MaGie Miniature Painting

Hi everyone!

Today I want to share a short step by step on how I painted simple tattoos on this lovely miniature from Hasslefree. This is the easy way, and I think it works really well with tiny minis with tiny tattoos. Bigger tattoos (with larger surface areas coloured I mean) require a different method, with more lighting effects. I might make another tutorial for that as well. For gaming minis, but also for small display minis I find that this way works quite well.

Unfortunately my lighting was a bit harsh and I didn't find out till after I was done, so there is not so much shading seen on the skin, but the tattoo looks as it should more or less.

Step 1:
Make sure you finished painting the skin entirely. You can still work it a bit afterwards, but it is better to start without worrying about that.

Step 2:
Start with sketching in the tattoo with a diluted blue colour. I find that the old GW colour "space wolves grey" works well for this. If you don't have this, a grey blue is generally ok.

Step 3:
Then cover the entire sketch with the colour of the tattoo. I used a mix of black (GW), space wolves grey (GW) & golden skin by Scale 75. I don't know the mix exactly, but I think it is about 3:2:1.

Step 4:
To emphasize some volumes in the tattoo, I added a little black to the previous mix and painted that into the larger surfaces of the tattoo.

Step 5:
There are two steps hidden in this pics. The first is cleaning up the area, using skintone to make sure the edges are tight and the shapes are like you want them to be.
The second step is to add a glaze of skintone, this will give the tattoo a slightly more worn look. The more glazing you do, the more it looks embedded to the skin. It really depends on what effect you want.

Variations

As you can see the tattoos on my lady are quite dark, so they look more like newer tattoos. Yes, she is naked because she wants to show of her new tattoos.

Of course, you don't always want to paint new tattoos. To create older tattoos, add more blue & skintone to the tattoo colour.

If you want the "just-had-this-tattoo-done" look, you can add some red glazes to the edges to make it look like irritated skin. But then, the tattoo has to be really dark and preferably a slight gloss to it. People with tattoos know that you have to treat your new tattoos carefully and keep them moisturized a bit ;).

Hi everyone!

Today I want to share a review with you, about two miniatures from ShadowCrafter Miniatures, a small company from Spain.

A while ago I ordered two of their wonderful miniatures: Oromë the forest keeper and the Renaissance Assassin. I really liked the look of the sculpt. While the first is a real traditional fantasy miniature, the other is a quite familiar character to gamers. Both should be real fun to paint :)

Before I start the review, I want to mention something sad, but important. After arriving home one day I found the package with the miniatures on my doorstep. Unfortunately there was also a big sandy footprint on top of it. Yes, my stupid housemates stepped on it, at least once, maybe more. Unfortunately the minis are quite damaged because of this. I can fix it, but keep it in mind when you see the pictures. I still wanted to post this review, because I believe ShadowCrafter minis deserve to get some attention :)

The minis arrived in a blister package. Good choice, as it is much safer that way.

Solid blister packs, although you can see the result of my careless housemate

Oromë, the forest keeper

Let's first take a look at Oromë. The mini comes in a blister package, and is additionally packed in a zip-lock bag. It comes with a 30mm base and a card insert.

Oromë is a tiny miniature and comes in four pieces: The main figure, a right hand including a sword, a bird and a cape (the cape is missing in the picture because it is shattered). Click pictures to enlarge

The mini is made from resin. It is a delicate material, but it does carry the details really well. As you can see from the pictures it is a very clean cast, with hardly any mould lines. There is a bit of flash, but it is superthin, so you can easily remove it with a toothbrush. Clean-up of this mini will be a piece of cake. Nice :). Also assembly should be really easy, the pieces fit well together. The contact areas are really small, so it will require delicate handling. But as the resin is very light it should be ok without pinning.

On the pictures above you can see how well the details have carried over to the cast, and the overall clean look of the material. On the back of the legs some clean-up is required, but that should be really easy to do. On the back you can see the place where the cape should be attached.

Renaissance Assassin

The Assassin is also packed in a zip-lock bag and comes with a 30mm base. The mini is formed out of 3 parts: the main figure, a right arm with sword and a left arm.

When I took this mini from the package I was amazed with all the incredible details. Seriously, when you see just pictures, you could easily mistake this for a 50mm or even 70mm miniature, but it is not. It measures about 33mm.

The cast again is very clean, has amazingly crips details and I cannot find any mould lines. Again, there is a little flash which is removed easily. This mini is also very fragile (yes it has snapped on several places which I need to fix). Especially the sword is super thin, but it is also straight (and thank heavens it is not broken too) so no fiddling around with that. Assembly will be simple as with Oromë, but again probably easier without pinning.

Overall

I am super happy with these miniatures! I think they look excellent, they are unique and of amazing quality. Both cost only 11 Euros, which is incredibly low for such high quality resin miniatures. I cannot wait what is next in store for this company. Really great to see pieces like this. Additionally, I can only be happy with the service of the company. They did not have a card insert for the assassin anymore, so they send me a big card instead. The package was sent fast and communication was clear. Nothing but praise for this ShadowCrafter Miniatures!!

Well I hope you liked this review, and keep a lookout for their miniatures :)

Hi everyone!

I think many mini painters can relate: when you post a picture of your minis, either work in progress or finished, often other painters will ask: what colours did you use? How did you paint this? What techniques do you use? etc. Of course, I never mind answering those questions, as that is what a community is for, we share & care!

This time, I was thinking that maybe it would be nice to take pictures of the whole process of painting a mini. Step by step. I always enjoy reading / seeing other people's full mini SBS-s so when I wanted to start painting this Dark Eldar Succubus I decided this will be the perfect mini for my own SBS.

Dark Eldar Succubus - GW studio paintjob

Because I talk much, and because the process is long, I will split the SBS into several parts. As I am still working on this miniature, I cannot specify exactly how many but let's just see how it goes.

In this first part I will cover the priming of the model, preparations for painting and the full process of painting the skin. I hope you enjoy following me in my painting process :)

The light in the pictures is a little harsh, it would simply take too much time to set up a photo area for each step (my whole working area is 50 by 50cm so a fixed photo area is no option). But the process should be clear to see on the pics :)

Picking the colours

Sometimes I like to work with a pre-determined colour scheme. I print a copy of a picture from a mini in black & white, and I colour it in to see how the colours fit. Sometimes I go on the fly and sometimes I take inspiration from studio paintjobs or works of other painters.

This time I plan on slightly following the studio paintjob. With two major exceptions: I want the skin to be more purple, more alienesque and therefore less human, with a cool undertone. The second exception is the colours of the armour, in the studio paintjob it is hard to tell the black leather parts from the green armour plates. I don't like that. I also don't like too much edge highlighting, so I decided to paint it a little different.

Prepping & Priming

This is a multipart plastic mini. So I started with cutting the parts from the sprue and cleaning up mould lines and bit of sprue. I got rid of a hairy fluffy bit on the weapon, don't need it and I got rid of the chain on the back, didn't like it. After that I assembled only the two parts with the legs and torso. For me it is easier to paint that was. With such dynamic miniatures extremeties can get in the way of your brush and I don't like that.

1) So I primed the mini with a very light coat of Tamiya Surface primer in white. More is not needed and it is better to give a light coat to prevent details from being lost.

2) Then I find it easy to start blocking in the hard to reach areas with black. Since you cant really see it as they are in the shade, I don't want to make it hard on myself so just painting it black is the easy way. If you want less comical or softer shadows you can add some brown or blue to the mix, depending on the effect you want.

That's it! Prep work is done, let's get to the interesting part :)

Painting the skin

As I mentioned before I chose to paint a purple. But be aware that this skintone is quite different from the skintone of the Dark Elf Sorceress I painted earlier. The skintone for the succubus will be cooler, less human-like. I believe I read they don't spend much time in the sun, so I will use very little warm colours for the skin.
An a side note, this colour palette is again different from a third type of purple skin tone I painted, which can be found here. All colour palettes are HERE.

This is the colour palette that I have used:

From left to right:

Naggaroth Night (GW base)
Genestealer Purple (GW layer)
Slaanesh Grey (GW layer)
Golden Skin (Scale 75 colour)
Pallid Wych Flesh (GW layer)
Pale Flesh (Scale 75 colour)

The colours itself are really meaningless without the mixes, so you can read about that below. My philosphy is as follows: skin is not one dimensional, it has different tones within it. Even for a cooler skintone I have added some warmth as I feel it gives more life than just purple would do. For the moment, I have not added a complentary shade for the shadows yet, but I might do that later on.

A slight note on technique: I like to use a layering technique, using diluted paint. I don't know the exact ratio, but it is somewhere around 1:1 paint and water. This I use to paint on the different layers. In between steps I like to use more diluted paint to make smoother transitions. Of course, sometimes I also wet-blend or use the so called push-and-pull technique where you push the paint toward the area you want it to be.

Basecoat

For the basecoat I made a mix between Slaanesh Grey, Golden Skin and Genestealer purple. The mix was about 3:2:1. I diluted the paint and painted all the flesh areas with this mix. It took my about three coats before the colour was opaque. I like to have the basecolours opaque as that way I can make smoother transitions later.

First Shade

For the first shade I added a little bit of Naggaroth Night (NN) to the basecolour. I think about 2 parts basecolour to 1 part NN. NN is a colour from the "base" collection of GW. It is designed to have more coverage. I don't know if it really has, but using this as paint did make it a bit hard to make smooth transitions on the first go.

I painted this first shade to the areas that are in the shade, such as between the belly button, below the belly and on the underside of the leg.No need to make everything smooth just yet, I did that later.

Second shade
Again I added some more NN to the mix, and painted an even smaller area, covering the previous shadow.

Smoothing the shades
I used some diluted mix of the basecoat to smooth the transitions in the shades. For this to work, I try to make the paint more transparent, with consistency of a glaze.
Edit: in Part 2 of this step by step I will add some pictures that hopefully show the consistency of the paint :)

First highlight
Then I started working on the highlights. I started by creating a 1:1 mix between Pallid Wych Flesh (PWF) and Pale Fleshtone. Let's call this the highlight mix. I chose this because PWF is a little too grey for my taste, so I added the yellow/pink tone to warm it up ever so slightly.

I painted the first highlight by mixing in the highlight mix (1 part) to the base colour (2 parts). I painted this on the areas that needed to be lightest, making sure to leave an area of basecolour in between the shades and the highlights.

