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Made in gb
Fresh-Faced New User






Hello and thanks for reading,

This will be a long first post to ask for any advice on painting some miniatures I kept since 1989-1995.
I don't yet know how many there are or what points value or even what games: I had at least a small army/team/gang for nearly all of Games Workshop's games of the time.
My main thing was a Skaven army. I remember buying the army book when that came out (for 4th edition?) but the kids at my school were using it with the 3rd edition rules we had in the library.

I'm 40 now so was collecting these models between the ages of 8 and 14. The Skaven would have been ages 12-14.
It wasn't possible for me to get paints and tools where I lived. Lots of the olders models were ruined with Humbrol or car spray paint.
This might amuse you: there was a pair of Epic (6mm scale?) plastic Land Raiders covered in red gloss - so transparent at the highlights that the original blue plastic showed through, but in the deep parts the paint had caked into virtually solid red plastic. (Doors? What doors?)
And after doing those two I'd realised that was a mistake, and I'd read that it was good to paint models white first. So next to them there was another almost identical pair of Land Raiders but covered in white gloss instead.
But I've had really good results soaking models in Isopropyl alcohol for 1-2 hours and then scrubbing with a toothbrush.
I'd also kept all the broken-off limbs and weapons, and have finally been able to reattach them with a pin vice.
Snips (side-cutters?) are a joy too - they can finally all stand next to each other. And my advanced heroquest doors sit flat.

But by the time I started collecting Skaven, I'd managed to get a starter set of Citadel paints.
So in the worst-case scenario I can strip enough of the paint off to be able to start again from a new undercoat.
I still had many problems: no workspace, no solvents, no help, not enough time, I didn't know to thin the paint, or to use washes, or blending, or most other techniques... and what painting guides I got hold of always seemed to require stuff I couldn't get.
The main resulting problem, I think, was that I was approaching it like paint-by-numbers, and every model had nooks and crannies that were left white where I couldn't get a brush to them without going over the lines, or where I knew I was missing a colour.

What I want to do now isn't to blitz them all and start again, least of all to sell them - but to fix up the 1994 models to what I could have done as a kid if I'd had advice from kind grown-ups on an internet forum.
I'm then going to look for some of the Jes Goodwin models I missed out on - and pass the hobby on to my kids.

My outlook is that I like Skaven as a continuation of the ancient idea of an army-of-vermin, which goes back at least to the Batrachomyomachia (~200BC), carries on into modern times with The Nutcracker (1816/1892), and received a pessimistic, Gen-X update from Games Workshop in the early 1990s. By the mid-90s, I feel GW had already dropped the ball - mainly by failing to unite the disparate Clan concepts they had brainstormed. I don't care for the lore, although I'd acknowledge some of it was well-written. I like the sculptures and how they look on the table - and I like a lot of the ink line illustrations too. I find the current Warhammer Skaven box sets for AoS a bit serious business - I guess there is still some social commentary e.g. perhaps with the Pestilens box looking like an approaching swarm of over-eager British local authority jobsworths who have been informed of a non-compliant wheelie-bin.

Spoiler:


And I generally see the shoehorning of female characters into previously all-male storyworlds to be cancer, but in the Skaven's case their lore re. broodmothers seems (to me) to be such a misogynistic throwback to 1970s fantasy fiction (if not Gor, then perhaps James Herbert, who by 1993 also has a grotesque rat matriarch in 'The City' but I can't remember if she also appeared in his earlier Rats books) - wherever it came from it doesn't much resemble natural rats. I think natural female rats take misogyny and breeding-machine status in their stride and remain commendably lean and vicious. I'd subscribe to the idea that there is hardly any dimorphism and a male and a female clanrat wouldn't be noticeably different - except that most of the sculptures use such distinctly masculine figure-art, poses and clothing in the human elements that the artists carry over onto the rat. Any commercial vermin miniatures will have an eye to GW's lore, so I doubt anyone will have conveyed a gender-agnostic army through the models' musculature/posture/fashion - I'd like to find any models or parts of models, from any range, that have squared this circle and convert them into champions or characters.



