Saturday 22 October 2011

A Beast among us…

So the DIY is on hold for a week or so until the plaster is properly dry - a bit annoying, but nothing I can do about it other than be patient.

I’m still on my “clearing the painting desk” mission, and my next finished miniature is this beauty from Reaper:

Beastman at Kenny's

My photography has improved a little – this picture was taken under the supervision of Kenny, owner of the Ancible and the guy who takes all the pictures of my finished miniatures for the articles, using his setup.  He gave me a crash course on taking pictures of miniatures, and I’ve learned a hell of a lot.  One of the main things I’ve learned is that I don’t have anywhere near enough light (see my pictures below).  Not sure how I’m going to solve that bit yet, without spending plenty of money…

Beastman Angle

This miniature was an absolute blast to paint (yep, he’s meant to look Khornate) – the skin I’m particularly pleased with:

  • Base:  P3 Beast Hide
  • Shade:  Devlan Mud
  • 1st highlight: Beast Hide
  • 2nd highlight: 1:1 mix of Beast Hide and P3 Ryn Flesh
  • 3rd highlight: Ryn Flesh
  • Glaze: Gryphonne Sepia

The final glaze really seemed to tone everything down and tie it all together, I’m tempted to use it more often.

Beastman Rear

The rest of the miniature was painted how I usually do things, the horns were a bit of a challenge as in trying to remove some pretty nasty mould lines, I had to sacrifice some of the ridge detail, which had to be recreated using paint.  Thankfully the tops of the horns were clear of mould lines, and they painted up really nicely.  It’s often tempting to dry-brush things like that, but painting on the highlights with a fine detail brush really can make a difference.

Just another bit on photography.  I’ve also learned that trying to do things on automatic really isn’t going to work, this stuff has to be done manually to get decent pictures.  Yet another area where it doesn’t pay to take short cuts!

I retook a picture of the assassin from the last post:

Better Assassin Kneeling

Still not perfect, but definitely better than the previous pictures!

A quick list of things learned:

  • You can never have too much light
  • The camera settings need to be done manually, automatic doesn’t cut it
  • Background light (from windows, overhead lights, etc) can have a huge effect
  • The background you put your model in front of can have a huge effect too…

Beastman on Red Background (I won’t be using a red background often…)

So a big thank you to our glorious dictator leader for the crash course.  I now have to get some photography practice in, and when the lair is set up properly I’ll have a permanent place to have the camera set up

The next article, Bikou, and maybe something else are next on my plate.  Off to Warfare at Reading next month, I noticed Black Scorpion Miniatures will be there, so I maybe picking up some Elven Pirates…

As always, comments and criticism welcome!

4 comments:

  1. Lighting equipment doesn't have to be super-expensive if you don't need great reliability (i.e. if your subjects tend to be fairly still...), and you use all manual settings.

    For example would a couple of Vivitar 285HV's off ebay from Hong Kong take you a long way.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Cheers mate, I shall look into it. :)

    ReplyDelete
  3. I really like the paint job on these latest two models.

    I see you used P3 paints for the beastman – are you preferring them to GW or just different?

    ReplyDelete
  4. Thanks DT!

    They're just different really, they're a little thinner out of the pot, but the coverage is probably a bit better than GW's standard paints.

    Beast Hide is quite similar to Khemri Brown in colour, but the others I have are very different from anything in the GW range.

    ReplyDelete