Secret Sophie 2016 WIP #2

I hope everyone had a wonderful Thanksgiving! We hosted family who came down in an RV (cue the National Lampoon Christmas Vacation jokes), we had 5 people, 5 dogs, 2 cats running about. It was a lot of fun, though it didn't leave much time for painting. I was able to get some work done Sunday night once I had some time to myself. I decided to work on Arthrand Nightblade for the Reaper forum's Secret Sophie 2016 painted mini exchange. He's almost done:

I'll need to clean up the chainmail and the bit of sword paint that managed to get on the tunic fold. I'm still working on the bracers. At first I painted them as leather since that's what an archer would usually have. However, as I painted them, they looked more & more like metal bracers in their perfect cylindrical shape with a rounded lip. I also figured this would be an opportunity to paint another piece of metal on the mini and visually balance out the metal on the sword hilt. I really should have done True Metallic Metals/Shaded Metallics here but oh well.
 
While there's more work to do on the metals but the real question is, what to do with his hair. Platinum blonde would look cool but I don't want it to look too much like the gold on his dagger. It's either blonde or warm brown. I think a blonde color would provide good contrast to the cloak but I'd risk muddying the cloak and having to repaint sections of it. Eh, I'm overthinking it.

In the meantime, I've based him with Oxide Paste and some tiny clay-based gravel and Army Painter battleground sand. This way, it looks like his boots will be sunk into the mud a bit. While it's risky to do this after he's been mostly painted, I'm up for the challenge! I'm going to let him sit overnight and then prime & paint the base (very carefully!).

Secret Sophie 2016 WIP

Once again, I entered the Secret Sophie exchange on the Reaper forum (more info here). Last year, I painted a fox archer for the gift exchange and sent it off to my mystery person on the other side of the country, which they were very pleased with when they received it ^_^ In turn, I received a beautiful winter witch, basing materials, and chocolate from my partner last year and it made my month! The painted mini exchange is a great way to share in the holiday spirit and keep painting during one of the busiest times of the year! 

I decided to send two painted miniatures this year. One of the minis I'll send is a Sandra Garrity sculpt that's been knocking around the bottom of one of my "Will Paint Someday" boxes. Since my Secret Sophie partner says he needs a paladin and ranger for upcoming campaigns, I decided to break out my metallic paints and paint some life into him!

Unfortunately, I had a hard time deciding on my second painted miniature, and I either thought of sending another paladin-type, Kale Nolan, or a hunter character, Arthrand Nightblade. So I let Twitter decide:

Arthrand Nightblade won by one vote and I wasted no time cleaning and priming him. I also looked up a few examples of how he's painted in the past. While there are many nicely painted examples of him already, I wanted to choose a different color scheme than the classic ranger greens and browns.

I chose a blue and cream color scheme for my main colors– the rest will be neutral browns. I'll paint lighter, worn leather (or maybe linen?) wraps around his quiver and darker browns for his boots and bow. I still haven't decided on his hair color though...

So far so good! I'll have more to show after the Thanksgiving holiday. I hope everyone has a wonderful extended weekend :) See you back here soon!

Barbarian WIP

I'm currently working on a special project for a badass lady who plays badass barbarian fighters in her Dungeons & Dragons campaigns. I'm even painting it in her image, complete with tattoos I will attempt to freehand (this will be a first for me!) Since I needed a character with lots of skin, I chose Reaper's "Viking Girl" sculpted by Bobby Jackson. If I were to enter this mini into a competition a year ago, I'd surely name her "The Cold Doesn't Bother Me Anyway" when the "Frozen" movie was still relevant ^_^ 

I started this mini two years ago and had to strip her since I just wasn't happy with how she was turning out. I'm now at a point where I feel more comfortable painting her and I'm no longer intimidated by skin, fur, or hair (of which there is a LOT on this mini!)

I paint primarily in Reaper paints, and I chose Highland Moss & Pale Lichen for the cloak which I purchased at ReaperCon. You can see the progression in the works in progress photos, where I've started with a shaded basecoat that includes purple in the deepest recesses and folds. After taking Rhonda Bender's "Level Up" class, I've decided to experiment with more interesting shadow colors in my minis. In the past, I would have chosen a dark olive green for the shadows of the cloak, however, this time I've mixed the mid tone Highland Moss with a touch of Nightshade Purple. After the basecoating process is complete, I start to layer in more of the midtone color mixed with Pale Lichen. I blend as I go and make my way up to Pale Lichen on the highlights of the folds. I may go up an additional level of highlight,  I'll see how much contrast I have on other sections of the mini once I'm 90% done. 

I keep my lining very clean in between sections of the miniature, and oftentimes I'll go back and clean up things I don't need to, only because it makes me happy to do so :) I'm still using the Windsor & Newton Series 7 brush I accidentally dipped in super glue less than 2 weeks after I received it in the mail. It's painful, but I just can't bring myself to replace it. I waited so long to buy another and I have to use it as long as I possibly can before truly retiring it. Yes, that means my details aren't as clean and paints are harder to blend properly, but I feel like it's a fitting penance for ruining a perfectly good brush. 

Without further ado, please enjoy my work in progress photos below and stay tuned for my next blog post where I join Paul Filion and Antoine Bergeron from the Geeks of the North podcast! Have a fantastic Miniature Monday ^_^