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Achaylus72 wrote: Coming from a military modelling background of over 45 years, GW paint jobs are the worst examples of painting in the extreme.
Would never catch Tamiya painting their models that bad.
GW painting in general is shyte.
I keep hearing stuff like this. You'd agree that GW stuff is a bit above actual tabletop (i.e. what is actually on the table, not some vague idea what it should be), right? Are we really at the point where over half the stuff out there is "shyte" because somebody who's been painting for decades can do better? I know the top end of painting has improved a bunch in the last 15-20 years (the guy who I gamed with who was an early Golden Daemon winner has stuff that wouldn't even get close now) but to act like that actually moved the middle of the hobby, as in what normal people bring to the tabletop, is asking a bit much.
I get that there's a lot of hate for the style GW uses, but that's an artistic choice. It would be like calling impressionist painting poor because it's not photo-realistic. For most people and in most lighting, realistic contrasts and highlights don't work out well-- they look like a slab of a single color that gets eaten up by the poor lighting you're playing under. I get why it works for display pieces, but complaining that stuff for a wargame is painted for play seems odd to me.
It's very easy for armchair painters, anonymous on the internet to pick holes in photos of figures blown up to 600% or 1000%
The individual models in GW's studio paintjobs aren't GD/CB quality because they're fething armies, and I doubt that many or most who take the time to criticise them like this on the internet can paint anywhere near that level. Not that this would be an issue, but these same people then go on to call the studio paint "Tabletop" or "slightly better than tabletop" which is just feth-off bs. Beyond that, "internet average" standard is also higher than "real world tabletop average" because most people who paint to an average level don't decide to show their models off on the internet, while competitive painters who might finish one model per month vie to get their models showcased on CMoN. The internet sample is skewed.
That's why when I've said average I put it in quotations The stuff on the GW site is still much better than I'd say 99% of actual models I've seen on the table top. Even the worst stuff I've seen GW paint is equivalent to my high end and I'd certainly never consider painting an entire army like that.
But that said, I do think GW should put more effort in to painting the handful of models that they photograph for close ups. Even if the ones in the wide shots aren't painted quite as well, if you're going to do a big zoomed in close up of 3 or 4 models, it's probably worth paying the extra couple of hundred bucks to get someone to paint them top notch.
My gallery is on display to show how awful I am at painting (and even worse at photography).
This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2015/08/01 05:12:36
odinsgrandson wrote: What you're spotting aren't the kinds of things that take 40 hours to get right- they're simply assembly errors. Sometimes this happens, and small ones can get by whoever is in charge of sending them back for fixes.
Here's the biggest error I've seen them make- it got onto the wraithguard box:
Spoiler:
I really don't know how many people would have to have missed that in order for it to get onto the box...
Now, the studio painting is always marketing/advertising, so the paint jobs will fit into that budget. If you want your painter spending 40 hours on a mini, then you'd better be ready to pay him for it as well.
Bitch please...
Spoiler:
Spoiler:
Games Workshop Delenda Est.
Users on ignore- 53.
If you break apart my or anyone else's posts line by line I will not read them.
It's very easy for armchair painters, anonymous on the internet to pick holes in photos of figures blown up to 600% or 1000%
The individual models in GW's studio paintjobs aren't GD/CB quality because they're fething armies, and I doubt that many or most who take the time to criticise them like this on the internet can paint anywhere near that level. Not that this would be an issue, but these same people then go on to call the studio paint "Tabletop" or "slightly better than tabletop" which is just feth-off bs. Beyond that, "internet average" standard is also higher than "real world tabletop average" because most people who paint to an average level don't decide to show their models off on the internet, while competitive painters who might finish one model per month vie to get their models showcased on CMoN. The internet sample is skewed.
