That planet-ball is brilliant, especially considering how small it is. Would love to steal this idea.
Thanks guys! Thanks to your comments this ended up being a much better miniature. I was satisfied with it before but now I think it's my favorite piece in the army. Until the next piece, that is
Your whole army project is such a big inspiration!!! Now that I've moved in my new house and that I'm setting up a permanent painting workshop, I hope to work on my own project with as much regularity as you have in the past year. Great work on the skink priest, he looks really good and it's a very creative idea that you got there. Exactly what the forums are for .
would it be possible, if you have time.. to get an army shot in? really amased with orb by the way cheers lustria
Wow...SeBM - a whole year has gone by! I didn't realize that until you wrote it. Pretty cool Lustria, I could try for an army shot next time I set everything up for a game, sure. Well, just to keep things rolling along, I'm going to post some photos of my CoC. I started assembling this unit way back at the beginning before my first Lizardman game, but put it aside when skinks took over my life...not to mention that for the longest time I was of the opinion that cavalry in 8th edition wasn't worth taking. I have since revised that opinion somewhat, owing to the fact that 5 of these guys is still, IMO, an affordable way to add some much needed punch in HtH, transforming our Saurus & Skrox units from 'only slightly better than average' into combat res dominators. Also, I am a huge fan, as is everyone else I'm sure, of the mounted Scar Vet running amok among the enemy's lines I wanted to show all the conversions and other greenstuf work done to my Cold Ones before they are primed and painted. So here goes! To begin with, as some of you may recall, I wanted to fix the fact that all the Cold Ones have identical tails. So after going as far as I could with melting and re-bending the plastics, I sculpted one of my own: Below you can see the remaining work on that tail, which I only just finally got to doing after this model sat neglected on my workbench for almost a year. As you can see, in addition to the scales, upon further reflection I decided that this one should be my Scar Vet's mount, and accordingly swapped out the normal head for the one with the mask: Here's a view of the sculpting from above: More about the Scar Vet later, as I plan to do some conversion work on the rider and he will be the first to receive a paint job.... In the meantime, here is a look at some of the work done on the rest of the CoC: More to come soon, but I have to go on the road for work tomorrow, so please leave me some comments to read for when I get back on Thursday!
looking really good so far love the coldones tails and good news about hopefully getting an army pic in lustria
nice work as always, the longer tails do help, but personally i think that the current cold one models are beyond saving. possibly if you cut off the front arms and made new ones with GS, but thats a hell of a lot of work. i like the new orb on the skink, though it is a bit hard to tell what it is. it is very cool once you realize how much work has gone in to it though. a brilliant model all in all
Some more work on the mounted Scar Vet, who is ready for painting now: Note the green stuff on the shoulder to get the pose to what I wanted it to be. Also the sockets into which I have placed the banner poles on his saddle. Other than this, he is a pretty straight-forward build, using parts from the CoC plastic set. If you look closely at the Cold One's neck (above) you can see my fingerprints melted into the surface where I heated up and bent the plastic so that all of my Cold Ones aren't looking in the same direction. You can also see that I used the same heat and bend technique to get the Scar Vet's Cold One to have his front claws facing downwards. Here is a group shot with the Scar Vet and full command in the unit: The Cold One's are not "beyond saving" in my opinion, but if I add any more to my army I am going to convert them from some older metal raptors I own from Grenadier's Dark Elf Cavalry line (long out of production). I will admit that it is really disappointing how much work needs to go into this particular kit, especially on filling gaps and seams in the Cold One's snouts, re-positioning the arms and heads of the riders so that they can see over their shields, and re-positioning the necks and tails of the Cold Ones, so that the unit doesn't end up looking like the "Rockettes": P.S., Lovely weather today...I think I will go at these Cold Ones with the airbrush to give them a nice uniform look, and even blending. P.P.S., I need to do more with the other bases. Basing is the Achilles heal of my army, I think. P.P.S.S., Lord Tsunami, thanks for your comment on my Skink Priest's Orb From a distance it still looks good, although you have to pick it up to really see what it's supposed to be. The photo doesn't do it complete justice, but I am stick using my DROID camera until the next campaign game (I travel over state lines to play my once a month campaign game, where I left my camera last time - doh!) Anyway, the folks at Coolminiornot do not seem to like it as much as you folks...maybe some of you could be kind enough to vote on it? http://www.coolminiornot.com/288941 <--the link
Wow, cool looking scar vet! The tail seems a bit short, but it looks great overall. I'm keen to see it painted.