For now, the main thing is the painting. This is a typical one, what could I do to it non-destructively?

I've removed/disabled the url as follows and would be grateful if a mod can ok it



(His rack-o-severed-bonces won't be missing, it's that I wouldn't have glued it on yet and it will be further down in the box)


This message was edited 2 times. Last update was at 2022/06/11 18:49:27


 
   
Made in eu
Frenzied Berserker Terminator




Southampton, UK

cattyandco wrote:

And I generally see the shoehorning of female characters into previously all-male storyworlds to be cancer


Whoa whoa whoa whoa whoa, what?
   
Made in gb
Fresh-Faced New User






Crispy78 wrote:
cattyandco wrote:

And I generally see the shoehorning of female characters into previously all-male storyworlds to be cancer


Whoa whoa whoa whoa whoa, what?


I just want any recommendations for suitable models. I wasn't wanting to be controversial - it's that I see that stuff to be tokenistic, and divisive-for-the-sake-of-it, and without usually achieving a jot of what it pretends to want.

But in the Skaven's case their lore had gone a tad further than unconscious bias, and the lack of dimorphism means there's an easier opportunity to rebalance without doing violence to the visual canon. It might even improve the overall look and visual interest-value of their swarms.
Miniature sculptors have stuck rats' heads onto every muscle-man pose going. Sticking rats' heads onto some female figure-poses should be an easy win creatively, whilst being able to mix in almost unnoticed with other clanrats.

Like all talking-animals, Skaven should be using naturalistic study of rats to parody humanity's flaws - but what they came up with for the broodmothers in my view drew too strongly on hive-insects.
I bet if we picked through James Herbert's Lair and Domain (assuming City was too late to have directly inspired the Skaven army book) we'd find there's a subtext around tokophobia, which ends up being lifted (lazily) into whatever tiny info box mentions the Skaven's broodmothers.

If talent and effort was applied to them, it should be possible to make naturalistic female rats grimmer, or more bitingly parodic, than broodmothers. They should be active parties in the rat-eat-rat Machiavellianism. It cuts a moral corner, and sanitizes, if our army's mothers are helpless, passive baby-factories. With real rats, in captivity, certain females always eat their first litter. One might think that's an evolved survival tactic (since the first litter is more prone to congenital deformities)... but it's been observed that if females from a colony that cannibalizes its first litters, are introduced into a colony that doesn't, they teach them: they proselytize.

And it's topical: appeals to motherhood have been a recurring background message of the Ukraine war.

Well, perhaps I should have simply said "are there any female ratkin/were-rat/vermen/etc minis I can use?", but I didn't feel that was specific enough.

(22/05/2022 - I moved the chaos warband to another thread for clarity)

Spoiler:


These ones are a bit like a before-and-after:



The 2 before minis were daubed seemingly randomly by my 8-year-old self in enamel paint. The chaos 'trooper' (1987) in the foreground shows the loss-of-detail around the visor.
And check out the poly cement on the chaos thug!

The other 2 are me trying to fix this. On metal (unlike plastic), isopropyl alcohol can be left on the model safely for longer (indefinitely!), but it hasn't resulted in such good separation of the paint from the surface.
After 2 days it reached a point where I had most of the detail back, but in some areas (particularly lowlights) the enamel is still stuck fast. In many areas it could be lifted off with a sewing needle, but it's not worth doing all of it.
Rather than priming the models, I tried to use the black and red as a base coat, and fill in the bare metal areas with several coats. Metallic acrylic covered the black enamel okay, but it took a few coats to hide the red. And even then it shows through in places.
On the 'Hound of Chaos' (which had been red and gold - and the gold Humbrol was lifted well by the alcohol), I found it was possible to blend the leftover red into the skin, so long as the dog was red.
The 'Champion of Khorne' I'm not happy with. He's a subtle sculpt (the footwear of a pirate, the head and body of a medieval knight, with a plasma-gun crossed with a bolter organically grafted onto him). The transitions between those things need to be picked out more carefully.