Yeah, that's a lot of the place where I am. I also think the internet has done a lot to discourage people from painting (along with games not bothering to enforce painting standards at events) because there's a lot of "if you can't do it well, don't bother at all". It keeps people from getting to the starting point where everyone has to begin from. None of these highly skilled painters always were good, and with the absurd increase in "tabletop quality" you have people now talking like multi-level highlights and the like are expected for everyone. Hell, a forum I used to read was all about just dogging people over their awful first paint jobs, which I can't see actually helping the hobby out. Screw the attitude that makes people discouraged to actually start and improve-- I also see this on the play side, but there's a lot more vitriol about the hobby side oddly enough. Normal people get that yelling about "battleforce armies" or the like makes you a jerk, but we're 100% willing to have some "thin ur paintz" guy crap on a kid's first or second figure he decide to put out on the net.
To be fair, it's also a skew within peoples own gaming groups depending on the overall skill level. I consider my stuff tabletop level, but I do multiple layers shading and highlighting, put effort into my basing, and have started exploring things like blood effects.
In my group, my brother is a fantastic painter who has recently been looking into Angel Giraldez's techniques with an airbrush, and has been producing some remarkable results. Another friend is purely a brush painter yet produces equally amazing results. Putting my stuff on the table with theirs is always humbling (though I do manage to kick their ass a lot when gaming, so it evens out).
Another friend paints very basically if he paints at all - prime, details, maybe a wash or highlight, and another doesn't paint at all. I don't really count either of those when comparing my painting, since one is painting only rarely and even then wouldn't even usually meet the '3 colours' tabletop standard at a lot of events, and the other doesn't bother at all.
Personal experience with painters in your group can skew your opinion as much as the level of painters you see online.
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AllSeeingSkink wrote: My gallery is on display to show how awful I am at painting (and even worse at photography).
Dude please, that stuff is great, even your speed paints.
This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2015/08/18 04:08:08
-Loki- wrote: To be fair, it's also a skew within peoples own gaming groups depending on the overall skill level. I consider my stuff tabletop level, but I do multiple layers shading and highlighting, put effort into my basing, and have started exploring things like blood effects.
In my group, my brother is a fantastic painter who has recently been looking into Angel Giraldez's techniques with an airbrush, and has been producing some remarkable results. Another friend is purely a brush painter yet produces equally amazing results. Putting my stuff on the table with theirs is always humbling (though I do manage to kick their ass a lot when gaming, so it evens out).
Another friend paints very basically if he paints at all - prime, details, maybe a wash or highlight, and another doesn't paint at all. I don't really count either of those when comparing my painting, since one is painting only rarely and even then wouldn't even usually meet the '3 colours' tabletop standard at a lot of events, and the other doesn't bother at all.
Personal experience with painters in your group can skew your opinion as much as the level of painters you see online.
The thing is your buddy's 3 colors plus wash is the tabletop standard. Look at what's actually being put out there on the table. It's mostly some very basic paint jobs. I'm just mostly annoyed at the guys who are really dismissive of normal painting, or dipping. It's like they'd rather see unpainted armies than stuff that's not internet good. You see the same thing with this crazy hate on GW using "bad" techniques when in reality it's just normal stuff instead of whatever model pr0n you're seeing out there on CMON.
It's crazy because we've gotten over it with the gaming side of things, or at least gotten to the point where normal people see you as a jerk for doing it. But crapping on people's hobby work is still seems pretty common online, and is seen as acceptable.
To me, the 'tabletop' standard offered by commision painters often struggles to represent actual tabletop standard. The stuff I see from reasonably talented people betters most people's greatest paintjobs ever.
The showcase isn't really attainable by most people either, but it at least provides a clear visual breakdown of how the models are painted. You can see the highlights and the blending due to their somewhat mediocre quality, whereas on CMoN and GD winners you can't see a single paintstroke.
BlapBlapBlap: bringing idiocy and mischief where it should never set foot since 2011.
BlapBlapBlap wrote:What sort of idiot quotes themselves in their sigs? Who could possibly be that arrogant?
SickSix wrote: I think asking 'collectors' to comment on GW painting is futile. GW sells game pieces to gamers. True collectors aren't part of their equation.
As an average painter, I never would have seen any of those mistakes and think that model looks great. I couldn't do that.
Dakka seems to lose perspective sometimes. Dakka is a small representation of the table top world. But within that small community is probably a large portion of the top painters and modelers. So some of this criticism is unrealistic honestly.
