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Reaper released a new miniature for each of the 4 factions at ReaperCon this year. This was the release that represented the River Widows: a woman and a big axolotl, both sculpted by Bobby Jackson. (I figured that "Cailleach" was Gaelic but I didn't know how to say it. A web-search says it is like "Kal-ee-akh". The diphthong "ai" is the sound in our word "pal", not "pile".) I put both figures on one 30mm round base, with a tree stump that I sculpted for her to stand on. I did an image-search for axolotl colors. There are black, brown, green, yellow, pale pink/white ... but apparently the lighter colors are rare in wild specimens and more common for pets. I chose light olive-green (with dark mottling) with reddish gills, similar colors to what Cailleach is wearing. (But see below for how it would look as a lighter color.) I can imagine people getting this axolotl figure to use on its own, for dioramas, etc. I changed her hair a bit to match Talin's concept art more closely (shown here in a photo from the ReaperCon program). The stock miniature has wavy hair covering both ears. I cut away the mass of hair on the right and sculpted a new ear and curls. I also added some sharper curls on the left side. If I hadn't done that conversion, the figure would have looked more like this: A quick experiment to make the axolotl lighter-colored: Enjoy, Derek

Just finished this mini I picked up at ReaperCon. I have some youngish kids so I removed the severed Vampire Head and add a gun (which I got in my ReaperCon Swag Bag:). Not the best pictures, tried using an actual camera instead of my phone and don't really like the results, probably going back to my iPhone for future minis.

Okay, so I left off the wings, used a little bit of putty as gap-filler, slightly tilted the figure forward on the base (so her pose might be interpreted as a sudden rush forward, perhaps waving her gun in the air to get someone's attention?), and painted this up as a regular Old West sort of character. Doing plaid on the shirt required lots of attempts and revisions. So did her left eye (viewer's right), for some reason, and also the mouth (so many tries, and she still looks like she's biting her lip to one side). Argh! Ahem. Anyway, so, once again, this isn't contest-winning material by any means, and a dubious inclusion for "Show Off," but I've got to ask: Is there a STORY behind this miniature? I thought maybe it was a DYOM, but during my long and frustrating hunt through the Reaper store to try to identify this miniature (the name "Gunslinger" isn't terribly informative, and for some reason the tag "cowgirl" does NOT apply), this one didn't show up as one of those tagged as "DYOM." Somehow, it's NOT under Chronoscope. So what's the story? Are there angel gunslingers wearing cowboy hats in some edition of D&D that I happened to miss? :D The stagecoach, by the way, is from Multiverse Gaming (MDF & cardboard kit, but I added a few extra bits for decor).

Looks like its been awhile since I last posted up here. I've been playing Village Attacks for a couple weeks now and decided to give some of the monsters a quick paint. Today I painted the Vampire. If the cast would have been better I might have spent some more time on him, but he had enough flaws that I didn't feel it worth the effort. I did a bit of an experiment with creating textures on the cloak, which worked better in the blue portion than the black. I didn't quite have the energy to freehand on the veins like in the reference art, but I might go ahead and darken the claws now that I see how it looks.

Dear Players; Screw Your Gear! Found this rust monster from wizkids the other day and had to make this little diorama. Tried to replicate the first illustration of a rust monster I ever saw. Fairly successful, for a quick little project. It had a few problems and I could have agonized over it a lot more. But I've been really slacking lately and wanted to get something finished and up. Love to hear what you guys think!

I painted these up yesterday. I'm running a Pathfinder D&D Age of Worms campaign and plan to use these for worm naga worshipers of Kyuss, demigod of undead and decay. I like how they are turning out so far, but need to figure out what further detail to add, and what if anything to do for basing. I'm open to feedback and suggestions on how to finish them. Thanks for looking.

This was stress relief from bad contractors and totally unplanned. The beach base was a total whim, and works for one. I have no idea what I was thinking with the Obelix type...

