Paintsgiving

I started this weekend organizing my paints, cleaning the house in anticipation of guests, and trying to sneak in a little painting time before navigating the Thanksgiving holiday. I realized I've now accumulated enough paint to fill three of my paint racks and then some! I love these paint racks-- they're one of My Favorite Miniature Things that I wrote about last December. I can easily see the paint colors and they can also sit flat so I can store them in drawers. I'm still considering acquiring some upright paint racks that you can place on your desk, but for now, these are working for me!

Other than that, I'm happy that my sister was able to travel and spend Thanksgiving with us-- we played some card games, cooked, hung out with the our "furry kids" and watched Casino Royale.

I did my best to get some painting in the day before, despite some feline setbacks. "Oh, I'm sorry, did you want your paint desk? Well too bad, it's occupied."

I managed to paint most of Carla's face, despite the severe 30-degree drop in temperature that day. The weather really messed with my paint consistency! The colder it became, the thicker my paint seemed to become. That's new to me!

Other than that, I've been gearing up to start a new batch of minis that I'm really excited about. I'm putting togethersomething for a Secret Santa painted miniature exchange before the holidays-- it's a bit of a secret now but I'll share more about it in my next post!

I hope everyone had a lovely Thanksgiving here in the states and for those traveling abroad. I'd also like to take the time to give thanks for my blessings and appreciate those who support me in this hobby, whether it's kind words of encouragement or sharing their knowledge and experience. We all have things to be thankful for, and sometimes the biggest joys in life come in the tiniest packages -- literally :)

Review: Mountain of Metal Miniatures

Last month, I was contacted by Joanne, co-owner of Mountain of Metal, who asked if I'd be interested in reviewing a few miniatures her company has recently released. Mountain of Metal is based in Nottingham, United Kingdom and was founded in September 2014. They specialize in painting and terrain commissions, and have very recently branched out into online retail. This November, they launched their new online store and released three 28mm fantasy miniatures available for purchase through their website. These three miniatures were sent to me for my honest review. I look forward to walking you through my experience from beginning to end!

New releases from Mountain of Metal (click image for a link to their website)

Upon receiving my miniatures, I opened the box to find three miniatures wrapped in bubble wrap and shredded paper. I appreciate the care they took to ship these, though the shredded paper made quite a mess as I pulled the bubble-wrapped miniatures out of the box. Whoops! After a quick cleanup, I unboxed three smaller black boxes to find Nenqua, Havan, and Volac. The miniature boxes they come in are the perfect size, though the cotton-like padding they come with snags more readily than traditional foam inserts. I made doubly-sure I removed any loose strands stuck on sharp edges of the miniature during the cleaning process.

I didn't find any jarring mould lines or chunky flash I had to contend with-- in fact, it only took about 15-20 minutes to clean, sand, and scrub each miniature before assembling. Two of the three miniatures require some assembly-- Volac's arm/staff and Nenqua's leg and dagger. Assembly and gap-filling has to be my least favorite part of this hobby, so I'm glad for miniatures that require minor prep work. Upon inspection, the miniatures are of a nice quality and only Nenqua showed signs of metal discoloration with a few rust-colored spots. Luckily, this kind of oxidation isn't an issue in modern white metal miniatures (unless you're talking about "lead rot" in miniatures from the 1980s & 90s). In this case, it's easily covered up when you prime and paint the miniature.

In doing some further research, I found that these miniatures were sculpted by Gael Goumon, a well-respected sculptor in the industry who has created miniatures for many companies including Dark Sword, Wyrd, Reaper, Andrea, and CoolMiniOrNot. While I enjoy painting female miniatures, I wanted to choose what I felt was the most appealing sculpt. Surprisingly, Nenqua is probably my least favorite miniature of the three. The angle in which her leg would need to fit together seemed a little awkward to me, like she's not quite standing balanced. Her stance just isn't as lively as the other two, though she'd make a great rogue or wily thief character with her dagger held out of sight behind her back. Havan "The Half-Seen" really stood out to me. However, just to be sure I was giving Volac a fair shot, I cleaned and assembled him for full consideration. It took little time to glue his arm/staff and the angle set easily. Volac's dynamic pose is appealing for any magic-wielding player character, and I find it convenient that his base is sculpted in. In the end, Havan was still my favorite-- I was sold by the sculpt's dual weapons, segmented armor, and powerful stance.

