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This is a 3D printed bard I picked up cheap at Reapercon; he was part of a batch of misprints I bought. Quite a few were still useable in my opinion. This guy for instance had the left foot broken off, but the part was present, and it was a clean break, so very easy to glue. He's also supposed to have a feather on his hat; that wasn't present, so I cleaned up the break and painted it as a badge instead. I wasn't sure if he was supposed to be a halfling or a goblin since he's barefoot, has hairy feet, and he's dressed fairly well, but he's also got huge ears and exposed lower canine teeth. I went with halfling, and found out it's supposed to be a goblin when I saw the figure on Etsy. Oh well, maybe he's got a little goblin in his blood from a few generations ago. There IS a reason he's on a pirate ship, after all. Let me know what you think.

Hello All, Here is a 44145 Dragonfolk: Bard I completed a few weeks ago. Thank you for looking.

I like the way this one came out. I tried to match realistic fox coloration as much as possible. I went for a Romani-inspired wardrobe. I wanted the verticle green stripes in her skirt to be subtle, but I think they actually ended up being a bit TOO subtle (you can barely see them). I guess it's just an old, faded garment. 🙂

Another one from that Path Miniatures bulk lot. Overall, I like his design (I could have done without the glasses, though). My buddy used this mini to play a bard a while back. The character's background was that he was a smuggler. So...I painted him up in the clothing of the most famous smuggler I know of 🙂

"Born with an innate love of music, (stringed instruments, in particular), Gunnar spent his formative years aspiring to be the greatest bard the realm had ever seen. Sadly, his Dwarven heritage left him with thick, stubby fingers that were more suitable for crafting and battle than they were for making music. For years, Gunnar was told to forget his dream of plucking strings and focus instead on the joy of metalwork or the fury of combat. But few things are more tenacious than a determined dwarf with a dream. Always one to keep his ears open, Gunnar soon heard rumors of a mystical instrument that could be expertly wielded by anyone brave and lucky enough to find it. After years of searching and struggling, Gunnar was finally rewarded with the object of his quest high above a misty mountain. Now, he churns out an endless stream of heavy metal to amp up his companions in battle and terrify their enemies!" I got this set of bulk minis from Path Miniatures on Amazon (it's a great set, btw). It contained four identical dwarf clerics with warhammers. It's a great sculpt, but certainly not the kind of thing I needed four of. One had a hammer that was too warped to reshape, so I carefully cut it away with the plan to add some other dwarf-like weapon at some point. THEN, I got this Starlink figure at Dollar Tree (named "Razor Lemay"). She had an electric guitar strapped to her back, which inspired me. I cut it off, was pleased to find that it fit nicely in the dwarf's hands, and Gunnar Thunderaxe was born! I also added some spikes to his armor to make him more metal. Enjoy!

Good evening to all of you in the final week of the Kickstarter! Not at all related to Kickstartes, but once a part of one, this next miniature is a female Halfling Bard, sculpted by Mike Evans at Stonehaven Miniatures. This mini in itself was part of his Halfling Kickstarter, which created a hole bunch of different hobbits, guys and gals, with different professions and adventuring classes. and a close up of her face: Once again, no idea on the colors I wanted to use, so I basically just went for the skin, face and hair, and then had to start working on her attire, inside out, shirt first, later pants and then hat and armor. Ended up with this yellow, blue and pink pallet, which hopefully doesn't clash too much! Anyhoos, enjoy and put in your Kickstarter bids!

Continuing with my group of under-represented character classes, I painted up this bard from the Ral Partha set “Female Adventurers”. I’m not sure who the sculptor was; the range was a mix of Mize, Guthrie, and Meier. I’m trying to use some colors I don’t use as often on these; hence the lavender shirt. This is a fairly petite little figure. I know @72moonglum would have highlighted the nail polish 😂, but I can’t see that on the table. How petite, you ask? Scale creep, anyone?

I went for a goth/rock chick look with black, violet and purple. Her hair is turquoise, highlighted with sky blue.

I hope this one gets re-implemented in Bones USA. Very cool, fun and funny model. The quality of the model wasn't so great, unfortunately. On the bright side though: I knew she needed a pink hair! And a pink hair was really asking for bright green armor and purple vest! 🙂 (All sorts of comments are always welcome!)

This is the Reaper Bones Familiar from the Stone and Familiar set (SKU 77390). He will be an important bard NPC in a Savage World game I am hoping to run sometime soon.

So after a substantial break from painting I purchased a new toy….a resin 3D printer (as I don’t have enough unpainted minis). So far I have enjoyed printing some minis even though my favorite will always be pewter. My first choice to paint of the batch I printed to knock off the rust was this pretty lady Nihae. I printed her at 87.5% as Artisan Guild is too large to suit the rest of my collection. She is about the size of a standard reaper mini printed at this scale. I printed some ferns and quickly put her on a base so she is ready to hit the table sometime soon. C&C welcome.

