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looking nice.

lol, I almost hate to say it but the hazard pipes look great! Excellent work!

Hey hello there,
i would like to give some constructive feedback but 2 things keep me from doing it .
First: I dont know if its wanted.
Second, I have the feeling, the pictures need more light to see all the details you painted.

For example, on my monitor (which may be bad for watching pictures, i dont know) the horn on the back just looks plain black and misses highlights. Same with the horns on the head.
Or the skin just goes from either white to black.. without much in between.
Please dont take that wrong, i believe its just the lighting or monitor but id like to know .

Cheers

Looking very nice! Question: Whereon the body does the armor start and stop? Is there just a sharp line between the front and back somewhere in the middle (as with two chest pieces that are swappable) or is there a melded area?

If the former, I suggest putting some straps and a little thong on his backside to show how that armor is staying put

Iron Angel wrote:Hey hello there,
i would like to give some constructive feedback but 2 things keep me from doing it .
First: I dont know if its wanted.
Second, I have the feeling, the pictures need more light to see all the details you painted.

For example, on my monitor (which may be bad for watching pictures, i dont know) the horn on the back just looks plain black and misses highlights. Same with the horns on the head.
Or the skin just goes from either white to black.. without much in between.
Please dont take that wrong, i believe its just the lighting or monitor but id like to know .

Nothing wrong with feedback!

This is a Character standard commission, meaning I am holding back from the likes of Shrike or Korvydae.
The black is as black as possible, it has literally one small highlight and that's it, which is a very thin line along the main edge. What looks like small amounts of shine along the edge of his horns is actually the highlight. The skin does have some shading changes, but it is based around the actual muscle ridges bar being more kind of zenithal, due to the standard again The pictures are pretty bright, if I went brighter then he would just look white completely. Maybe it could be a monitor brightness/contrast tweak?

@Wehrkind - there is absolutely no phasing between metal and skin. It is really, really bad. His chestpiece at the sides just stops being metal and becomes skin, and I am pretty sure his back is not metal as it has none of the cracks or grid bits. Very poorly designed and confusing model imo. I had to kind of paint on a joint for the chestpiece to end at the sides. Maybe some little bra straps and a whaletail at the back would help, yeah?

Oh and @ Dee, thanks for the email. Really cool idea for an IW DP!

Ah ok now i get it

Whats your next project?

And people say Im mad.

http://www.ursasden.com/

this is the friends site who did it.

Dee, that site is amazing. The converted slaanesh demon prince blew my mind. He does really great work allright.

Iron Angel, next up is a medium lizardman army, about 110 troops, a slaan, and some salamanders. I am really looking forward to this as it means batch painting units, which I love, bright colours, and tons of gold! After that it should be a medium Skaven army, and an Ork Big mek.

Ifalna wrote:Dee, that site is amazing. The converted slaanesh demon prince blew my mind. He does really great work allright.

Iron Angel, next up is a medium lizardman army, about 110 troops, a slaan, and some salamanders. I am really looking forward to this as it means batch painting units, which I love, bright colours, and tons of gold! After that it should be a medium Skaven army, and an Ork Big mek.

Can't wait to see them.

_Tim?

You enjoy batch painting... that must be sooo usefull for a commissions painter. I just don't know how people can put themselves through batching :(

Ifalna wrote:
@Wehrkind - there is absolutely no phasing between metal and skin. It is really, really bad. His chestpiece at the sides just stops being metal and becomes skin, and I am pretty sure his back is not metal as it has none of the cracks or grid bits. Very poorly designed and confusing model imo. I had to kind of paint on a joint for the chestpiece to end at the sides. Maybe some little bra straps and a whaletail at the back would help, yeah?

I will send you a fiver if you do it! Your friend can consider it my contribution to the commission. :-P

Now if only you could sculpt the little copper tone dog pulling down the back of it...

Trilobite wrote:You enjoy batch painting... that must be sooo usefull for a commissions painter. I just don't know how people can put themselves through batching :(

There is something very satisfying about seeing an entire unit come together colour by colour. By the time the unit is done, it feels like I only completed one large model. I always found I get a much more uniform look by doing it too, but then again I also love cleaning and organising things into perfectly even stacks, so it could very well be due to just being a freak.

Wehrkind @ If only. I think the owner would send me a letter bomb!

He's from Ireland then?

*rimshot*

Thank you very much! I'm here all week! (Till someone sends me a letter bomb)

I think you just lose sight of the models themselves. It becomes more of a painting by numbers thing, like "apply green paint here, move along, apply green here, move along."
That said, well painted ranks look incredible.

