Frost Wyrm: Painting Guide

One last painting guide for 2013... I've been under the weather for the past week and a half in part because I've little time to rest up and properly recuperate.  Condensed word schedules made for longer day and the days off was spent maximizing time with family and friends.  Oh... and had to work the past too weekends as well.  In any event, I took advantage of the day off today to do some painting and get a model I had primed a couple months back actually painted and finished.

The model is from Reaper's line of Bones miniatures and the initial priming was done with Gesso ... a darker gray color.  I mention the color due to an unexpected mistake I had made when experimenting with another paint -- an Iridescent Pearl.  You see, as a favor for someone else, I had primed a frame in white and painted with the new paint and got fantastic results.  I figured that this same color would be fantastic as a base color for the Frost Wyrm.  I missed the part on the bottle which stated the paint was 'SO' (semi-opaque).  The paint is a white-ish color but when I applied it to the model with my airbrush, the model became silver as opposed to a white pearl.

Oops.

The effect was still pretty nice but a silver frost wyrm was not what I was looking for.  I was still able to transform it into something a lot more serviceable that I am proud with.  It was quite easy to do too.  Once again, I am using paints from the Citadel line for the rest of the model.

First thing was first, I applied a dark blue wash called 'Drakenhof Nightshade' over the entire wyrm. 

Second step was extensive drybrushing using 'Ehterium Blue' and Praxeti White' -- both Dry compounds from the Citadel line.

One the drybrushing was done to my satisfaction (heavier in some areas and lighter in others), I used 'Ulthuan Grey' to highlight its arms and legs with a touch more drybrushing with the same paints as before.

I used 'Mephiston Red' with some 'Bloodletter' Glaze for the creature's eyes and a touch of 'Screamer Pink' for the back interior of the creatures tongue and throat.

With all of the model done, some of the iridescent bits are still coming through but the creature is no longer a 'silver' but a blue-greyish white.

M

Male Human Wizard: Painting Guide

It's been far too long since I last did a painting guide and since the blog has really been quiet in the past 6 weeks or so, I felt that I should at least manage one more painting guide before the end of 2013.  I have recently re-started my C&C campaign and I have a new player who's never played a tabletop RPG before -- he went with a wizard and based on what he wanted, I pulled out on of the Bones miniatures from Reaper that I had yet to paint and decided to do it up for him.

In many ways the model was not difficult to do and I'm really happy how it turned out.  As usual, I am working with the Citadel lines of paints but before painting, I primed the model with acrylic gesso.

As far as base coats were concerned, nothing too fancy.  Robes and hat were done in a 'Celestra Grey', inner coat in 'Naggaroth Night', beard and hair in 'Ceramite White', shoes and hat banding in 'Khorne Red', and scroll in 'Rakarth Flesh'.  Skin was done in a 'Gorthor Brown'. The staff (and belt pouch) was done with 'Dryad Bark' for the shaft and 'Balthasar Gold' for the head and base of the shaft.  I opted to use 'Warpstone Glow' for the ribbon tied to staff.

Once the entire base coat was done, I used 'Nuln Oil' as a shade very liberally over the entire model with the exception of the scroll itself.  The work on the scroll was among some of the last I would do to the model.  I touched up the purple with a bit of 'Druchi Violet' wash as well.

With the shading done, I did some drybrushing to bring out details and some of the highlights.  Robes and hat got some 'Longbeard Grey'

Robes and hat were done in a 'Longbeard Grey' and I used 'Praxeti White' for the beard and hair.  With the shading brought about by the 'Nuln Oil', the hair and beard looked a bit like a white but peppered beard -- exactly the kind of effect I was looking for.  Both ends of the staff got a a bit of 'Golden Griffon' to accentuate the gold effect already present from the base coat.

Coming back to the scroll, I used layers of drybrushing using 'Underhive Ash', 'Tyrant Skull' and 'Praxeti White' in combination with a wash of 'Seraphim Sepia' to get the texture and color I was after.

The very last thing on the model was the base.  It was a perfect excuse to try out one of Citadel's new technical paints -- the 'Agrellan Earth'.  It basically cracks when it dries giving it a very cool looking effect with a next to no fuss.  I was very happy with the effect and is similar to the effect you can get when using a crackle medium but without the long drying time and heavy coats.

M

Overdue Blog Posts

A bit behind these days. A few too many of those 'too few hours in a day' lead into being 'not enough days in the week'.

The good news: I've brought someone on board to help me nail down a couple of key concepts for the Ballista Fast Play rules.  Much discussions on that and related projects were had and more than a few issues resolved.

The bad news: This isn't really bad.  I'm just busy which means I'm about a couple weeks behind were I would like to be.  I also have a couple of painting commissions and a couple of OTHER projects which is occupying my time this month.

With all of that, certain bits of upkeep like regular blogging hasn't been kept up and the sale price for S&W version of Ramat is still going on.  If you have any interest and want to take advantage of the lower price, please do so before Monday.  Afterwards, it will be going back up to the regular price.

You can get it HERE.

Thanks,

M