Balon's hair

Worked on Balon's hair. I may need to darken up the shady parts a bit, or else put in brighter highlights. It seems a little low in contrast. Also put the base coat on the metal bits. I'll be doing NMM for those.

Cloak and some practice pieces

Put highlights on Balon's cloak and started on his hair. It'll be gray...trust me, it will. Looks like I need to smooth some of the highlights on that cloak, too.

The other thing I've done lately is prepping a couple items for practice. I'm getting together with a couple friends this weekend who want to learn to do better blending, so these figures are for that. We'll start with the blue cloak guys - one for me to demo on, one each for them to practice. The barbarian we may or may not use. If not, I'll try shading one with browns and the other with purples to compare.

Balon has armor

Well, more or less. I did some finishing on the details on his shirt, did he belt, bracers, and shoulder pads, and started on his cloak. All that's left is to finish the cloak, do his hair, and last the little details -- belt buckle, the bits on the bracers, etc.

Well, and then base him. I pulled out a resin base that I got from a Kickstarter, but the quality isn't that good. I may go with something different. It'll probably depend on how happy I m with him when I'm done -- is he going to be good enough to rate a fancy base, or will the not so good one be good enough?

Also, tried out my new P3 spray on primer. So far so good - it doesn't seem to have come out griity/fuzzy. On the other hand, it doesn't seem like it covers as fully/opaquely as I'm used to. We'll see how it takes paint.

Shade and highlight Balon's tabard

Detailed the green, and decided to use a darker green for the fancy bits on his shirt. I think once I've detailed that I'll do the bracers, belt, and shoulder pads next. Still thinking a warm brown for those.

Green

I did the shading and highlighting on the gray shirt and put on the green base coat. There's some trim on his shirt; I haven't figured out what to do with that yet. I am thinking I might go with a warm brown for the belt, bracers, and shoulder armor.Maybe gold for the trim...more likely steel.

Balon's eyes and pants

I did his eyes so I wouldn't be getting that zombie stare anymore. Dude has some tiny eyes. They're also set pretty deep, which does not help. I may have to do some more work on them. They look fine to my old person eyes without magnification, but have some issues in the close ups from some angles.

I also decided on a color scheme, I think. You can see I did his pants and boots. They're the same off-black; the pants are pretty well hidden anyway so there's no point in making them a different color. I took that hint from the model piece on the Dark Sword web site. I put a base coat on his shirt. It's a little hard to see because it's very similar to the primer color. Anyway, it's going to be gray. The tabard will be a greyish green, and the cloak is going to be either a dark purple-ish gray or a darker green. The only thing I haven't figured out yet is what color his hair is going to be. Usually I'd do the hair before the clothing, but in this case I don't want to choose a hair color until I see the rest of it come together.

30!

Finished the mousling musketeer.

I was trying to make the NMM on his sword have a look of lighter metal - usually mine comes out pretty dark. I think I made some progress with that, so I'm pleased.

Also got back to Balon. Shaded and highlighted his skin and put in the whites of the eyes. Still haven't decided on colors for him. I've looked at the painted version on the Dark Sword site, and that color scheme is stuck in my head. I'm not sure I want to replicate it, but I haven't been able to think of anything else, either. :/

Mousling hat, gloves, sword

I put a freehand fleur de lis on his tabard, did the hat and gloves, and started his sword. If you ever paint this mini, take note -- do the hat and gloves FIRST. It doesn't look like it, but it's quite difficult to get in to the back sides of the gloves and the under side of the hat. I had to fix up the tabard after getting brown paint on it. I need to clean up the fur on his cheek, too.

Mousling tabard

Worked on the tabard tonight. Went with Musketeer blue. This has shading and highlights. I'm going to come back and freehand a fleur de lis on there....I'll try, anyway. I need to get an image to work from and practice it for a while.

The colors are RMS Templar Blue, the Templar Blue mixed with Nightshade Purple, and RMS Ashen Blue mixed with a little Leather White. These seem to be very nicely behaved blues - I didn't have any trouble with the highlight color going chalky at all.

Mousling fur

I focused on the little guy today. Did the fur and his non-fur flesh bits. Some of those highlights on his tail are a little rough; I might go back and smooth that a bit more. Next will be deciding on a color for his tabard. I might go with musketeer blue. I should see if I have another one of these guys so I can put that one in cardinal's red.

29!

Here's the vestal with the base finished.

That wraps up the whole set of five. As a project, they took way too long. But here they all are in order I did them from left to right.

Now, the next couple of pieces. This is Balon Greyjoy from the Dark Sword George RR Martin line. He was one of the ones I pulled to maybe be my competition piece for ReaperCon, but I didn't end up going with him. He's been sitting on my desk prepped since then. His left hand is separate, so I want to get him done and put together before I lose the thing. He also suffers from fuzzy primer syndrome, so the quality I'm going to be able to get on him is limited already.

And, I feel like doing something different, so...mousling. The front view pictures did not come out.

What happened to the giant skeleton? Well, I'm not happy with how he's coming along, and I haven't decided what to do about it yet. I may redo his base coat and start over.

Lame freehand and all

I highlighted the vestal's flag, and immediately things went poorly. I think the color was too light compared to the base color. Also, that particular paint doesn't seem to like to go on thin. I fight with it every time. I should find another or try mixing it with something other than water.

Then I put some freehand on the flag...not good at all. Too twitchy on the edges and too small. Really I should have put the pattern on the back as well, but the first half went sufficiently poorly that I'm not going to bother. Time to base her and move on.

28!

Finished the other two spiders.

Also shaded the vestal's flag. Still haven't figured out what to do for freehand. If I don't come up with anything, I'll just skip it.

Vestal Skulls & Flag

Finished the skulls, put a base coat on the flag. I'm pretty happy with the skulls. The flag really calls for freehand. I don't have any bright ideas for what to put on it, though. This is complicated by the fact that my 2D arts skills are pretty close to nil.

Weapons, staff, and skulls

I highlighted the sword and staff, and put a base coat on the skulls. She's coming along.

Finished armor

Finished the vestal's armor and put the base coat on her sword and the metal bits of her staff. I stuck to a quick job on the armor, so it could probably be better, but I think it'll do. I'm hoping to finish her soon.

More spiders, more armor

Put a base coat on the second set of spiders. It's really a new pair, promise.

Also finished the first round of highlight on the vestal's armor and put a base coat on the staff.

Vestal's armor

Put the base coat on the vestal's armor. I started putting on highlights, but had to quit to head out to a movie.