From the first post of my WIP thread:http://forum.reapermini.com/index.php?/topic/82127-warduke/&tab=comments#comment-1741308 Some of you are old enough to remember the old Dungeons and Dragons toy line from way back when. In that toy line, they featured an evil fighter named Warduke. He also made one appearance in the cartoon, and was given stats (more than once) for use in the pencil and paper RPG. I have decided to make/convert a copy of him for myself. This is who I'm talking about for those that don't know, or remember: He got brought back for 3.0 or 3.5 edition D&D, too: Now, that's some pretty cool artwork, and my apologies to Mr. Reynolds, but it's wrong. Warduke is LEFT handed. See? I brought him to Reapercon and entered him in the open category, and earned a bronze medal. Thanks to my judges ( @Corporea, @dks, and I'm not sure if Brice Cocanour is on the forum or not) as well as @Kuro Cleanbrush for giving me some excellent feedback on what was good and what I needed to improve on.

You can also see pirates here Girl & boy Noble & farmer Waitress and dancing girl

Thought I'd post my recently completed pair of Commander II Anti-Grav tanks painted up in the ADON Regiment 45 "Bone Collectors" scheme!

At last, got some more work done on this! I'm not learning any hubris-related lessons yet! Made a pair of oxygen tanks from greenstuff, a plastic brush-protector cut in half, a tiny watch screw, and a pin end. Also made some more tubing to attach to hydraulics and put a tiny bit more detail on the feet. Laid down some baking soda 'silt' for the base.

This is the Bones version of the Large Earth Elemental. I painted it over the course of a week or so. Thanks for looking.

Dad of one of my oldest boys classmates was telling me a story like this. His oldest daughter moved to the city for college a couple years ago. She was coming home for the weekend and was on the #1 highway. For us it's the biggest highway around. 4 lanes and 110 kph speed limit. She just got up to speed when a mattress flew of a small car in front of her and she hit it. Wrecked some stuff on the front and underneath her car. Guy stopped and they exchanged accident information. She was pretty shook up. Turned out the guy with the mattress was from the same small town where her dad grew up and they knew eachother. Her dad said he always was an idiot and was just glad his girl wasn't hurt.

Well that caught my attention. Wish they'd let me take that german correspondence course in school. I'd really like to know what a naked woman in a tub or shower has to do with driving a tiger. Guess the high command figured that was the best way to the tankers to actually open the book. Probably. Seems like a good bet anyway. So you know the whole "Never split the party" thing for D&D? Well, my Stonehell group decided to split the party to return an NPC to the surface, and collect one of the PCs who missed last session. Tonight was the one player trying to get back with the rest of the party. On the way into the dungeon, he was intercepted by someone who the party sort of trusts, the leader of the wererat clan. But it wasn't actually her, it was someone who *looked* like her, and that person sent them off into an entirely different section of the dungeon. Oh, and amazingly there's only one copy of the map. And the player tonight doesn't have it. He and his hirelings were wandering ALL OVER THE MAP!! It was great!! And while they didn't actually hook up with the rest of the party, they're near enough that I need to wait till the next session to see what they're going to do.

I'd been planning on driving all the way to Eastport, starting about three hours ago - but a few days ago Megan pointed out that the Cat ferry would be a whole lot faster - and I already had a gift certificate for the trip, that was going to expire in October. (I forgot about that thing - I had never taken the Cat. I won the gift certificate last year at a trivia competition.) So, we are heading to Canada, and seeing the tide from the other side. A six hour trip instead of twelve and change. Megan thought that had been my plan all along.... I wish... The Auld Grump - thankfully, Megan remembered it, and reminded me, when she realized I was planning to drive us. Otherwise I would have been travelin' through the dark. *EDIT* Megan was originally been planning to stay with some local pagans, while I camped out - but being in Canada means a hotel with me instead.

Well that caught my attention. Wish they'd let me take that german correspondence course in school. I'd really like to know what a naked woman in a tub or shower has to do with driving a tiger. Guess the high command figured that was the best way to the tankers to actually open the book.

