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Still pretty new to mini painting (a total of 7 done 😅), but was feeling adventurous so took a stab at blending to create some layers in the fur. I only used base coats and dry brushing on the figure. C & C welcome!

Newbie post. I've only painted half a dozen or so figures so far, but I'm enjoying myself, and that counts, right?! She's painted with a mix of Reaper MSP and Vallejo Game Color. I haven't done so yet, but I think I'd like to start chronicling the colors I use for each future mini. 30001 Lysette, Elven Mage

So I'm thinking of running my Virtual Expo games using this VTT. Any opinions? thanks

Started painting during the pandemic but was really intimidated by basing. Finally picked up some supplies and based my first couple models. Really improved the overall quality and aesthetic.

So, before I go any further, I am an absolute rookie in the mini painting world. So, uh, prepare for the worst. Anyways, here's a trio of Kobold leaders. Yeah, I know there's six of them, but one got lost and the other two need a good bit more work, so it's just these three for now. As I said, I'm completely new to this hobby, so any friendly critiques are welcome! KNOWN FAULTS: I missed a couple spots on the first kobold leader's face. And a few other random spots elsewhere on all three. All of their bases look nasty... I didn't do their eyes, as I want to get a bit more familiar with this before I try doing something like that.

Hi all, my first post was answered by such warm and supportive folks I decided to have a crack at the ol' orc from Reaper mini training set #1. The left eye took me 6 tries (and twice that many curses.) Really enjoying this new hobby, first time I tried was back in 1983 and it was a disaster. Maybe patience does come with age. :) #separatedbutnotseparate

Hello all, I'm stuck at home the next couple of months like the rest of the world and thought I'd finally try again after my only failed attempt at painting minis thirty-five years ago. I got one of the Reaper Core Essentials kits and did my first one today. Honestly I just can't believe it came out at all. When I was a kid I didn't have anyone to give me advice like the awesome Reaper booklet did (washes, base coating, etc.) and I seriously have to say thanks for putting out such a well designed tutorial. I just bought the Layer kit and I look forward to learning from all the expert artists here.

After several iterations of painting and base, I'm finally happy with my Griffon and I'm calling it finished! The mini ended up looking a bit cartoony I did go for something else initially, but it seemed too plain for a griffon, so I was happy to exchange realism for 'striking'. More on PSA. And I just finished redoing the base -- thanks for support on the WIP board.

I'm very handy with a knife. Or so I kept telling myself. Until I cut off Cassie's index finger while trying to remove a few mold lines. Now, I'm trying to pass that particular incident off as a modification, but I'm not sure anyone is really buying it. Least of all Cassie. Hi everyone! Long-time lurker, but this is my first post, with my fifth miniature. Newbie painter, started with Reaper's LTP kits. This particular mini is one of my favorites, but I may have taken on a bit more than I can chew (or fix... with my hobby knife). I found a lot of good examples of well-painted Cassies here on the forum and decided to imitate one of the paint schemes I found. With mixed results. The amount of experience and talent around here is both inspiring and a bit intimidating. In any case, here she is, almost finished but not yet based. Haven't quite figured out what to do for a base. Is she in a forest setting, in a cave, in a desert? What would fit best with the current paint scheme? Will she ever forgive me for cutting off her finger? Questions, questions... /Cpt Tweet More on painting Cassie over at https://pocketsizedadventurers.wordpress.com/2019/03/31/playing-with-knives/

Hello! I am a very new painter, I have painted some minis in the past, not a lot though, but due to some jerks at a game store I stopped playing. Almost 10 years later, I have decided to get back into it and I present to you Mr. Webster the Giant spider. I had a lot of fun with this, and the paints were all from the Reaper Learn to paint kit core skills. This was my second time ever using washes and dry brushing, and I am really excited with how it turned out! Going to get him on a base soon, and introduce him to my players at D&D...

This is the very first mini I painted this year! :D

Sometimes, I feel really out of place posting a mini I painted as some of you guys are scary good mini painters, but I am just so darn happy with this mini and had such a blast painting her I wanted to share! And you can't improve if you don't try! Right? So introducing Pucket, the Halfling Paladin of Lliira. Aside from the gnome from LTPK this is my first Hero type mini. She's my character for my next campaign and I ordered her on HeroForge. There just aren't enough dancing halflings out there. I tried a lot of new techniques I've been reading about and am pretty pleased with the results. Her eyes look sort of like eyes! The bottle looks vaguely like there is something inside of it! I did totally chicken out on the armor, I was going to try to paint the decorative bits a different color but just didn't trust my hand/eye coordination enough. Now I just have to figure out a background reason for her to have purple hair and a shiny blue scabbard that my DM will actually buy. Also, can someone tell me how to do that thing where you drop photos under a banner you have to click to expand?