While painting wasn't part of the requested review, I was excited about the propect of painting Havan. In my opinion, you can best review a miniature after you've cleaned, assembled, and painted them. I can't tell you how many times I run into odd sculpting issues only after I've begun painting. "What is that supposed to be-- a pocket? A patch? A buckle?" or finding out that shapes and angles don't quite line up. It's hard to make out details in unprimed pewter, since the shifting reflective surfaces play with our eyes and make it hard to see the details.

This miniature has lots of great metal detail sculpted in-- buckles, thin armor edging, and studs that were fun to paint and practice the gold NMM (Non Metallic Metal) technique. Each time I thought I'd painted the last buckle or stud, I'd find a new one under the arm or on his boots. His eyes are a bit difficult to reach under his hood and hair and would be a challenge for a beginner painter. As it was, I wasn't able to paint much more than black pupils-- nothing fancy, but it worked out just fine since the focus of this miniature isn't his face.

Havan's original concept is more of a shadowy character, slipping in and out under cover of darkness. I struggled with the idea of painting him in a darker color scheme, and eventually settled on a brighter forest green and brown leather armor scheme. Perhaps he's a middle-aged Robin Hood-like character who has graduated from the bow and has taken up weapons that match his increased strength and experience. I worked to carefully outline the segmented leather armor in gold Non Metallic Metal-- it's not plate armor, but it allows the wearer increased movement and mobility (and it just looks cool). Perhaps it's reinforced leather armor with metal trim for a tough woodsman adventurer. Heck, maybe he's a volunteer lumberjack on the weekends to stay in top physical shape (hence the axe). As I made progress oh Havan, I posted a few works-in-progress throughout the week on Twitter.

Now, without further ado, here's my version of Havan. Let's check him out!

What do you think? Who would you be most excited to paint of these three? For more information about these Mountain of Metal miniatures, visit their website at www.mountainofmetal.co.uk or visit their Facebook page.

Fun with Chibis

Sorry for the delay! My internet went out and I'm posting my Monday blog post late this evening after things are back online-- mostly. I've written this blog post about 3 times since my internet keeps crashing and I lose a good portion of it each time. 

I've been working on the Soda Pop "Twilight Knight" chibi and this weekend I had a chance to paint her eyes. While I like to paint miniatures differently than how they appear in the concept art or studio model, I wanted to give her facial expression more personality. As you can tell in the unprimed miniature on the right, her face doesn't have much of a mouth sculpted in. I decided to take a cue from anime and give her a "brat tooth". You know how the mischievous character has that little sharp tooth-- usually on one side of their mouth? Well, I painted in a curved mouth, brat tooth, and a cocked eyebrow. Check it out!

BEFORE  •  AFTER

I'm just getting started, and I love her so far! So much that I'm glad I took advantage of the clearance sale on the Miniature Market website. I bought six chibi miniatures for around $40, which is a great deal considering each one is $13 or more. Since I'm pretty much a miniature hoarder, er, "collector", I keep an itemized spreadsheet of miniatures I acquire. Mostly, it's to help me get a realistic view of exactly how many miniatures I own and prevent me from accidentally buying the same mini twice (hey, it happens). While I try to keep them as orderly as possible and store them in bins separated by theme (i.e. Player Characters, Monsters, etc) I find that seeing them listed on a spreadsheet gives me perspective-- mainly, that I own way too many! However, I feel less like a hoarder if I have an organized, running catalog that I keep current (I even have a check box for "Painted? Yes/No"). 

In other news, I bought some new brushes this week. I've been using the same Winsor & Newton Series 7 brush (Size 0) for a whole year. I also have some Rosemary & Company brushes that I use for base coats, but I'm not entirely crazy about them. I know several talented painters that use the Rosemary & Co brushes with much success. However, in my experience, I find that the bristles separate and split very easily which is frustrating. This Size 0 brush has been used once or twice and I've treated it well. I didn't allow any paint to reach the ferrule and I've conditioned my brushes after almost every use. I have four of these in different sizes and I haven't been impressed by any of them-- I guess it just doesn't work well with the way I paint (my friend who loves these brushes this is an avid brush-licker, maybe that's the trick?). I use a wet palette and after I load the brush, I get about 3 light strokes before the brush splits like this (before & after below). 

That being said, different brushes work for different folks, and I'm still on the hunt for brushes that work well with the way that I paint. So for now, it's Series 7 for me. I bought two from Dick Blick, one in a Size 0 and another in a Size 1. I also picked up some firm clay shapers to help shape Green Stuff and Milliput when gap filling. I also took one of Julie Guthrie's sculpting classes at the Reaper ArtistCon and I think I'm ready to try some conversions! In fact, I have a new challenge that I'll write about soon, a "Secret Sophie", a holiday blind gift exchange with painted miniatures.