This is a repainted prepaint of a WOTC Dungeons and Dragons figure. I kept the paint scheme mostly the same since I liked it, but I tried to a do a better job. She's got a decent table top paint job now, I hope. I did her to get back into painting after being in a bit of a slump when I lost my job earlier this year. Ahe's actually been done for a while, I've just been bad about taking pictures. Anyway, I hope you like her.

I have opted to use this labelled hill troll as a Fire Giant youth gang member/merc thug

just didn't want to do the Boris Karloff green skin. Victor was a brilliant scientist that managed to maintain bloodflow through various body parts and his creature was done through picky and meticulous means by Victor.

Two more members of my B&B war band...

20. I got there first!!

After Thousands of years: GEM

Turn it off then back on again. I was hoping this one would pop up. Always works. Except when it doesn't.... :P Yes!! Command Inanimate Object is one of my verbal cantrips.

Starting to show some skin~ Also, I'm glad I'm not using one of my new brushes for base coating...this brush is having fits. Also. Skintone is HD 29822 Suntan Flesh.

Purely coincidental. Even evil clowns have standards.

Nelly - Continued (Sept 22nd-23rd). I spent some time working on Nelly's corset as well as blending her apron. I used Scale75 African Shadow and Indian Shadow for the corset, adding a bit of white to provide the highlights. Man the Scale75 paints are crazy matte, still trying to determine if I like that or not. It just is so different... For the apron, I started with Reaper Cloudy Grey and then mixed up some layers with Reaper Ghost White. I wanted to go with a cool white to contrast the warm tones of the dress and corset, adding additional contrast. Today was tiny detail work, mostly introducing a bit more red and shading and highlighting into her hair. I used Reaper Golden Highlight as the hair highlight tone, glazing back over with Vallejo Orange Brown. I mixed up a bit of Citadel Reikland Fleshshade and Agrax Earthshade to make a reddish brown, and introduced that to the bottom part of the hair, where it turns back towards the shadows. I then glazed over the transition lines with more Vallejo Orange Brown to smooth out the transition.

Problem statement: Automated, motion sensing, electrical, gadgetified, miserly, touch-free, paper towel dispensing machines... ...somebody fixed it for me.

This is the second in a series of four posts each concentrating on a different entry category. You can find information about the scoring system itself in the Painter Division post. From here forward I will just concentrate on how the component guidelines apply to the other three divisions. Open Division The Open Division is far more of a freeform division than the Painter Division. Here is where you get to really strut your stuff with major conversions and scratch sculpts. If you have just a single entry then the judges can just go ahead and score your entry, no discussion is necessary. If you have multiple entries, then there will be a discussion between the judges on which entry they want to score. That conversation is typically the only conversation although these discussions tend to be longer than they might be in the Painter Division. However, when selecting the scoring entry the conversation is still based on “I can score this one higher than the others” or words to that affect, till they come to a decision just as it would be for the Painter Division. If multiple entries are visually very thematic the judges may decide to judge them together as a single entry. Let’s take a quick look at the scoring guidelines the judges use (which is published as part of the MSP Open rules): Difficulty: 15% Creativity: 10% Workmanship: 30% Painting Skill: 30% Presentation: 15% What does this mean for the Open Division? In this division we are really want to see all your skills. While the components remain the same the emphasis has obviously changed a great deal. Difficulty: This is far more intuitive than it is in the Painter Division. The level of difficulty depends entirely on the difficulty of the conversion, with a minor conversion being the least difficult with graduations on up from there with a complete scratch sculpt being the most difficult. Creativity: Creativity stays about the same as it does for Painter. Painting is still a factor here. Now painting is combined with your ability to convert and sculpt to reach your audience. The entrant’s imagination comes into play here, you are looking for impact on the audience. Are you straining the boundaries of believability or are you trying to evoke a specific emotion from your viewers? Have you achieved what you set out to do at the end? Workmanship: This remains a pretty straightforward component but in the Open Division there is a higher emphasis on it. It reflects how well constructed the entire piece is. Any type of non-painting effort is represented here. Again a well done conversion means that the judge can’t tell that anything has been converted. A scratch sculpt should be properly proportioned and well sculpted (no thumb prints!). A missed mold line, poor assembly or a poorly executed conversion could easily drop you a while numeric value in the scoring. This is a category that we really encourage documentation, show us what you did and how you did it. Painting Skill: Everything that was said about painting still applies in the Open Division but there is less emphasis. At this point workmanship and painting are equal. While we don’t expect your abilities to be exactly equal in both areas you cannot count on your ability to paint alone to carry you over the top. Presentation: There is more emphasis on the is component as well. If you are building the entire entry, essentially from scratch then the presentation of your entry is going to have a significant impact on how a viewer perceives your entry. Bring your entry to life!

