Malifaux; Never Borne Battle Group

Well, those few followers I have may have noticed that I have not kept up on my weekly updates.  I was hoping by doing weekly updates it would generate more discussion, but that has not changed, and putting together weekly updates take considerable time.  I will continue to update things regularly as I finish projects and write up a few articles, but until more discussion happens on a regular basis, the weekly stuff will be put on hold for a while.  In addition to this change, I have also added a feedback page and changed some things up for my commission pricing to more accurately reflect the interaction and effort I have and put into my clients projects....nuff of the technical stuff, lets get to some pictures.

So a several weeks ago, a friend from the gaming store I use to hang out at before I moved asked me if I would be interested in painting up some Malifaux, we talked about some ideas and through some numbers around and eventually I ended up with the commission.  What really interested me about this commission is the rich character of the figures that Wyrd produces.  Each model is unique and has some really life to them, in addition Josh, the client, wanted the basing of the figures to represent a "child's nightmare" this presented some interesting challenges from a painting and basing standpoint.

One of the things that I really tried to do on this commission is to work with and use color to provide the shadow and highlight to all the models, in addition I wanted to keep my pallet very limited so that the battle group would have a cohesive look to them, lastly I knew I needed to keep things dark, and shadowy, yet retain the vividness that we have all had from time to time with our dreams and nightmares, so that meant things needed to be painted with high contrast.

So to start things off here is the first of the figures to show.  His name is "Lord Chompy Bits".  When I first pulled this mini out of the box, and I saw the post of the arms, I immediately knew that I needed blood, but I didn't just want painted blood, I wanted it too look wet, and fresh, something that could be very scary to a little child.  I started researching blood effects and found an interesting technique that uses UHU Glue, and Tamyia Clear Red.  I really love the effect and I am very happy with the results!

The other figures were all painted in similar colors and fashions, some received an additional degree of semi-gloss after the dull coat, and others did not,it was all dependent on the effect I was going for.  These guys were a ton of fun to paint, and I am looking forward to doing more Malifaux again in the future!

Here is a sample of a few of the pieces;

Blog Update #4 , Sorry missed a week

Well, it looks like I missed a week in my updates. Though I have good excuse, last week I was nursing an infected tooth, and the week ended up with me having a root canal and a new crown. As one who hates the dentist, let me say that one should never underestimate the power of laughing gas It takes the edge off and really makes the experience more enjoyable.

Well onto some updates!

First up are some Bretonians. This is a rather large commission and I will probably have weekly updates with it. The customer, a friend from the local hobby shop where I used to live, wanted this band of knights to all have a cohesive element to them. So all the barding is painted blue, while the shields on the barding and their personal shields will bear unique heraldry. The client provided me with some older Bretonnian decals for this purpose. The horse on the left has the decal placed, a little touch up with a brush, and some highlights and I think it will look great.

Another interesting thing about this commission is the gold on the helmets. As many in this hobby will witness too painting gold is a major PITA! So I thought with this project I would try something new, and see how it went. Basically I did what has been done before. I painted the area in GW Mithril Silver, then once dry I added about 4 to 6 coats of Gryphonne Sepia. This really brought the gold color out. Then once I achieved the look I was after with the sepia I went back in and added some black, this really made the gold pop!

Next up is going to be an ebay project. As part of a trade a while back I received a Forgeworld Dreadnought, a World Eater one. I was playing around with what to do with it for a while and I settled on this pose. The "tortured" victim on the wrack is a converted Privateer Press mini that I had in my bits box. The wrack was built out of aluminum and copper tubing, with some Chaos bits.

Lastly, I have made some more progress on my Imperial Fist army. Many of the "Bad Ass Space Marines" that I posted pictures of in an earlier
post are going to be for this army. I am really digging the yellow, the Cadmium Yellow is such a bright and vivid color. These guys have been painted with oil paints, the bases are a mixture of bases from Secretweapon and Base Contacts, they have been weathered with pigments from Secretweapon.

