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Hello! I got a couple more of my models to show off today. Any suggestions on how I can improve my sculpting and painting will be very welcome. Thanks.

Very nice.

As for where to go next... well. I think the biggest problem you have at the moment is mellowing. GS tries to flex itself into a sphere as it cures. It doesn't do a very good job at it, but it does just a good enough job to take all those nice, crisp corners and edges and to round them off, making everything look a little puffy. This is called mellowing.

There are two main ways to fix it. The first, and more futzy way, is when you're done sculpting, stick around and keep working with it until it cures all the way. Come back every fifteen minutes for example, and re-dress the edges to keep them crisp.

The other way is to sort of oversculpt and then come back in and cut a nice straight line with a hobby knife. I've found this to be especially useful with fabric edges which, due to their thinness usually suffer from mellowing worse. So try making things just too long, or just too wide, and then hacking it down once it's cured.

As for a few specific things. With chainmail, it looks a little better if you do a poke-and-drag technique, rather than just poking it. Dragging down is the classic, but I've seen some nice work before where every other row was dragged left and the others right. Something to play around with.

Also, don't be afraid to use plasticard where it's due. The sword, for example, could be done much more easily in the future (and, depending, look better as well) if you cut some plastic for it, and the same could be said for those armor plates on the arm between the shoulder and elbow, for example.

Finally, for the eyes, I've found that it's something that GW has gotten done really well. Sculpt the cheeks and forehead and then put in two big, pillowy lower lids. It's an exaggeration, but an exaggeration for a reason. At this scale, eyes just don't look right, and having that sort of cue put in is helpful.

Anyways, nice greens. Any chance we could get some more pictures, especially of the top one?

Thanks for the reply, some nice constructive criticism in there :-) I've encountered the mellowing problem, and I'm currently finding a technique that I'm happy with to solve that. The chainmail is an absolute pain though! This is the first attempt at it, so thank you for being kind. I'm currently practicing the drag and poke technique you suggested, I'll be posting my efforts up here for further suggestions. As for using plasticard for swords however, I can't do that, as I'm using a vulcaniser to create my moulds for a spin caster, and the plasticard wouldn't survive the ordeal of that. If you have an alternative suggestion on how to get nice thin, straight weapons, I'm all ears! Thanks

Did you use any type of armature or is this free standing?

 Icelord wrote:
Did you use any type of armature or is this free standing?

I use aluminium wire to make the armature

Paul of DOOM wrote:As for using plasticard for swords however, I can't do that, as I'm using a vulcaniser to create my moulds for a spin caster, and the plasticard wouldn't survive the ordeal of that. If you have an alternative suggestion on how to get nice thin, straight weapons, I'm all ears! Thanks

Umm...

Could you put down a plasticard sword of too-narrow a thickness, and then clad it in a thin layer of GS? Or use metal? I know you can get really thin brass sheets at hobby stores. Maybe you could laminate a few layers of that?

I'm afraid I have no experience whatever with vulcanization, though. I'd be surprised that greenstuff would survive a heat-based process that plasticard would not.

 Ailaros wrote:

Paul of DOOM wrote:As for using plasticard for swords however, I can't do that, as I'm using a vulcaniser to create my moulds for a spin caster, and the plasticard wouldn't survive the ordeal of that. If you have an alternative suggestion on how to get nice thin, straight weapons, I'm all ears! Thanks

Umm...

Could you put down a plasticard sword of too-narrow a thickness, and then clad it in a thin layer of GS? Or use metal? I know you can get really thin brass sheets at hobby stores. Maybe you could laminate a few layers of that?

I'm afraid I have no experience whatever with vulcanization, though. I'd be surprised that greenstuff would survive a heat-based process that plasticard would not.

It's a combination of heat and pressure, the plasticard melts before the mould is made, so you'd just end up with a horrible mess. Green stuff survives really well in the vulcanisation, better than milliput does. Brass sheet is a possible solution though, layer a couple of sheets and file it down, with GS added for details. That might work. To the hobby shop!!!