Second highlight

I painted the second highlight by adding more highlight mix. Ratio highlight mix to basecolour: 1:1

Smoothing + final shade + final highlight

For the next step I did many small things, and I forgot some pictures but they won't be that different anyway.
I started by smoothing the highlights using strongly diluted mixed of the highlight mix and the basecolour. I painted the final highlight of pure highlight mix on the tiniest areas (dots really), and I used a highly diluted Naggaroth Night on super tiny areas in the shadows.

Here I leave the painting of the skin. I might go back to it later, I usually do.

I hope you enjoyed this step-by-step so far. Please stay tuned for the next part: painting the black clothes and the green armour parts.

I would appreciate it if you share this post with all your painting buddies :) Cheers!

Hi everyone!

Another month has ended! Usually I start with saying "Wow! This month passed by so fast", but for some reason this month feels different. Maybe because so many things happend, it just feels like it could not possible have fitted within one month.

This month had many events especially, like Hussar (I would love to go there one day) Warhammer Fest and at that same day I went to the amazing event of Scale Model Challenge. Maybe there were more events, I don't know.

What is so nice about these events, is - apart from the awesome events themselves - that there is so many things to enjoy afterwards too. Like pictures from the events, all the amazing entries!

So what else did October bring us, that is now part of my favorites?

Inspirational pieces

Epic Scale eldar diorama by dim69
6mm minis! That's a bit tiny. Who would've thought you could make such an amazing piece with that? Really great diorama. And what is even more amazing, there is a full tutorial about it as well :)

Orque du Behemot by dim69
Another stunner by the same painter! Although it is an older paintjob, I just first saw it this month. Beautifully painted, and it is Rackham so there's a win right there!

Necron lynchguards of the pumpkin dynasty by Rafal Maj
In light of this month's festivities, this projects gets my full praise in creativity! Not only that, but the painting is amazing as well.

Ultramarine Terminator by BuzZin
As I mentioned before, this month Warhammer Fest took place, including the Golden Demon painting contest. While space marines don't typically get my heart buzzing, an amazing paintjob such as this one - who won gold in the 40K section - really excites me.

Battle Chick by Adam Halon
This has got to be my ultimate favorite of this month! What an incredibly exciting paintjob! You don't usually see such strong contrast in these larger miniatures, but wow I really love the extreme highlights and the tattoo is out-of-this-world. I will draw inspiration from this piece for quite some time :)

Chaos Lord by Adam Halon
While we are at it, why not another awesome paintjob by this painter :). I especially love the lighting effects on the freehand on the banner.

Orc hunter! by Max Richiero
I do love them greenskins! What an incredible sculpt, so much character. And the paintjob is just perfect for such a piece. Great.

Khrom by emuse studio
I'm starting to get a feel for this "bigger minis", especially when you see what amazing painters do with it. I really love the look of the face and the armour is very well done!

Tutorials and step-by-steps

Survivor Painting Guide by Scott Hockley
I'm thorougly enjoying this painting guide series by Scott Hockley. It is really great to see how he paints those smooth and silky-looking female skintones. And what better canvas than the lovely Kingdom Death minis.

Basing step by step by Karaikal Painting Studio
Great in-depth tutorial on creating a forest base with water effects. Very stunning results :)

Step by step Theseus destiny by Peter László Tóth
Of course, a month cannot pass without amazing tutorials by Massive Voodoo. This step-by-step was particularly insightful, discussing some (undesirable) effects of glosses and a very clear insight into zenithal lighting on big muscular pieces :). Great read!

Well that's it again! I hoped you enjoyed this list, for I have.

See you again soon :)

Hi everyone!

Welcome to Part 2 of the Dark Eldar Succubus step by step. If you want to see part 1, where I show how I painted the skin, please go HERE.

So before we start the step by step, I wanted to show the current "state" of the mini :).

For this part of the series, I will show you how I painted the black clothing and the green armour parts. I hope you will enjoy this step-by-step. If you have any questions, please let me know.

Some readers have asked me what dilutions I use for my painting. This is a difficult question to answer, as it depends on what parts I am painting, what colours and what effect I am going for. In general I like to use a layering technique, but sometimes I also use wet-on-wet blending.

From left to right, I mostly use these dilutions for each technique: painting the basecoat, layering and smoothing out the transitions with glazes.

Clothing

Before I start blocking in the basecoat, I like to blackline the areas surrounding the skin. Depending on the mini I am working on, I use pure black (usually for a more comical look) or a very dark brown or grey. For this mini I used pure Chaos Black from GW (old colour). In the picture it looks like the blacklining is very thick. In fact, It is very thin, because I don't want it to be too strong. By place most o my brush on the parts that still need to be painted I can get a thin line, the thicker part will cover areas that still need to be painted anyway.

I use the following paint palette to paint the black:

From left to right, these are:

Chaos Black (GW, old colour)
Dark Reaper (GW)
Shadow Grey (GW, old colour)
Basic Skin Tone (Vallejo)
White (Vallejo)

Basecoat

I started by painting the basecoat, in several layers until the colour was opaque. The colour is a mix of about 1 part black, 2 parts Dark Reaper. I don't start with a full black basecolour, as then I would not have a shadow colour anymore.

First Highlight

I added a little bit of shadow grey to the previous mix. About 1 part to 2 parts of the basecolour. I painted this as a first highlight on quite large areas on the leg, chest, boots and straps under her chest.

Second Highlight

I added more shadow grey to the previous mix, and a little basic skintone. It is hard to give exact ratios. I think about 2:2:1 (basecolour : shadow grey : skintone). I painted this on even smaller areas on the chest, legs and straps. I didn't add this to the boots anymore, they are lower on the mini and should be a bit darker.

Third Highlight
I added a tiny bit of white to the previous mix. I think about 1 part white to 3 parts of the second highlight mix. I painted this on very small areas of the chest, the straps, and the knee.

Smoothing

I smoothed out the layers using dilutions of all the mixes used before. I also darked the underside of the straps a bit as they became too bright for my taste,

Spot Highlighting & Shading
In this step I added tiny dots of highlights on the chest and the chest straps by adding a little bit of white to the previous highlight mix. I blended them in using the third highlight colour.

Then I used a dilution of pure black (glaze consistency, see above) and shaded areas that I wanted to become darker.

That is it for the clothing. On the pictures the highlights appear a bit chalky, in reality you don't see this I think it is the light bouncing of the white particles. I think I will try to smooth out this parts a bit more to try to get rid of this.

Middle part of chest

For lack of a better word, this is shortly how I painted the middle parts of the chest - the ribbons. You can see the result in the picture above. It was too tiny to get it on picture perfect for a complete SBS.

Basecoat: I painted the basecoat in Gorthor Brown (GW).
Wash: I washed the whole piece with Devlan Mud (GW).
Highlights: Then I painted the top of the ribbons with Gorthor Brown + Pale sand (Vallejo), ratio 1:1.
Shading: I painted the shadows (deeper part of ribbons) with Chocolate Brown (Vallejo)
Spot highlight: I added tiny fots of highlights using pure pale sand

As the area is so tiny, I didn't feel the need to smooth out any blends.

Green armour

Before I start with this part os the SBS, I want to express my apologies for the pictures. My camera has a lot of difficulties of making pictures of green (and blue too) colours. Hopefully the text will speak for itself :)

For the Green armour I wanted to try something. I decided to use the colours that Games Workshop suggests on their Dark Eldar armour, but to paint it in quite a different way. I said before I don't like only edge highlighted areas, so instead I tried my own style using their palette choice (sort of).

Basically I wanted to prove that using the same colour palette you can create very different results!

I used the following palette:

Chaos Black (GW, old colour)
Incubi darkness (GW, base colour)
Kabalite Green (GW, layer colour)
Sybarite Green (GW, layer colour)
Gauss Blaster Green (GW, edge paint)
White (Vallejo)

Basecoat

I made a mix of 50% incubi darkness and 50% kabalite green and applied this as a basecoat.

First Highlight

To create the first highlight I added more kabalite green to the mix (1 part incubi darkness, 3 parts kabalite green). I applied this to the upper parts of the armour plates on some places (above the knee pad and chest) and on the lower parts of the armour plates on other places (below the knee pas and below the chest).

Second Highlight
I used a mix of 50% kabalite green and 50% sybarite green to paint the next highlight. In the picture you can clearly see the layers of the highlights. The transitions will be smoothed out later :)

Third Highlight & Fourth Highlight
On even smaller areas I painted the third highlight colour which was pure sybarite green. I started to edge highlight raised areas with a mix of 50% sybarite green and 50% gauss glaster green. A little note on the guass blaster green. GW refers to this colour as an "edge paint". But to me it works like any other colour. It is not comparable to the horrendous "dry painting" colours they also sell.

Unfortunately I do not have pictures of the final steps :(

Fifth Highlight

I applied an even smaller edge highlight using pure gauss blaster green.

Spot Highlight
Using a mix of gauss blaster green (2 parts) and 1 part white I painted spot highlights on just the tiniest places, for example on the very top of the armour plates above the knee.

First shadow
Using diluted Incubi darkness I painted the first shadow layer, keeping sure that I do not cover all the basecolour.

Final shadow & Smoothing
The final shadow was painted with pure chaos black, also very diluted.
After that it was time for extensive smoothing! I think that was the part of the painting of the armour that took the longest. But it is also a lot of fun :)

This is what the armour looked like at the end:

Pfeww!!! That was a long post! I hope you didn't suffer from the too-long-didn't-read syndrome!

I hope you enjoyed following me in this part of the paintjob :). Please let me know if anything is unclear. And I hope to see you in the next part!

Hi everyone!

Welcome back to the next step-by-step on the Dark Eldar Succubus. If you want to see how I painted the skintones and the armour, please check Part 1 and Part 2. Today it is time to share one of my favourite parts when it comes to painting: Gold NMM. Gold NMM can be tricky, especially in larger areas as the blending needs to be really smooth for it to look like metal. What I like about Gold NMM is that you can exaggerate it on some minis. Like on this one ;). What is hard for me with NMM is that the colour hue is sometimes difficult to replicate across areas on the mini. Preferable I would paint each step on the whole mini before proceeding to the next step. But, since some minis have a dynamic pose, that is sometimes impossible. In this mini that is the case. So I just try to get it to look as close as possible :)

Feedback
Before I begin the next part of the SBS, I want to thank everyone for their support and the awesome reactions I had to the previous parts :). It lifts my spirits that you enjoy my tutorials.