One of the other minis from his blister pack also has heavy armour. I will try and prime over the red areas left after the alcohol so that the metallics don't need so many coats.

EDIT (17/04/2022):
These are the other Humbrol-covered chaos minis after isopropyl alcohol and then acetone (as Mothsniper recommended in the next post).

I'm finding the alcohol makes the red enamel paint flake while the acetone seems to change its composition and make it rubbery. My acetone had mostly evaporated, I don't have enough left to soak whole models, and if it's brushed on it evaporates off again within a few minutes. But hopefully I've got enough of the detail back (e.g. the champion of khorne's teeth), and hopefully putting primer over the red layers will work.

The models can be base coated better with more of the paint off and primer over the red enamel. These will be the test minis for the Skaven. The (other) champion of khorne is suffering from the extra undercoat of paint - as the details on his helmet were a little faint to begin with (e.g. there is a raised area round the eye-slots). I have a feeling I'm going to struggle with how all the paints have changed. I might leave these at a nearly-finished stage and delay the Skaven while I get some cheap models to work that out.

This message was edited 16 times. Last update was at 2022/05/22 11:00:50


 
   
Made in us
Grumpy Longbeard






I love that you want to preserve and pass on the army! I am involved in similar preservation efforts for me dwarf army here (https://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/804229.page) Your nemesis!

What I can recommend:
1 - First two options are to paint over existing paint (like I did with my dwarfs) or strip the models of the old paint. If details are lost like you describe then stripping is better option for sure. This will give you opportunity to clean mold lines, reassemble the models and possible pose them, and obviously get the details back. For metal models I use Acetone, remember to remove plastic bases first otherwise they will melt. For the plastic models I use Awesome cleaner.
2 - Set up a small painting area, or a paint bin. That will allow you to walk up, sit down, and in few moments be working on your project. Physiologically having an quick and easy way to start painting and walk away without major clean up helps a ton.
3 - For my dwarfs I decided to re-base them all in themed terrain bases. So, you can choose to do that or paint up all the old bases in classical green to preserve the old style of basing that will go nicely with the old style models.
4 - For painting I can recommend this video, it has helped me alot!


5 - For the last stage when everything is painted, get matt varnish to seal in the paint, that will create a clear protective layer that will prevent paint from flaking or rubbing off. Some people apply 2-3 coats of varnish.
I am sure that there are rat female models you can get. Although I was unable to find any with a quick search. I know there are Redwall rat and mouse miniatures, and I though Reaper made some rat warriors, but nothing "female skaven" like. So far it seems most are ether converted or sculpted or 3d printed.
Like this one http://www.coolminiornot.com/111829
You can get these and try some conversion work with green stuff. https://www.reapermini.com/search/rats/latest/04074
Making various conversions is a very fun part of the hobby. Infact, a Slanesh themed skaven female conversion might be a fun side project.

Sidenote -
Spoiler:
I though that brood mothers made sense for a horde themed faction because the theme draws from the real horde/hive type creatures like termites, bees, ants, ets. Besides there is no point in referencing natural rats or their behavior for a fantasy faction. For example (Real rats don't live in colonies but in small packs in nests 5 to 10 rats, colonies are just few nests in one area. The size of a rat colony can be on the order of 100 rats if sufficient food is present) as opposed to Termites for example (A subterranean termite colony typically contains between 60,000 and 1 million termites) And skaven most definitely go way over 1 million rats in any said colony. In fact, id argue that the only thing that actually makes logical sense for the skaven's huge numbers are the hive type brood mother concept borrowed from the insects. But to each their own.

