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There has been some talk on the boards of people's costumes, the wearing of them and how they change things and what people are working on. So I'd like to throw open the question, What is your costume? It can be any approach. Are you working on one now? Are you a fan who appreciates them but doesn't make them? Do you have a favorite costume? Do you have favorite memories of one? Do you like realism, or abstraction, history, sci fi, or fantasy? Does costuming connect to your gaming or other hobbies? When and where do you wear costumes? Are you making something for another person? Or for a doll maybe? What's your favorite one you've seen? What would you make if you had the materials and time? *** I'll start. I have a reproduction late-eighteenth century dress in a big floral print in shades of red and blue on white, complete with undergarments, big pockets, mitts, a ruffled cap, and cocked hat that I had been wearing to our neighborhood's annual Fourth of July parade. But I've been feeling weirder about it in the last few years since late eighteenth century dress has become political in a direction I am not. So I've found myself turning towards the struggles of the Suffragists a century ago. I've been reading old mail order catalogues from the First World War and checking out the eminently practical suits women wore at the time -- big pockets everywhere! At this point I have plans for nearly everything except a suit. I have undergear and petticoats, a blouse, nearly acceptable shoes, hats to be modified, a good pattern for spats, and a pageant-style banner edged with green and purple ribbon* ready to be painted front and back with "Votes for Women". At this point it would be nice to make a historically accurate suit, but looking at what I have, I think it would be a fairly convincing impression with any reasonably matched jacket and calf-length skirt. *Those are the colors of the English suffragists, not the US ones, but I'm okay with that.

Quick, easy and cheap. †Probably not good for you, but here is: Scavenger Hunt Lo Mein 1 package Top Ramen (beef or pork works best), 1/2 to 1 cup frozen Peas and Carrots two table spoons of cooking oil (olive preferable) one slice of lunchmeat (ham preferable) (optional) 1 egg In a small pot heat up the peas and carrots, when they are basically thawed put them in a bowl. †Dice up the meat into little pieces and toss it in with the veggies. Boil the ramen and drain off the water. †After draining the water add the soup spice package and stir up the noodles. †(For maximum efficiency use the same pot you heated the veggies in) In a sauce pan of sufficient size heat the oil for three minutes or so, no more than five. †The heat setting should be between low and medium heat and mix the stuff in the bowl with the noodles. †Put the noodles and stuff in the oil and mix gently for three to five minutes and it will be Lo Mein. You can add other stuff, if you whip the egg and cook it up omelette style, then dice it you can add it with the stuff in the bowl to the noodles. †I like to throw in some finely diced bell peppers. †The more stuff you add the less Peas and Carrots you need. You get about two adult servings. †Helps if you have something to go with it. †Eggrolls in the oven is a favorite of mine. †But, in keeping with the scavenger hunt whatever you find is fair game. †This has worked well for me on the no one wants to cook and no one wants to go out nights where we fend for ourselves. †Usually takes less than thirty minutes to make. It's not pretty, but it usually tastes good. † † † † † † † † † † † † † † † † † † :O