Few of you asked if it is really necessary to use all these steps, and all these dilutions & mixes. Hmmm, that is a hard question! Well, honestly I would say of course not! Everyone has their own style of painting, and you can do awesome things with simple palettes. This is just my way, which is definitely not the only way. Paint however you like to paint :), but mostly have fun!

As with the previous parts, these are the dilutions I refer to in the text (from left to right):
For basecoating and for painting gold NMM in small surfaces, for layering, for smoothing out transitions.

Gold NMM

This is the colour palette I have used:

From left to right:

Chaos Black (GW old colour)
Chocolate Brown (Vallejo)
Snakebite Leather (GW old colour)
Bubonic Brown (GW old colour)
Flash Gitz Yellow (GW layer)
Pale Sand (Vallejo)
White (Vallejo)

While this palette looks similar to a Gold NMM recipe I posted before, it is actually much colder in tone. This is because I left out the Bestial Brown (which is a warmer brown) for this Dark Eldar mini. Also, I used a little less yellow in the mix and instead of mixing yellow with white for the highlights, I added pale sand, so that the gold becomes a bit less saturated.

Blacklining

I start by blacklining the parts that will be gold NMM in Chaos Black. In the armour details this means that the whole NMM area is painted black, as it is such a tiny element.

A little sidenote: For Gold NMM I have two approaches. Depending on the surface area that I need to paint I use either one of the approaches: On the tiny parts that are NMM I usually use very undiluted paint (for my standards). Instead, I like to use more mix steps in between and get transitions that way. I usually start with the darkest shadows as a basecoat and work my way up to the highlights. For larger surfaces, I like to start with a midtone (50% Bubonic Brown, 50% Snakebite Leather for example) and paint shadows and highlights much like on the armour and the skin)

Basecoat

Using pure Chocolate Brown I paint over all the gold NMM details, leaving only a very tiny part os black at the edges as for blacklining.

First Highlight

I cover a large part of the surface with a mix of Chocolate Brown& Snakebite Leather (1:1), leaving just the tiniest areas dark.

Second Highlight

On an evermore smaller area I paint pure Snakebite Leather. This is still most of the area, just leaving the tiniest bits for the shadows.

Third Highlight

In this step I added Bubonic Brown and a little Flash Gitz Yellow to the previous mix (2 parts Snakebite Leather, 2 parts BB and 1 part FGY), and I painted this in smaller areas again.

Fourth Highlight

On again smaller areas (is it boring you already?) I painted the next highlight: 1 part Snakebite Leather, 2 parts Bubonic Brown and 2 parts Flash Gitz Yellow.

Fifth Highlight

Now it is time to start the brighter highlights. I add a little bit of Pale Sand to the previous mix (about 2 parts fourth highlight mix, 1 part Pale Sand)

Sixth Highlight

And even more Pale Sand is added in this step.

Seventh Highlight & Spot Highlights

On the smallest areas I paint a mix of 50% Pale Sand and 50% White. Then I add spot highlights of pure White. This is the final step and the NMM is finished. Afterwards I cleaned up some transitions in the midtones slightly using the Bubonic Brown and Snakebite Leather.

Leather straps

This model has a few straps that I wanted to paint in a leather colour. As this is again a very tiny area, I used less diluted paints. In the basecolour consistency as I described above.

The colours I used are:

Leather Brown (Vallejo)
Gorthor Brown (GW layer colour)
Pale Sand (Vallejo)
Devlan Mud (GW old wash colour)
Gryphone Sepia (GW old wash colour)

Notice that I often use Pale Sand in my highlights? When you use the same colours to highlight on different parts of the mini, it tends to give the whole mini a coherent look.

Basecoat

After blacklining the strap, I painted the basecoat of pure Leather Brown.

First Highlight

I painted the top part of the belt using a mix of Leather Brown and Gorthor Brown (1:2 parts).

Second Highlight

Here I use the edge highlighting technique. I explained before that I don't like it on a whole mini but on some areas it can look nice and it is very effective. I also used it on the highest highlights of the armour. I edge highlight the belt using a mix of Gorthor Brown and Pale Sand (3:1 parts).

Third Highlight

On a smaller area of the edge I paint the next highlight by adding more Pale Sand to the previous mix (1 part Gorthor Brown, 2 parts Pale Sand). I paint this area on the side of the mini to emphasize the hip and on the belt area bellow the belly.

Wash

Although on the picture the effect is not very clear, in reality I think this step makes a huge difference, by adding some warmth to the colour and adding a very slight satin effect, which I think looks really nice on leather :)

In this step I washed the whole belt with a mix of Devlan Mud and Gryphone Sepia (1:2). After that I re-highlighted some highlights that disappeared after the wash with the Third Highlight mix.

Finished

When I finished the leather belt, I painted the golden parts on top of it as described above :).

I hoped you enjoyed the third part of this Step by Step :). Any feedback is welcome! On the next part I will progress through the painting of the pink scarf, the skull and the fur on the back of her cloak.

See you soon!

Hi everyone!

Let's continue with the Dark Eldar Succubus :). This mini is turning out to be much more complex than I had anticipated, and takes more time to complete than I expected. But that is OK, I like this mini quite a lot!

Today I want to take you through the steps on painting the pink cloth, the fur cloak and the skull that is pinned to a spiky thing. I have tried to put up some bigger pictures, you can click for enlargement, though some of the pictures turn out slightly blurry when you do that...

In case you have not read the previous parts, so far I have covered:

Part 1: Skintones
Part 2: Clothing & Armour
Part 3: Gold NMM & Leather Straps

You can find more information about the dilutions and consistency of the paints I use in those posts as well. Here is a reminder of the terms I use:

From left to right (purple stripes): basecoat consistency, layer consistency, glaze consistency

If you want to keep track of my paintjob and see "work-in-progress" shots, please join me on Facebook.

So let's continue with the mini :)

Dark Pink Cloth

Basecoat
I chose to paint a dark pink cloth, to not attract too much attention to that part. I did want it to be slightly vibrant in the highlights, just because I like that and it is in coherence with the rest of the mini.

Here are some tips on painting bright colours

I started by painting the basecoat with a mix of Warlock Purple (GW old colour) and Chaos Black (GW), in a ratio of 2:1. As this colour does not cover very well, I paint it in about 5 layers until it is opaque.

First and second shade

I started shading by adding more black to the previous mix. Now the ratio is about 1:1 warlock purple / chaos black. I chose to paint quite a large area in shades, as I don't want the cloth to be too bright. I painted this shades using paint in "layering" consistency (see here).

For the second shade I diluted pure black and painted that in the smallest area of shadows.

First Highlight

I painted the first highlight with warlock purple and chaos black, mix 4:1. For this I used a diluted paint in layering consistency. I painted this on the raised areas of the folds and on the edges of the cloth.

Second Highlight
Then I painted another highlight on top of that, using paint diluted to layering consistency, but in a slightly smaller area with pure warlock purple.

I want to take a moment to show you something that I think is crucial for my style of painting. Even though I painted pure warlock purple in this step, the colour on the mini is not that strong as the colour in the pot. Even if I paint several layers it will appear much darker because of the darker undertone.
You can see this by comparing the colour in the pot with the picture below:

I want more vibrance, like the colour in the pot, and that is the reason for the next steps!

Second Highlight
I added a little bit of pink (vallejo) to the warlock purple, ratio 1:3. I used a less diluted paint: in basecoat consistency. Just to make sure it covers faster. I paint this on the very top edges.

Third Highlight
Lastly, I paint the final highlight. It is painted using pink (vallejo) & warlock purple in a 1:1 ratio. As you can see it is very light and a little too strong compared to the rest. This is done on purpose, as the next step will cover most of it.

Wash & Smoothing
Next I smoothed out the transitions using a very diluted mix of warlock purple (glaze consistency). I also made sure to cover the highest highlights in this step. When you do this, not only will the transitions become smoother, but in the highlights it will brighten up the tone a lot and get rid of the too strak highlights from the previous step. Further smoothing was done mostly in the shadows by adding a bit of black to the glaze.

Re-highlight
Then I re-applied the third highlight on only the top part of the knot on her hip, just to get a little more attention there. I made sure to smooth it in using a mix of the third highlight and warlock purple.

Fur
After that it was time to start her fur cloak. I painted the inside of the cloak using the same colours as I will describe below. I have no step by step for this. It was painted really fast and not too careful as most of the inside of the cloak is invisible. I chose to paint the inside before glueing the part because this way it was easier to reach.

After it was painted I glued the cloak to the rest of the figure.

I wanted to make the fur cloak quite muted, with not too strong vibrant colours (so no red tones in the brown colour) and also no strong highlights. There is already a lot going on in this model, and I am not a big fan of fur cloaks so I didn't want the attention to go there too much ;).

Basecoating

I started with a basecoat of Leather Brown (Vallejo). I gave the whole area about two coats, it was ok if not everything is completely opaque, I thought it was ok to give the fur a more rugged look.

On the picture the paint is still wet, hence the shine :)

First Highlight
I used Gorthor Brown (GW) as the colour for the first highlight. I used a very undiluted mix for this, maybe even less diluted than the basecoat consistency. The reason for this is that I wanted to apply it only to the higher parts of the fur. The way I painted it is a lot like drybrushing: you cover only the raised areas. It is, however, different from drybrushing as my brush was far from dry and I used more control to place it exactly where I want.

Second Highlight
I added a little bit of pale sand (Vallejo) to the gorthor brown (ratio 1:2), and painted this in the raised fur on top of the cloak, on the bottom of the cloak and on the sides. The middle (where the pole is) I left untouched. I used basecolour consistency with this step, making sure that my brush was not too loaded. If you have too much paint on the brush it will creap into the crevices.

Third Highlight
More pale sand was added to the previous mix. (2:1 ratio pale sand to gorthor brown). I painted that on the very outer fury bits on the bottom and sides, and to the fury bits on top of the cloak.

First shadow
I used a mix of Leather brown and German Camo Black Brown (vallejo) (1:1) to paint the shadows under each fur flap. For this I used a layer consistency. Note that this is absolutely not a wash, I placed the paint carefully in the crevices. The reason that I didn't use a wash is that I did not want to loose the highlights, and also because this way it felt more controllable.

