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This past week I painted the Drys, Dryad, figure from the Bones II, Sylvan Creatures set. Since I was in kind of a Frostgrave frame of mind when I was thinking about painting her, I decided I would try to paint her up in winter colors, like a dryad that has been unexpectedly awoken from her Winter sleep, and is not happy about it. Photos linked for nudity: Photo 1 Photo 2 Photo 3

I need to get busy this year, my numbers aren't keeping up with last year. So I decided to push myself this month and finish off all 30 of my skeletons in one month. They're only skeletons, right? First step was gluing them to their reaper plastic bases, then milliputing the bases they come on to blend more evenly over the new bases. That took about 3 nights of work (I did some gnolls too so that once done I wouldn't have to do too many mass milliputs for a little while). I'm putting the first coat down on the bases now, en masse. Sometimes I have trouble getting color to cover the greenish of the milliput so I like to do two coats and am getting that going. Anyways, I know skeletons are probably boring, but thanks for reading!

I am just calling this "Tiik Abomination" because it looks so much like Julie Guthrie's Tiik Warriors, apart from the extra set of arms and what looks like Cthulhu on its loincloth. But that's just my name for it; I don't know what Reaper will officially call it when it is released in their store. Anyhow, to start with I prepped and primed it with Reaper's Brown Liner, then washed a light turquoise blue over it and a medium red-orange I had mixed up on the base (because for an undercoat for sand any warm color will do). I mixed up a cream color and painted the creature's teeth and loincloth and washed a layer of it over the base for sand.

I just completed the Alistrilee, female elf archer, figure from the Bones II Core Set. I had actually put this figure in my Bones "out" box when I first sorted my Kickstarter. But since I have been bitten by the Frostgrave bug recently, and needed to boost my warband recruits, I pawed through the "out" box to look for suitable candidates who look attired for winter adventuring. I had culled this figure originally as it is rather plain and lacks a dynamic pose, and I already had a selection of elf archers from Bones I, but her hood and cape made her perfect for exploring the ruins of Felstad. And for those of you who like a close-up to see the details: I'm really pleased with how this figure turned out, and in the end I'm glad she was rescued, as I think this figure has a lot of subtle grace to it, that I missed on first passing. For the complete painting write-up, please see my blog: http://allbonesabout.blogspot.com/2015/09/alistrilee-elf-archer-bones-ii-figure.html

I have trouble with bigger "miniatures". Maybe its impatience, or that fact that I can't hold them very well to get good details. Anyway, this guy came out ok.

So I'm painting up some of the Bones II Mouslings to be used as ship's crew and NPCs in a fairly weird game. These aren't all of them. There's also a mouse king and queen (with pointy hat with veil), a samurai, and a classic wizard, all nice but not quite for my purposes. To be honest, I have mixed feelings about the buxom little "girl" mice. I prefer to think of all Mouslings as something you'd have to be a mouse to tell the difference, like in real life. But gosh, they are cute. At the moment I am referencing real mice for coloring. One Mousling is going to be black, one white, and four a kind of mousy brown. There will probably be some variation on this. Here the six I'm doing are, cleaned up and washed with Reaper's Brown Liner, and a bit of paint added to the white mouse. Here the basic colors of the fur are blocked in and I've painted their tails and ears pink. Black mice seem to have a slightly darker pink, but on the whole all mice seem to have delicate pink tails and ears. Real mice have tiny, pink, handlike feet, while the Mouslings have more teddybear-like paws. I am compromising by painting their fingers and toes pink.

Continuing the aquatic theme in my miniatures, here's the Bones version of Bobby Jackson's Eregris Darkfathom, Evil High Sea Priest, not yet in general release. He's got a lot of wonderful robe layers vaguely reminiscent of scallops in their shells, some nasty looking weaponry, and a tiny, difficult-to-reach face inside a fish-shaped helmet. We'll see if I can do him justice. Anyhow, to start with the usual prep for Bones: Scrub with a soft toothbrush and dish soap in warm water, trim off some of the flash (I only did a bit of that), and prime with Reaper's Brown Liner, the wonder paint. I mixed up some ocean blues and started in on the lowest layers of his garments. His base I painted in a peachy orange I had lying around on the principle that any old warm color works fine as an underlayer for sand. I also tossed a bit of the orange lightened up on his face tucked in the helmet there. I mixed what I would call an extremely medium green and painted it over the sort of snakeskin hanging down his front and the fish helmet. I mixed up an ivory yellow and painted the fish mask teeth, the knob on the end of the fish mask lure, and the sand on the base. I also brushed a much warmer olive green loosely over the medium green parts, but it may not be easy to see. Here is the priest's face. It really is well sculpted and molded, but wayyyy in there. The last thing I did this painting session was paint his weaponry black. I'm not sure if I'm going to paint it silver or leave it blackish, but either way a black underpainting is the way to go.

I just completed the Stone Giant from the Bones II Expansion Pack 1. I couldn't find his catalog number, so sorry for not including it in the title. Didn't there used to be a pinned topic here with a link to the item numbers for Bones II figures that hadn't entered the official catalog yet? In thinking about what color to paint him, I decided I didn't want to do him just purely stone grey, but wanted to give him a a slight hint of pinkish flesh-like skin tone to help differentiate that he isn't just another grey troll. For the complete write-up on how I painted him, please see my blog: http://allbonesabout.blogspot.com/2015/09/stone-giant-bones-ii-figure.html

This one started out primed with Reaper Brown Liner (not shown). First I very thinly washed color over it, green on the base and two shades of blue over the body, allowing the Brown Liner to show through.

This is Julie Guthrie's sea hag, part of the core set of the Reaper Bones II Kickstarter. To begin with, I cleaned up the flash some, scrubbed her with soap and warm water, and primed her with Reaper's Brown Liner. When that had dried nicely I painted up her flesh with a pale sky blue and layered first a brick red color, then a pale yellow on her base for sand color.

Here is my version of Mudcroak (Bones). I love him! The store only had 1 or I would have purchased several more and will be getting more as soon as I can. I had a great time painting him and want to do several other froggy patterns. I also purchased the frogmen...well frogman as only one was in the package. (Sad face) I am planning on painting that one with the typical tree frog bright green with orange feet pattern. I need more frogs! I painted this little guy while I was waiting for the water effects to dry on my exchange mini. So, here is Mudcroak in all his poison dart frog glory! (The sun is very bright this morning so the pictures a brighter and more heavily shadowed than I would like but I wanted to show him off now and not wait!)

I just started painting the Stone Giant from the Bones II Kickstarter, and I can't determine what are the series of cylindrical objects he has strapped to the front of his belt. I've thought perhaps a rack of ribs, or a pan flute, but neither seems quite right. I looked at the painted example on the Reaper Store, and they're just painted grey. Are they Dragon's teeth? Tent pegs? Anyone know for sure?

Last week I posted a photo of a Bones II Sharkman figure that I painted like a regular shark: http://forum.reapermini.com/index.php?/topic/63885-sharkman-77278-from-bones-ii/ This week I completed another one of the Bones Sharkmen, but I wanted to do something a little different with this second one. The first Sharkman I painted just like a normal shark would look: so this one I wanted to do more as a creature who had adapted to life on dry land. Perhaps a desert land where all the oceans had dried up. In keeping with that, I wanted to do this one in more a brown scheme like he had evolved to blend in with the surrounding dry rocky landscape. For fun, I thought I would keep a little bit of his ancestor's grey coloring in his tail. I'm pleased with how this different look turned out. For the complete write-up on how I painted him, please see my blog: http://allbonesabout.blogspot.com/2015/08/another-sharkman-desert-version-bones.html