CMON is a site for snobs and meanies. it is so easy to down vote something when it is completely anonymous. Sure, it wont win you any golden daemons, but it is not a good idea to always compare one self (or others for that matter) to the very best of the best. It IS a very good looking mini, and that is what counts.
Thanks Tsumani, I don't often frequent CMON, and I haven't posted much there, but every once in a while I forget myself I have seen some stuff on there that has really inspired me, and there's nothing like being dissatisfied with your work to propel you to work harder and take things to the next level. Thankfully I am not easily discouraged. Thanks for all who voted on my mini too! Stewart, not sure which tail you mean looks short, the Cold One's or the Scar Vet's. I kept the Cold One's tail the same length as the others - didn't want to make this a new species, although I plan to break that rule when I sculpt my Horned One. As for the Scar Vet, he's pretty much just done with parts off the sprues. Here's another photo showing the greenstuff on his other shoulder, which was obscured by the shield, putty gap filling on his waist and a bit of the other socket for the second banner pole. It's a pretty impressive model overall - this guy looks like he means business!
Just wanted to show you guys the Cold Ones after they've been airbrushed. They need to be cleaned up with a brush, but base-coating this way saves a lot of time (all 6 of them done in about 30 minutes, with 3 colors - white underbellies, yellow transition color and green tops), and the blending comes out pretty nicely: Here's a shot showing the tops, and you can also sorta tell in this photo that the tails have been bent so that they aren't all identical: Coming soon...painted Mounted Scar Vet!
I did not know you could get that sort of precision with an airbrush. I thought they were much more 'blunt' than that. Like the tails, too. Definitely a peeve of mine, all those tails and heads pointed the same way. Do you lose more or less detail using an airbrush than with brush painting?
When you get started investigating airbrushing a lot of things come to light. There is a difference between an airbrush and a spray gun, such as the citadel spray gun. The name is self evident once you think about it, one is as delicate as a gun, and the other is an air brush. An air brush can be a big initial investment, but you save tons in the long run, especially when you place a value on your time. More materially, you save paint as well. I painted about 30 skinks with about 20 drops of paint. You mix it 50/50 with windex, which makes it cheap and possible. I had all 30 basically painted in 40 minutes. All it took after that was highlights, washing, and painting all the wing dings. I recommend the Badger Patriot for a starter brush, its what I've got, and I'm a starter. I did a bit of research and this brush has everything you need for a top quality airbrush. Internal mixing, gravity fed... other stuff. As for air compressors, someone else can help you there. I was lucky and found one in my garage. I have a heavy flow roommate situation so the garage turns into a treasure trove of abandoned goodies. Sometimes you get lucky. Oh yeah, you also won't lose any detail.
Mossy, just to add to what Brokbrok said, you lose no detail when you airbrush, as the paint goes on super thin and fine, and yet dries within seconds of application so you can really control how much goes on in very light passes. When I use a brush I tend to glob on way more paint than I need to just to cover the primer, even though I've been painting for many years and am very mindful most of the time of how much paint is on my bristles. You can get very good control over paint placement with your airbrush with practice, especially if it is a double action kind that allows you to control both the amount of paint and the air pressure with one finger (push down more for more paint, pull back further for more air). I have a badger and it's great, but more often use a testor's Aztek brush because even though it's not as precise it's about 10 times easier to clean. As for a compressor, I have an air compressor in the garage that I use for all manner of tools. It was about $125 at Sears (about 12 years ago?), and is nothing fancy. Set it to about 40 pounds pressure. You can also control where the paint does not go by using frisket, your fingers and scraps of paper strategically placed on the model while you are working on it.
All the cleaning i've had to do is thoroughly rinsing with water after each use. I'm terrified of the day I have to learn to take the thing apart. Are there cleaning products people use to remove the paint from the airbrush besides water?
Yeah, there is a thinner that comes in a plastic bottle that I use with acrylic paints. Badger makes it and there is another company as well - I'll have to check the brand next time I'm out in the garage working with the airbrush, which will hopefully be soon because I want to get my terradons together and base coated before the weather turns cold and wet... If you have a badger or other standard airbrush you absolutely have to take it apart and clean the nozzle and needle from time to time, especially if you are using goopy, thick miniatures paints like those sold by GW, Reaper, etc. Even the Vallejo paints, in the dropper bottles (vastly superior in most cases to GW's stuff) need to be thinned to work in an airbrush and due to the fast drying times of acrylic paints I can't imagine how your needle isn't accumulating gunk. It may splatter or spit occasionally when this happens, which can really ruin a paint job - so be careful. Taking your needle out and wiping it should be second nature to you - I would recommend doing it a few times for practice so that you can do it while painting without having it interrupt your focus.