Last year PingosHusband, after noodling around Exalted (2nd edition) and World of Darkness rulebooks (Vampire the Masquerade 2nd edition, Werewolf the Apocalypse, Mage the Ascension, etc.), announced that he'd like to run an Exalted game set in the World of Darkness. We, his friends and loved ones, said “What, are you crazy? Have we not long joked about how unplayable and internally inconsistent the World of Darkness is; how its timeline makes no sense and its rules and worldbuilding are buried and often mutually contradictory; how foolish and suicidally incurious the various groups are regarding each other; and how so many of its many tragic angsty world-destroying problems could be solved if only each isolated group got its head out of its backside and actually talked to one of the others?” He said, “Hear me out,” and since we have long experience of his keen ability to run entertaining campaigns, we heard him out. See, PingosHusband has a knack rather like Alan Moore's ability to take unpromising old third rate comic book series and turn them into fascinating multifaceted mythic dynamos, or Neil Gaiman's ability to mine world mythology to create astounding and consistent and multilayered worlds, or James Burke or Kenneth Hite’s ability to take fascinating historical and technological developments and spin them into stories of human interconnectivity or disturbingly deep illuminati conspiracies for game use, respectively. More than once PingosHusband has taken historical oddments, played “What happens if this is taken seriously and assumed to make sense somehow?” and produced some wonderful story or game setting or world. (One of them won awards.) So apparently he did this with Exalted and World of Darkness, getting under the hood, finding the core of what worked and what didn’t, seeing what could be connected to what else and what made sense, what was clearly absurd, what needed tweaking, what could be fun, what couldn’t be possible, why things happened, and who could have done them. He looked keenly at characters, places and situations, saw potential for fun in a campaign, wrote up background, and presented us with an introductory players’ handout. I’ll get to particulars later. The simple version is that the world looks basically like the World of Darkness, except that all of a sudden a tiny number of people have Exalted with memories of the world of Exalted (“Creation”) and powers derived from it. There are five to begin with (the PCs), although more will come soon enough. I have to say, this game has so far been tremendous fun. Our group has been playing together for over thirty years and I have rarely seen all of us this excited about a game. Our teenage / adult children are also involved and we have been having vivid family conversations over meals about history, strategy, and characters. I’ve (of course) been painting up miniatures for the game. I’m having a lot of fun with these too. I’ll put links to Show Off threads when I have them up.

Happy birthday, @TheAuldGrump and @Inarah. I hope you enjoy this. Notes follow after the photos. This is Grenadier’s Hippogriff, #138 from the Fantasy Lords series way back in 1983, now sold in lead-free pewter by Mirliton Miniatures, Italy. It’s well sculpted, with securely fitting wings. I wanted to paint something different from the common hippogriff colorings, something with a little challenge to it. So I decided to go with several black and white patterned creatures. The front end is based on an osprey, the wings on a hoopoe’s, and the hindquarters on a zebra, all somewhat modified to suit the figure and to blend where the shifts happen. Whenever you’re going to paint a chimeric model, a creature made up of the parts of other creatures, it’s a good idea to go look at real animals to see how their colors and feathers and skins look, and also how they blend into other things. If nothing else, there are excellent visual resources on the internet. Technical notes:

Coincidentally, I had this figure very nearly done two days ago when the sad news of Diana Rigg’s passing was made public. It always was a tribute to her incandescent portrayal of Emma Peel in the old British TV show “The Avengers”, but now it’s a memorial as well. Requiescas in pacem, Ms. Rigg. The figure is “Pandora King (Classic)” from Crooked Dice miniatures. Crooked Dice has a minis game based on cult TV and they’ve produced a lot of different figures suitable for that sort of storytelling.

These are two copies of the Reaper Bones Large Earth Elemental 77185, sculpted by Kevin Williams. I saw someone, I can’t recall who, paint up, it might have been one of these, like cooling lava which I thought was lovely, so I wanted to give it a try. I painted the lava version very quickly, in a few sessions: A layer of butter-yellow intensified with yellow glazing, then laying on pure black paint rather thickly, then some washes of Quinacridone Magenta and some fiddling with that and yellow on the gems. The rock version I painted v-e-r-y slowly, in many layers over time, often with whatever paint was left on my palette from other paintings. I’m not sure when I started it, but since I haven’t painted any minis at all for the last year, it’s been some time. I thought it interesting how very different a sculpt can look depending on how you paint it.

Well, I've gone and done it. I got a YouTube channel and have started making a series of videos on matters of paint and painting. Okay, I say "series of videos" all grandly, but at the moment it's one video and a planned syllabus. But I have more planned! This is pretty much my first video ever. I was helped a great deal by my family members who have more experience in this. The first video is a paint comparison, looking at one of the new Liquitex Acrylic Gouache paints (Quinacridone Magenta, PR122) and considering its suitability for miniatures painting. Enjoy! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zwonRqv0Xgk

This was one of the half-finished minis in my end of the year finish-it-up pile. When the news about David Bowie's death broke I pulled him out to finish him. Shadowrun first came out in 1989. This figure (originally a Ral Partha, now from Ironwind Metals) came out in 1993. At the time the future aesthetic was terribly 1980s, and all the male elves looked like Bowie's Goblin King from Jim Henson's movie "Labyrinth". He is a decker. This involves having actual computer implants in his skull and having to carry around, in his hands, a gigantic 1980s-style keyboard and computer, because the future is not wireless. Ah, well. I'm not sure how well the figures sold, since Shadowrun is not necessarily a game that lends itself to minis scale combat (being prone to car chases and virtual reality). I like them anyway, as a bit of '80s retro-futurism noir.