Except that GW themselves say that they are marketing to those 'true collectors' - moreso than to the gamers that make up their actual bread and butter. (They have actually claimed that most of their miniatures are bought by collectors, not gamers. Though, without that otiose market research, how can they tell?)
Snark aside... except for that Wraithguard box, most of the nits being picked... are not terrible models for a tabletop game.
Though I do miss the competition level paint jobs that they used to have on their studio armies. And the layouts that actually looked like in game battles. (And the one that used Epic scale minis in the background to create a forced perspective, way back when.)
The Auld Grump
Kilkrazy wrote:When I was a young boy all my wargames were narratively based because I played with my toy soldiers and vehicles without the use of any rules.
The reason I bought rules and became a real wargamer was because I wanted a properly thought out structure to govern the action instead of just making things up as I went along.
TheAuldGrump wrote: (They have actually claimed that most of their miniatures are bought by collectors, not gamers. Though, without that otiose market research, how can they tell?)
Well, I suppose if they follow the reasoning that the ONLY place to play Warhammer games is in a Games Workshop Storefront (sorry, couldn't think of a snarky name for making fun of Finecast or any of the ridiculous unit names out there now), and that there are more independent retailers than there are GW's, then it must be true that there are more collectors than gamers, right?
It used to be that the studio armies represented the pinnacle of what you'd want your paint jobs to look like. This was in the days before internet, the days before "How to Paint Citadel Models". Those days, you'd see player armies in White Dwarf and marvel at the technical mastery exhibited by Mike McVey. I remember buying the 2nd Edition Eldar codex and having my socks blown right off by Mike's Eldar Avatar and Eldrad. I KNEW I couldn't match that level of artistry (smooth blends, freehand), but it didn't stop me from trying.
These days, I feel the GW formula has moved to a more step-by-step, paint by numbers approach. While this is OK for the how to paint books, I feel that using the same level paint jobs for the studio models flies in the face of their claim and aim to be the Ferrari of miniatures. Surely you'd want the greatest artists painting your Michelangelos of miniatures!
With Golden Demon a pale imitation of its once all encompassing grandeur, the complete removal of all hobby articles from the website, and the legal strangulation of fan sites - GW, by design controls the public perception (and painting level) shown to customers. Its surprising that GW wouldn't pull out the stops to show their models in the most impressive light... especially if they are really marketing to collectors.
I think this is even more important now that their Citadel Fine-stores generally contain a single Citadel Fine-staff, and their required hobby output (new release) quality will definitely be affected by how much time they have - and as such, may not present the best face of the model to the new customers.
This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2015/08/19 16:45:21
@keezus - In my opinion, there's a difference between box art and the models that exemplify the pinnacle of painting and modelling.
There are plenty of really awesome paintjobs by GW -- just look at the 'Eavy Metal sections of WD or Visions. The recent Demon Prince showcased was superb by any standard.
On the other hand, GW comes out with new models -- anywhere from 1 to 15 -- every single week (for example, a box of blood warriors would require 10 finished models). A competition quality model can take hundreds of hours to paint. It's just impossible for GW to pay painters upwards of 3,000 hours a week to paint all the miniatures they produce, and 150,000 hours a year. Based on a 40 hour work week and accounting for holidays, sick days, and all that, they'd need a hundred golden demon quality painters doing nothing other than painting their new releases, and that's just never going to happen.
The other thing is, I think people are overestimating how good armies used to look. Pop open an old white dwarf. Sure, there are great *individual* models (as there are today), but the Ultramarines Strike Force from 2008 for example (in the Black Reach issue)... those models are painted to exactly the same standard as models you see displayed today.
One thing that has *dramatically* improved in appearance is GW's dioramas, scenery, and lighting. All photographs now look cinematic, and those dioramas take a long time to assemble and photograph. On the other hand, gamers would argue that once upon a time, GW's photographs represented actual games, not something that looks like a really cool movie set with miniatures.
Talys wrote: A competition quality model can take hundreds of hours to paint.