Second shadow
Using a mix of German camo black brown and chaos black (1:1) I painted in the shadows near the pole. Only in this area I wanted the dark shadows, just to give some depth to the fur cloak.

Note: The picture is slightly overlit, therefore it might appear that the cloak is lighter after this step. I assure you that is not the case :)

Skull
I have been a very bad step-by-stepper as I forgot to take pictures between the steps. As boring as I think it is to paint fur, I really enjoy painting bones and I just got carried away without snapping any shots.

I will write down the steps nonetheless, so you know what colours I used. I often use these colours for bone, as it gives an aged look that I like a lot.

Basecoat
I painted the whole skull in Graveyard Earth (GW old colour).

Wash
For fast shading I use a wash of Devlan mud (GW old wash) over the whole skull. The wash is taken straight out of the pot.

Basecoat again
Leaving only the tiniest areas dark (the eyes, the nose hole, the holes beneath the cheekbones and the cracks on top), I used the basecoat again to lighten up everything

First Highlights
I added Ushabti bone (GW) to the basecoat and paint it in every smaller areas. I make sure to emphasize the teath, the nose, the eyebrow bones, the cheekbones and top of the skull. For each consecutive layer I added a bit more Ushabti boneuntil the colour was pure UB.

Second Highlighs
For ever smaller areas I added Pale sand to the Ushabtibone. Again adding Pale Sand until I reached a layer of pure Pale Sand colour.

At this point I ended like this, and I thought I was satisfied. But then looking at the pictures I didn't like it so much. Although the skull had a different tone, it resembled the fur cloak too much. Also I thought it was just a bit too dark. I also thought it didn't look clean enough.

Applying more highlights
So I decided to lighten up the whole skull and clean it up as well. What I did is I re-applied the first and second highlights in a much larger area on the skull. I left less basecoat on the forehead area where the difference is clearly visible.

Spot Highlight
Because everything was a lot lighter I felt I needed another highlight. I decided to paint a spot highlight using a mix between pale sand and white (1:1 ratio).

At this point I was much more satisfied :)

And this is where I will end this part of the step-by-step. I hope you enjoyed yet another long post :). Please let me know what you think, and as always questions are very welcome. Feel free to share this with all your painting friends!

I will end this post by showing you what the current state of the mini is, so you have an idea of what is coming next ;)

See you soon dear friends!!!

Hi everyone!

Today I am excited to share the fifth part of the Dark Eldar step-by-step tutorials. You can find the other parts here: Part 1, Part 2, Part 3& Part 4.

In this post I will focus on painting the steel NMM on the blade. Mind you, the blade is not finished after this, it still needs some flashy colours in the runes (or whatever it is), but "that is another story and shall be told another time"!

Before I start, I will write a tiny ramble. Just because that is what I do :). The past few weeks I have seen some discussion about using NMM (non-metallic metals) or true metallic paint to paint metallic surfaces. At the moment I don't really feel like sharing my full thoughts on the matter, but maybe I will post a longer piece about this in the future. Please let me know if you are interested!

So, to be short, I have absolutely no preference for either the one or the other! Both have their purposes and both can look extremely good. I use both techniques, and honestly it depends on the figure what my preference is. For example, Alice was painted in metallic paints because I like that on steampunk pieces. When I am going for a more cartoonistic look, like the dark eldar, I choose NMM. It's great that there are different opinions, as that creates diversity in our hobby. For me, I like both :)!

That being said.... I am not claiming to be an expert in either technique. They are hard to master! For me, true metallics even more than NMM. In this SBS I am showing you how I painted the NMM of the dark eldar weapon. Perhaps it is not perfect NMM, but it works alright and so far I am happy with how it looks :)

So let's get started!!

Sorry for the blurry pics. I did not check picture quality during the painting :(

These are the colours I have used (from dark to light):

Chaos Black (GW)
Abyssal Blue (Scale Color)
Anthracite Grey (SC)
Caspian Blue (SC)
Bering Blue (SC)
Artic Blue (SC) - Haha annoying name, I keep wanting to add the C
White (SC)

As you can see, I am mainly using Scale Color paints, from Scale 75(Scale75 paints). I am currently testing a variety of their paints, and although it takes some getting used to (as you can see in this review on their flesh paint set) I really enjoyed painting with them. Especially the metallic paints are superb.

The Scale Color paints are really extremely matte. I think it looks great in NMM, reminds me of the Rackham style. Building up the layers look quite rough with this paints, but once you start blending I really notice a difference from my NMM with Vallejo paint.

Basecoat

I started painting the basecoat using a mix of Anthracite Grey, Graphite and a little bit of Caspian Blue (ratio 4:6:1). I paint this in basecoat consistency in several layers until the coverage is opaque.

First Highlight
I have added Graphite and a little bit of Bering Blue to the basecoat. It is hard to tell exactly, but I think 2 parts basecoat, 2 parts Graphite and 1 part Bering Blue. With this mix I started blocking in the highlights. For all highlights and shading layers I used a layering consistency.

On the picture you can clearly see where the focus is. For the moment, I do not care about making smooth transitions. Only blocking in colours to see if it works.

Second Highlight
I added a bit of Artic Blue to the previous mix (3:1 ratio) and I painted that on top of the previous highlights but on a slightly smaller area. Notice that the area is still quite large, especially on the curved part of the blade.

Third Highlight
With more Artic Blue added (ratio 1:1 First Highlight mix to Artic Blue), I painted in the next layer of highlights on a smaller area even. Still I am not bothered with blending. At this point I decided that the direction and placement of the highlights looked ok to me, so I proceeded with more highlights. If I hadn't liked it at this point, I would have started over from the basecoat. Better to make those kind of decisions earlier rather than later ;).

As you see I also used this highlight mix to paint in the rim between the two surfaces of the blade. I like to emphasize this because in my mind it gives a more reflective look to the material.

Fourth Highlight
The highlights go ever on. I painted the next layer of almost pure Artic Blue. It is not completely pure as I kept adding it to the previous mix, but on my palette they looked the same at this point.

Fifth Highlight
Then I started adding White to the Artic Blue, starting slowly with a mix of 1 part white, 4 parts AB. I also make sure to paint this on a smaller area of the line between the areas of the blade.

Sixth Highlight
More white! I think the mix is now about 1:1 White to Artic Blue.

Seventh Highlight
The final highlight has got to be white. If metal reflects light, the brightest part is white. So I added White on the smallest of surfaces. But, as you can see on the curved part of the blade it is still quite large.

First Shade
To get a more reflextive surface it helps to put really light colours close to really dark colours. So of course I needed to do more shading. The first shade is done by adding Abyssal Blue to the basecoat, mix 1:1.

Second Shade
Using pure Abyssal Blue I painted another layer of shadow colour. Do you notice that I use less steps for the shading than the highlighting. This has two reasons: The first is that I started the basecoat with quite a dark colour already. The second reason is that the dark colours from Scale Color mix so nicely I didn't feel like it needed more steps.

Final Shade
Oops! I forgot a picture here. I created the final shading by painting pure black on the very tiniest areas.

Smoothing
As with all the previous parts of the step-by-steps a lot of smoothing is involved in the next step. Using diluted glazes of the colours used the previous steps I made sure to blend the transitions. Especially in the highlighted areas that was needed.

Edge highlights
Then, to finalize the effect I painted edge highlights. The first layer was painted using the Fourth highlight mix on all edges. The second layer was pure white on only the most extreme areas. Because it is such a thin line, there was no smoothing necessary :)

That is it! That is how I painted the weapon. After I took the pictures I did a little more clean-up, which I did not see before ;).

I hope you enjoyed the fifth part of this step-by-step. If you have any questions, suggestions or request please leave a message! And of course, sharing is encouraged :).

See you!

Hi everyone!

With November in our rear view mirror and the cold but cosy days of December ahead, I want to share my favorites of the previous month.

Before I start I would like to share my sincere thanks for all the great responses to the Dark-Eldar step-by-steps that I posted this last month. November has seen the largest number of visitors on my blog ever, so I'm really excited about that! So thanks everyone!!!

November was the month of Monte Savino, and while unfortunately I haven't been at the event myself I have been drooling over pictures of the contest entries that were shared all over the internet. You will see some of these awesome entries in my favorites as well. If you want to read more about Monte Savino, check out Massive Voodoo's event report!.

Paintjobs & Sculpts & Other

Space Marine Captain by ithandir
That flag!! The mini is painted really well, but the flag is the most stunning for me. Both front & back are amazing! I'm also really impressed with the painting on the face.

Brothers to the end by Sergio Calvo
While this bust is not really a mini I would ever paint myself probably, I'm super impressed by this work. The skintones are amazing as is the excellent OSL!

Lolth the Spider Queen by James van Schaik
This is a really awesome sculpt! It is a quite simple mini but it has some great (spidery) details and I also like the pose a lot. Too bad that it is released for D&D minis and it comes in a box with another mini. I think it is also an older sculpt, but I discovered it this month :).

Twilight Knight by Jennifer Haley
Damn! This is nice! Such an incredibly moody paintjob, I love it! Also, a very special miniature I think.

Hansel & Gretel by Francesco Farabi
What an inspiring piece! It is so different from what we usually see, both on sculpting and on painting. I think it is extremely refreshing. I love the colours and storytelling here :)

Mr Sandman Mattia Papaleo
More colors! This paintjob immediately caught my eye. Because of the colours, but also the scene is really awesome. The base is great with the floor shaped as a cloud. There is so much inspiration in this piece :).

Dark Ritual by Max Richiero
Another stunner that was seen at Monte Savino! What a great idea and excellent execution. Great use of colours on a grim piece. I also really like the OSL here.

The Beginning by Winterland
More storytelling! Who does not love a hobbit house? I think this is very cleverly done, with the house spanning the corner. It gives more dimension to the piece than if it was only on the back of the base. I love the colours used on this piece. And of course not to mention the freehand plaque on the bottom, very well done!

Jessica Rich
Usually I wouldn't post a painter in my favorites, but for this I will make an exception! I have always really enjoyed Jessica's works, and her paintjobs for Darksword are amazing. But this month I think she has shown even more brilliance. Especially her paintjobs for the Kickstarter (see below) baffled me. What is also awesome? She shares her expertise :).