On controversial topics however one has to remember that this is fantasy and a game that has zero consistency between "moral" points, thus making the lore/factions and how each person perceives them highly subjective, and thus, to each their own! Covert the skaven into female warriors and run your own twist on the lore and that is awesome! That is how I build all my own armies.
Otherwise after one has dealt with skaven misogyny one has to deal with skaven slavery, and skaven body dysmorphia, and skaven substance abuse, and most grievous of all the skaven dwarf-hate, and so on until a fantasy and a game is no longer a fantasy and a game. And generally this very interesting type of topic is not for the Painting & Modeling section

This message was edited 3 times. Last update was at 2022/04/16 04:48:29


 
   
Made in gb
Fresh-Faced New User






Wow thanks - Your dwarfs - the flying hammers ones where you've left the old paint on - are a great restoration. I guessed these two were an after-and-before:-
Spoiler:






I'll be very happy if I can get my Skaven to this stage. Speed and readability will be my watchwords
I have some acetone and if I can detach the chaos cultists' shields (which apparently now cost £3 each) I'll try that
Apparently they don't sell slotta-bases anymore. So for the time being I'll maybe paint the acetone on with a brush. I could at least see if it lifts the red Humbrol

I've got a work-area and most of the things I need - like spray varnish. And I live near a hobby shop now.

Most of my Skaven models though are like the first two - where I want to complete what I was doing when I was a kid.
On the dwarves you kept the existing paint due to effort vs. reward - I like where you've redone the chainmail under his belt, where the original painter had splashed brown over it.
I was bulk-painting the Skaven, so I guess it's working out a list of simple touch-ups and going through repeating them.
And I guess it would be to complete all the gaps in the base coat, and bring everything to the same stage of a process.



24/04/2022:-
Having done the chaos warriors, I feel I need some test minis to get to know my new paints. The Vallejo ones feel very thick to me. And Citadel's contrast ones are just... odd: in all respects - in the shades they are, and the consistency, and the seeming insistence on mediums.
I knew the ranges of colours would have changed, but I wasn't expecting to have to re-learn what white and black acrylic paint are.

These models were all broken ones (apart from the second row of rats - who just needed sticking down better).
I made the front row of rats out of spare green stuff from doing the weapons. They are poor quality but I want to see how that affects the paint on top.


This message was edited 11 times. Last update was at 2022/06/11 20:09:44


 
   
Made in us
Grumpy Longbeard






In that case, for metal miniatures, before acetone First try to strip the paint with Awesome cleaner or Super Clean. If that works then no need for acetone.

Best of luck in your efforts with this project!

 
   
Made in gb
Fresh-Faced New User






I hope it is okay to post here again to ask for any advice.



Something that is harder about this project of trying to finish an old paint job is that the Youtube guides I can watch never quite match what is on the model to start with, or the paints I have.

What I'm conscious is wrong here is that:-

- zenithal priming would have avoided tiny white patches
- should have removed seams
- the brown wash (Agrax Earthshaker) has dried glossy and I have since read it should be shaken for a longer time before use
- on the skin, the highlight colour (Vallejo medium-fleshtone) jars with the basecoat (Citadel ratskin flesh) and I should have mixed the paint rather than guessing
- the desaturated colour of the clothing doesn't make the clothes look drab/worn, just harder on the eye
- the colour for the claws (Vallejo buff) is too bright for the base coat

But is there anything else? Or perhaps stages I have missed out or misunderstood from Youtube?

This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2022/06/05 21:58:45


 
   
Made in us
Fixture of Dakka





Without taking a close look at genitalia, I can't tell male and female rodents apart. So there's a hefty female contingent in my Skaven army across every unit. You just can't tell them from the males, that's all.

Now that that's dealt with, thus far your recovery work looks good. Looking forward to seeing more in the future.

CHAOS! PANIC! DISORDER!
My job here is done. 
   
Made in gb
Fresh-Faced New User






 Vulcan wrote:
Without taking a close look at genitalia, I can't tell male and female rodents apart. So there's a hefty female contingent in my Skaven army across every unit. You just can't tell them from the males, that's all.

Now that that's dealt with, thus far your recovery work looks good. Looking forward to seeing more in the future.