This miniature is 15503C Nyamaunir Piratin, a catgirl pirate from Das Schwarze Auge (The Dark Eye, Germany's 1980s answer to Dungeons and Dragons). She's a little Old School and a little short even for that. I like that she looks like a cat who is a person in sensible pirating clothes. There was a WIP thread, but it didn't get very far.

This is Reaper's 14048, Fatima, Nefsokar Cleric. Or rather it will be when you click on the links because she's super NSFW, front and back. CLICK HERE TO SEE THE PAINTED FIGURE FATIMA, NEFSOKAR CLERIC. There isn't a WIP thread because I couldn't figure out how to make one that would abide by the board rules. But questions or comments are appreciated. The images are hosted on Instagram so you can post comments there too if you like.

I could have sworn I had started a thread already. Ah, well. Here's a drawing I did related to a vampire game, with an enlarged detail to show pencil work. It's 5 inches by 8 (12.7 x 20.3 cm). The detail is about 1.75 x 2 inches (4.4 x 5 cm).

Finishing up some minis, including a small coterie of spider centaurs and their demon mistress. These are two of Gene Van Horne's "Arachnid Archers". I had a lot of fun painting them. Front views are linked offsite because of nudity. Front views: http://i1067.photobucket.com/albums/u439/PingoPaints/Miniatures/Female%20Driders%201_zpspjgm3vbn.jpg http://i1067.photobucket.com/albums/u439/PingoPaints/Miniatures/Female%20Driders%202_zpsxvv1dozb.jpg http://i1067.photobucket.com/albums/u439/PingoPaints/Miniatures/Female%20Driders%203_zpsgye2xhwm.jpg I am especially pleased at how the red one came out. In person she looks translucent like a pomegranate seed: Companion pieces: 77180: Shaerileth, Spider Demoness and 77181: Arachnid Warrior WIP thread here.

Felicitations on your personal solstice!

This is the Reaper Bones 77371 Basilisk sculpted by Julie Guthrie. It's quite small - about the size of a large dog, with a wonderfully grouchy visage. I painted it up fairly quickly to illustrate a video about how yellow and black can be mixed to make greens. This was an example of the less vivid greens (For a really vivid yellow-and-black green, see my She-Hulk Show-Off thread). All the colors on the critter were mixed just from yellow (mostly Yellow Ochre, but also a little Hansa Yellow), black, and white. The video is here, if anyone cares to watch it.

This is Reaper's magnificent 50212 "Incredible Woman," sculpted by Bob Ridolfi. She's a great figure that can be painted up like a lot of (tall - she's a big one) women superheroes. Wonder Woman is on my wish list, and maybe Captain Marvel one day. This version is Marvel's She-Hulk from her classic days as one of the Fantastic Four, replacing Ben Grimm for a time. As a materials and techniques note, I didn't use any green or blue pigments in her skin. It's all mixed from yellow and black. This was partly to prove a point and is kind of central in the art video I posted on YouTube last week: Yellow and Black Make Green. Enjoy!

This is Stonehaven's Half-Orc Mechanist, a nice little character for the more open-minded steampunk campaign. The quote in the title of the thread is from Gail Carriger, author of the "Soulless" steampunk series. I actually finished him around Christmas, but I never put up the Show Off thread. So here he is. Questions, critiques and comments welcome. WIP thread here.

