Ironhammer

Thus far I've neglected the pegasus rider a bit. The parts come together so nicely that it is almost like putting together a regular multi part figure instead of a conversion. That being said, the original steampunk legs had a pistol holster, which I felt needed to go. Once that was done, it was a simple matter of drilling holes and pinning the various bits together. As a finishing touch, I glued an orphaned sword blade onto her hip where the holster used to be. I also flattened out the pommel of her sword and trimmed it into a more complex shape than the original. I think a little bit of sculpting is in order to flesh out the rest of the pommel and add some appropriate fittings to her scabbard, but otherwise the conversion is more or less finished.

The shoes on the beach elf were starting to bother me. The modern high heels just don't gel with the more "primitive" aesthetic I've been developing with her. However, I was hesitant to alter the shoes drastically, since 1) the thick soles are serving to anchor the figure on her pins and 2) the entire posture of the model is dictated by the fact that she's in heels, and I think would get thrown off if I tried to change it into a different kind of shoe. So I compromised by just trimming off the toes of he shoes and sculpting in some bare toes in their place. This way she at least looks like she's wearing sandals of some kind (albeit elevated ones).

Thanks for all the kind words! For some reason the back of the sea elf' hair had been cutoff, so I sculpted some under structure for a new head of hair (which will be covered up with putty later). I also filled in the gap in the beach elf's torso. However, the anatomy was starting to look odd. She might pass (at least to someone who is not much of an anatomist) for someone with a particularly long torso, but her original navel is way to high up on her body. I figure it ought to be right about where her belt buckle currently is. I tried simply filling in the original navel with greenstuff and leaving her with a high waistline, but I feel like I need a "marker" in place to show where her anatomy is supposed to be. That, and there is still a big seam on her backside, which will be easy to cover if I bring her waistline down to that level. So, I clipped/carved/filed away the belt. With the belt gone, I went ahead and carved in a new navel for her. I've been debating what kind of clothing should be on her lower half, and I settled on a short skirt made of grass (or perhaps seaweed) based loosely on the string "miniskirt" found in the bronze age Egtved find. Meanwhile, I'm getting very close to finishing up the conversion for the "Fairy of Victory". After gluing the wings in place I filled in the remaining gaps with putty, and also added some putty to her neck so that it transitions to her head smoothly. After test fitting the head again I noticed that there was a large patch under her hair which would be visible at certain angles. I went in and sculpted some hair on the underside. It's not especially pretty, but it gives just enough texture to do the job. With the head now installed, I took the remaining putty I had on hand and blended her stand a little into her base (pics linked below). At this point I think this conversion is finished and ready for painting! http://s1376.photobucket.com/user/Jack_Ironhammer/media/20180905_190323 2_zpspadcm0vp.jpg.html?filters[user]=145063139&filters[recent]=1&sort=1&o=1 http://s1376.photobucket.com/user/Jack_Ironhammer/media/20180905_190637 2_zpse3kvcep7.jpg.html?filters[user]=145063139&filters[recent]=1&sort=1&o=0

Thank you! Doing some more tinkering. I filled in the seams at her hips and replaced some lost detail. I then went in and sculpted the rest of her left arm, as well as her neck. http://s1376.photobucket.com/user/Jack_Ironhammer/media/20180905_010917 2_zpsfjil1nnl.jpg.html?filters[user]=145063139&filters[recent]=1&sort=1&o=1 I then shaped the mounting points on her wings so they will sit on her back the way I want them to and added pins to anchor them. I then drilled matching holes in her back and test fit the wings. I held them in place with some office putty so I could move them around and see what angles look best. When I was satisfied with their position I glued them in place. I also test fitted the head, which I think is from an old Ral Partha figure. http://s1376.photobucket.com/user/Jack_Ironhammer/media/20180905_012528 2_zpska37pzpk.jpg.html?filters[user]=145063139&filters[recent]=1&sort=1&o=0

While I had my tools out, I also drilled the sea elf torso to its legs, and also added some pins into the feet so I can hold the figure steady while I work on it. Given that my sea elf is now apparently on land, I think I shall dub her a Beach Elf, and see how the figure develops from there. Picture is linked below as before. http://s1376.photobucket.com/user/Jack_Ironhammer/media/20180904_123651 2_zpsb5yzx4lo.jpg.html?filters[user]=145063139&filters[recent]=1&sort=1&o=9