Sure if you want the 10/20 models unit on the box painted and converted to a standard of 10 fantasy/40ksingle model competition winners then that will take quite a bit more time but nobody is asking for that. On the one hand competition models that take hundreds of hours often include conversions/sculpted parts (the box photo should probably be as unmodified as possible) and that time tends to be included in the count and it also makes the painting process harder/take longer because of the added details/greeble, also they tend to go overboard with freehand painting that is not needed for a box to that degree. And on the other hand nobody is asking them to do that at all, people just want a bit more quality (like with their games' rules, people just want better and not perfect) and GW who make quite a bit more money than the next competitor should be able to do that just by hiring more competent people.
What they are doing is comparable to Porsche totally slacking when it comes to producing their catalogues or not even caring in what condition the car is they use in their official photographs. I have yet to see a catalogue that is not retouched until perfection (in addition to all the actual by hand polishing and highly produced photography). GW could use this to really showcase the quality of their miniatures but they seem to not really care about that.
Though I do miss the competition level paint jobs that they used to have on their studio armies. And the layouts that actually looked like in game battles. (And the one that used Epic scale minis in the background to create a forced perspective, way back when.)
The studio armies were pretty much always painted as armies. Individual, characters, showcase and special models were always painted to a higher standard, but the masses of troops were simply painted to essentially the same kind of standard as they are now (though of the day). You might be remembering when 'eavy Metal often showed new releases and other random figures as special showcases, and often those were literally outstanding. Some of those models might make it into vignettes or advertising shots (and subsequently into Ansell's personal collection!)
Of course, we didn't have the interwebz back then, so "tabletop quality" wasn't the level that you decided what you saw in White Dwarf was, or people's online galleries, but the stuff you actually saw on the local tabletop.
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heartserenade wrote: Product shots are made to show your product in the best possible light. No exceptions.
Models painted for box arts are considered product shots.
A bunch of words saying nothing.
Product shots are not meant to be award-winning paintjobs. It's about the golden ratio of time/quality. Not taking months for each model, but showing very good quality images of very well painted models. Beyond that, the way they're painted for the box art is also as a small piece of a larger puzzle (army shots), rather than as amazing individual models.
This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2015/08/20 08:11:46
heartserenade wrote: Product shots are made to show your product in the best possible light. No exceptions.
Models painted for box arts are considered product shots.
A bunch of words saying nothing.
Product shots are not meant to be award-winning paintjobs. It's about the golden ratio of time/quality. Not taking months for each model, but showing very good quality images of very well painted models. Beyond that, the way they're painted for the box art is also as a small piece of a larger puzzle (army shots), rather than as amazing individual models.
If I walk into McDonalds and see a poster of a burger that looks like it was made in the 30 seconds I want it to take for them to hand me it it'll be realistic, but probably look like a greasy mess that would make me walk straight back out.
Instead they show heavily photoshopped burgers that are inedible (I believe hairspray is what gives them the nice shine and I have heard parts of them are made with cardboard and the like to make them look like they do), but look good.
Simple fact is when trying to show off your product you jump through hoops to NOT show something 'reasonable' and 'realistic'.
A lot of recent box art has put me off buying GW models. I didn't pick up AoS cos I thought the Khorne stuff I might have wanted to paint looked like awful models, I did however paint a single marauder and was blown away by how nice the sculpt was, it was simply the paintjob that made them look like ass. Had they shown them off in a better light I might have bought a box.
Fafnir wrote: Oh, I certainly vote with my dollar, but the problem is that that is not enough. The problem with the 'vote with your dollar' response is that it doesn't take into account why we're not buying the product. I want to enjoy 40k enough to buy back in. It was my introduction to traditional games, and there was a time when I enjoyed it very much. I want to buy 40k, but Gamesworkshop is doing their very best to push me away, and simply not buying their product won't tell them that.
Product shots are not meant to be award-winning paintjobs. It's about the golden ratio of time/quality. Not taking months for each model, but showing very good quality images of very well painted models. Beyond that, the way they're painted for the box art is also as a small piece of a larger puzzle (army shots), rather than as amazing individual models.