Trilobite wrote:I think you just lose sight of the models themselves. It becomes more of a painting by numbers thing, like "apply green paint here, move along, apply green here, move along."
That said, well painted ranks look incredible.

Try batch painting Space Marines! It is not a fun task

I have a salamanders army. It looks pretty. It put me off army painting completely. I vowed never again to let a painting project tie me down like that and now I only do single minis and purely for the enjoyment. That said, Im restarting my nids and have so far painted the tyrant which was super good fun. Next I have 20 gaunts. I wonder how Il feel about batching them this time. Might take one gaunt per day or somthing, seems less painfull.

I guess at least the salamanders are such a nice color that it made it slightly less tedious, green is the besst

I really like the armor. Gold looks great. Not quite sure I'm feeling the color choice of the skin though. I think I would like to see a much darker skin, almost black.

Well we can see how I feel after doing 100+ batch models next month. So many may warp my opinions on the matter

TheChronoTrigger - Heck yeah black would have been pretty awesome alright. It was in the running when I was deciding on colour scheme but I figured it would have taken a lot more effort to get looking good, and I did not want to spend Showpiece level time on a Character standard model if I could help it.

I also would have worried a bit that the dark metal would have caused the black skin to be lost and would not capture the eye, but I may still try it out eventually as a test

The gold seems to bring the model together. At first I was thinking where is the warmth as it would bring nice contrast to the fig and with the gold you are bringing it. Cannot wait for the next update.

Cheers Metsuri.

Will be continuing a little more work on him tonight. While in town I picked up some cork boards to try out some more dynamic basing, and some methylated spirits which seem to be the mildest alcohol solvent available that I can use to clean brushes after using my new liquid metals. I will test it out on an older brush and hope it does no damage, fingers crossed.

If it is fine, I will post a pic of how great the metals look in my next picture update, which will be either later today, or tomorow

Edit: Actually, heres 2 quickies of the amazing liquid gold. Not touching the DP till my hand shakes stop. No food eaten today yet.



Top is a single layer GW shining gold. Middle is a single layer Liquid gold "old gold". Bottom is Liquid gold with a devlin wash, undiluted. It really is as reflective as it looks, and covers black in one brushstroke. You can also get darker versions. It is so bright that it is really hard to photo unless in just natural dull light.

The only gripes with it are that you need to clean your brush carefully. Any water added to the paint pot will cause the gold to rust, so you need something like Methylated spirits ( mine was €2.50 ) to clean up. You would also be wise to not use synthetic brushes as the alcohol can damage them, but GW brushes are fine it seems. Just condition them afterwards with any waxy brush conditioner. I use "The masters brush cleaner and preserver" and have only pure positivity to lavish upon it.

I wiped some of the lid spill with this tissue, I still can't believe how metallic it is compared to GW metals.

Wow that is pretty shocking. I have seen Testor's enamels go on that crazy shiny (I have some old Hero Quest Chaos warriors I did up like that when I was about 12) but still I am a little shocked. I am really curious now to see what you can pull off with that; it seems like it might be a little too super shiny reflective to use much of without a wash, lest it look like bad '80s airbrush art ("omg I can totally do metallic unicorns riding a '67 mustang on a chromed rainbow in space!") but it might work really well for details or even filigree if it flows nicely. Hrmm...

Good luck to you on the batch work. If I may offer a little advice on process:

1. Plan your colors ahead of time, and keep them set up and out in their groups. (I personally try to keep it to 2-3 layers and a wash at most.)
2. Avoid mixing colors if possible (just too hard to keep right after you are on model 43.)
3. Small batches (5-7 seems to be best for me)
4. Plan some more.
5. Don't switch colors or brushes mid stream. If you make a mistake, at most dab it off with another wet brush and keep going. Touch up is a definite step to plan for along the way.
6. Plan for a Touch Up Step periodically, and definitely for a "Unique Detail" step towards the end for the little bits that make each model special (or the other models don't have.)
7: Break things up by having other models to do in between batches so you don't burn out. You probably have less of an ADD issue than I do, but after 30 of the same sort of model you will want to murder God.

Ok, that is a lot of words, but I like to think I have gotten pretty good at it after churning out 3 armies in 2 years (well, sans vehicles at least... hate those.)

It will deffo need a wash, but it is going to be fantastic on the lizard men. Plan is a layer of this, layer of 1/1 mud/water, then this as a slight highlight. It takes washes really nicely as you can see on the bottom part of the sword. It does not actually mask detailing once washed as all the recesses get darkened, but you can actually see a slight reflection of yourself in it in a flat surface with no wash. Insane.

