What are you doing today hobbywise?

I agree, Guardians was unique at the time and was able to find a decent balance of serious and humor. Marvel went head first at humor ever since and ruined almost ever movie after with stupid mood killing jokes. Other franchises followed hoping to cash in and never thought that perhaps this wasn't the way. CGI is an amazing tool to assist storytelling and there have been amazing uses of it. Sadly it's usually used as a crutch and used to hide weak story points. Practical effects if done well have a weight to them that I feel adds to the realism due to them being real. Sadly these can also be overdone to hide weak storytelling. I tend to use black and white photography as a example of my philosophy, when done well the shadows and light become characters in the movie. You will literally get a sense of the scene due to what you can and can't see clearly. The limited pallet forces you to apply camera angles and actor positions as absolute characters in each scene, and characters just as important as the dialog. With color you have more options and while everything I mentioned is still applied it is less draconian a law as you color pallet allows for emotion etc to be seen with a greater spectrum. It's why Schindlers List was so well fil.ed and other new era black and white films didn't have the same gravity. They were filmed like a colored film and ignored the need for more precise camera work. I'll stop as I have way too much of a soapbox ramble on this subject than anyone has time for.

 

Still painting hellhounds. Trying to think of suitable lizard-like markings and decorations

 

How solid are they? It's a cool idea.

 

Okay... to which I reply, "it can be done well and in limited amounts works very well... mind you, a good script without forced humor helps. Ghostbusters (the first one from the 80's) comes to mind."

 

Big trouble in little China is one of my favorite movies and it also has humor added to a serious issue as a plot. The humor feels natural and as you look mentioned the good script helps. Original Ghostbusters was great and I actually just watched it with my wife and youngest son. I forgot how many times they used mild profanity... but the movie was a masterclass in humor but it wasn't billed as a comedy as far as I remember.

 

I have to admit that I disagree that practical effects are supposedly better than CGI. I've seen several old B-movies from before the CGI era where the practical effects used are utterly pathetic (including an instance where a 'pantomime horse'-style costume was used to depict a monster ), and every bit as bad as cheaply-done CGI. There is rather too much of a CGI-phobia these days coming from people who get all nostalgic for the best films from the pre-CGI era while conveniently forgetting about all the stinkers that were also made at that time. Of course I'm also not an advocate of CGI-only films either, but rather than CGI simply being an add-on to practicals, I feel that the two mediums are best used for different parts of a film, and neither one should be sacrificed in favour of adding more of the other. Each has its place.

You simply cannot recreate the spectacle of a mass battle, for instance, with masses of human extras, without the film being incredibly expensive and there still not really being enough extras to do the job properly. Films like many old 60s epics and Waterloo try their best, but they still fail to capture the sheer colossal size of the battles they're meant to depict (and often ended up box office bombs to boot because of the expense of said extras). That's something that CGI was designed to achieve, and does so pretty much effortlessly (and to great acclaim in films like the Lord of the Rings trilogy, which wouldn't have looked half as good without CGI). Indeed, CGI is without a doubt best used to display things at a distance (whether creatures, masses of troops or historical or fictitious locations) affordably. But on the other hand, you absolutely need practicals for close-up shots for them to look in any way convincing - physical sets and creature maquettes are ideal for close-up shots because they do, admittedly, look so much more physical and, in general, real.

All in all, I'd think a more 50:50 approach would work, and in series like The Last Kingdom, such a method works extremely well.

 

Like with anything, CGI and practical effects are but tools, which are bound to be used and abused by people who don't know how to use them properly.

 

I agree, to clarify I'm not blind to the limited nature of practical tools and yes we have some real stinkers. Even something as minor as the ending to Abbot and Costello meet Frankenstein, they are in a boat. The boat is rock steady as it was obviously a set prop that they didn't need to move. I prefer real models but, as you said, I can't argue that massive battle scenes or truly alien worlds don't look better with a well used cgi. My dislike is that it's an overused tool and practical effects are sneered at even when they can produce IMO a better effect. Even if it's just something real for the actors to work with. I will also throw in that movies like the original Iron Man were great as the actors were in prop suits but they were later animated to look like the full armour. This wouldn't have looked as slick if they had just used practical effects. It was only later that CGI was, again IMO, way over used and made a diluted effect. 50/50 would be nice to have again.

 

The high ground has been completely tiled



I will start painting soon-ish

Grrr, !mrahil

 

Looks like it was an absolute PITA to tile

 

Outside of half of the high-ground closer tot he camera, and a dozen oddly coloured tiles, it almost looks like you could have gotten away with not painting them, they're so well coloured already.

Though being Gondorian, I suppose it was inevitable that they'd be painted over regardless. Whites and light greys for the white city?

 

It will indeed be a variant of greys

Grrr, !mrahil

 

Thank you for reminding me that everytime I think I'm alone in hobby detail insanity that there are others like me. That looks awesome!

 

Believe me, you're not alone... I nearly drove myself insane trying to get the painting of every strap and sash on my Warlord Epic Battles ECW figures just right, to the point where I have had to be firm with myself and implement some pragmatic "Don't worry about it, it looks fine from any distance away and as part of a grouped up unit" reassurances.

 

Hahahaha the struggle is real! One of my friends is a historical gamer and he constantly reminds me that we look at our models at a 3' level. His armies look amazing at 3' and his banners are beautiful when you scan the battlefield. When you get closer you notice the lack of details and fine level highlights that many gamers add. Many of his banners are larger than they should be, more on the scale of American football banners. No banner man in his right mind would haul these things around, but they look amazing! People will stop as they are walking by the table to check his army out. One of his friends is an amazing painter but half of his details are lost at 3' and even worse not all his armies look coherent due to the details muddling up the battle lines. I try to do my best but unless it's a really large model or a display piece, or I'm just being crazy, I try to temper my painting detail mania. Ursakar Creed was one model I went crazy with, highlighted his lower lip, purple wash under his eyes...it went on and on but it looks cool close up ‍

 

Honestly, I think that's why I've come to like using Contrast and contrast-style paints so much. If I'm painting a character who deserves extra attention then by all means I'll start trying to work out how best to achieve the detail he deserves, but to get a lot of models out there and "battle-ready", then thanks, I'll cheat and use the contrast-style paints as much as possible to cut away some of the work.

I'm also inherently lazy, so there is that.

But it is telling that I assembled so many models, but never painted more than a handful of characters before contrast came out, then when it did, I didn't come to dread the idea of painting them so much - overwhelming numbers notwithstanding.

It also doesn't prevent the risk of burnout. I'd have zero grey models by now if I hadn't burnt myself out back during lockdown... the first months of lockdown...

 

I think I need to learn new techniques tbh. I'm still painting like I was 15 years ago, back when there were just acrylic paints and inks. It takes me bloody ages to finish most models and I might depend on dry brushing a bit too much for highlighting.

I always find eyes are the key thing though. If I get eyes that look good then the rest of the model will look fine