If you got nothing from that, I think you have a problem with comprehension. You can tone down on the snark, because I can be snarky as well and I don't think it'll produce a good conversation, is it?
A respectable company will show their product shots in the best possible light, not "golden ratio of time/quality" (where did you get that, BTW?!). I would know, I've worked as a photographer's assistant for food photography shoots. They apply oil on bread to make them look shinier. They use mashed potatoes instead of ice cream to represent ice cream (actual ice cream will melt under the lights). They arrange the food and pick ingredients that are shaped right just for the photo.
Now, note that I didn't say that GW box art is inadequate for that, but it is frankly stupid to assume that product shots are meant to look like what's realistic or achievable. If such is the case, GW product shots will look like what an average painter can produce, and it's far less than that.
Instead they show heavily photoshopped burgers that are inedible (I believe hairspray is what gives them the nice shine and I have heard parts of them are made with cardboard and the like to make them look like they do), but look good.
Something worth watching if you want to have an idea of that they do, exactly.
This message was edited 3 times. Last update was at 2015/08/20 09:34:02
Huh, that was weirdly informative. The second I saw the title 'Director of marketing' on screen I got suspicious and expected it to go on about how they would never ever photoshop anything ect, ect.
But as was pointed out there is nothing 'reasonable' about it, they are trying very very hard to make it look as good as possible (short of making it inedible I suppose). Hell, making that video alone is a lot of time and effort that they wouldn't have gone to if they didn't want to show it all off at it's very best rather than 'good enough'.
Fafnir wrote: Oh, I certainly vote with my dollar, but the problem is that that is not enough. The problem with the 'vote with your dollar' response is that it doesn't take into account why we're not buying the product. I want to enjoy 40k enough to buy back in. It was my introduction to traditional games, and there was a time when I enjoyed it very much. I want to buy 40k, but Gamesworkshop is doing their very best to push me away, and simply not buying their product won't tell them that.
I doubt that they don't do other tricks for their actual products, but that would be the "lite" version of what they do that's acceptable to show to their customers. Bad publicity if they show them brushing additional oil on their products.
@heartserenade: i have to say that this, "A respectable company will show their product shots in the best possible light, not "golden ratio of time/quality" (where did you get that, BTW?!). I would know, I've worked as a photographer's assistant for food photography shoots." does not reflect my experience as a studio painter in the industry...
the "golden ratio of time/quality" is very much a thing...
a studio director will say, "here is the deadline, here is the scheme, just make it look "good enough", and have it done on time"...
seen as how an 'Eavy Metal painter is expected to be able to paint a standard box art quality mini, like one of those Stormcast Eternals for instance, in one work day, i would say that their "good enough" is pretty damn good for the time alloted...
it is not easy to work to tight deadlines, but that is just a reality of the business...
jah-joshua wrote: @heartserenade: i have to say that this, "A respectable company will show their product shots in the best possible light, not "golden ratio of time/quality" (where did you get that, BTW?!). I would know, I've worked as a photographer's assistant for food photography shoots." does not reflect my experience as a studio painter in the industry...
the "golden ratio of time/quality" is very much a thing...
a studio director will say, "here is the deadline, here is the scheme, just make it look "good enough", and have it done on time"...
seen as how an 'Eavy Metal painter is expected to be able to paint a standard box art quality mini, like one of those Stormcast Eternals for instance, in one work day, i would say that their "good enough" is pretty damn good for the time alloted...
it is not easy to work to tight deadlines, but that is just a reality of the business...
cheers
jah
Nor my experience. Deadline and budget are the two points of control a client (firm or private) has, really. Of course a company wants the best it can get (or afford) within either of those - sometimes the deadline can't move, but the budget can stretch to (for example) getting me to work overtime, or bump things along my schedule. Note - I strictly work short office hours, with one night a week for personal painting time / pushing things I feel like. Outside of that is family time, unless I'm getting overtime rates (which usually means +20-50% on the job). Even with a stretch in budget, sometimes timescales aren't achievable.
The stuff on the 
(They have actually claimed that most of their miniatures are bought by collectors, not gamers. Though, without that otiose market research, how can they tell?)
