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This week has been a week of experimentation. I tried my first NMM this week and my first attempt at actually shading hair rather than just dry brushing it like I have forever. I still have free time, so I have been able to keep the production level up. My players will be starting a new adventure soon, and I need a whole new set of monsters. Oh gee, how sad, I have a bunch of new minis that I "have to paint" (He says to his wife). Centaur The week did not start out well. I was cleaning up the mold lines on this bones centaur (which are not conveniently placed) and I almost cut off his nose. This is not a figure that I was particularly excited about so I just slapped together a paint job and moved on. No fixing that nose. Tried to make the base pretty though. Brigands Just like last week, I painted the bones brigands (one more set to go). These were intended more as practice faces and a little NMM on the guy on the left and the ax. I think it didn't come out too bad. and the faces are characterful. These guys will be the random ruffians/bandits that get thrown on the table now and then. Aeowyn Silverwood I had a little success with the face on this one. I also tried to do some shading on the hair. Only after I started did I read that black hair is actually a little tricky to highlight. This was a start. I planned on NMM here but chickened out and moved on. Nalani, Dancing girl Working on skin tones and hair highlights on this one too. The metallics here are so small that I didn't even try NMM. I feel like the highlighting on the hair and the dress came out well. Nemesra, Dancing girl This one was an attempt at translucent clothing on the legs. Townsfolk V Grandmother The face came out as surprise, but that works for me. Nolzurs Griffin Just a fun figure to paint. Humblewood owl Here is the owl knight from Hit Point Press's Humblewood setting. This one is the best of this week I think and he's also adorable. Big shout out to Wickedshifty who I copied for this mini. They did the NMM that I wanted to try and did it so well that I had to copy it just for practice. The front came out good, but the helmet on the back is not quite right. This has given me some confidence for more experimentation. I will probably look around for a mini that is really shiny to try it out on. . I doubt that I can keep this level of production up as I am trying to push my level of painting up a bit. But I am making a big dent in my pile of mini's. Let's see what happens next week.

The goal was to keep the same colors used across the three of these baddies as if they are in a gang. I tried to use a Drakenshade wash to mimic black over the zenethal primed area. Didn't work like I had hoped, but the navy shade doesn't look too bad. These guys have a LOT of hardware hanging off of them from satchels (he purse), sacks - to hold coins, scabbards, and straps. Basically I spent most of my time doing all the accessories over the larger areas. I'm still not done! I did these three at the same time as my toads and goblins, so I had time to shift between all of them while I waited for the stupid 4:1 wash mix I made with GW wash and Vallejo glaze. Took FOREVER to dry. On one of my toads it's been well over 4 hours - still not dry in deeper areas. Better use of zenithal priming. Made for less work in the shaded areas, which I made it a point not to try and paint some of those areas no one would even see anyway. Much better use of tie. Win. I'm still having difficulty with wood textures. Ican't figure out a good color to use and then wash/highlight with to make it look like wood. I'm not trying to do 4 layers, but just there's got to be a better mix of 2 colors and wash. I'd hope. I did Khaki with a Nuln Oil wash and it did okay. The big win for me on these three was the use of the Flesh Tones from Reaper. I started with the Fair Shadow, then a Reikland Flesh wash, then came back with Fair shadow, and used the Fair tone to highlight. Since these are brigands I didn't think going lighter was necessary. I mean, they probably bathe like once a month. I think "fair" is being kind to their complexion. So far they are good, but I think I will do more use of dark colors on top and lighter colors underneath. The hooded dagger guy I think didn't come out great with a lighter color on the top. I should have done dark brown on hood and khaki underneath. Meh. I'll still need to highlight and bring out some of the straps/threads. Would love any feedback y'all have at this point. Also - the eyes are getting better. I watched someone say make their eyes aim somewhat like they may be looking down at something. It helped me hit a focal point when doing the eyes. They came out okay. Only one of them looks like he may have taken a few shots from Mike Tyson, but...he's a brigand.

How's it going everyone? Got a handful of baddies to show off today. Painted these a few months ago and still pretty proud of them. They're a mix of the Brigands from the Bones 4 Core, and the Bandits from Bones 3: Stoneskull Expansion. Painted them up to match. They'll work great as bandits, thugs, mercenaries, or militia men. Very versatile figures. They were also a great opportunity for me to practice my face-work. Brigands (3) 77707 I'm assuming the upcoming bones "Brigands" are in fact these three. Lovely little models. I'm a big fan of the slightly chunkier bones models that have been coming out lately. They tend to have larger surface areas and better-defined edges. They also tend to have less clutter. This makes for an easier, cleaner paint job in my opinion. More Photos below the Spoiler: Bandits 77507,77508,77509,77510 These four are from the Bones 3 Stoneskull Expansion. I've had them sitting around for awhile, but decided to paint them up with the Brigands. They have similar enough designs to fit together. In general, I like their design less, but once I painted them up that didn't matter. Perfectly serviceable mooks! More Photos beneath the Spoiler: Who's your favorite of the bunch? I'm partial to the Executioner myself, with the Bandit Bully taking a close second.

Once again I'm trying to pull myself out of a painting slump (this one stretching for most of the year). I recently attended my first paint workshop. While I mostly learned how much I have to learn, and that air brushes are pretty cool, I did rekindle some of my desire to paint. And in an atempt to keep it going until the holiday break I thought I'd try a WIP thread. I've been holding on to the brigands from Red Box Game for some time now... so no time like the present. First up (actually second...) is Smarty Sean. And his hood going from highlighted then shaded (first pic) to mostly done for now. And the first miniature is Burt the Brash (but I didn't take any pictures until now). So here he is with his face and hood done for now. Next will be the tunic I think.

This trio may not have come from a Kickstarter, but they went into the factory line at the same time as my November Kickstarter paint projects. It's just a group of low-lives styled after those in "The Witcher" video game series, heavily converted. The crate in the group shot came in my ReaperCon swag bag.