Consistency wise, it is very very liquid, as thin as water but it does not run, so it is actually really controllable bar it drying insanely fast. Luckily you can remove mistakes with a swipe of cotton swap with methylated spirits, which the primer ignored, so hopefully the other paints will too. Afaik, it also needs to be sealed with mat sealer or it will tarnish over time as it contains real metal.

My way of batch painting is very similar to yours it seems! I work 1 colour at a time, so if doing blue, I will base blue on all models, highlight blue, wash blue, and finish blue before moving onto the next part. I feel it helps the feeling of completion come quicker. I also don't mix up paints as it is too much hassle to try and remix, though with the wet pallet that may now be redundant Plan is to work on the Black reach SM captain in between the batching, as he is going to me more practice on weathering and slightly better basing.

That metal is insanely bright. I may have to buy myself some. Though having to use alcohol to clean your brush is pretty insane.

I batch paint slightly differently: if I am painting, say, red, I basecoat red on all the models, Then, I go through and basecoat all the other colors. Then I go in and do the first layer of highlights on each basecoat, followed by more highlights, ETC, ETC. It isn't a very good system, so I may be switching over to finishing one color, then moving onto another one, and finishing it.

How many models can you batch-paint at once? I have done 5 savage orcs, though that is a record. 3 seems to be a much more manageable number.

I once tried to do 20 solid marines. *twitch,giggle*.

I usually batch entire units in one go. I know that seems mental, but it never bothered me. Looking back though, my painting skills were a lot lower than they are nowadays after so much practice, so I might end up doing small batches instead, ranks perhaps.

I think it also really varies on what you are painting. I mean if you are painting empire or SM's, they are all going to be really similar, meaning you can batch an entire unit and not lose out on time. But what about Skaven? Zombies? Things that need different colourations, different coloured stains, cloth etc. Those would really have to be done in clumbs of whatever colour you are planning.

For the Skaven I should be doing in a month or two, massive clan rat units will be broken into grey fur, brown fur, black fur groups, then the same basic colours for their clothes, but mixed up. Some might have brown pants and dirty green shawls, some might have vice versa. That means I will need 3 batch groups for the fur, and then swapping around for the cloth etc.

Christ I am all excited already. I am such a freaking nerd.

Go get yourself some scrambled eggs on toast.

*L* I hear you. I have come to accept the dork lord Geek. Right around the time I realized I spent ~90% of my free time painting, building, working on my foundry project and then reading econ texts as a "break", and that my wife collected the receipts from all that to build an accounting statement of some sort just in case a business shambled to life for fun I thought "I should totally be building a small closet shrine to the Dork God here... oooh in fact I could build a foam core mock up of a symbol and then cast it from brass... and paint up really sweet little devotional statues..." then decided to start my own religion

I am pretty impressed that you grind a whole unit at a time though. 14 marauders at once about killed my interest (though I did bone my paint process). That is a really good call on the rat men though, breaking them down into fur groups, then cloth groups. That might turn out to be a new "best practice" for motley, but not too motley, blobs of gribble.

One thing I have tried with some success when doing lots of multicolored things (Zombies in this case) was to go with only 2-3 base color groups that were pretty light, and then apply various washes for the shading and color differences. I found it actually worked pretty well, though a base color and highlight was preferable to a straight light base. It there is not a ton of different colored details it seems to work really well. Boss Salvage's nurgle/skaven are a good example of this too, though more mono chromatic than I have in mind. (Not that he has any pics up that I know of. PIKER!)

Dee, some bolognase sorted me out. Nom.


Wehr, the seperate washes over the same base colour will be utilised for the Skaven for sure, but I will be saving that for the final touches. Lots of dirt and stains. I am going off nightshift tonight, so I have to try and stay up for most of the day. Will work more on the DP and try out my Silver liquid metal. I am pretty sure it will be almost like chrome considering the gold!

Edit: Oh I'm British again :(

Can't you control your amazing floating island?

Ifalna wrote:
Christ I am all excited already. I am such a freaking nerd.

Nothing wrong with getting excited over minis, or being a nerd. However getting excited over batch painting does possibly require the services of a counsellor. But when you speak to them don't mention demon pronces in metal bikinis

edit: You know I meant princes.

The vast majority of those models would be better described as Pronces. You hit the nail on the head.

My island goes where the wind takes me, but I always seem to end up back home.

EDIT: Oh I'm Irish again.
EDIT2: BACK TO BRITISH ffffffffffff.