Blog posts & Tutorials

Tigurius face tutorial on Serpentarium
Really great step by step on painting the face of this space marine character. I really enjoy reading the feedback of Kirill Kanaev (aka Yellow One - awesome painter!) on each step and his ideas on improving it. Very insightful!

Releases

Darksword Miniatures - Stephanie Law Masterworks
This is a very special range of miniatures. It is really different from other fantasy ranges, I love the fairy themed minis a lot. Jessica's paintjobs are perfect for this. If I didn't have a strict budget I would've pledges without a doubt!

I hope you all enjoyed my list of favorites and I hope you will join me again this month with more content coming up soon!

Hi everyone!

Today I want to share my review on this wonderful mini from Kingdom Death: The 20 years old version of Savior. When this miniature was first released (limited) I was on a long hobby hiatus. I saw some pics of it later and I was bummed that I missed out on it. So a few months ago when I heard this mini would be re-released I did not hesitate for a moment and added it to my shopping basket :).

This miniature was sculpted by Yannick Hennebo, an ex-sculptor from Rackham and in my opinion the creator of some of the loveliest female sculpts that I know: for example Al-Vianna & Ar-Fienel from Studio McVey. The miniature is produced as a limited edition resin miniature (but I have no idea what that means exactly with this "encore" feature).

Sculpt

The sculpt of this piece really caught my attention. There is some innocence and grace to her pose, while her attire is slightly sexy. I love the subtle nature of this figure, especially when compared to the pin-up series from Kingdom Death (which I also really like, but have a complete different "feel to them). The miniature measures about 35mm from head to toe.

Components

The mini comes in a little craft box. I like those details, it makes it feel really special. Within that box there are several pieces: A little ziplock bag with the miniature, an insert base, a 30mm base, and a small card of concept art. In the enveloppe there was an additional print of the artwork. It feels like a little gift! The packaging is very sturdy and the miniature pieces are well contained in their bag.

The miniature comes in three pieces: The main figure, her left leg and a piece of sprue with her right hand and staff, and a piece of scarf.

Cast Quality

The cast of this mini is superb! Really not much to add to that. I cannot say anything about the difference between the original release and this "encore" version, but let's say nothing was suffered with the re-release. The details are incredibly crisp, as we are used to get from Kingdom Death. I have been looking very hard for a mold line, and I found only one on the inside of her left arm that is super tiny (I could only see it slightly on the pics afterwards) and because of the material is very easy to scrape away. There are only the tiniest bits of flash that are easily removed with a pass of a toothbrush. Really, the clean-up session of this piece will be faster than me finishing my hot chocolate!

Click on the pictures to enlarge. It is hard to catch all the details of resin minis on camera, but this should give you a nice idea of the quality. This is a 35mm mini!!!

On this pic you can see the only mold line I found, on the left arm.

Assembly

Although the pieces should be easy enough to assemble, I think this will take a bit longer. The pieces are very delicate. Especially the hand is really small and there is only a then piece to attach it to. I'm not sure yet if pinning is necessary, I think I won't do that myself. The leg is a bit more tricky, it is a little hard to find the right angle in which it should be positioned. I also think that it needs the tiniest bit of gap filling when in place. But it's an easy to reach area and it should be no problem at all to finish assembly completely before painting. That makes me really happy :)

Overall

I'm super pleased with this figure. It screams quality and originality, and I am really looking forward to paint her. I love the boutique feel you get when opening the package and the crispness of the cast makes me want to scream "Hallelujah!". The prize is a little high on this piece, it costs 25 US dollars. I you include the shipping costs of 12 dollars, it becomes a very pricey piece indeed. But, for such a one-of-a-kind sculpt that I was dying to paint someday I think it is absolutely worth it :).

Unfortunately this miniature is sold out. So you might wonder: Why would you post a review on a mini we cannot get anymore? First of all, with this review I'm hoping to give you an idea of what the general quality of Kingdom Death miniatures is. Second of all, when there will be other "encore" releases, this shows you that there is absolutely no reason to worry about deteriorating cast quality.

I hope you enjoyed this review!

For those who are wondering about the next parts of the Dark Eldar step-by-steps, they are coming soon!

Hi everyone,

Today I want to share my latest finished piece. This is a lovely lady by Hasslefree Miniatures, called Zetta. I have painted the resin version, but I think there is also a metal version of this mini.

Originally I started this mini as a practising piece for the Scale 75 fleshtone paint set. I had some trouble getting used to the paints and it think it shows on the mini. Therefore, I'm not entirely satisfied with this piece. Still I wanted to finish her, quickly, to get back to other projects :).

I did really enjoy painting her tiny, simple tattoos! And I must say that the metal paints from Scale 75 have become my absolute favorite metallic paints (although here the effect is rather simple).

I hope you like this little lady :).

Hi everyone!

Today I want to share the latest installment of the Dark Eldar step-by-steps! This time I am guiding you through the painting of my favourite part of the mini: the face :). I absolutely love painting faces, especially of female characters. It is very nice to play with highlights and shading on the face, and of course add some feminine make-up.

In my opinion painting faces is no magic, just follow the rules of zenithal highlighting and slightly exaggerate some features. Also, be patient. Slowly build up the details and take time to fix mistakes. After I took my pics I still noticed some rough spots that I will correct afterwards.

Just to give you an idea of the time I spent on painting the face: For this tiny head, which measures 4mm (flesh area), after painting the fleshtones (see below) I spent almost 3 hours painting the details, eyes and make-up.

Disclaimer: As I said before, the face is tiny. Therefore it was quite hard to get sharp pictures of every step. Also, the painting of the face is a lot of going back and forth, spending most time fixing mistakes and smoothing surfaces. Nonetheless I hope this gives you an idea of my elaborate process :).

Fleshtones

I painted the face together with the rest of the body, to make sure I use the same colour. As the mix was self-made it is easier to paint the parts at the same time to prevent differences in tones.Previously I have posted the SBS on painting the dark eldar fleshtones. For the face, the steps are the same.

Click to enlarge

From left to right: Basecoat, 1st shadow, 2nd shadow, first highlight, second highlight, third highlight. On the face I try to make the highlights bigger than the shadows, as it is a prominent feature of the mini and it is also the highest point.

I'd like to share a few tips on painting female faces.

1) Be smooth. Ladies do not have strong features as men do, so try to keep the transitions smooth. Also don't make the shadows to stark.
2) Placement of highlights and shadows is essential. If you find it difficult to see where they should be, you can google some "make-up contouring" pictures (see below).
3) A little make-up can help give life to a face. Again, look on the internet for pictures or ask your lovely lady(-friend). Painting in a little bit of blush (rouge) and eyeshadow is really pretty! But take care not to use garish colours and try to stick with colours that fit the rest of the mini, or preferably are used on other parts of the mini.
5) Do not forget about highlighting the sides of the nose. They don't always have to be prominent, as are the ones on the dark eldar lady, but a little accent makes it look more realistic.

Reference for painting highlights and shade (I do not own rights to this picture)

Warpaint

On Facebook, someone (sorry I forgot who it was and I cannot find it back easily) suggested to paint some warpaint. I didn't plan this in the beginning, but of course I wanted to take the challenge :).

Basecolour (picture 1 & 2):
I painted a line underneath each eye with the basecolour: Warlock purple (GW old colour). On the left eye I made the lube a little thinner and added two vertical lines. I also made a line on the side of the eye going up.

Highlight:
To add some interest, and also to prevent the warpaint to look too much like dripping blood, I added a highlight. I added some Pink (vallejo) to the basecoat. Mix was about 50:50. I painted that inside the basecolour. On the right pic, it still looks a little rough but I corrected that a little later by adding a glaze of warlock purple.

Eyes

Eyes are an essential part of the face. They are often also very small. Depending on the size of the eyes you can add details such as coloured irises etc. For this lady I decided to only do a reflection on the pupil. There is already a lot of colour on the face, so I decided to skip the coloured iris.

Blacklining
I start by blocking in the complete eye. I use Vallejo Camo Black Brown for this. I tried to not cover the pink warpaint. But little mistakes can always be fixed. A little note on painting eyes: do not use too much dilution. Having to cover a small area with multiple layers only increases the chance to make mistakes. Also make sure not to have to much paint on your brush or you will lack control.

Painting the white of the eye
Then I used Pale Sand (Vallejo) to paint in the white of the eyes, making sure to leave the tiniest line of brown on the outside. For me painting the right eye is always easier, if you have the same problem you can try turning the mini upside down to paint the right eye ;).

Painting the iris
I then painted the iris using Chaos Black (GW). You definitely don't want googly eyes, so always make sure that you don't see white above or below the iris (unless the mini is supposed to be looking up or down).

Painting in reflections
Using Pale sand I painted a super tiny dot for the reflections, slightly above the center of the iris. For me reflections in the eye makes it look more lively.

Corrections & eye-liner
I am never able to do this all perfectly in one go, so after the steps I took some time to fix little mishaps. I also painted a thin line of Camo black brown on top of where the lash-line should be, to represent an eyeliner and give more definition to the eyes.

Note: If you are really critical you can see that the eyes I painted are not perfectly centered or exactly the same. But honestly you can absolutely not see this without using extreme magnification :).

Painting the eyelids & some tips on make-up

In this step maybe you can see already where I went wrong. But I will show you anyway.

Basecolour
I painted the eyelids in the basecolour for the fleshtone, except I added a tiny bit of extra Genestealer purple (GW). To give it a little bit more colour, you can hardly see the difference though.

Shading
Then I added some shades by adding a little bit of black to the previous mix (3:1 ratio). I shaded the upper part of the eyelids towards the brows. By adding a bit more black I painted in the brows as well.

Highlights
I painted a highlight on just the eyelid by adding pale sand to the basecolour.

At this point I realized the eyebrows looked too strong, and there is something I didn't like about it. So I went back through some make-up references and my common sense.
I had painted the crease: the little fold in the eyelids. Make-up artists often emphasize this part with darker eyeshadows. But what I forgot was a little highlight underneath the brows. It lifts the face and gives a open eye-look. See some references below. So I corrected that, you can see it in the next pictures.

Picture from Temptalia.

Blush

To add a bit of warmth and life to the face I painted in some blush using Pink (vallejo) which I diluted to glaze consistency. It is very subtle, but I think it makes a difference :).