I completed the Sharkman figure this week from the Bones II Core Set "Under the Sea" group. I didn't like this figure at first because it is sculpted oddly, so that the whole body of the Sharkman is slanted off to one side. I have looked at a couple of these figures, and they all seem to share this quality. It doesn't seem to be a typical Bones bent leg problem, but actually the way the figure is constructed. I decided that putting something under the foot on the tilted side might help bring the figure back up into alignment. Also, there were gaps where the shoulders attach to the body that needed to be filled. My solution was to use some 2-part epoxy putty to prop up the leaning leg by making a rock for the figure to stand on. I also used the epoxy putty to fill in the gap now created by the different angle of the foot on the other leg, as well as the gaps in the shoulders. It was an easy fix, and in my opinion improves the figure. I'm pleased with how Mr Sharkman turned out. And I think the base turned out suitably so that he won't look too out of place either on land or an underwater setting. I may go back and hit the eyes with a little gloss varnish as I think they look a little flat and not beady enough. For my complete write-up on painting the Sharkman, please see my blog: http://allbonesabout.blogspot.com/2015/08/sharkman-bones-ii-figure.html

This week I completed the Mountain Troll from the Bones II, Expansion Pack 1. I tend to hesitate to select the large figures to do, as I somehow find the prospect of painting them intimidating; and I want to try and make more of an effort to work on them in the future. This guy, for all his size, was a nice easy figure to complete. For the complete painting write-up, please see my blog: http://allbonesabout.blogspot.com/2015/08/mountain-troll-bones-ii-figue.html

This week I completed the Ice Troll from the Bones II "Expansion Pack I". I'm particularly pleased with how his face came out. For the step-by-step painting write-up, please see my Bones painting blog: http://allbonesabout.blogspot.com/2015/06/ice-troll-bones-ii-figure.html

This week I also completed the three Barrow Warden figures from the Bones II, Expansion I set. In looking at the figures, and thinking about how I wanted to paint them, I got the idea of them being from the barrow they guarded, and the image of them being buried in their armor... I had the thought of how old rusted iron looks after it's laid around in the dirt for a while. So the idea hit me to paint them entirely in a decayed rusted scheme. Then I thought I wanted to do more than just give them plain skeletal heads, so I got the idea to give them some sort of magical looking green glow-y heads. I thought the brown rust, and the green heads would look good together. For the complete write-up on the step-by-step I used for painting these, you can see the full article here on my blog: http://allbonesabout.blogspot.com/2015/06/barrow-wardens-bones-ii-figures.html

Finished the balor fire demon that my roommate got from his Bones II fulfillment that I started forever ago tonight. There are some things I could do to make him better, but honestly I'm kind of sick of looking at him and painting over him. I've never painted anything this size before. I learned quite a bit. Like that I should probably paint before assembling (which fills me with dread because I already assembled the minotaur demon and I want to paint him too). Anyway, I haven't seen many of this guy painted yet. He's a fun sculpt I think. I was going for sort of lightning runes on his sword, but I don't yet know/have the brush control/have a small enough brush to be able to pull that off. So. Blue it is for now.

He's too cute to be one the of the deadiest lizards.

This guy reminds me of a medieval Darth Vader.

I've actually been working on this off and on since my roommate's Bones II fulfillment box arrived. I've never painted anything this size before. It's been daunting, honestly. I also realize I should have painted the pieces separately before I glued him together. Which brings up a question: good way to pull apart pre-assembled Bones? Some that showed up aren't glued all that well and will be a nightmare to paint assembled. I haven't found a good advice source for how to do this (though admittedly I haven't combed through here completely).

I'd like to guess this one is a hero. She seems to have a pleasant demeanor. However, aren't centurions usually bad guys? Like in movies, and books, and bibles. Whatever, Hero.

The last of my Hero/Villain set. This one is a no brainer. I imagine instead of a Holy Avenger this Anti Paladin got a Demon Shield. It's her side kick. Talks to her, has its own personality, etc. That's why I painted it a completely different color than her. I have a double of this mini minus the ax arm. I think i'll make it a Half Orc.

Not sure if this guy is supposed to be a Hero or a Villain. Either way I imagine he's pretty punctual.

With the majority of my painting backlog cleared, I decided to start on some of the Bones II models. Being a fan of the undead, and having bought additional skeletons I decided on this batch of ten models to start off with. The models were cleaned up, washed and then glued to some round bases, green stuff was then used to finish these off prior to a black undercoat. The models were then left out to dry for a bit, I plan to dry brush the bone onto these models to give them an ancient dirty look.. As always comments or suggestions welcome.