This is Stonehaven's Half-Orc Nobleman, another nice and eccentric steampunk character. The quote in the title of the thread is from Beau Brummell. Comments, etc. welcome. WIP thread here. This is all paint:

This is Hasslefree HFD104 Drya Lafhelgasdottir, sculpted by Tre Manor, and not, as I identified all through the WIP thread, a Red Box Games dwarf. I think I was confused because she was by Tre Manor. She is also the last, the seventh, of the dwarves I painted for the project "Jade Green and Seven Dwarfs," an effort both to get some dwarves painted up for general gaming use, and to make a group of Jadeborn for a game of Exalted. This is a photo of all the project's figures together:

This is Stonehaven's Half-Orc Librarian, a pleasantly sinister and unassuming character. The quote in the title of the thread is from Neil Gaiman. Comments et alia welcome, natch. WIP thread here.

The Stonehaven Half-Orc Kickstarter fulfilled recently. The figures were really inspiring, and I have a use for several of them already. I'm in a campaign in a steampunkish world with many different races. Anyhow, these are the four half-orcs I'm painting up for it: the Gentleman, the Librarian, the Artificer, and the Pistoleer (not sure if those are official names for them). I have glued them to their bases, primed them white, and washed over them with Burnt Umber. I've loosely shaded in their faces with a grey mixed from Burnt Sienna and Phthalo Green and white, but I haven't added any facial details yet. The gentleman would of course be wearing gloves, so I haven't painted his hands yet. The Pistoleer probably would too, but I felt like painting her hands anyway. The Artificer appears to have bare toes sticking out of his exo-suit, or whatever it is.

Well, now. This is a bit of an unusual project. Earlier this year @malefactus kindly sent me some unpainted miniatures that he thought I could get some use out of. Among them was an already based and primed copy of Reaper's 14016, Judas Bloodspire, Necropolis Warlord, sculpted by the legendary Werner Klocke. I had already painted a quickie version the Bones version of the sculpt, 77160: Judas Bloodspire, Vampire and had discovered how fun the sculpt was, so I was pleased to have another to paint, especially since it was mounted on one of malefactus' inimitable bases. I am not entirely sure how malefactus put this together. The central cylinder and the base seem to be wood. He sculpted pavement on the upper base and added something like moss and his signature mushrooms and primed the whole thing in black with white brushed over it. In transit the cape (whose attachment is always a delicate piece of this figure) had come loose, so I cleaned the glue off it and set it aside to paint separately and rejoin later. While playing around with how to attach the cape I discovered a different angle of attachment from the standard pose which appears to be more stable, and which I plan to try. More details on that later, or you can check out the link. All paints used are Golden Matte Fluid Acrylics. Color mixes are (usually) noted, but not exact ratios. Questions are welcomed and I will try to answer them. Critiques are appreciated. Here the figure is almost as malefactus sent it to me. I have set aside his cape and already put a light wash of green on the mossy bits. This was a simple transparent mix of Phthalocyanine Green and Burnt Sienna, my go-to mix for foliage. It's completely transparent and acts like a watercolor wash. I layered on several coats of varying mixes of the two pigments, sometimes adding a little Ultramarine Blue, also a transparent color, or Hansa Yellow Opaque, which despite its name is only semi-translucent. This lets all of malefactus' shading show through. I like to paint skin and especially faces before the rest of the figure. I've been painting up my vampire figures with completely colorless skin mixed from Titanium White and Carbon Black, so I did that here. The metal figure has much more delicate details than the Bones. The fangs are a mix of Titanium White and Yellow Ochre and the lips and eyes are pure Red Oxide and Hansa Yellow Opaque with Carbon Black. For a color scheme I decided on a contrast to my Bones Judas Bloodspire, who had white hair, a red cloak, blue drapery and a rather misunderstood outfit (I had painted him very quickly, only intending him for tabletop use. I fell in love with the sculpt as I painted.) This one will have a dark blueish or purple cape (still thinking about that), a red greatcoat, and brown hair (maybe with some white streaks. I do like white streaks.). I didn't take pix of the hair painting, but you can see the results in the cape-position testing pictures here. His hair was, I believe, underlaid in a medium brown mixed from Burnt Sienna with a little Ultramarine Blue and Yellow Ochre and Titanium White, then glazed with Burnt Umber and maybe some Burnt Sienna too. (Browns are complex!) No highlights yet. I also painted malefactus' paving stones with a cold grey mixed from Ultramarine Blue, Burnt Sienna, and Titanium White, visible in some photos. Next: Beginning the figure.