On the picture above you can see I corrected the eye make-up, including a little highlight underneath the eyebrows. I also made the eyebrows a bit thinner. If you look closely, you can also see the little bit of blush I added to the cheeks.

Painting the mouth

Then it was time to paint the mouth & teeth.

Blacklining
I painted the entire mouth with a mix of German Camo Black Brown (Vallejo) and Hull red (Vallejo), mix 2:1. I added the red colour because I thought it would look a bit better on the mouth.

Basecolour teeth
I painted the teeth using a mix of Pale sand and German Camo Black brown (3:1 mix).

Highlight teeth
Then adding more Pale sand I painted a slightly smaller area of the teeth.

At this point it still looked a little rough. So I decided to do a little wash of Devlan Mud. I painted the stripe between the upper and lower teeth again. And lastly I highlighted the canines with pure Pale Sand. You can see the results in the pictures below.

Painting the lips

Last, but certainly not least, I had to paint the lips. I wanted to give the lips a more natural colour, as the skin tone is already quite "different". I also didn't want to emphasize them too much. So I decided to go for a natural glossy lip.

Basecolour
I mixed a basecolour of Hull Red, Basic skintone (vallejo) and Pink, in a ratio of 2:3:1. I painted this on the lower lip and a very thin line on the uper lip.

First Highlight
On the lower lip I painted a highlight by adding more Pale Sand to the previous mix. I think about 1:1.

Spot highlight
On the right side of the lip I added a small spot highlight with pure Pale Sand, to make the lips look a little glossy.

Finishing the face

Then it was time to paint the black collar, the spikes in steel NMM, the gold NMM details and the bone hair decoration. I used the same colours as in previous step by steps. Click on the links to see them. Oops! I forgot to paint the hair band, I will paint that later :). The hair is not finished yet, when it is finished I will post the SBS for that as well.

Well that's it! I hope you are still enjoying these posts :). This was by far the longest, and took quite some effort to make. But it is great to be able to share it with you all!

Just for fun: The real size (as I see it on my screen)

Hi everyone!

When I saw Ax Faction advertising their latest release, Lacerta, I immediately new this was thé mini for me! I don't know if it was because I had just started watching Vikings, and she somehow reminded me of leading lady in the show (perhaps the hair-do or quite similar name). Or just simply because she is a tough lady and the armour is like nothing I had ever seen before, being a combination between lizard hide and tree bark. Anyway, I was excited and soon sent an email to Paul, the owner of Ax Faction. To avoid the tragedy with housemates stepping on my mail & breaking the figures, I asked if he could send it in extra sturdy packaging. That was absolutely no problem and my figure arrived safe & sound in a couple of days :).

So with that little story, let's start the review!

Sculpt

Lacerta is a lizardman hunter and part of the Series 1- Hunters. She is a 32mm miniature cast in a matt grey resin. Altough her stance is quite simple, I think it has a lot of character. She looks very confident & tough yet at the same time she looks quite sexy. I have to say that the concept art for this mini is also stunning. With the great choice of colours that compliment themselves and the mini it stands out for me!

Components

The miniature is packed in a small cardboard packaging with the company logo. As I mentioned in previous reviews, to me that really adds to the feeling of a good product. There was also a big card with the concept art & a pin with one of the Ax Faction Hunters.

Within the smaller package, there is a 30mm base and a small ziplock bag with all parts of the miniature. Lacerta comes in four parts: The main figure, the insert base, her right arm, and a piece of sprue with her left arm & weapon and a big carved stone to go on the base.

I'm happy it was packed in an extra box (over this one), as you can see there has been a stampede again. It all went well :)

Cast quality

I enjoy discovering new companies and obviously when you are ordering at a company the first time it is always a bit exciting to see what the quality of the cast will be. Well, let's say that this time I was absolutely pleasantly suprised. The pictures on the Ax Faction website and Facebook of the cast don't show all the crisp details that are actually on the figure. Just look at the tiny knobs and pieces, and even the eyebrows are sculpted on!

The big problem with resin casts are usually air bubbles (I don't think I need to remind anyone of failcast). Lately many companies seem to have resolved these issues and tiny holes resulting from air bubbles during casting are rarely seen. This mini is also absolutely hole free! The casting is really well done. There is some thin flash, as always, that can be removed with a slightlpas of a toothbrush. The only bit of cleaning will be necessary on some protruding pieces of sprue. There are often on minis because the air needs to vent out of the mold. You can see some places in the picture below. with this material they are very easily removed. I think only the removing of the piece on her hair might require a little bit of cleanup with putty after. I have only found a single tiny mold line on her right arm that is scared off easily. So overall the cast quality is super!

Assembly

For sure, assembly of this mini will be a piece of cake! The pieces fit together extremely well. I prefer to be able to assemble a miniature completely before painting. Often, however, I don't do this because limbs or stuff get in the way of some parts of the mini making it hard to paint. In this case, the right arm of the mini is blocking a large part of the side figure. I would choose to glue it on after painting the body. Since the fit between the arm part and the body is so good, it doesn't need filling and glueing it together after painting is easy. The right arm also fits easily, but perhaps needs a bit of filling. However, because I can assemble it before painting (as it is not blocking areas) that is no problem. The mini itself, and the big stone also fit on the insert base very well. Overall, I'm very happy with the design to make assembly easy :).
Really well thought of design I think!

Here are some pics of the assembled piece. This is just temporary, done with blu-tack, to give you an idea.

Overall

Yes! Woohoo! I am as excited about the actual mini as I was about the concept art and the pictures I saw of the mini :). This, in combination with the great service by Ax Faction really makes me happy! This mini costs £12.90 (about 16.50€) which in my opinion is a perfect price for a miniature of this quality. I am looking forward to see what more greatness is in store for this company!

Hi everyone!

With the year only lasting two more days, I want to end 2014 with a small recap of the previous year.

After a long hiatus (I wrote my last blog post on 11 January 2013), I picked up the brushes again in 2014 :). Then in April I started posting on my blog again and kept going ever since. With more regular posts and updates, I've noticed a significant increase in visitors and pageviews, for which I am very thankful to all of you!!!

I'm a scientist, I like charts :). The black dot represents April 2014.

This year I have discovered many new companies that produce amazing miniatures. Some of their minis can be seen in the reviews I have written. For me, that was probably one of the most fun things this year! There are just so many incredibly beautiful miniatures released! Although I am not a fan of kickstarters (something with having to buy in large sets wen I just paint few minis), I think it has giving a lot of smaller companies an opportunity to share with the world! I am very happy with that :).

Another thing that has really turned this hobby around for me has been Facebook. Not only have I started sharing my own work on my Facebook page and in several groups, I have also discovered many incredibly talented painters from all around the world - and I have made new friends there as well! I think it is really great that we are able to share our works & get feedback in such a way, and I think it enhances the feel of a "community".

I am not exactly sure when Putty & Paint was established, but I certainly enjoyed it a lot this year. While on CMON you often see a voting bias (both positive and negative) for certain miniatures & painters, I find that this is much less on P&P. For me, it has been a daily stop this year and it is a great source of inspiration :).

Of course this post would be incomplete without mentioning the most amazing event of the year (IMHO)! Scale Model Challenge 2014! What an amazing day it was, I still look back at it with warm memories of meeting all my painting friends and looking at the bomb of inspiration in the contest :). Of course it was also great that Alice won second prize in the Fantasy Master category. But the best news is that next year SMC will span 2 days!!

In this post I will not share my favourite paintjobs or sculpts, simply because I have shared them in my favourites post over the past year and it would be nearly impossible to choose from all those awesome works!

For me it has been an amazing year painting wise. I have painted several models this year and I feel that with every mini I paint I improve bits & pieces. On top of this post you can see a little overview of some of the minis I painted this year.

As I mentioned before I have seen a big increase in visitors this year. Obviously that makes sense because I was very silent before, but I also think some posts really made a difference. And purely for my own interest, I have seen that especially the Dark Eldar Step-by-steps are really viewed a lot. Here are the top 3 viewed posts of this year (which is also of all time)

1) Dark Eldar Step by Step Part 2: Clothing & Armour

http://magie-miniatures.blogspot.nl/2014/11/dark-eldar-step-by-step-part-2-clothing.html

2) Dark Eldar Step by Step Part 3: Gold NMM

http://magie-miniatures.blogspot.nl/2014/11/dark-eldar-step-by-step-part-3-gold-nmm.html

3) Dark Eldar Step by Step Part 1: Skintones

http://magie-miniatures.blogspot.nl/2014/10/dark-eldar-step-by-step-part-1-skintones.html

Closely behind these three posts follow the post Tips & Tricks: How to paint vibrant colours and Step by Step: Fast & Easy tattoos. I guess it is safe to say that you guys enjoy reading tutorials :D.

So what better way to end this post then by wishing you all the very best 2015!!

I hope to see you again next year! I have a lot of plans for the coming year and some exciting news as well :). Of course I will finish the Dark Eldar step-by-steps and many more tutorials!

Hi everyone!

Welcome to 2015 & best wishes to all of you!!

Of course I cannot start the new year before finishing the last, so therefore I am sharing my last favorites post of 2014 :). I have to admit that, along with many of you I suppose, December is a busy month and I have not spend that much time on the internet browsing cool miniature websites. So my list is a little shorter than usual, I guess.

Anyway, here are my favorites last month!

Sculpts & Paintjobs

Warrior of ancient nations by Markus W.
I immediately loved this paintjob. From the lovely blues to the excellent metallics and the smooth skintones. And of course the amazing tattoo :) Then I saw the anglerfish on the shield and possibly got even more excited - I like fishes :D. Brilliant work!

Barin by Freeman
Wow! What an impressive sculpt. It's iconic, it's fierce, it's highly ornamented: Great! I especially love the expression on his face.

Die letzte Valkyrie by TheChromaticCircle
That atmosphere! I like the painted backgrounds a lot, really sets a mood to a miniature. On this lady the skintones in particular are very well done in a cool tone that fits the scene very well. I really want to try out skintones like this someday too, and then this piece will definitely serve as inspiration :)

Berrock, Bull warrior by Roman Lappat
I love the unexpected skintone on this beast. Brings so much live to the piece, especially in contrast with the brown tones on the rest of the mini and the base. The metallics & rust effects are truly perfect!