I felt like a slightly less involved project after Vlad, so I decided to paint Elliwyn Heatherlark. I swapped her weapon with a gladius from the Agema Romans and also decided to give her a more interesting item than the small shield she originally carried. As it happened it got again more involved, as I sculpted a Nure-onna, basically a snake with a human head, that she defeated in battle. Worked out well with the pose and provided me with the opportunity to experiment with gore effects. C&c very welcome. You also find the WIP thread here: https://forum.reapermini.com/index.php?/topic/89770-elliwyn-heatherlark-gnome-bard-77164/

Continuing with my showcase of old Player Characters for Frostrun, we have Nox, the Drow Bard, represented by Astrid, Female Bard. Nox was a fun challenge and one of the few times that I played around with color palettes online, and tried out some test drawings to really decide on colors and patterns ahead of time. Settled on black and dark grey for the main colors, with red for pattern accents, and purple for a dash of flavor. I feel it lands properly in the category of a dark entertainer without reading too much like a Harley Quinn knock-off. Though the player she was designed for loves Harley so I'm sure the similarities were appreciated. Reverse side under the spoiler: Nox is a Drow Bard and a newcomer to Frostrun. Nox left behind her home in the Underdark to seek out a life of adventure and fame as a traveling entertainer, but soon found herself on the wrong side of the law. With nowhere else to go, Nox has turned towards Frostrun, the edge of civilization. A place where people are judged not by their past, but by their ability to survive. Unfortunately, a dark force has threatened her one chance at redemption. Will Nox rewrite the tale and come out a legend? Or will darkness have its way and leave her as a footnote in someone else's song? Read her story and check out the rest of the Frostrun project HERE.

So my fellow players wanted to get Hero Forge custom characters, and as the only painter in the group I did them up. The bard was in metal, the other two in resin. My goodness are the surfaces rough and the detail shallow! I was a bit embarrassed to hand them over, but they really liked them - it was super important that the figure was exactly the design they wanted. It was an interesting bit of calibration for me and how to enjoy the imperfect. I think the barbarian came out the best and my favorite bit to paint was the violin.

Been on a painting spree these last few months, in fact Cassie is mini 52 painted so far this year, out of my original goal of painting 50 all year. First up is Elliwyn Heatherlark, Gnome Bard (SKU 77164) which is the bones version. The details were a bit soft, but she is totally serviceable for table-top. Next up, Blink Berenwicket (SKU 3689), the super spunky female gnome warrior in metal. The sword didn't really turn out, and I should have had a side view... Metals are shaded metallics. And last but not least, Cassie, Female Gnome Wizard (SKU 77031) in bones and mini number 52 of the year.

Painted for one of my Player characters. Almost a speed paint. Original goal was to get done quickly, but started to take a little more time with her than I planned.

Another delightful sculpt from Oathsworn Sensible Shoes line, the Tabaxi Monk/Mage/Bard (SS38). Had some trouble settling on the color scheme, so she sat half painted for quite a while.

Howdy, He sings the song of his people... Sing it baby, Kev!

In an unusual turn of events, I ended up painting the same miniature three times this week. First one was for a customer who wanted the bard from Dark Sword Miniatures but without the pipe in his hand. So it was replaced with a glowing musical note. Red armour, blue clothes, yellow cloak. While I was working on it, a different customer wanted the same bard but just a quick paint job for a sidekick NPC in his D&D game. Of course, no pipe for the second bard either. Brown armour, green cloak. I think I spent more time on the base than painting him. While I was working on the second one, the first customer decided he didn't like the colour scheme and could I change a couple of things. No problem, I'm happy to do it. But there is OSL and all kinds of other stuff, so it was actually much easier just to start again from scratch. So I painted him a third time. Red cloak, grey clothes.

On Wednesdays I’ve been playing in Storm King’s Thunder at my FLGS, and since I have lots of minis, I’ve basically been providing the minis for the game, including for my fellow players. However, in spite of how expansive my collection is, I don’t always have a perfect match… sometimes not even close to a good match. This was the case for the party’s human warlock and bard. For the warlock, I was using an elven bladesinger, and the bard was a female elven bard, both from the Chainmail line. It was not a good fit for the rogue-like warlock, and my utter and total lack of male bards of any type was frankly astonishing. The monk was okay (also from the chainmail line), but as an asamar, the skin was wrong, and the colors of everything else was off too. So with my most recent order I selected some new minis. 14544: Ian, Ivy Crown Mage for the warlock 02500: Fergus the Weaver for the bard After washing them and taking care of a bit of flash and moldlines (very minor in both cases) I mixed up some greenstuff and pressed out new bases to match the bases I’ve made for the rest of the party’s minis from the Ruined Courtyard stamp from Happy Seppuku. Once the greenstuff was cured I spray primed them black, and then got to painting. I’m still blocking in colors, and checking with my fellow players to make sure they match what they picture in their minds. I used Tanned Flesh for the warlock and and bard’s skin, and NMM Gold for the monk’s skin. Beyond that I’m not really sure what to do for the monk… Waiting on feedback. For the warlock, I’m painting the tunic in blue, and I’m thinking about trying to give the impression of raven’s feathers for the mantle. The yellow accents will give a nice contrast to the otherwise black/blue/purple colors that’ll make up his pallet. The bard I’m less clear on how to paint him up. So far I’m going with a bright red tunic with some yellow/gold trim. We’ll see what feedback I get from the player going forward. More to come!

89012: Lem, Iconic Bard sculpted by Derek Schubert. This guy was supposed to be a speed paint, but I got too interested in putting diamond patterns on his clothes.

Howdy, This turned out to be a rough sculpt... Kev! P.S. Sing it baby!

So here's another homage figure I just finished. Ral Partha back in the day did a few figures based on popular figures of the time. The dwarf samurai I did recently was one, and here is another one, Elvis, King of the Bards. So hard to choose colors on him, so ended up kind of with a red, white and blue motif, kind of close to Fourth of July. He has some really small circular eyes, but they turned out surprisingly well. When I was editing the photos and got a good look at them, they were actually pretty decently laced. Anyhow, another great old Partha figure to enjoy!