I've contended though that it's not the rodent parts that gender nearly all the Skaven sculpts (at least the early ones that I've seen), but the specifically masculine figure art/posture/body language in their human component. The Heroquest clanrats - if we took off the head, the tail, and the weapon - would be doing that classic beefcake/bodybuilder pose that's been around since the 19th century. So much so that I suspect the sculptor might have been using it as a reference point from a magazine.

I'm finding that for some of the unit types that use poses from the stage (e.g. gutter runners) or which are entirely covered (e.g. plague monks), it's less noticeable. It's the clanrats I'd like to adapt.

Spoiler:





I think these ones might be good to mix into the unit - I believe they are from a very old box set Warhammer Fantasy Regiments

I can imagine her holding a rolling pin in the shield arm ^^

Thanks for such kind feedback - hopefully they'll improve some over time


This message was edited 3 times. Last update was at 2022/05/08 14:05:40


 
   
Made in gb
Fresh-Faced New User






These are my test minis at week 3:-



At the back are some Heartbreaker Miniatures ratfolk, from around 1995 - any leftover paint I have I'm sticking onto them.
They are interesting models: on the one hand they are derivative of Skaven and seem designed as proxies, and they are crudely-sculpted compared with Citadel.
But they have some good ideas - e.g. one of them has a monocle and when they aim their guns they steady themselves with their tails. Also they are really easy to paint.

The next row with 3 gutter runners + a musician I bought off ebay - already painted but broken. This is useful because I need to work out colour-matching and they had similar issues to my army.
The first two gutter runners were snapped at the ankles - and on this particular model there is only ~2mm of material to put a pin there. They have baggy assassin-pants now, hiding a pin going from heel to butt.

The next row with 3 plague censer-bearers were also bought off ebay and their chains were all snapped off which is a really easy fix.
The previous paint job was that the person had put a coloured wash onto the bare metal, so I've just sprayed them and started again.
What I'll be testing with these is whether it's better to do their (dirty-white) robes by building up layered highlights, or applying a wash over white.

On the mid-right are a block of 9 giant rats - 3 of which are fake. I'm delighted with the fake ones. They are not made with a paperclip - but from a piece of electrical wire the same length as a paperclip.
After 3 tries, I'm close to getting the correct proportions and since the paint hides a multitude of sins I think I'll persevere with this (rather than paying £5 per rat or whatever it is they want now).

And over on the right are some daemonettes which were mine and were in a similar state to the chaos thugs.
Human skintones were something I couldn't even approach as a kid because although my parents were cool about me playing with naked lobster girls, I had to mix yellow and pink paint.
Now I've got about 7 different skintones between Vallejo + GW, plus special washes. I'm trying Vallejo Basic Flesh then Light Flesh then Flesh Wash then White highlights.

This message was edited 2 times. Last update was at 2022/06/11 20:10:26


 
   
Made in gb
Fresh-Faced New User







The Skaven army is on hold waiting for reinforcements from ebay. Certain units I just couldn't afford to bring up to a full complement when I was a kid - the main ones being slaves and gutter runners.

I'm buying a mix of old metal models and recent plastic ones if I think they might still fit in visually.

Old gutter runners I still cannot afford in bulk, and the more recent versions I think are still pretty old and suffer from the monkey-rat problem.

I got these ones on ebay though and repaired and touched them up.
I thought the process of finding dozens of tiny gaps and matching colours to old paint would be similar to what I will need to do for the army.
It's very slow and constraining. The other person (or my 12-year-old self) has made a whole bunch of creative choices and if I can't reproduce one of their colours it all goes back to the beginning.
These were originally supposed to have natty orange trousers, but the repairs involved covering their ankles and shin in green stuff, so that colour was lost and the model loses a little interest value.
The original painter I think also missed a trick with the stitched-together cloak: these different patches of cloth should have been different colours than just blue.
The blue I think whatever they used is pretty similar to Kantor Blue, so next time I return to these I will try to add some variety.
I'm not convinced I want the final army to have navy blue gutter runners.



My Verminlord was the best paint job I could do at the time. I haven't changed him much.