Blog Update....

It is Friday, and thank goodness....for me that means many things, and among them now is the weekly updates I will be doing for my blog. Theses updates will be where I will talk about tutorials, showcase some work, and share thoughts in general.

Before I get into showing some stuff off I want to talk a little bit about what I call the 30min rule. Here is the situation;

A friend of mine approached me the other day and we were having a conversation about painting, he is currently working on Grey Knights and is feeling a bit bogged down by all the painting. So I shared with Bobby my 30min rule....Basically when I am painting my army I don't spend more than 30min painting a single figure, unless it is a centerpiece or vehicle. This is alows me to keep things moving and progress through units rather quickly. One thing I feel that new players get hung up on is trying to make each piece be a stand out piece....This will drive a player insane and lead to discouragement, resulting in many times as burnout. A great thing about limiting yourself to 30min a figure is you really begin to polish your painting skills, and after some practice you can sit back and see just how far your skills have progressed. I would like to share a few tips that I use when using my 30min rule to help speed up my process....

1. KISS--Keep It Simple Stupid....not sure where I picked this acronym up at, but it is a mantra I try to live be, life is as complicated as YOU want it to be, and miniature painting is not much different. Dont try to get all creative on every figure. As I will talk about later you can change some colors around here and there, and change poses of your models up a bit, but the bottom line is, at 3 to 6ft away, a CLEANLY painted mini can look just as cool as a showcase piece.
2. Color Pallet and Planning--This is a very important step, keep your color pallet simple, say between 3 to 5 colors tops, and I would say that includes highlights too. Plan out what colors will be where, decide where your light source is coming from and above all if you mix colors, write down the ratios! Color is also a good way to give a little variety to your guys. Perhaps some grenades are painted green, and some red, and others yellow. Unify units of space marines or other troops by painting a certain part of each guy the same color. This is where you have a lot of room, but keep it simple, remember, you only have 30min a figure
3. Keep it between the lines--Brush control, this perhaps is the biggest skill to focus on as a painter, putting the paint where you want it. As I mentioned earlier, a cleanly painted unit can look quite impressive. If you keep your lines clean and crisp, as soon as you put that unit on the table I guarantee it will get compliments, because there is a "cool factor" that takes over when a unit gel's together because of a clean paint job, dont get "clean" and "nice" confused, they are very different terms.

So there you have it, 3 simple things to keep in mind when you paint to help you move through those figures, just keep it simple!

Lets move onto some updates!!


First up is one of my all time favorite mini's Sigurd, from Reaper's Dark Haven line. I dont know what it is about this guy, but I love to figure. This was a personal project, call it a practice if you will. Recently I attended a painting class where using a wet pallet and some other painting techniques were discussed, so I took some time to practice on this guy, I dont think he turned out to bad considering it is really my first time using this blending technique. I have some other figures that I will be doing as will over the next few months to help reinforce these skills and make me a better painter. He is about 95% done at this point, I ordered some UHU Glue from the UK today to add some nice blood and gore effects to the axe, that too will be a bit of a practice, as currently I have some Neverborne on my workbench that are going to get a nice gory treatment....





Lastly...here is a Imperial Fist tac troop that I finished up. The unique thing about this guy is he was painted with oil paints, and it took about 30min. I will be posting a tutorial on oil painting soon, but
the more I work with it the more I like it. It does have a steep learning curve, so be prepared to get a little frustrated from time to time. As far as the model goes, it is a set of FW Mk V shoulders, and legs. The knee caps will drilled and a steel bearing was inserted to match the artwork in the SM Codex. The base is from Secretweapon Miniatures and has been weathered with pigments.


Well that is it for this week, check back next Friday for some more updates!!

Ashton

I am BACK!!! and this time I have company!

That is right folks, I am back in contact with the real world. I will be ramping back up to full painting production with in the next week, still have a few boxes here and there to unpack. In the meantime though I was able to get this guy painted up. He will be auctioned off at a charity event called "Clash for the Cure" I was trying to strike a balance between playable and showcase. In addition I was also trying out some new wet blending techniques, I think as time progresses and my skills increase, it will definitely be a technique that I will use often.

Another unique thing that I tried out with this model was playing with colors. Typically my go to color for shading reds is Vallejo Black Red. I decided to try something different this time and I shaded with a Vallejo color called, "Dark Sea Blue" it is a really nice deep greenish-blue color. I really like the resulting effect as it seems to add a richer deeper red to the over all scheme.

Another new thing I tried was the base, it was actually colored using pigments form Secretweapon Miniatures. Pigments are not a new thing to me, I had used them quite a bit in my military modeling days, but I found that using them on mini's was no fun. After talking to Justin over at Secretweapon, come to find out that many of the weathering powders out there have a binding agent in them, like a wax or some other thing...in the small scale of mini's this often translates into a mesy, or blotchy look, Secretweapon's powders are pure pigment, no binders, so they go on much smoother and have a more even appearance. The base turned out a little darker than I would have liked, but I am happy with the results.

Lastly, I know things have been a little sporadic around here on updates, going forward I am going to have weekly updates, talking about everything from recent completed projects, to tutorials, and possibly rants on my own gaming experiences. Look for those updates to come on or about Friday of every week!

Ashton

Death Company Dreadnought and transport!

I recently took to fielding DC in my lists, they are pretty fun, but in the end I decided that DC was not for me, I am far to conservative of a player to field DC. But these guys were done up so nicely that it is worth the mention.

The rhino/razorback combo is now how I am building all my transports, with the ability to have the stormbolter and top hatch removed so that the transport can be ran as a razorback if needed. In addition the weapon, las/plas, has been magnetized as well so that I can switch things out if needed too.

The big guy is a conversion I did a while ago and was quite fun to do, basically I looked at the BA dread box and said, "there is no way a DC dreadnought should be standing still like that!" So out came the plasticard, and razorsaw and an hour later I had a pose I liked.





Ashton

Bad Ass Space Marine Conversions!

I love Space Marines, I think the fluff is awesome, I think the models, to a degree, are awesome, and I love painting and converting them...So when I set out to build my Imperial Fist army, I decided that I really wanted to take my time and make each marine as unique as possible. In addition I have been reading a lot of the 40k battle books, and though it does not translate so well sometimes in the game, Space Marines are freakin uber!!

So the decision was made to try and make my marines look "bad ass" I know when you see the title to the post you might be thinking that I am implying that these are "bad ass" marine conversions, but that is not what I am leading to at all, in fact I think in some ways my conversion skills are sub-par at best....the conversions I am talking about here are conversions that make marines look "bad ass", as opposed to the Space Marine "two-step"....lean to left, lean to the right...

So in the end my goal is to build the entire Imperial Fist 5th company, and to make each tactical marine, and maybe the others ;) unique in some way, something that can contribute to the "bad ass-ness" of their appearance.

Feel free to check out my Imperial Fist album, it has more pictures there of other conversions in various stages of build. In case your wondering too, the bases are resin bases from Base Contacts, tell him Ashton sent you when you order your stuff from him!

Ashton

1750 "Extra Crispy" Tourney Army

Here is the 1750 list that I took to a local tournament recently. The photos aren't the best, I took them the day of the tourney and it was a bit cloudy outside

Anyway the army was a TON of fun to play. The Heavy Flamer's proved to be quite useful and were definitely something that people were not sure how to react too. I had the best finish I have had since I started playing 40k a year ago, 6th out of 80+ players!
The FOC restrictions made for some creative list building, and ultimately the Immolator Spam template the Kirby over at 3++ came up with was the starting point that I used for this army.

