skya

Yet another tribute to my love for Tom Meier's Sculpts. From George R.R. Martin's Fire and Ice, Melisandra. Done to Mr. Martin's specifications, she has milky skin, copper hair the color of a new penny, and a flame red dress. I must say this was probably the most fun commission so far this year.

My pictures arent going to end up being taken until the combo piece is finished as I have already attached it to the new base. I had been expecting that would be this week, but I'm rather behind on an illustration commission so it's gonna have to wait a bit I'm afraid.

I tell ya, the squirrels are evil, well ok, maybe they're just psycho, but still!

The goth fairy in Familiar pack six is pretty darned tiny. As are the ones from the first two Warlord familiar packs, though the male one with the spear is bigger then the others. For reference I'm pretty sure the base he's sitting on in the pictures on the fugre finder is a small size base.

The end result has a very interesting watercolor looking feel to it. Very different then some of the other styles of painting I've seen.

So theres this amazing comic series called ElfQuest. I've been reading it since I was oh, seven years old and I still regularly reread the entirety of it every couple of years. For their 30th Anniversary they are putting the entire series online for all to enjoy. I highly recommend that anyone who loves fantasy check it out, the stories are some of the best comics I've ever read; and I have to admit I have a bit of a personal investment as I'm doing the scanning for the project. So go! Enjoy! ElfQuest.Com

I wish... Wendy Pini is going to be there. It'd rock to actually meet her in person.

Woodland Scenics has a pretty good variety of nice trees. I think they tend to be about 3 for $10.

Was there ever a final answer on whether we're allowed WIP online? I'm hoping they are..

You know, the DaVinci's just dont do it for me. I've tried them, but they tend to get all spiky and splayed so much fast then the WNS7s that I actually get more brush time for the money from the Series 7s.

I think part of it is that shipping small packages overseas cost us more to send, but shipping larger ones for some reason costs us less. A priority flat rate envelope (I think they're about 8x12 inches) only costs $11-14 to ship most places in the world. Smaller packages arent much cheaper though. I'm not sure about shipping from the UK, but I do know that from Germany, Finland and Sweden it is much more expensive to ship something of equivalent size because the costs are based directly by weight as opposed to package size.

Not sure what scale you're looking for but snagging some plastic one off of kids toys isnt a bad idea either. You can get big bags of plastic insects at most toy stores. I've got a dragonfly I've been wanting to build that been threatening to do that with.

Havent done those since I was a kid, but I remember them being pretty fragile when dry.

*sticks out her tongue at the lack of size small t-shirts* :P' Dont you people have gamer kids you need to clothe or something? I know I cant be the only one who wants a small.

*falls over laughing* Intelligent, scientific, and amusing response noted and appreciated.

Very impressive. You've got clean lines, you obviously know where the highlights belong, and you're insane enough to be starting on NMM. Now to take it up another notch. As Sue always says. "higher highlights, darker shadows." Sometimes that just means sharper highlights as well. It's time to go up to white. but you have to do this carefully. The front picture actually shows the kind of thing you want to be doing on the highlights, you see how they go almost white on the silver? That's what you're looking for but more controlled. You want nice pinpoint little highlights on the points where the light is brightest. Then you need to make your shadows darker. Darklining is probably the best way to start doing this. Darklining requires thinner paint for control. Doug's recommendations are all good ones. Once you've got darklining and a some white highlights added I'd love to see how this is turning out. If you need some inspiration Benathai's Custodians are a great, if rather intimidating, reference material for placement of highlights and shadows on NMM. Trust me, you can do stuff just as good it's just a matter of time, patience and practice. You're obviously off to a great start.

I would normally say that the sky is too brilliant a color, but I've *seen* skies like that in New Mexico. It does look quite good and almost mirror like on the breastplate. The little dots in the upper corner add nicely to the effect. If you want to pull the viewer's eyes around the mini you might try adding a thin triangle of your highlight coming upwards on the other side like so: It certainly isnt doesnt *need* it, but it shows that earth/sky doesnt neccessarily need to be mirror smooth unbroken surfaces. The left kneepad however looks a little to perfect for a surface that has that much curve to it. As well as having as much sky on it as the breastplate which is facing more towards teh sky. If you pull the shadow on the inside side up a little higher and then ad some of those sparkly highlights over it it'll have teh feel of a smaller surface with more curve to it: I hope you dont mind me showing by tweaking your pics. I'm not real good at explaining otherwise.

Another good link about how to deal with lead rot from Gearge R. R. Martin's Website.

Browns arent always muted orange. Some of them are yellows, purples, even greens. You can actually take any color and turn it into a brown, though most of the brighter browns we minis painters tend to use end up being oranges.

Primer is specifically designed to stick well to it's intended surface while also creating a surface with enough tooth that paint will stick to it. The occasional black primer I have used is Armory's and while it isnt nearly as nice a surface to paint over as my regular primers it does seem to dry just fine. I have had Duplicolor recommended to me by friends, though I have no personal experience with it.

That was a ridiculously helpful amount of info. Thanks Joe, I'll have to experiments with some of that.

You gonna do He-Man too? ;)

I used to do a whole lot of selling of gaming stuff. I honestly havent done much in a couple years though I have a stack of ElfQuest comics and books, as well as couple of limited edition minis that I need to get off my butt and actually list.

I tend to mix Valleyo Camo Black Brown or RMS Blackened Brown in with my base color and use that. It's a bit purpley, but not overly so, giving a nice contrast to the yellow tone of the cream color without going overboard and making it blue.

I start dark and work light. I do add a few browns into my dark blues though. It depends on how blue you want the water. Real water is clear, to murky brown but it reflects the blue of the sky, so the lighting of you piece is an important factor as well. Sounds like you might want blues with hints of greens and browns, the greens from the color of the reeds. Anyways heres a few things I've tried: Water Nymph Egos Crossbow Chic