Before: there were some white gaps and details that I couldn't reach with the brush; and I had drybrushed it with too much white; and the red of the horns and the fur did not work well on its teeth. It is also covered in dust.
What's the best way to remove dust? I'm thinking of those little silky brushes they use on jewellry.


This message was edited 3 times. Last update was at 2022/06/11 20:10:57


 
   
Made in gb
Fresh-Faced New User






This is the first Skaven unit I've restored




The one at the front centre (iirc) used a colour scheme from White Dwarf that I wasn't able to find a match for.
It used a counterintuitive base coat - possible Bad Moon Yellow. But as well as being a bit on the cartoony side, I don't think it makes the robe-holes stand out so well.
The robe-holes are the highlight of these sculptures - a love-letter to trypophobia. On the recent plague monks, it's just a little general scagginess on the robes - less powerful imo
   
Made in us
Utilizing Careful Highlighting





Tangentville, New Jersey

Nice plague censors! The robes came out really well!

This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2022/05/22 05:01:18



 
   
Made in gb
Fresh-Faced New User






I've completed a batch of miscellaneous models from when I was younger, plus a few test minis
I'll put these as close as I can to a "before-and-after" format, and hopefully it will be clear enough to show what I've grappled with

They are mostly a command group: it was the models that for some reason I felt compelled to put paint on, but which don't fall into one of these groups:-
- war machines
- heroes (I had Thanquol+Boneripper, Queek, Ikit)
- the Stormvermin
- the plague monks

...which for various reasons I'll need to delay starting on

BEFORES

1. Stormvermin Before

These weren't mine, but test minis from ebay. I saw them to have similar issues - but having painted them I suspect they might have been base-coated a certain way to prepare for speedpainting or perhaps contrast paints.

2. Command Group Before

These were all mine.

I had mostly used Citadel acrylics on these ones. And I had worked out that washes make cloth look okay.
However shades I didn't know how to do - on the warpfire cannon at the front you can see where I covered areas in thinned black paint and then wiped it off with kitchen roll right away.

3. Warlord Before


4. Globadier Before

The two globadiers were mine. I've rebased them from 25mm to 32mm to match a set of unpainted ones I bought on ebay.

5. Plague Monk Before

Scrofula. Malaria. Yeah.
I'm not sure if that's ball-point pen or one of those fine pilot felt tips

6. Boneripper + Ikit Before


7. Thanquol Before


=====

AFTERS

1. Stormvermin After

The jezzail and musician also weren't mine

2. Warpfire Thrower After


3. Command Group After


4. Whole Group After


5. Boneripper After


6. Thanquol After


7. Ikit Claw After



I'm happy that I was able to:-
- colour-match the purple clothing and give it highlights
- improve the colour of the scrolls without losing what I'd written there as a child
- fill in all the white bits and highlight place where I didn't have the right colours before
- spend far less time trying to mix up colours that I couldn't afford to just buy a pot of
- generally get decent combinations of fleshtone + a fur colour
- paint all the little chains and things that absolutely require a 5/0 size brush
- base them cheaply, quickly, and easily and looks alright (at least, it does compared to the Goblin Green that both I and the previous owner of the Stormvermin leaders used to use)

But:-
- the green clothing was the main colour for my Stormvermin, and I couldn't match it and need to figure out what paint I should buy before I start that unit
- the toenails. Dear god the toenails. Was Jes Goodwin a foot-fetishist?
- there are certain places where I let myself be constrained by the previous coats and didn't highlight or shade them much in case I spoiled what was there before. Also I think I'm too content leaving areas of flat colour
- looking at close-up pictures, I wonder if I need to thin the paint more. I've been doing it by dipping the brush into the water every so often but next time I'll try with a wet palette

This message was edited 18 times. Last update was at 2022/06/21 10:09:22


 
   
Made in gb
Fresh-Faced New User







Sorry again, this post has been moved to:-

https://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/805183.page

https://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/805499.page

This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2022/06/11 20:13:20


 
   
 
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