Ravehammer and Beyond!

So as it happens, I was introduced to Warhammer 40,000 by my boyfriend Angry Richard. Fortunately enough for him, I've taken a HUGE interest in painting miniatures! 

I suppose it wasn't really a surprise, after all, I'm a nerd of other sorts --  I've been playing World of Warcraft and other vidja games for a while now, and being an art student it's only natural I'd like to make tiny adorable things awesome looking. So after a few vague verbal introductions to building/painting armies and the mechanics of the game, I begged for a model to paint, just to see what it's like. He gave me this fellow:

Naked and hungry for pigment.

 So, still blind as to how one actually (and beautifully) paints this junk, I attacked full throttle with an arsenal of terrible acrylics and fishing lure coating and ended up with a striped abomination that glows in the dark.... yeah. In my defense, stripes are my favorite things and the carapace certainly lent itself to alternating colors, and anything that glows in the dark must kick ass in the dark too. Minus the fluorescent spray paint claws, it was painted with a thick, artist quality, very latex-y acrylic that did not thin well with water. Unfortunately for me, this paint also lends itself to revealing brushstrokes too. So, with a terrible chunky wash over the whole thing, and every last brushstroke showing, I had to shame the thing more by covering it in UV-Glo lure coating. And with the black light bestowed upon me by the previous tenants of this apartment, I was able to look at the little guy all lit up.

Ravehammer 40,000.

It's not that this was a completely disgusting wreck of a paint job, I just suppose it was not ideal. Technique-wise it blows and its color scheme is a little out there, but I'm thinking it's at least one step up from a Hello Kitty army. And for the record, I applaud anyone who happens to paint their Tyranid army in this beautiful black and white monstrosity, and I would happily sell you my soul for it.

After a while, and after looking at numerous pictures and examples of well painted (some not-so-well painted) pieces, I at least had some knowledge now of what these things are supposed to like. After seeing what other people have painted up, it gave me an idea of how to do several techniques, or at least what the result should look like. I then ended up with this dumb beastie:

Rawr.

Again, not that this is completely disgusting, but it is a little less disgusting than last time. At least this looked a little more reasonable. I had a slightly better supply of paints that would do what I wanted them to, but that still was not quite enough. I needed to try out a shade, but only had this weird Winsor & Newton set of translucent inks. Didn't work out too well as a shade, but turned out pretty bitchin' on the carapace. A layer of yellow, and a second spotty layer of brown, and I was able to create a nice dappled effect without much hassle, and even more the ink dries glossy and gave it a little more contrast from the rest of the model. The dry brushing overall was a little more successful this time around. A few mistakes here and there, but I didn't expect much with this since I was still practicing. Although I felt I was starting to grasp how to paint minitures, I was still unhappy with it.

After requesting for more things to paint, Richard threw another mawloc at me:

Blending!

Maybe I'm a little biased at this point, but I'm thinking Tyranids are my favorite. This time around I wanted to work a bit more with blending and glazing and other such things to create gradients of sorts. This more of less came from looking at James Wappel's miniatures, which gave me a huge case of the jellies. With that beautifully gaping mouth and an arsenal of better supplies and techniques starting to work their way under my belt, I set to work. I'm obviously not finished with him yet, and I suppose I don't have a whole lot left to do now. Updates will surely be given once I'm finished.

To continue practicing, Richard also managed to toss my way  a four piece Warmachine Cygnar group, something he'll be selling on eBay once I finish them. I'll give an update on these when I'm actually finished with all of them.

This guy's finished.

This guy's not.

These have temporarily been put on hold for now, since I've been recruited to help Richard paint a handful of centaur robot conversions he made that he's going to use for Feast of Blades in Denver next weekend. Yeah, he sure does cut it close...