So, after indulging in the metal trade at Reapercon this year I found myself going through my stores of salvaged miniatures and putting together various bits and pieces. I tend to save a lot of scraps and fragments of figures in my spare parts bin (or drawer, rather) which I think may be useful for something someday or other, and after pouring the lot of it out and sifting through it I realized that I have accumulated an awful lot of this sort of thing, and it was high time I did something with it. After messing around and experimenting for a couple of hours I came away with a promising assortment of parts, enough to assemble three or four female figures in all. I thought it would be fun to make a WIP out them (hopefully it will help keep me motivated to finish all four of them). Most of the parts are from Reaper figures (I'll try to list the catalog numbers), but there are a few other bits and pieces in between, which I'll try to identify as best I can. First off, I've got one of the alternate torsos from the 03096 Pegasus rider. This matched up really well with a random set of legs I had lying around, which I think once belong to a steampunk-ish figure. Digging around in my stores of weapons I found the original shield that went with the torso. Next up, I have the upper torso from the 03631 Sea Elf Bard, which marries up surprisingly well with the legs from the alien pole dancer from 50270. In particular, by using a hobby knife to carefully separate the thighs of the legs I was able to get a pretty dynamic looking pose (DISCLAIMER: In the picture it looks a bit like she has some camel toe going on, which is an artifact left over from the incision I made to separate the legs. That being said, I have nonetheless linked the picture to comply with forum rules on nudity). http://s1376.photobucket.com/user/Jack_Ironhammer/media/20180904_012314 2_zpsaxgvp2ma.jpg.html?filters[user]=145063139&filters[recent]=1&sort=1&o=3 Lastly for now, I've got the torso from the 03459 Angel of Justice. With a bit of judicious trimming, it marries up almost perfectly with the legs from 03336 Cancer from the Children of the Zodiac series. Pictures are linked below due to nudity on the angel model. http://s1376.photobucket.com/user/Jack_Ironhammer/media/20180903_230715 2_zpscmiiqn4i.jpg.html?filters[user]=145063139&filters[recent]=1&sort=1&o=1 I started out with the angel of justice mashup. The original figure was drilled for wings, and since I was already starting to get kind of a supernatural vibe from the figure I dug around my spares bin for something wing-ish to put there. I ended up with a pair of fairy wings. I then looked for something suitable to put in her hand where the original sword was, and after a bit of experimentation I decided that another sword is kind of looked the best. As before, images containing nudity are linked separately below. http://s1376.photobucket.com/user/Jack_Ironhammer/media/20180904_011843 2_zpscgmugyiq.jpg.html?filters[user]=145063139&filters[recent]=1&sort=1&o=0 Whatever she is, she's got a very triumphant look about her (a couple people I showed her to said she looked a bit like the Statue of Liberty). As such, I have dubbed her The Fairy of Victory. I have no idea what a Fairy of Victory does, but I'm quite sure its suitably magnificent.