Sinister looking pixie. The wings are done in the color changing green flash - changes from green to gold.

The evil cleric and his equally evil sorcerer twin.

just a quick paint job.

Y'know, it seems like fingerling potatoes would be excellent for this purpose. Quarter long-ways, toss with … olive oil, perhaps. Hit with spices and a little salt (I'd use Penzey's Salad Elegant blend, with a little kosher salt and maybe a touch extra garlic), bake in oven for however long it takes. Nomnomnom ... I do something like this with tiny 'toes, or quartered slightly larger red 'toes - my 'Infamous 'Toes' formula. ^^;

Potato skins do hold most of the vitamins and minerals and other good stuff. This goes for pretty much anything with a peel. It is part of the defense mechanism of the fruit. Grains ar kind of the same, if you aren' t eating whole grains you ar basically eating sugar aka simple carbs. All the good nutrients are on the outside, some principle as the fruits.

Next best thing: potato skins, I’ve heard, hold much of the nutritional value. So, start with small potatoes to maximize skin. Chop into pieces about 3/4” (20mm). Toss lightly with olive oil. Add some minced garlic. Sprinkle with dried thyme leaves. Spread on parchment on a baking sheet. Sprinkle with salt. (I use Morton’s kosher salt for this. ) Roast at 450 degrees F for 35 minutes.

Apparently my brain still thinks that ships are in the 'nineties. The Cat has wi-fi. And I was surprised. The Auld Grump - the last time I went to Nova Scotia the trip took eight hours, and no wi-fi... in 1998. Now the trip takes 5.5 hours, and has wi-fi. Yet somehow I found us a Pathfinder game. (Met someone I know.)

I have a drawer dedicated to brushes.

I have quite a few; enough that counting them would put me to sleep. I stocked up when it looked like red sable would no longer be available. AND I have a couple dozen bristle brushes for terrain. The Imexes (red sable), Kolinskys (red sable) & the Simply Simmons (bristle) are my favorites. Grumbacher made a series of red sable brushes that were my absolute favorites for a lot of years. My then local hobby store stop carrying them & broke my heart.

Glad to hear that you're ok.

Many. I don't have any favorites; the knowledge that any one of them can (and probably will be, sooner or later) be murdered and replaced helps to keep them all in line.

There's something to be said for pictographs, though. They can convey a lot of meaning in just a few symbols, where words take much longer to express the same. And, especially when they're as detailed as emojis can be, they're almost able to be read universally. The problem comes with trying to convey complexities, because then pictographs are very limited while words aren't.

Some vast number well beyond the ken of GoblinMath™️. I probably have a dozen that are meant for 1:1 scale scenery. I have no favorites. I do not not paint well enough to be that fond of any particular brush. If I think about it... Nearly* every brush I have has earned my wrath at least once. *There could be one or two I’ve not tried.

Okay, much later, I've attempted another go at Dr. Darius Hellstromme (#59003): The "forced light" thing just wasn't working for me. Also, I decided to give him a mad experiment as a backdrop: that's courtesy of one of the male "blanks" from #75004 "Heroic Blanks" (apparently no longer available in the Reaper online store :( ), hooked up inside the "tank." "It's alive! Aliiiiiiiive!" Once again, Tropicana juice lids make a great decorative base/dais/doohickey for big critters or gizmos.

