious process of blacking was completed it was on to the brown undercoat for the golds. I used Vallejo Game Color - Beasty Brown. For the next step I needed to decided what gold I wanted on the model. I decided to go with something a bit darker, so I grabbed Vallejo Model Color - Bronze as a base. Then it was onto the silvers. Again I wanted something darker to start with so I chose P3 - Pig Iron.

Once all that was done I worked on his tiny little half face. Which is a great focal point on the model as its a huge contrast to the big shiny robot body. I started with Reaper - Olive Green as the undertone. then glazed Vallejo Model Color - Bright Flesh. Then I did a very light glaze of purple to give the skin tone a bit more depth, and highlighted back up to Bright Flesh. With all that work done, It was time to gloss coat it again.

Then I added the oil washes. For this model I did two. I used a black and Burnt Umber, The black was used on the reds and silvers, and the Burnt Umber on the golds.

So that's were we leave off. The only things left are to add the highlights and shades to the silvers and golds, work on the base, and add the snow effect.

A wild update appears!!!


First I wanted to apologies for the almost 2 week gap between posts. I wanted to get this model (and a few others) finished so that I could show you a few completed models of the next few weeks.

I give you the Khador Gun Carriage by Privateer Press. I have wanted to paint this model for years and finally got the chance. I absolutely love this model. It's big, bulky has great lines that lend to shading and highlights. It just has the feel of being solid and tough. My only nitpick is that both horses have the exact same pose. Sadly they are two piece metal models (split down the middle) so no change of pose is really possible. Other than that it's just fantastic.

So here are the finished pictures.

Back from Vacation!


Have you ever not realized that you seriously needed a vacation? Well if you have then you know how I felt. We had set up a 4 day trip to Nashville to visit with friends and wound up staying for almost a week! That being said I hadn't realized how much good a break would do me.

I have been home for a few days and finally found the itch to paint. I have been working on a commission for another Blighted Bather from Privateer Press. I love working on alternate models. Especially fun stuff like this. This customer wanted the skin tone to match the normal Legion of Everblight colors and who am I to say no.

So here she is. All done and ready for her owner. I still chuckle when I look at the rubber ducky like Shredder.

Batch Painting - a few thoughts.


I was waiting for the next gloss coat to dry on the GW tanks yesterday but wanted to get some painting done. I had a few models laying around (who doesn't really?) that were primed and and patiently waiting their turn in line on the shelf. I decided to get them at least base coated. I knew that all of them were going to have strong reds and figured "why waste the paint?"

Batch painting, especially with an airbrush is pretty easy and can save a you a bunch of time. Make sure all of your models are prepped and ready to go. Keep them off to the side so that they are not picking up any over spray, and have at it. Simple really but what a time and effort saver. From base coat to under ehighlights to inks all four models took less than an hour.

So here are some pics....

Major Announcement Time!

As I promised at the begging of the year, I have been expanding the blog. So far I have worked on different models. I have started on the product reviews (stay tuned for more and better!), and now for the next. 

We are officially launching the store today!

The first product that we are offering are dice trays. Not just any dice trays but cognizable trays that don't cost a fortune! The trays are made from real wood, with the most durable felt we could find (and believe me we tested a lot of felt).  You will be able to add lettering to the sides and logo's or pictures to the bottoms, to truly make your dice tray unique! All this for the low price of $45. 

So what are your choices? 

You can choose felt in Red, Black, Blue or Green. We will have three differnt fonts avaiable for the lettering on the sides and logos on the bottom will be 6in by 6in. The Dice Trays themselves are 9in by 9in so they offer plenty of room to roll dice, carry models, cards, or anything else you can think of. 

So come over to the store and check it out! 

http://www.flightmedicgaming.com/

As a side note the blue tray is the only one showing right now (working on it!) You can still order any colors you would like. When checking out you will be asked what text you would like, Just let us know what color felt you want and we will make it happen!

Oh and I'd bet you'd like to see the trays. This is one of the trays we did for the one and only Menoth John.

Making old timey looking paper for diorama's / display.

We have all seen amazing diorama's with wonderful old time looking paper on them, usually they have some kind of description or saying. They are a great way to break up a mundane piece of wood and add a nice touch of style to the piece.

So how do you make it? Well it's incredibly easy to do.

There are a few things you will need to gather:

1. A piece of paper (duh)
2. Tea  (or coffee in a pinch) brewed.
3. A pan
4. Your oven set to 200 degrees F. (If your from the rest of the word just go and google the conversion calculator).


When you have everything you need. Go ahead and print out what you want to say on the paper (unless you are planning to do the writing by hand later). Personally I have the hand writing of an epileptic 3 year old so I chose to find a font I liked then printed it out.

I then placed the paper in a backing tray that would fit into my toaster oven.

And poured the tea over the paper getting it good and soaked.

I let the paper sit in the tea for a few minutes. I left it long enough for the paper to absorb as much tea as it could hold. Then gently dumped the excess liquid out of the pan.

My toaster oven was warm by then and I placed the cooking sheet with the paper inside and set the timer for 15 minutes (give or take a few minutes).

I let the paper bake till it looked like this.

Then it was just a matter of tearing the paper to the shape you would like.

And now its done and can be glued to the plinth when the model is ready.

So there you go a simple easy trick to take your diorama's to the next level.