I finished the last of the LTPK2 minis! The last one I did was Hajad the Pirate. About half way through I realized my brush skills were not up to the task on blending the shadows and highlights properly so I decided to exaggerate them instead so he came out looking a little comic book arty. I am pretty happy with the end result but this mini was mostly a lesson in how much I need to practice building up thin layers and blending. Also he was an epic eye failure, so he's a blind pirate. C'est la vie Either way, he was a lot of fun!

It's been a slow few weeks painting wise because work wise has been crazy but I almost finished with the LTPK2. Here is Ingrid. I am pretty pleased with her and feel like I learned a LOT. She also has the best eyes I've been able to manage thus far. Everything else either gets just a black dot or no eyes at all. I apologize for the bad pictures, I am working on getting a proper background set up but for right now I just hold them up to the light and take a photo and hope it comes out well.

So this is my Super Secret Christmas Project for Mrs. Gargs (don't worry, this isn't all she's getting). Holiday Mouslings wonderfully sculpted by Gene Van Horne. I'm going to be giving this a go as a stocking stuffer for Mrs. Gargs. Now, I have no hope in heck of matching the beautiful paint job seen here, in fact, I'll be thrilled with a high table top quality on this as I'm just still new at this and don't get near enough time to paint as much as I'd like to in order to improve. That said, I do think I can at least get a halfway decent job done on this (by my standards anyway). However, it won't be without its challenges. In fact, I've identified three major hurdles already: 1. The Super Secret. You see, my painting desk happens to be the dining room table and sits roughly 15 feet away from where Mrs. Gargs is usually sitting while I paint, and we very much have an open floor plan. So, keeping it a secret will be the first hurdle. I will at least have a decent amount of time on Saturday while she is at work in which to get a good start, but I am very much a slow painter, so in addition to trying to do the best I can, I will also likely be trying to get stuff done quickly. 2. Ummm, yeah, there's a snow man. He's white. I haven't ever gotten a handle on white (admittedly still new). No getting around though, gonna have to give white a go. (Yeah, sorry, not gonna do a yellow snow man ;P). 3. Basing. I'd love to do something a little fancier than the stock photo, but that's probably the best I can hope for. I may have to go searching for the main piece of base though as I don't think these guys are all going to fit on a 50 mm base, which is the largest I have at the moment. I'd gladly sculpt something (and will consider any and all suggestions) but the next thing I sculpt will pretty much be the first. That said though, for using snow on a base (I have some snow flock from Army Painter) do you normally put down a layer of green stuff for the ground, or just throw it on the plastic/wooden base directly? At any rate, I strongly encourage/appreciate/request/etc. any and all feedback along the way. Criticisms, critiques, suggestions, etc. Its all good. One of the things I hope to accomplish out of this is actually improving! And if I pick up some new skills along the way, even better! So don't hold back, I'm going to be trying a lot of new stuff along the way here, so I really do appreciate any comments and feedback! As always, thanks in advance!

So here's my latest creation. I tried a different technique this time around by "overbrushing" for the the highlights on the skin and it was . . . ok. I can see it as a great way to speed the process along for a speedier paint job, and might be great for painting armies and units, but it does have its limits when it comes to blending. I'm also not sold on the blending in the armor as it did not blend real smoothly despite my best attempts but its a start at least. As always, any ideas, suggestions, critiques, feedback, etc. are most appreciated!

I’ve decided to start this creepy eye beast monster! So far I’ve primed the main body with Blue Liner and have blocked out the eyes in Rosy Pink, he’s totally going to have pink eyes because that makes me laugh and the rest of him will hopefully end up in shades of purple and blue

So I was gonna wait to post any WIPs until I at least finished LTPK2 but I picked up a few of the chibi Bomesvylian’s and decided to to skip ahead of the LTPK2 a bit and give Lou a try, mostly cause his creepy little face is so adorable! I primed him with 2 part blue liner to 3 part white primer so I could see the details better and to hopefully cover any errors I may make when adding shadows. My goal is for him to be mostly purple with bright green wings and tentacles. I saw a WIP Lou on this forum a while ago with the same colors and just loved it so I’m totally stealing the color scheme. I’ve got 2 layers of the purple base (Imperial Purple) on so far and I’ve decided on red (Brilliant Red) for the eyes. To hopefully keep him being too cutesy colors.

Couldn't resist the silly-ish title - it was originally going to be "Novice Painter, versus LTPK:Core!" but I changed it a touch at the end.. Bonus points if you read that as the Innkeeper from Hearthstone. :P While I have painted miniatures in the past, I've first and foremost never shown such results to anyone, and secondly went in blindly with those ones, and while I was happy with them at the time, I wanted to improve. Other things in life took over for a while, and then finally I said that's it, I'm either going to FINALLY paint my primered army of doom that was at Doom In June 2005 or I'm going to sell the minis I've had sitting in boxes for over a decade. So glad I found out about the Learn to Paint Kits, because that pretty much solidified that decision right then and there :P Anyways! At some point we were all at this stage, and while looking over the pictures I can see a number of things I can improve on (*cough* like my up close photography skills *cough*), but for most things... I'm happy with them. Especially the chain mail on the Orc Marauder. I just might have to retake some of these photos, because I realize looking at them that, uhm, first and foremost f1.7 blurs half the model, and secondly, I didn't get a shot of the backside of the Marauder's Shield, which I was also happy about. Oops. But before I ramble on for three pages......! Drybrushing feels sooooo weird, but it was starting to click once I got to Magnu, even if I wound up overdoing it in a few areas and it so wasn't a dry effect anymore. But that's life, we learn from our actions!

Finally got around to finishing up Ragnor Skysplitter by Privateer Press. Available in the Trollblood Starter Box for Hordes. Not my best work, but just reached the point where I needed to move on, and there are some parts that I really like. As always, any C&C would be most welcome! Cheers, Gargs

Edit: AH this forum is so unlike what I'm use to I have no idea how to format this sorry! Double edit: All my text is in the pictures what is this forum even help im drowning in quotes and i dont know how to get rid of them So! I just started painting, like... a week ago at most? After a trip to the game store to buy spell cards for our campaigns (4, each with a different dm, of player levels levels 3,1,1,1) we noticed and decided to invest in minis. Since I'm DMing two games (one with players who are not coming back, so likely a dead game, and one thats ongoing) and I'm the crafty one, I'm the most excited, and the one doing the actual painting. I wanted to try out different tequniques on the goblins, so they all look kinda different. I did basecoats on five of them, two black, three brown, and then I painted on with no base (and found that, so far, thats my favorite meathod) I tend to favor crappily drawn maps on manila drawing paper (downside, it has no grids. But we're going to try and get a sheet of plastic and put grids on that, so it can lay ontop my maps.) One big upside is its super easy to make crap ones (that one I spent time on tho) My players derailed into a cave (that the module specifically said "was not covered in this adventure) so I had to improvise. It took me 15min to design the entire cavern dungeon (while my players were writing down spells (this was before we bought spellcards) ) How rad is that for just 15 min and no warning? I named everything random words, so they couldn't tell what was next, or if they were missing anything.

I just got into miniature painting and decided to post on the forum to get some feedback and advice. This is only the second miniature I've ever painted. I'm pretty happy with how he turned out despite my lack of experience. I'm thinking of dry brushing his back a bit more for an even more intense frost/ice effect. I plan on varnishing and basing him as soon as the bases I ordered arrived. Any CC is welcome thanks for looking!

So, because I have a bit of Hobby ADD as I like to call it, and because I really wasn't in a painting mood yesterday but was in a hobby mood (go figure) I decided to start on my Hordes Two Player Battle Box. I decided in addition to getting started on this, and documenting my misadventures as a newbie hobbiest/hobbier? I would also conduct a bit of a product review along with it. I figure that this box is intended, at least in part, for new players, and as such, may also include those new to the hobby. So I'll document start to finish (fair warning, it will be a long time before I get it fully complete) while also providing commentary on the quality, etc. So, for starters, this is a compliment to the Warmachine game (could also be called the second side of the same coin). The two games are fully compatible. The box itself comes with a starting army for the Trollblood and Skorne factions (hence Two Player). From a pricing standpoint, the value of the box in terms of content is somewhat dependent on whether you are just looking to paint the models, or if you are also looking to get into playing the game. The box retails for about $90 but you can likely find it cheaper if you look around a bit (I myself got it for about 33% off). As for the contents, you'll get 28 minis (if my math/memory serves) divided evenly between the two factions. Additionally, you get various tokens and other bits you can use for playing the game but which are not related to the actual painting side of things. Fair warning though, those 28 models include 10 models in each faction that are part of the same unit and thus, will be fairly similar. If you were to buy the models separately though (or rather as they can currently be purchased outside the two player box) you'd pay about $150 retail, so from that standpoint, its a great deal. Even better is if you have a friend that is looking to get into it as well and you can split the box with them. I'm a masochist though and actually bought the box for the sake of having some of each faction and for the experience/joy/pain of assembling and painting them. Anyway, removing the non-model related items from the box leaves you with this: Huh, how bad could that be right? Well, I decided to start with the three troll warbeasts which are contained together in one of the plastic bags shown, and when opened, leave you with this: I seem to remember counting 24 pieces for the three beasts though I only see 22 here. Its possible there's a couple small pieces hiding, or that I just miscounted (no worries though, I know I'm not missing any pieces). As I prepped these for assembly, I ran into my first complaint. The mold lines on these pieces are quite plentiful, rather noticeable, and often times poorly placed (like right down the center of the face). Fortunately I am not a perfectionist and am willing to say "good enough" but the plastic mold lines do come up easily enough with a hobby knife provided you can get the knife in there. I got what I could, but didn't go nuts on it. We'll see how bad it looks when they get primed. As for assembly, these are actually pretty easy to assemble so far. The torso pieces can fit into any of the leg pieces and although the three beasts all carry a different armament, its easy to match the arms up with the torsos because of the shape of the pegs. The downside to this is that there isn't a lot of room for mixing and matching the pieces between the three. You could probably work the shield onto any of the three if you really wanted, and there's a pauldron that you could likely do the same with, but that's about it. That said though, assembly was pretty easy which is good for a product targeting new players. So here are the three beasts mostly assembled. The remaining pieces will be added later as I paint so as to allow better access to all parts of the models. From left to right are the Troll Bouncer, Troll Impaler, and Troll Axer who I shall call Dalton, Vlad, and Lizzie respectively. Dalton is currently a bit forward leaning and needs his shield in order to stand still for the picture. Or maybe he's just drunk, not sure. Anyway, next step will be priming and then they will probably sit for a few days while I a) work on some other models, b) let the primer cure (I use brush on) and c) go out of town. As always feel free to add in any questions and C&C (though not much to C&C yet I realize). :P

So with my ongoing RPG game heading into a new chapter, one that has a rather extensive focus on trolls, it was only right that I start painting up some of everyone's favorite regenerating, pyrophobes. So starting out with (from left to right) Lardgulp 2Headed Troll 02657 by S. Garrity, Bones Marsh Troll 77152 by J Wiebe, and the Bones Cave Troll 77004 by B. Siens. As you can see, the cave troll has already received a layer of blue liner to prepare for the rest of the paint job and has had his broccoli cut off to prepare for a rebasing (which will be a first ever attempt for me for this particular style of base. I do have another cave troll that might get added to this thread if time permits. I also have some Hordes trollbloods that will be used in the campaign as well, but will create a separate thread for them since they are a completely different company. Hoping to make some good progress on the cave troll at least today, though it is absolutely gorgeous outside, so will have to see. :)

Ok so I'm 5 months from 40 and never painted a model in my life. But a group of friends and I have recently started a D&D 5e campaign on guys trip and really got into it. However it soon became apparent that stick pins and grid board suck. So i wanted to get some minis for our game.... I was looking at pre paints but those are few and far between or over priced so watched a few Youtube videos... got an itch and firgured why the hell not.... so since i live in bumfuq nowhere i ordered from amazon and ebay the types of figures i needed for our characters a dwarf cleric, elf ranger, and elf mage.... i started with the dwarf, figured it would be easier as my friend likes alliance in WoW and always plays dwarfs but soon learned metal paints are a pain in the rump to me. the elf i did last night and i think i see improvement over the dwarf attempt. though seeing pictures brought out the flaws i hope fix before clear coating either one. i was in such a newbie rush i primed before triming the extra mold lines on the elf but really i seem to be missing the trick even with a new knife blade the lines seem to splinter or split and not come off the model. maybe i need files? seems like there were alot of defects on these plastic minis... my mage is metal and much better and detailed. Please let me know what you think and where i may need to ficus my attention to improve. Oh and any and all tips on mold line/imperfection removal definately appreciated :-)