Griffin Exorcist

I painted this figure in the same week as the Tigers of Dirz as well as the Griffin Conscripts I will be putting up next. Again I was trying to get as many minaitures done in my few days of painting as I could. When I started out I would get one miniature done over weeks, with hours and hours spent on them. I want to say something along the lines of 10-15 hours a miniature. Now I tend to get them done in 3-5 hours of work. A big improvment, and yet my painting quality has also rissen even with that decreased time. This piece took perhaps 3 hours in total. It was a bit simplistic in sceme, but then again its not a character piece but rather a specialist for units. Once again I felt the red cloth came out really well. As did the holy relic on the front of the miniature.

As always you can click the images to see full size photo's.

Tiger of Dirz

Worked on a set of Tiger's of Dirz this week. I wanted to go for a more tiger feel so I used a more orange tone for their skin rather than the light blue green seen on the prepainted miniatures. Since I am going ot be playing some Dogs of War I wanted to keep them usable for the Tiger Event card for Dogs of War. I painted their tails in flesh tones becouse they seemed so very rat like to me. Painted creatures just feels so more more relzxing to me. I think its the lack of any real "edge" to paint to for the most part your just painting faster as a bit of randomness to color changes actually improves the look of these as their more natural in appearance that way. As always you can click the image for a full size photo.

Undead Skeleton

I took a shortbreak from the more complicated miniatures I've been working on and worked ona skeleton for the Archon army instead. I havn't done any undead since I got my new paint set last christmas as a present. I enjoyed working with the new paint trios of the reaper master paints. That along with dropper bottles seem to make the work so much easier and help me improve my painting as well. I like the more grey tones that I got on this miniature than the last few skeletons I've worked one.

Dasyatis Clone

My second attempt at one of the large Dirz creations. I went for a diffrent skin shading on this one. Mostly due to the fact that I wanted this piece to fit in onthe table with the new pre-painted army sceme. (They all have more of a blue gree tone to their skin.) Once more I am continuing to use the gold/scorpion green color combination to do the metalic green looking effect that I have been using to highlight specific metals actost the Dirz metals when I work on them. I really liked the way the skin came out on this one. After first painting it up with a pinkish skin tone much akin to the Aberation I applied a black wash and dry brushed over that a nice purple/blue color to get the skin result you see. I was extremly pleased with the results. I ended like all Dirz creatures by applying a bit of a scorpion green wash to various places to represent the use of mutagens by the Alchemists of Dirz.

Venerable Ambrosius

I started on this miniature to finish off my Hybrid board game miniatures so I could field a wholy painted game. He was a surprisingly simple minature to paint. I took me only part of a day to finish him up from start to finish. I felt that his face came out surprisingly well. The eyes really made it. He just seems to be glaring slightly to the side like a stuborn old man would. I've not tried any form of free hand so I am leary to put brush to the banner to free hand in MERIN down the banner. I might try it again later, once I've tried my hand at some practice. Especially now that he's all sealed up. For now though I'm just going to leave him as is.

Griffin Cannon: Part 3

Finished the last two members of the cannon crew, the last ammunition carrier, and the loader. With them completed I have my cannon's crew and with just on proxy mini I can even field a second cannon for say a Temple of the North list. Considering they are the only hero box that I have so far I do tend to use that faction list from time to time. I played my first game of the new Confrontation game with my current gaming group. My opponent enjoys the fluff of the Wolfen so he picked them as his army. He is using mine until his own army shows up. I love the Griffin so that was my choice. I fielded one cannon unit and had a... well I didn't get to shoot them much and when I did casualties to the Wolfen was minimal. Their howls do a great job of reducing the effectivness of my ranged units. I think I will do my best to limit the number of guns in my future lists. As always click the image for a full size photo.

Griffin Cannon's: Part 2

Next I worked on the crew of the cannons. Sadly the C4 rules require 3 crewmen per cannon, while the Third edition metal cannons came with 5 crew for two cannons. So I'm one crew shot of the second cannon. Although with a second cannon box, I could field another 5 crew for three cannons worth of cannon and crew. This was my first attempt at a non flat painting of red cloth. I started with a very dark red as the base coat. I then base coated the entire miniature before applying a black wash to the whole piece. Then I went back and in the case of the red, applied the base coat once again except into the deepest recesses and cracks. I find black wash looks terrable on red of any shade. From their I built up successive layers of red until I had hit my brightest red for the teps of the clothing. Also The fire I think came out really well. It was my first attempt at painting fire. I worked from the bottom up, starting with a bright yellow, and working my way up the fire to a deep red. Then I mixed some black wash in with some red in successive amounts to get that smokey look at the top. I was lucky to have so much skin work on these mini's. I don't know why but I have always been pretty satisfied with the results I get while painting skin. Perhaps I am simply more aware of the way shading on skin works than with other substances.