The Brony Mech and some OGRE

I've been doing a lot of work behind the scenes.  I've got some commissions that I'm trying to pump out a little bit here and a little bit there.  I haven't had as much painting time since I've started exercising three times a week for an hour approximately.  This affects my painting since I spend time going to/from the location, and I'm just not as fast when I'm tired after exercising.  Enough of my boring life though, onto the miniatures!



What you are looking at is a custom paint job for a fellow blogger.  It's an amazing chain as my friend who is also a blogger (and my biggest patron) has a friend who is running an auction (feel free to check it out!) to raise funds for an operation for a fellow blogger.  Being short on funds I offered my services, and after working out the details I'm donating two Vindicators from Reaper Miniature's Combat Assault Vehicle line.  Both will be painted in tribute/homage to two characters from the new My Little Pony, one as Celestia (whom you see above), and the other as Luna.  I finished up Celestia (whom I've come to regard as the Celestia Mk. III) earlier today.  Here is what I was drawing from for color inspiration:



I tried to take as much inspiration from the character as I could.  The cockpit and round missile-pod were taken from the jewelry that Celestia is wearing, while the feet were inspired by the markings around her hooves.  The rainbow of colors is obviously inspired by the mane/tail.  This is one of the first times I tried to work with both pastels and tried to do a water color effect.  Thin paints get a nicer flow and pick out details very well, but unfortunately they ended up looking blotchy and I had to do multiple coats which takes away from the effect.  I did do a bit of freehanding though.  Notice the sunburst symbol?  Here's my attempt at it:



There was a request for a couple of symbols on both mechs, and I was a bit hesitant at first.  The detail on these is a bit above where I've been able to hit before, so it's a push for me to try something different.  I could have tried to forgo it, but given that the symbol is a significant part of the character as well as being one thing that makes them distinguished from their fellows I felt I couldn't ignore it.  There is one other symbol I was asked to put somewhere on the Mk. III:



I saw this and my jaw just about hit the keyboard.  Something that intricate on a surface you could fit on a penny would tax my skills!  I felt like this would stop me in my tracks, but I wanted to help out my fellow blogger!



Not bad!  I think that my attempt went over pretty well.  It was actually easier to do the Solar Empire symbol (pictured above) than the flame burst.  It took several layers, but in the end it was more about patience than precision.  To do it I painted dots within dots.  What this means is a large red dot, then a white dot inside the red dot, then another red dot followed by a yellow dot.  By doing this I didn't have to worry about drawing perfect circles on a white background.  All I do now is wait for approval from Erin Palette before I do the seal coat.

Not into bronies?  Does the idea of brony inspired mecha cause you to switch off?  How about some Super Heavy tanks painted in Blumentarn?



These are part of a commission for my friend, and if I find time later this week I'll put up my step by step pics.  According to my patron the paintjob is spot on!  I seem to be doing more and more freehand though, as this was another request:



I liked painting this one.  Reds are a color I do well, and I ended up putting a bit more love into this one.  The request was for me to: "Make it look like the Soviet flag with crossed hammer and sickle."  Thirdpower is a fan of military history.  Simple but complex symbols are becoming easier and easier with practice.  The big thing I'm learning is patience, which sounds like it would be obvious but that symbol is small enough to fit on your fingernail.

Last one for today:



The instructions for this missile crawler were to make it a drab olive with the ordnance looking newer than the crawler itself.  The idea being that the crawler would be faded from use and exposure, but the ordnance would be relatively fresh.  I used the same color for both, but added a bit of a lighter shade drybrushed over the crawler to give it a worn look.

That's it for now, but I have more commissions to work on.  Wyrd miniatures is running their Rotten Harvest contest once more, and I hope to be entering a piece or two.  Unfortunately I won't be able to post pics here until after the contest ends as per their rules.  It should be a good competition though!

Completed Works

In between blog posts a lot is going on.  Sometimes it's work, sometimes it's fun, but I also get stuff painted as well.  I figure it'd be easier to do a short review rather than an a in-depth walkthrough for each and every model.

Up first is another camo scheme that I tried out.  I used another C.A.V. model to try out German Desert Flecktarn



I think it's pretty close to the original but could definitely do with a bit more finesse.  It was more a quick job to see if I could pull it off.

On a whim and in a camo mood I decided to try out infantry.



The scale of these is rather small, probably 10-15mm to take a guess.  These two dudes are sporting the Russian Arctic Cam that I tried previously, and with their guns painted gunmetal and a splash of black ink I think they turned out looking really nice!  I've been worried about trying to paint at that scale, but it turns out that painting camo on troops in full armor with guns is pretty easy (or lazy, depending on how you want to look at it).

Last but not least I finally got off my rear to paint a model that's been sitting in my bag for a while.



One of Wyrd's Punk Zombies for the Resurrectionists faction, this is a model that didn't catch my attention as much, but with Nicodem's Avatar fully painted I'm going to need more of these guys.  Thankfully I have a few sculpts of the Punk Zombies so it won't be tedious to paint them.

OGRE Part 2: Russian camoflauge

With the Avatar of Decay finally being complete I'm free to explore some other areas of painting.  This time I decided to try out some Russian Arctic cam, again using a tank from Reaper's C.A.V. line.  Here's my inspiration pic:




So taking a look at it I see an Olive Green, White, A fresh mud kind of brown, and black.  Layered in that order.  Looking at it I tend to see more stripes than blobs, so that's what I decided to try out.  First though I had to get my base coat on using Camouflage Green (Vallejo 72031).



This particular shade has a property that I encounter from time to time which is the opacity of the color.  Some colors look more opaque before you apply them, resulting in a mess of wavy brush lines/strokes



The best way to overcome this is to make sure your paint isn't too thinned out (which can cause this) as well as multiple coats.  Just give your first coat a chance to dry and then layer it again, repeat as needed.

Moving on to my next layer I mentioned stripes.



The stripes ended up being a bit thicker than I would have liked, and you can see that I probably used too much white towards the front.  As I was painting this layer I began to realize something about painting camo: the second layer is a pain in the ass.  It's not difficult to per say, it's just that looking at it all I can see is a bunch of squiggly lines that look NOTHING what they're supposed to look like.  I had the same issue when I painted the Aussie Cam Tank.  My advice would be to finish all the layers before making a call one way or the other as the layers build on and cover each other giving it the camouflage look.



Splotchy brown stripes.  Going off of my inspiration pic it's hard to tell if the brown spots are supposed to be more blob like or line like, and the more you look at it the more you begin to see how things vary.  I decided that mine would be more blob like with tentacles sticking forth.  I can slowly begin to see the final product, and each successive layer helps me to feel better about that 2nd layer.  The last layer of cam to put on was the black.



When I put the dark green on the Aussie cam I found it to be stark and contrasting, and rather than blend the whole thing together it seemed to draw more attention to it.  That's not a good thing when you don't want to be noticed.  For the Russian cam though it was different.  The darker brown acted as a good medium in the blend, and as I started painting the black on it seemed to be more natural.  This made me feel better about using darker colors for future camo spreads.  All in all it turned out nice.  I put some metal down on the treads and hit it with a watered down black ink to help add some depth.  The final product looks pretty decent IMO.



As I'm practicing camo in order to paint a friends models I asked his opinion.  While appreciated he felt that more bloby and splotchy while less stripy would be better.  Time to try again I suppose.