I've been painting up several Reaper Chronoscope and Savage Worlds minis for a future Deadlands Reloaded campaign. Here are three I finished today. From left to right: * 50111 Diamond Sue Dawson, Cowgirl * 50155 Mickey O'Doul, Wild West Bartender * 50045 Jesse Moonwalker, Werewolf Tracker All three of those are from the Chronoscope line, but they seemed like they'd work just fine for Deadlands -- and Jesse Moonwalker seems to particularly fit into the "weird west" genre. I was tempted to use the optional "cyber-arm" for Jesse, but then that would have made it all the more complicated when trying to find a suitable miniature for him when he's in his human form. I suppose I'd need to get an extra copy of the cyber-arm to slap onto the human mini ... and wouldn't shapeshifters have problems with artificial limbs? Also, particular to the Deadlands setting, I'd feel obliged to stick a ghost-rock boiler on poor Jesse's back, since that arm would need a power source. So, I stuck with the "natural" arm, and I'm holding onto that cyber-arm, as I'm sure there's some conversion I can make with it, where it would come in handy. The only modification I made was for Jesse, where there was some sort of a casting issue on the right side of his muzzle (a mold line?), right on the lip-line, that I had to file down. In order to salvage things, I drilled a hole and inserted a piece of wire, to give him a cigar. Besides, I figure that helps to emphasize his role as a "civilized" werewolf who's able to use a shotgun, not one of your run-of-the-mill "goes berserk at the full moon" werewolves. Diamond Sue Dawson's mini might also present some conversion opportunities in that her right arm is a separate piece. I'd have to find a suitable replacement first (or break out the wire and green putty), but I could imagine, say, putting a lasso in one hand, and then using some putty to add a handle to her holster (so it looks like she still has a gun, but it's not out and pointed at anyone's head right away).

At least 50 for miniature painting purposes.

I think I have about 15, and while my Winsor & Newton Series 7 Size 0 brush is absolutely lovely to paint with, don't tell it, but it isn't my favourite! .....My favourite is an old Citadel Starter Brush that I've put through hell with priming, lining, washes, and general coverage duties. Twice now it's shown signs of starting to give up the ghost, and a bit of a massage later it's holding a point again and all signs of dying are totally gone. It's near and dear sibling on the other hand (another starter brush, but red handled and with more bristles) is nowhere near as nice to paint with.

How about the classic "Hit it!"? Everyone does it at some time or the other. And sometimes it *does* work. Other times, verbally threatening an inanimate object makes it work.

Oneboot’s answer reminds me of something I might have mentioned before: So yeah. I changed a “0” to a “90” on line 38 of a text file. And magically, (...to this day I have no idea why it worked...) one small bit of our CAD software started working properly. It had been drawing a random looking mess of lines on the screen. Long boring TLDR version I’d only expect @TaleSpinner to understand:

Something a little different today, but not quite totally different. Today, things were assembled, and/or had their bases swapped! Rat Ogres and the packmaster with the long pokey stick had their bases swapped, while five gutter runners were started from the beginning with new bases. Two sprues and one box valiantly sacrificed themselves for this endeavour! In other words.... FINALLY, one box is done - the Rat Ogres and giant rats one. Well, at least taken off the sprues. The giant rats are being held for other possible projects, being turned into swarms, or... Other. Aka I'm going to be looking into the giant rats some other miniature companies provide, because apparently some of them are like... gnome sized. Sounds harmless, until you realized it's an angry, toothy nightmare that AS BIG AS A GNOME! So, first and foremost... Man, that was a LOT of mold lines, and I'm guessing I didn't get them all. Probably fairly certain of that fact, but it's life. Some of these minis had already been assembled, and others... Even today, I got the same feeling I probably had ten years ago of "screw it, just get them assembled" but this time I didn't give into that temptation. Also, before I totally forget for the fourth time, the reason why the fourth packmaster hasn't been attached to his base is quite simple - glue is still drying, and I'm not gunking up a drill bit with gorilla glue. So, why assemble this weekend instead of paint? Well, two reasons... One I was sick on Saturday (yay allergies!), and two, I'm wanting to start working on a sort of three month schedule per squad. In essence, a month to assemble said squad, and then two months to paint. Sounds like a bit of a stretching of goals at times, but at the same time, it means I'm aiming to have a semi-regular turnover of miniatures. The other reason why it's longer than one might expect is because I know some squads will take longer due to fiddly bits (or they're just bigger!), AND because I'm also trying to keep my miniatures half Reaper half other stuff. It's kind of a personal reason, but it also means I can work on various projects without getting too much "ugggggh, all this drybrushing of fur" or "ugggggh, it's the same blasted things night after night". Arguably another is that omg, the sheer amount of mold lines on Games Workshop products compared to Reaper's stuff. It feels like not much consideration was put into the sprues and their design other than "this is easier to pop out of a mold this way" instead of "huh, maybe we shouldn't have that mold line going through half a mini's worth of fur, how can we tweak this to work better". This is something I would have accepted from a company 10-12 years ago, but now that I've had the joy of working on miniatures from various companies it's rather noticeable.... So is the fact a lot of these miniatures are multi-pieced, but seem to go together only a few select ways... Right now I have these particular guys out for two reasons - first is they were technically the first and easiest box to finish, since most of my Rat Ogres had already been assembled. Secondly, one has to start somewhere. Also third, even though I said two reasons, so I suppose we'll call it two and a half..... I'm hoping to have an "in progress" shot of what's been rebased, including ones that are being painted (and/or are finished) at the end of the month... And I'm also hoping to have finished off my first ten rat squad of poison wind globadiers (I say first because I plan on buying minis for a second at some point) AND the squad of Night Runners by October 25th at the latest, preferably by the 21st... Why those particular days? Well, if I make the goal of the 21st, I'll have time to do the in progress for October pictures, and clean up my desk for a challenge that isn't really a secret anymore.... Dragons Don't Share - 2014 Edition (aka DDS2) 7-Day Goblin Challenge. That's right, I plan on starting it on October 26th, coincidentally riiiiight as my vacation starts (I take Samhain off every year due to various reasons, although one of them was practical - it's just a tad longer than six months after my birthday, and the first four years at my current company I only had two weeks of vacation, so went a week each in April/October). This is also arguably why there's been a good amount more activity from me the past two weeks... It isn't just because I'm wanting to clear up my desk, but I'm also testing some of my various endurance limits as to what my body will let me get away with before I need to take a break of some description. I'm also testing out various forms of speedpainting techniques now, so that way I can hopefully put them to use better when the time comes.

Reaper/Studio 2 S2P80004 "Waster #1 (female)" -- a fairly straightforward wasteland survivor ... though I adore the addition of a TEDDY BEAR to her visible equipment. As with several of the other minis, the pose is ideal for hand and weapon swaps, but I figured I was fine with it the way it is. (I've actually been using the HoE weapons pack more for converting other figures -- fantasy, etc. -- into passable post-apocalyptic models.) There wasn't anything particularly "western" about this figure, and I tried adding a cowboy hat, but that wasn't turning out well, and I didn't want to mangle the top of the head of the mini during my experimentation. So, rather than forcing a "western" angle, I decided to go the opposite direction: I decided to paint her t-shirt with the "Vim!" logo, and for the photo I reused my "Far Harbor" scenery facade. (For a bit, I was thinking of putting on a "Sunset Sarsaparilla" logo for at least a tenuous "western" + "apocalyptic" link, but that would have been quite a challenge to do freehand, and I'm afraid it's not nearly flat enough of a surface for me to attempt to accomplish it with printed paper application.)