Monster Minotaure by bb68922449
Another big beast. I usually am not a big fan of these big creatures but this month they have captured my attention, because of these lovely paintjobs. Look at the translucent skin on this piece! The OSL effects are really done exquisitely. Honestly, I cannot tell wether the metallics are painted in metallic paints or NMM, but they look amazing :)

Irene von Goritsi by Jennifer Haley
Jennifer is one of my favourite painters and I always enjoy watching her paintjobs. This mini is absolutely no exception. Wow! I love this piece! The colour combination is awesome (I have to remember that), and I am a real fan of this sculpt from Wrath of Kings. Let's hope it will be available for purchase someday ;).

New releases, Kickstarters etc.

Black Sailors Kickstarter
Had I not been on living on a budget, I would definitely have tagged along in this Kickstarter. Those are some incredible miniatures and also amazing studio paintjobs!

Blood rage
I'm not sure yet what exactly this will be, I think the minis will belong to a board game. But when I hear Studio McVey, I already get excited. But mostly I was excited by seeing this sculpt below. I really hope it will be possible to purchase some of these minis separately. Preferably in resin :).

I found this picture on Blood Rage's facebook page. As linking to facebook photoos gives some issues (links getting deleted after a while) I decided to post this picture directly. I do not own rights to this picture.

That's it! It has been a lovely year, time for 2015 to shine!

I hope you enjoyed my favorites of December and see you very soon :)

Hi everyone!

It's been a little while, but finally it is time for the latest installment of the Dark Eldar Succubus step-by-steps. In this post I would like to share how I painted the OSL (Object Source Lighting) on the blade and other cybergreen parts (I don't really know wat it is supposed to be, but I thought of it as some tubing with fluorescent goo in it).

On a sidenote: The girl is now finished and you can find pictures of the finished work at the bottom of this post. I would love it if you vote for her on Putty & Paint or CMON.

A summary of all the previous step-by-steps can be found HERE

In the following steps I have used a dayglow pigment, or daylight fluorescent pigment, by PK Pro to create a very bright effect. You can create the OSL effects without these pigments, but I wanted to try it out in this way and I quite liked how it turned out. I do have to mention that I had difficulties painting with only diluted pigment, as it became very rough and granular, despite a good dilution. Probably it would be better to dilute the pigment with acrylic binder (as I have read on this great post on Massive Voodoo), but mixing it in with paints also works fine enough.

So let's start!

OSL on blade

Step 1: Highlights

For OSL it is much easier to work backwards then my normal trategy (start middle colour, then shade, then highlight). Therefore I start by painting in the highlights, which is the area that is supposed to emit the most light. This blade has some nice details carved in, and I painted the whole recessed area with a mix of white and scorpion green (GW, old colour) in a ratio of 3:1.

Don't worry about painting over the sides of the carvings, because you can clean that up later.

Step 2: Brightness spots

In the parts where two lines of the carves cross (on the crossroads let's say), I painted pure white to make them even brighter.

Step 3: Glow pigments on the edges

In this step I painted the edges of the carvings with dayglow pigment in the colours glowing wood by PK-pro, mixed with scorpion green. I think about 1:1, but it's hard to guess. The colour is very undiluted as you can see on the picture.

Step 4: Painting the glow

Then of course a lighted object will emit light and will cast a glow on surrounding areas. I wanted to keep that area relatively small to not obscure too much of the painted NMM on the blade.
I used the same colour as in the previous step, diluted to a glaze consistency. The closer to the carvings the more layers I painted of this mix, to make it look as if the colour fades the further away it is from the light source.

Step 5: Clean-up

As the blade was looking a bit messy, I cleaned it up, using the same colours as before.

Step 6: Highlights again

During the clean-up I had lost some of the highlights inside the carvings, so I carefully painted them in again using white. I also wanted to increase the contrast a little, so I added a bit of kabalite green to the glow mix (1:1) and painting that on the very edges of the carving. Sadly, because the dayglow pigments effect the pictures a little I did not manage to capture that clear enough.

Here's what it looks like in respect to the rest of the mini:

Cybergreen

These parts were painted in another reverse way, namely by starting with the darkest colour.

Step 1: Basecolour

I started by painting the whole area with a mix of Incubi darkness and kabalite green. If you have followed all the step-by-steps you might remember that I used these same colours for the base of the armour. I did this to make sure there is some coherence between the colours. Still, by using different colours in the highlights the end result looks very different from one another :).

Step 2: First Highlight

Using pure kabalite green I painted a bit smaller area. In all these steps my paints were diluted to somewhere between basecoat and layeringconsistency. It is a small area, and I wanted to paint it quickly.

Step 3: Second Highlight

I added some scorpion green to the previous mix, 1 part SG and 2 parts of kabalite green. I have used the same colours here as on the OSL, so that it looks as if the fluids in the tubes cause the blade to glow up. I don't know if that makes sense in the fluff of these alien ladies, but it sounds cool :)

Step 4: Third Highlight

I mixed some of the dayglow pigment with the scorpion green, about 1:1 and painted that as the next highlight.

Step 5: Fourth Highlight

To make it even more vibrant I added some more dayglow pigment (1 part) and some white (2 parts) to the previous mix (2 parts).

Step 6: Spot Highlights

Of course, so area on this mini will go without spot highlights :P, so I painted in spot highlights using pure white. After that, I smoothed out some transitions but I forgot to take a detailed photo of that.

I painted the tubing aroung the ladies neck in the same manner as described above.

I hope you all enjoyed this post! And, more importantly I hope you like the end result of this project :). It was definitely interesting to take pictures of each step, really makes you think about your own painting techniques....

In the next step-by-step I will show you all how I made and painted the base.

Bye :)

Hi everyone!

A few weeks ago I had a little chat with one of the great minds behind Guild Ball and he asked if I would like to receive some samples of their miniature. Of course! I love discovering new companies and seeing what pretty minis they make.

I was already familiar with Guild Ball. They ran a succesful kickstarter last year, funding their game Guild Ball. Unfortunately I had a little hobby break at that time and so I hadn't taken part in the kickstarter. When I saw the first 3d renders appear online, I was really bummed because these minis looked really good.

This year I started taking a strong interest in 3d sculpting and I started learning to sculpt in zBrush. It was at that time that I got familiar with Guild Ball and I also started watching some of their live sculpting sessions. Wat I really loved hearing in those videos is how much the sculptors and developers thought about the quality of the cast. Making a lovely 3d sculpt is one thing, but making it perfect for casting and creating the sharp details that we look for in our minis, is quite another. I wrote a little post about 3d sculpted minis and how 3d renders do not always represent the mini you will actually get. So, to make a long story short, when I saw the sculpting sessions for the Guild Ball minis, I was already quite convinced that they knew exactly what they were doing, and it would be great :)

Guild Ball is a medieval football game in a pseudo-historical world. Sounds interesting right?!?!

In this review I will share my thoughts on two resin miniatures, starting with Silence!

Silence is part of the sinister Mortician's Guild in the Guild Ball universe. This is a mini that comes in one piece (oh how I love that!). A little while back some WIP renders could be found on the Facebook page of Guild Ball.

The sculpt really excited me. It has a great combination of larger surfaces and small details. There is also a great opportunity for OSL effects. I mostly like his face, it reminds me of he-who-must-not-be-named and I personally love that. You can really make something creepy out of it.

Cast quality

Simply put, the cast quality is really great on this mini! The details are incredibly sharp. The raised edges are perfect. Not too thick to look weird and not too thin that it would require freehand painting to make it stand out. In their sculpting videos it was mentioned that the sculptors want to make these minis for display painters, but also for army painters that can use washes to easily shade areas. I think they did a perfect job!

(click photoos to enlarge)

Clean-up on this mini should be quite easy. On the bottom of the mini there are two little bits (from vents in the mould) that need to be removed. But since they are on not on a crucial area of the mini that should be easy and forgiving. Smart more from the designers again. There are only a few tiny bits of flash than can be easily brushed of by a tooth brush. I can only see one air bubble on his chin, but also that can be easily corrected by a little bit of liquid green stuff.

The only part of the sculpt that is a little rough is his face. But I think a little rub and a milliput wash will make it all better.

Overall this mini looks really great and I am very excited to start painting it soon :D

The second mini is Spigot from the Brewer's Guild. This is a very interesting mini, it has a very dynamic pose and I like the character feel a lot. His weapons are a broken bottle and a large beer mug. Wearing a cool point beard, moustache and barret this guy is really to play some ball :). Also, if you like painting stitches, this is definitely the mini for you, plenty of it to go around!

Cast quality

This cast also has very crisp details. You can clearly see how much thought was given to the depth of the stitches and other details. Again, they are raised but not too much. Also the details on the beer mug and his ornaments look really good.

This mini will require a bit more clean-up than Silence. As you can see on the pictures, there is quite some flash running along the mold lines. It is very thin, and a pass with a toothbrush should get rid of them quite easily. No many details are obscured and on some areas a little scrape with a scalpel will help. In fact, it looks more dramatic than it actually is. There are no air bubbles or any other rough areas. So apart from the flash, another top notch cast!

Assembly

Spigot requires a little bit of assembly. But since the joint is perfectly chosen - right at the border between the arm and the arm band (it's not a bracelet right? sounds too feminine) - this should absolutely not cause any problems. Also, there is a little ball joint on the hand, and a indent of the same shape on the arm, so this should be easy-peasy ;).

Final Thoughts

I think the guys behind Guild Ball have totally achieved their goal to make miniatures that are designed for the painter. The quality of the casts is really good and the minis are easy to clean-up and assemble. There are lots of options for display painters to make something special and for army painters they should be really easy to basecoat & wash. Best of both worlds I would say!

I am really looking forward to see the whole range of miniatures become available. I believe I heard something about March, so let's keep our fingers crossed. I will definitely be on the lookout :)

I hope you liked this review. There are plenty more to be found HERE. Have a nice weekend everyone!

Hi everyone!

I always wondered "what makes January fly by so fast?". It does! It is one of those months that flies by and afterwards you have no idea where the time went... That being said, I have been quite absent from the internet in this month, as I have started a new job :). So unfortunately my list of favourites is not so long, but there are some really inspiring paintjobs & some awesome tutorials so let's have a look at it!