The models are not painted in the traditional Blood Angel manner, this is my DIY successor chapter, "Sanguine Templar's" I really like the look of SM's done up "Black Templar" style, but I also like the BA rules....so wala!!! Sanguine Templar's

Here is a break down of the list that I took;

HQ
Libby
-Shield
-Fear the Darkness

Elite
Stern Guard x 5
-Combi-Meltax 2
-Razorback
-HK Missile
-Twin-Linked Heavy Flamer

Troops
2 x Tac Squad x 10
-Missile Launcher
-Melta Gun
-Comb-Melta
-Razor Back
-HK Missile
-Twin-Linked Heavy Flamer

3 x ASM x 5
-Melta Gun
-Infernous Pistol
-Razorback
-HK Missile
-Dozer Blade
-Twin Linked Heavy Flamer

Fast
2 x Baal Predator
-Flamestorm Cannon

Heavy
2 x Dreadnought w/ 2 Twin-Linked Auto Cannons

One thing that this army proved to provide was target frustration for my opponent, where do you start? What do you kill first? In addition to a great finish, I also took "Best Painted Army" and the "Players Choice" award!

More army pictures can be found here

Thanks for looking and feel free to leave any feedback!

Ashton

Grey Knight Justicar

Here is the first of 5 Grey Knight Terminators that I am working on. This one here is the Justicar. The base comes from Basecontacts, their "rubble" base, and the right hand on all terminators has been magnitized so that it can accept any weapon, hammer, halberd, sword, or staff.

The armor was painted using vallejo colors, base coat in black, gunmetal, steel, then highlighted in aluminum. Pin washes of Badab Black were used to give more depth to the armor.

The face was based coated in Luftwaffe Green, then highlighted using using Basic Skin Tone. The eyes and highlights surrounding were done in Electric Blue.

The gold parts of the armor were done in Vallejo Gold, then washed with Sepia and then Badab Black.

The power sword was painted using Black, White, Electric Blue, and Sky Grey.



Ashton

New contact info

Hello everyone, I have a new email address that I can be contacted through and would appreciate all communication going through the new address.

Additionally I have updated and revamped my pricing guidelines in order to provide better customer service. Take a look !

redmodeling@gmail.com


Thanks!

Ashton

Wraith Lord conversion complete!!

So here it is, all done! It is supposed to be a Striking Scorpion Wraith Lord.

The commission was a bit more challenging and time consuming that I thought it would be. All of the dreadlocks were rolled by hand, the chainsword needed to be scratch built, the Britelance converted to a rifle, and the legs and torso re-sculpted to the positions that they are in.


However after talking with the client the pose shown to the left was the one we came up with. As beautiful as the inspiration picture is, I felt like I wanted to do something that conveyed more of a sense of motion and "striking".

Sadly I will not be painting this guy as much as I would like to, but I will make sure and post some pictures of it painted when the client sends them to me.

Ashton

Raven Guard Commission Complete

Here is a quick commission I did, Raven Guard Sergeant. I am pretty happy with the results. I tried to keep the highlighting to a minimum, I felt like the stark black/white contrast was enough of an eye catching look, I didn't need to go over board w/ ultra stark highlighting. All vallejo colors were used, highlighting was done w/ oils. The parchment attached to the right shoulder comes out of the Flagellent Warband from the Fantasy line.

Ashton

Zepelin Vendetta is DONE!!

Here it is in all it's glory, I will get some pics posted after the client gets a paint job on it!!

More pictures are here;

https://picasaweb.google.com/RedModeling/VendettaConversion?authkey=Gv1sRgCJnF19_tpcqbFg&feat=directlink

Been a long time

Hey all,

It has been a looong time since I have updated this blog. My original intent was to eventually have my own site, I don't think I am going to pursue that now, rather I think I will use this blog as my means to share my work and pursue commissions. So over the next week or two keep a look out for some changes as I shift the site to showcasing personal projects and commissions.

Ashton