Apparently I never started a WIP thread for this miniature. This is Reaper's 50304: Rowena Von Graaf, sculpted by Julie Guthrie, which I started painting a long time ago. She's a fun steampunk figure. All paints used are Golden Matte Fluid Acrylics. Color mixes are (usually) noted, but not exact ratios. Questions are welcomed and I will try to answer them. Critiques are appreciated. This is the way I usually start miniature figures: Lightly primed with Titanium White, then when that is dry, washing it over with Burnt Umber. Burnt Umber is a dark, transparent pigment that settles into crannies when thinned down and shows the details very well. It also gives a nice warm undertone to later paint layers. I decided to paint her with a pretty black face. Here's a close-up of her face. There are tiny white points which are microscopic unpainted pits in the figure. They are much smaller irl than they show up in the photographs. I am slowly (maddeningly) working to fill them in as I go. I decided to paint her underskirt pink. This is Quinacridone Magenta lightened with Titanium White. And the base coat on her dress and spats is straight Red Oxide. And this is where I left her (cough) about a year and a half ago. More to come!

This is Reaper's 59009: Mad Scientist, sculpted by Bob Ridolfi. I thank Reaper for proffering Victorian Science Ladies in Big Dresses, and I am looking forward to painting her up. I am, as usual, working with Golden matte fluid acrylic paints. This is my standard priming, a thin wash of thinned-down Titanium White allowed to dry for a day then washed further with thinned-down Burnt Umber. I don't know if I've mentioned, but this is a classic Italian Renaissance priming technique. I can't remember the term, but it translates as "veil" of color and is supposed to give richness to subsequent layers of color. In this case it also makes details pop. I clearly missed a few spots with the Burnt Umber. I will be repairing those as I go along. I started with her skin. I like the Foglios' "Girl Genius" comic, so she is a little inspired by them. They have plenty of diversity in their cast, and I thought this figure might look well with darker skin. I have found that Burnt Umber, a slightly cool, rich dark brown, makes a good basis for dark human skin. This is the first layer, a light scumble (like a glaze but using a lighter color over a darker instead of vice versa) of Burnt Umber lightened just a touch with Titanium White. Dark skin, I find, looks well with warm highlights based on Yellow Ochre. I painted her skin quite dark, so I made the highlights a little cooler, less Yellow Ochre and more Titanium White, admixed with Burnt Umber. Here she is with her skin finished and her eyes painted in. I washed some clear Quinacridone Magenta over her lips. Her eyes were pretty enormous to begin with and I made them even larger. I am thinking mauve for her dress. Purple ftw!

This is the mermaid from the old Grenadier boxed set #6004, "Monsters of Mythology" from their Fantasy Lords range. I used to have the set, once upon a time. This was one of my favorite figures from it (though I painted it very differently back in the day and I am pretty sure my memories of how well I painted it are seriously rose-tinted). There isn't a WIP thread. And because I do like to play around with photographic backgrounds and water effects:

Sobek was a complex crocodile god of the ancient Egyptians. He was god of fertility, wild sexytimes and strength, and also a protector against the ravages of the river Nile and its inhabitants. The khopesh was a kind of ancient Egyptian sword evolved from a battle axe. The one on this sculpt is a little thicker and more swordlike than most of the ones I've seen, which makes it sturdier on a miniatures scale. The figure is Reaper's 14381, Nefsokar Devourer of Ammat, sculpt by Bob Ridolfi. I didn't make a WIP thread. I was halfway done with him before I realized that he was supposed to be a stone statue with cracks and chips in the stone. Maybe another time I will paint a version of him like that, but in this case I overlooked the texture and painted him with fairly realistic crocodile and corroded bronze colors. And because I like to play around with photography and backgrounds: