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In response to @R2ED's question in another thread about converting that large pile of unpainted minis into a large pile of painted ones, I thought I would create this thread for us all to share our tips. Here is what I have found works for me. YMMV, and I hope others share their tips for what works for them, so that everyone can find something that works for them. Tip #1: Play games. My primary motivation for getting things painted is to play on a regular basis. Nothing motivates me to get a painted mini done like have an upcoming game to use it in. Tip #2: Set achievable goals and track them. At the end of 2019, I decided that I was going to give myself a hobby goal for 2020 of painting at least 1 RPG related mini, 1 unit for a wargame and 1 terrain piece every month. When we moved into our current house about 5 years ago, the previous owner's pool table area became my gaming room/painting area. At one end of the room they had left a white board on the wall, and I decided to leave it up for gaming related info. To assist with my painting goal, I used that white board and drew a grid on it to track my success. The pandemic almost killed my drive to paint, and it would have, had I not had this chart to motivate me. I don't have a picture handy of my 2020 progress, but you can see my 2021 progress below. You'll note that i wasn't always successful in attaining each monthly goal, but overall, you can see that on average, I exceeded them. Some of these months I only attained what success I did by grabbing something half painted from that sperate pile of shame of half painted minis, and quickly finishing it. I should note that my categories are somewhat flexible here - a Unit can be anything from any wargame rules that can be fielded separately under those rules. So a single hero model for 40k or Star Wars Legions would satisfy my classification as a "unit", and indeed, some months were just that. Likewise with an RPG model - at first I just meant character models, because I had a bunch of PC & NPC models I needed to finish, but once those were done, I expanded the category to count any model i would paint for an RPG, such as a monster for an encounter. Confession - I do have a couple of months where I was able to count some models twice - both as a unit for a wargame and as RPG models - August and March, IIRC. I also expanded Terrain to include vehicles. I did have to set myself a hard specification on what constitutes a completed mini - for me, that was spraying it with a clear coat. Upon reviewing my success with 2021, I decided I want to be a little more ambitious for 2022, so I added two more category goals. First category I added was I wanted to try and do at least one display model each quarter. I realized my display models were being ignored in favor of gaming models. Second category I added was my 40k Sisters of Battle force. I was looking at my old 90s era 40k armies, and thought "You know, I'd like to actually finish a couple of these armies." In looking at the options (Eldar, Imperial Guard, two Space marine Chapters and my Sisters of Battle) I decided that the Sisters of Battle force was the most achievable of the goals this year. So here's my chart for 2021. As you can see, I had a good start with January (I did nothing but paint New years weekend), but I'm already falling a little behind with February. These charts have helped me get more painted in recent years than I did in the decade preceding them. Anyway, that's what I've found has helped me reduce my pile of shame (OK, not really, I'm still buying/printing more than I'm painting). What's been working for you?

Part of my goal for the year was to reduce my literal Shelf of Shame: The minis that I started and put down and never came back to. Some of those minis are recent, some extend all the way back to when i started painting minis in about 2014 or so. So as the first installment, here are a few things I've painted since the beginning of the year: First up is the Pillar of Good and Pillar of Evil: I forget why I had these on the shelf. I think I was intending to paint them along with the rest of the dungeon decor from the second Reaper Kickstarter. While the barrels and crates were finished long ago, these languished until now. They are painted with a green-stone mixture: Vallejo's Model Air Dark SeaGreen and US Light Grey , and drybrushed with a mix of US Light Grey and Model Color Dark Sand. I did the Pillar of Evil quickly, but then needed something to practice Reaper's NMM Gold Triad on, so the Pillar of Good got the treatment. Flowers are Reaper Punk Rock Pink, with Breast Cancer Awareness Pink highlights. Second up is a collection of large vermin Dire Rats: Not every mini can be a hero. Some have to be rats. These have been on the self of shame since the start. They were painted and stripped several times, and even served as test minis for various primers. I didn't care much about them, but they were on the shelf and are a quick-and-dirty (!) painting task. The paint job is table-top quality, but I did like the final coloration, so I'll record it here for the Giant Rats I have to paint later: Fur: Layer up with dry-brushing: MSP Walnut Brown MSP Russet Brown MSP Intense Brown MSP Intense Brown mixed with any ivory color on your palette Tail: Base: HD Entrail Pink Highlight: MSP Old West Rose Detail: MSP New Copper Finally, here is the current state of the Shelf of Shame: (I told you, it was a literal shelf! It's a shadowbox made from a plastic 12" x 12" picture frame and foam core board. See: GCB Tries Foam Core Joinery.) They're mostly Reaper minis I have to finish/repaint. The notable exception are the Gloomhaven: Jaws of the Lion figures on the top shelf. This group should be entirely doable, by the end of the year. Then I get to pull out new minis to paint!

All theatres and event locations in Switzerland are closed again, so it's back to short-time work for me. I figured I might as well use the extra time I now have to confront the minis that have accumulated on my shelf of shame. While I have enough unpainted minis to last me for a lifetime (or more...) there were a few I gave up on for one reason or another. Those are the ones ending up on this shelf. Having enough of their accusing stares, I'm going to tackle them, one by one. Some will be fun, some will mean I have to face my nightmares from the past, all will teach me valuable lessons. This rules I set for myself: Project runs until my regular work starts again - or until the shelf is cleared (I really hope for the former...) For every two minis I finish I may pick a new one from my collection of unpainted minis (but I don't have to) I will try to post an update every other day or so, mostly to keep me motivated because a lot of this isn't necessarily fun. Those minis all ended up on the shelf for a reason.

So, recently me, my dad, and my grandpa*, most of whom are excellent woodworkers (with the exception of me) made a collaborative effort at making me a new shelf for my minis, as my old one was just a board nailed into the wall. A pretty piece of scrap, but scrap none the less. Continuing the trend, we used only scrapwood for this shelf. Thus, no cost, except for some stain (which I stole from my dad, so uh, no cost there either). *My grandpa is no joke Santa Claus. A bit of a potbelly, big bushy white beard, glasses, likes cookies and milk, and get this - he makes toys. Right now it's just sitting atop a bookshelf, but I may hang it up on the wall if I'm so inclined. Doesn't look the prettiest, but not bad for being made solely of scrapwood! It's also now a dishonor to me, as there are waaaay too many unpainted minis on that shelf. That will soon change, however... Note: We did put in an extra notch, as you see at the top. The boards that are the shelves get really stuck in that one, plus it leaves no room for my big minis, so I decided to leave that one vacant.

I have 99 problems but a painted mini ain't one. That sounded better in my head and I apologize for the unintentional grimacing I have caused. I noticed by happenstance (while checking my BGstats challenges) that today marks 99 days until the end of the year. What better way to initiate a painting challenge? I am throwing down the gauntlet...for myself, I guess. I need to get some serious minis painted out of my collection. Tonight I will spend making a quick foray into what minis I have that I think should be thrown into this seemingly impossible challenge. I will hopefully accomplish picking the first thing to paint...maybe even a pile of things to paint. For the sake of this challenge, "mini" is going to be a vague guideline. Characters, NPCs, monsters, terrain, scatter, small, massive, etc. - it doesn't matter. I will paint a bunch of stuff. Some of it may even turn out looking alright...maybe. Anyone crazy enough to join me?

It's that time of year again. Those of us in the US have a 3 day holiday weekend coming up (May 24-27) and I am challenging you all to join me in a massively multiplayer paint binge! Everyone is welcome to join, even if you can only paint for one day.  The object is to finish as many figures as possible. Quantity counts over quality. All manufacturers are fair game, posting of WIPs and finished pieces is strongly encouraged. You may prep and prime figures before hand, in fact I recommend it. Get out all those new Bones, old primed or half painted figures and get ready to finish them! Got an army to finish, need to move some half painted terrain off your desk, want to tackle that dragon for the big figure contest? This is the time. All manufacturers are fair game. Prep and prime your figures now so they are all ready to go Saturday morning (or if you're taking a 4 day weekend, Friday morning). Have your camera ready to share photos. Photos strongly encouraged! For this holiday there is a special extra challenge: paint a figure in memory of a lost friend, pet or loved one. Anything goes. Painting begins at 00:01 May 24 and ends 23:59 May 27, in your time zone. Those of you who video chat are welcome to set up channels. Link to 2017 Challenge Link to 2016 Challenge

Sometime in the middle of 2018 I pulled out this old GW Mordheim Ogre Mercenary mini, and poked at it a bit, intending on painting him up pretty quickly. If I remember correctly, I did the base intending on using it for the dire boar, but then decided that it didn’t work for that mini. I have only a vague idea of how I primed it, but I think I mixed Reaper’s Brush On White Primer with… Grey Liner? Maybe? After priming it I started painting the flesh with… maybe Tanned Shadow? Maybe Ruddy Flesh? Since then I haven’t done anything with it, and he’s been looking at me accusingly the whole time. Blurry picture cropped from the background of a work table shot where the ogre sat unloved So time to get it done. Going back over the skin, I reblocked in with Ruddy Flesh. I used a bit of Walnut Brown to darken it for the shadows, and Rusty Red for the nose, cheeks, ears, and lip to make it look more fleshy. I used Linen White for the eyes, teeth and nails. Both the teeth and nails are going to need significant yellowing. The shirt was painted with Muddy Olive, while the jacket was painted with Rusty Red, while just about everything else has been painted with Walnut Brown. More to come!

So I mentioned working on a few old minis while I was also working on My Women in Horror Tribute... this is the thread for my continued work on those this spring. The oldest is Dark Sword's Male Fighter with Spear. I got that for a GURPS campaign PC that fizzled out. I had done crazy magic blue eyes, and a very thin layer of green on the cloak, and then it's been sitting on the shelf since 2013. I haven't felt capable of tackling it. it's got tiny eyes. Next I started working on the smaller of the fierce felines, to do some weird approximation of my cat Moose (in my profile photo). That was my first experiment with blue liner on a metal mini. Now I would mix in medium. Anyway, I had a blue and white base coat before it disappeared to the shelf. Here is where this started. I don't remember when I started working on the Whispering Tyrant - it's after the other two. I had some armor and bone basecoats and a green cloak. Mostly I just tried to do more on the green cloaks. I'll upload photos of where things are at after that first session when my phone is done charging. I did some more work last night too, but I haven't taken pictures yet. I'll probably try to do some painting tonight too. Then a few days of silence.

I've decided to start working on reducing the number of half painted, primed, assembled and partially assembled figures I've got scattered around the house on various shelves, trays, boxes, cases, cupboards, desks and tables, mostly because I'm running out of room for all this stuff and once painted they can get crammed on the "painted stuff" shelves. I decided to do these first. This came as a set of three I think, and I'm pretty sure it was from the old Mega Minis, but they have been out of the blister for a number of years, so not positive. They were already assembled and primed and the wood was mostly done. This was the way I used to do wood back in the day, which is basically while primer with Reaper Pro Paint Wood Stain Ink slathered over it. I just touched it up a bit (my bottle of that was still good), I'm just going for table top here. I decided to do the spears in three different colours in case these get used in a D&D session or something, so they are easily identifiable. Happy to see them migrate from the shelves of shame to the shelves of painted stuff!

In rounding up figures to log what I had painted last year, I turned up lots of half-finished minis. Some of them had little bits I was unhappy with; some need repair; some I had lost interest in or overlooked; some I felt weren't going as well as I would have liked; and some were just in the limbo of unfinished projects. So I figured I could finish them up, to tabletop standard at least, and have them usable in games. That's going to be my year's beginning project, clearing out the backlog of figures. They range from almost completely finished (except maybe for some basing) at the front, to just colors blocked in at the back. So I laid out the most nearly finished ones to begin with and got started. First I glued things that needed it: Some Tom Meier Thunderbolt Mountain elves are exquisite, but on tiny bases prone to tipping over. I glued them onto pennies. And I glued some skulls and books and things onto the bases of Hasslefree's not-Scooby-Gang. And by not fussing over bases and accepting that I may be unhappy with certain aspects, but they are okay for gaming, I finished four figures this first session! These are Reaper's 50134: Racquel Blackrose, Buccaneer by Patrick Keith; Reaper's 02115: Mishka The Mystic by the incomparable Sandra Garrity; Hasslefree Miniature's HFC002 Mineko by Kev White; and Reaper's 02075: Katarina The Invoker, also by Sandra Garrity. I am a little dissatisfied with them, especially Mineko's kimono which went a little wonky. On the other hand, yay! finished!

I was looking at my Shelf of Shame (or Opportunity) last night and realized it's grown quite a bit recently. It got me to wondering what others' looked like, so I decided to start this thread for us to share with each other in a show and tell of what our current shameful projects are. Feel free to post/link pictures of your shelves! ETA: This can be anything hobby-related you are working on: Figures, Terrain, or Basing. ETA2: My shelf!

I decided that I needed a shelf to put minis on so they stop cluttering up my work area. I needed a shelf of shame. I have a ton of foamcore, paper and WorldWorks Games products, so I knew a custom unit could be made. It probably took me 15-20 hours of time to build, but honestly a large portion of that was dealing with printer issues. Here is where the WIP starts: http://forum.reapermini.com/index.php?/topic/49824-talaes-wip-thread-of-everything/?p=901883 The final product:

So I have cleaned and stowed my painting desk and it is no longer a demotivational mess that sucks away my will to paint. So what to do with my new found inspiration? Finish up a couple of pieces from my now defunct WIP thread. The Bathalian I started at a Reaper Paint and Take at Pax East, in 2013. It sat staring at me because I cold remember what paint colors were on the table and what colors and ratios used to mix some of the different shades. I would pull it out when I was avoiding working on other minis at paint days and would inevitably get gold on the blue or blue on the pink and it soon became one permanent touch up. Finally I bit the bullet and am calling it done. Damien, I painted to represent my Eldritch Pact Warlock in a now defunct 4E game. As warlocks don't use staffs, a couple of clips later and he now has a very trendy rod, or a really big wand. Maybe he is overcompensating. Either way, Damien was usually the mini I'd avoid working on when I would pick up the Bathalian. So some touch up and picking the necklace with some Noir Black and Splintered Bone and e was good enough to sit in a case in the unlikely vent that the game restarts. Unlikely as the DM is in Deigo Garcia. Here is to getting some more bench queens off of my shelf of shame.

My husband printed this one out for me. He knows me so well. http://www.dorktower.com/2013/03/19/trajanic-tragics-dork-tower-19-03-13/