Paintjobs

Ilyad Sorceress by Roman Lappat
Having never owned or painted any Ilyad miniatures, I'm always very intrigued whenever I see a painted mini pop up somewhere. This is definitely no exception, what an inspirational piece by Roman! I really love the magic effects (you can find a tutorial about that on their website here) and the colour combination.

Excëlsy by mmasclans
Another amazing paintjob on an amazing sculpt! I really love the copper armour and the pretty face.

Dragon Knight by Karol Rudyk
Freehand galore!!! Ibn one word amazing! While I am not really a fan of the sculpt, who cares, this is just a wonderful piece of art :).

Sculpts

Aktra by Patrick Masson
Oooh I like this! What a dynamic pose and I just love her attire :). I think this miniature will be produced by Corvus Corax Miniatures, I really hope so.

Altana, Dragon Huntress by Olivier Bouchet
I'm really becoming a fan of Oliviers sculpts and this one really reinforces that. I love the combination between the delicate, yet tough lady and the big scythe.

Elf Archer ‘Amaryne’ by Ju-Won Jung
Aahhh pretty! Very femine sculpt with awesome armour and decorative clothing. Too bad she is sooo big ;)

Tutorials

Rose Window tutorial by Karol Rudyk
This is an awesome step by step on creating a coloured glass in lead window. This is soooo pretty! I am already contemplating what miniature could use a base with an element like this.

Maya Tutorial by Hobbytime
This is part 3 of a wonderful step by step on painting a anime/cartoon character in a bright and smooth style. The result is wonderful and the steps (even though it is written in French) are really easy to follow. I particularly like how the face is painted, especially the orangy blush tone and the tiny spot highlights. Very smart!

That was another month passed! I hope you enjoyed these links. Have a nice weekend!

Hi everyone!

Let's start by a little apology for my absence. It has been a hectic month at work and I am also working on an incredibly awesome commission (more about that later). Also, I am working on officially establishing myself as a commission painter, which I will also tell you more about in due time.

For now, let's take a look back at February. I have to admit that I have not been paying enough attention this month, so the list is short. but there are definitely some really interesting things to check out!

Paintjobs

The long battle by Juan Carlos Villoslada
So much atmosphere in this piece, it tells such a good story. I'm loving the tattoos and the small battle wounds. The NMM is amazing and incredibly well done. Beautiful piece!

Thorvin the Great by Antonio Peña
I really love the dramatic lighting on this piece, and the somewhat eerie green tones. Again stunning NMM (I think it is, might be real metallics though)

Pin-up preacher by Jen Haley
Oh la la! What a feminine piece, painting to perfection by Jen. She has an incredible talent, and very recognizable style, with her muted colours. Loving the purple tones and the soft skin.

Steadfast Tin Heart by Francesco "Franciuus" Farabi
I have no words for this awesomeness. There is so much creativity here and perfect painting. Just enjoy :).

Nymert by Robert Carlsson
Amazing piece! Great colour effects in the skin and the tail. I'm a big fan of the gold NMM on this piece as well!

Jessica Thunderhawke by Rodrigo Ciprés
Perfect paintjob on a perfect miniature. I really love the effcts on the leather and the fabrics look so lightweight. A real beauty :)

Links & tutorials

NMM Gold tutorial by The Hairy Painter
Great step by step on painting a cooler toned gold NMM. The results are very effective :)

Brave Tin Heart Freehand step by steps by Francesco Franciuus Farabi
What a great insight into how Francesco makes his amazing freehands. Very interesting how he starts with the freehand in black & white and then colours it in with glazes. The results are amazing and instantly recognizable as his work. Part 2 here.

Hope you liked my favourites. See you soon!

Last week it was time! Figopedia was there! I was super excited to see the book and the minis on my doorstep and of course I spent the weekend thoroughly enjoying the book and all its content.

Of course I want to share my experiences, hence this review! Not only will I share my thoughts on the book, but also on the miniatures that came with it.

Little back story

Jérémie Bonamant Teboul is a French painter that is well known for his atmospheric pieces. To me, he also stood out because he often uses vibrant colours, sometimes in combination with de-saturated colours, and I really like that. A couple of years ago he was the star of the DVD “Miniature Painting with Jérémie Bonamant Teboul” and of course he is the owner of Figone, a company that manufactures their own line of boutique miniatures and also sells other minis through their website. A busy man he is!

In September 2014 the Kickstarter was initiated to fund the production of Figopedia, volume 1. This book focuses on a very important aspect of miniature painting: “Colour & Light”. The funding goals was reached soon and optional add-ons were available, such as a miniature and a T-shirt. Backers also received a complementary miniature for free.

I backed this option:

I received the Figopedia book and two miniatures: Queen of Death & Queen of Barbary. They were all sent in one big envelope, fitting through the mailbox. I have some doubts about this sending method, mostly in regards to the minis but I will come back to that later.

Thoughts about Figopedia

When opening the parcel I immediately noticed the sturdy quality of the book. The book has a soft cover that is plasticised so it doesn’t damage easily. The pages are of the right thickness. They have a somewhat satin finish, which is good: no problems with shiny pages and no colours lost because of th e mattness. The colours look really good, very vibrant. Also the pictures are (with few exeptions, but that is more due to the photo than the print) all sharp.

Content

So far the look of it. What about the content? Well, I am really happy with this book. It covers a large amount of information about light, contrast and colours and it is supported by great examples. Although not all information was new to me, especially after taking many workshops in mini painting, it is very concise and I did learn some new things but mainly re-emphasized some things that I had forgotten. I like how the information is build up in different chapters. The book starts with “Light & Shadow” were different lighting situations are discussed and how you can create certain atmospheres. The second part “The Alchemy of Colours” is all about contrasts and how you can use colours to emphasize certain parts of a miniature or create a harmonious piece. I enjoyed the part about the different properties of colours. One part I usually forget about is the saturation of colours some followers will recognize this as I paint a lot of my minis with saturated colours), so it was nice to be reminded of that.

Overall I really liked the examples used to demonstrate the theory (except from the one on page 36, I don’t understand it, but maybe that is just me). It is really striking how strong effects small changes can have, regarding contrast or extra highlights. The drawings were also really helpful to understand the text.

To sum it all up, I can definitely recommend this book to all miniature painters. If you are painting tabletop models, display models, as a beginner (I wish I read this when I just started painting) or as a advanced painter, there will be something for you!

Miniatures

Of course I also want to review the miniatures here, as that is what I usually review. Both minis are now available at Figone. They are made out of resin and are about 32mm in size. The miniatures are packed in a little plastic bag and were directly included in the big envelope with the book. Sadly, this has resulted in some damage of the minis L.

Queen of Death

Queen of Death is a mini sculpted by Stephane Camossetto. I added this miniature to the Figopedia Kickstarter as an add-on as I really liked the look of her. It is mostly a nude sculpt, with some pieces of armour and a snake to cover her intimate parts. I liked the balance in this piece, with the elaborate scythe, but the simplicity in her garment (of which there is little). The feminine shapes look really good as well.

The mini comes in 5 parts: her body, her head, a sword, the top of the scythe, and the left arm that are attached to pieces of sprue.

Quality

Well, honestly I have to admit I was a little disappointed when I opened the plastic bag that contained her. The parts were obviously damaged in transport. Her sword was broken and one of the wings on her head was broken off. As they are such tiny pieces it is quite hard to glue them on, as they will remain quite fragile.

The cast quality was really good, with sharp details and very little flash (on the legs there is some that can be easily removed. Also, hardly any moldlines can be seen. There are no airbubbles , except for one. Unfortunately this one is located exactly in the center of the snakes face. That will be very hard to fix (for me at least).

Assembly should be quite easy. Even though there are no pre-made holes to make assembly easier the parts fit together quite well. A little bit of greenstuff might be needed to fill up tiny gaps, but that should be easy.

Queen of Barbary

This second miniature was free to all pledges that included Figopedia. Again, it is a scarcely dressed lady, this time sculped by Christian Hardy. Also, a nice sculpt with very feminine shapes and two big weapons. One of them is adorned with a big head of one of her latest kills. I wish the loin cloth was a little higher though, there is a little too much “ivy” showing for my taste. I do really like the naughty look on her face.

Quality

Luckily this lady suffered a bit less from transport, but her left boob was chopped (or scaved) off for a large part. I hope I will be able to fix that with my flawed greenstuff skills. Again the details of the cast are very crisp, as we are used to from Figone. There is no flash anywhere and on the body I cannot find any moldlines. The arms and the heft of the axe do have a minor mold line, but with this material that is easily scraped off.

This piece will probably be easier to assemble then Queen of Death as there are tiny holes with corresponding protrusions to make assembly easier.

Overall I think the minis look good in terms of sculpt and cast quality. I think it is really unfortunate that they were damaged in transport. I really hope that Figone will reconsider their packing method of the minis and will use blister packages instead. It is just such fragile material and to see these beautiful miniatures damaged makes me sad.

Final thoughts

I am really happy I backed this project! It’s a really great book with awesome reference pictures and just simply beautiful paintjobs to look at for inspiration. The minis are of great quality and it is also really nice that the paintjobs on these minis is also used in the book to explain some theory parts. Great job Jérémie and the rest of the Figopedia team J.

I hope you liked this review! If you have a product you would like me to review, send me a message and I will happily oblige.

Step by step: Fast & easy Tattoos

Review: ShadowCrafter Miniatures

Dark Eldar Step-by-Step Part 1: Skintones

Favorites of Oktober

Dark Eldar Step-by-Step Part 2: Clothing & Armour

Dark Eldar Step-by-Step Part 3: Gold NMM & Leather straps

Dark Eldar Step-by-Step Part 4: Cloth, Fur & Skull

Dark Eldar Step-by-Step Part 5: Steel NMM

Favorites of November 2014

Review: Kingdom Death Savior - 20 Years (encore)

Finished: Zetta by Hasslefree

Dark Eldar Step-by-Step Part 6: Face & Make-up

Review: Lacerta Lizardman Hunter by Ax Faction

In the rear view mirror: 2014!

Favorites of December 2014

New releases, Kickstarters etc.

Dark Eldar Step-by-Step Part 7: OSL & Cybergreens using Dayglow Pigments

Review: Guild Ball - Silence & Spigot

Favorites of January 2015

Favorites of February 2015

Review: Figopedia + Queen of Death / Barbary