So I had an occasion to create a new D&D character after a brief hiatus from playing, and I wound up rolling a half orc ranger named Logar Quickarrow, a vociferously proud member of the Bison Clan. Naturally, being the conversion obsessed sort of person I am, I was obliged to fabricate a proper miniature for him. I apologize for a few slightly blurry pictures, as I'm still trying to get used to my current camera (which is cleverly hidden inside my phone). After canvassing Reaper's catalog for half orcs and various iterations thereof, I quickly decided that Skreed Gorewillow by Derek Schubert was by far my favorite. It was merely a matter of transforming him from a spell caster into a ranger. For reference, here is the miniature as it comes from the factory: The first step was to remove both the dagger and the burning flask and make way for his new weapons. Rather than dig around in my parts bin for a matching set of new hands or sculpting a pair from scratch, I decided to simply bore out the existing hands and carve away all the pewter I didn't need and shape it to fit his new weapons. My character uses a shield in his offhand in melee combat, so to reflect this I also cut away the front two flasks on his belt to make room for a shield which will be hung there. Next, I dug around in my parts bin for some suitable weapons. I found an appropriately aggressive looking sword blade which was orphaned from its moorings, however after trimming away a portion of the lower half and rounding it out with a file I created a shaft for it which easily fit inside the hole I had drilled in his hand. I like my figures to have appropriately shaped scabbards for their weapons, so I traced out the outline of the blade onto a sheet of styrene and cut it out as a starting point for making him a matching scabbard. Next, I selected and appropriate bow and quiver. I also dug out a small shield, as my character uses a shield in his the offhand in melee combat. I drilled and pinned the quiver so that it can be mounted on his back where the figure's original sword would have gone. After test fitting the shield, I came to the conclusion that it just didn't sit very well on the front of his belt. So to cover up the damage I did earlier I simply sculpted a satchel where the flasks used to be. I thought about cutting off the empty dagger sheath from the original figure and replacing it with a completely new dagger, however instead I simply sculpted a small nub at the top and called it a day. The idea was that the dagger fits almost entirely inside the sheath itself, much like a dark age Seax or a traditional Finnish hunting knife. At this point I've also drilled and pinned his feet in preparation for basing. I've also tweaked the shape of his right hand by filing and carving it a bit more so that it closely fits around the handle of the bow I picked out for him. Next, I created a base using a very handy texture stamp made by Happy Seppuku. Our campaign takes place in a rather wintery sort of place, so I will go back later and add some small piles of snow to reflect this. In an attempt to mirror the design aesthetic of his dagger sheath, I sculpted the sword scabbard to match with a raised bulge on top of a flatted base. I left it otherwise plain, as I intend to hang the shield on top of the scabbard much like a medieval buckler. Next, I flattened out the nub of his sword with a pair of smooth nosed pliers to create a rough disk shape to serve as the basis for a pommel. I also sculpted a flap on top of his satchel. I then sculpted a fairly basic hilt, using a combination of styles mixing a "viking" type crossguard with a later medieval style disk pommel with a peen block. I also sculpted a small throat around the top of the scabbard to suggest that it is actually hollow on the inside After test fitting the buckler, I realized that a portion of the scabbard was just barely visible underneath. It was probably overkill, but I sculpted a rudimentary belt attachment to fill this gap (because I'm weird that way and can't let things like this go). I then went ahead and glued the shield in place. I then glued the bow into his hand and glued the quiver on his back. I had filed out the opening in his left hand specifically to fit the bow I had chosen for him, so it didn't take much to get it to fit snugly in place. The bottom end of the bow rests directly against the lower part of the figure's clothing, which serves as a useful second anchor point for glueing (he is a tabletop figure after all). For the final step, I took the last bits of putty I had mixed and put them in little piles on his base, which I then stippled to make them look like little piles of snow. Next up is painting!

Done and done!

Kyphrixis Cloudy Grey, Violet Red, and Lemon Yellow 3 star Link to show off thread: Link to WiP thread Photos!

Right, what with Reapercon being over I've been able to go back and finish this guy up. Total time wound up being about 4.5 hours from start to finish. Here is a link to the finish pics in the show off section.

Well, here is my Dragon in the show off section!

Right, so for those of you who haven't seen it, Cyradis, Sirithiliel, and Pezler the Polychromatic launched the Random Rainbow Dragon Challenge last month (check it out! http://forum.reapermini.com/index.php?/topic/76666-the-seers-and-a-wizard-present-a-random-rainbow-dragon-challenge/), and I couldn't resist the temptation to enter. I chose Kryphrixis for my, er, test subject, and I wound up getting Cloudy Grey for my primary color, Violet Red for the secondary color, and Lemon Yellow for the tertiary color. I took the 3 Star challenge, which meant I could only use the original three colors I rolled, plus black and white. WiP is here: http://forum.reapermini.com/index.php?/topic/76990-ironhammer-is-taking-the-random-rainbow-dragon-challenge/ So here is the finished figure! This really was a speed paint in the end, all told it took me somewhere around 4.5 hours. Cheers! Thanks to Cyradis, Sirithiliel, and Pezler for organizing this, I had a lot of fun with this guy!

Yes, it was the armor layout which inspired me to convert her to a gladiator. It just seemed like a perfect fit for her. Thanks! The competition has already ended though, and there were a lot of fabulous entries which far surpassed my own. The results were posted on facebook here, they're really worthing checking out! https://www.facebook.com/events/628589544011960/

Same here, color theory has long been something which has kind of scared me, but I've slowly picked up enough tidbits over the years that when I decided I wanted to lay this palette out really carefully I already had kind of an idea of where to get started. I wound up learning an awful lot of stuff in the process, and most of the what I posted were things I came across while working on this specific project, which I then had to apply to my specific situation.

I did this figure up for the quarterly painting competition. I made a weapon swap to turn her into a female gladiator, with a gladius blade pulled from the spare parts bin and a scratch built fantasy scutum, which was made mostly from sheet styrene. The scorpions are freehand. Apologies for my rather sub-par photography!