2018 Model Per Week Challenge

For those of you who don’t know, a few months ago I began hosting a bi-weekly Malifaux podcast with the other Admins from the A Wyrd Place Facebook group. In our first episode of the New Year, we all made some hobby resolutions for 2018 to try to get us all painting more; in this episode I committed to the Model Per Week Challenge in which I would complete 1 model per week for the entirety of 2018 so that at the end I would have painted at least 52 models. Part of the conditions of this challenge is that these models are to be for my own use on the table and that they can’t include miniatures painted for competitions or commissions. Along with the doing the Model Per Week Challenge I’m aiming to have completed at least 365 soulstones worth of models by years’ end. As I haven’t been posting here as often as I used to, I figure this is also a good time to get back to posting on a regular basis.

Work in Progress Wednesday 1-18-17: New and Improved!

Hey All! It has been far too long since I have posted anything here; the holidays happened and life happened and before you I knew it, it had been over a month since my last post. Things have finally started to settle down around here, so here’s a quick look at what I’ve been working on for the last week:

My new and improved hobby area!

A better look at the overhead rig for my video camera.

And speaking of cameras, here;s my new video camera!

A bunch of Oni

Academic friends for Sandeep!

A closer look at the Valedictorian.

Colette and friends

With things settled down around here, I will be getting back into the swing of things hobbywise. As I now have a really nice video camera and a rig to film myself doing hobby work, I will also hopefully have a video hobby tutorial put together for you all really soon!

What have you been working on?

Work in Progress Wednesday 2-3-2016: Productivity!

 

The Bear and Sigismund fair.

Really happy with how this Slate Ridge Mauler is looking so far.

My old west town with airbrushed basecoats.

Some forests to go with the old west town. I tried doing a quick guide-coat wash on one of the trees using the airbrush but wasn’t satisfied with the results, so I’ll be doing that by hand.

Some of my GW paints I transfered to dropper bottles. Much easier to load an airbrush this way. I will definitely be transferring most of my paints to dropper bottles.

Once again Work in Progress Wednesday is here, so it’s time for all good hobbyists to share what they’ve been working on! This week, I’ve been quite productive–I’ve done some detailing work on the Sigismund commission I’ve been working on (I swear that I’ll actually finish him one of these days, Chris!), started and nearly finished the new plastic Slate Ridge Mauler for Malifaux (this model we surprisingly quick to paint up), primed all of the terrain new terrain I showed you in my WiP Wednesday post last week, used my airbrush to put the basecoat on all of the old west buildings, and started the process of transferring my GW paints into dropper bottles for more efficient use and longer life. All in all, I would say that I got quite a bit done this week!

With how far I have gotten on the Slate Ridge Mauler, I am confident that I will be able to share the completely finished model with you by the end of the week. It has been far too long since I have shown off anything finished. With how well the Guild Arcanist Hounds have been working for me in-game and how little work I have left on those, hopefully they won’t be too far behind.

What have you been working on?

Work in Progress Wednesday 1-27-2016: Building a Better World

Work in Progress Wednesday this week is all about making my gaming world a better place, on and off the table. Last week I decided that I want to get the Malifaux scene in the friendly local game shop closest to me going again; I’ve recently gotten a few of my gaming friends who live near me into Malifaux and most of the shops in Houston where there’s a Malifaux scene are at least a 30 minute drive from all of us.

Work in Progress Wednesday 9-9-2015

Last week I said I would be starting a tradition of making every Wednesday “Work in Progress Wednesday”, so I have made sure to come through for you all because I know that deep down your week wouldn’t be complete without seeing what I have been working on. I must say that it is a pleasure to bring some light to the darkness that is your life.

Work in Progress Wednesday

I have several models that I would like to finish up painting before Gen Con this year and in an effort to build off of the painting momentum I have built up in the weeks leading up to and throughout the Iron Painter 2025 Competition, I am challenging myself to finish off all of the above pictured models prior to my trip to Gen Con. As I am leaving for Gen Con exactly five weeks from today’s date, that averages out to a little more than a model a week (which is convenient as I will probably finish off all of the Silurids at the same time).

The final round of the Iron Painter 2015 Competition will start towards the end of this week, so I need to keep going strong with these models. I have called upon you before, oh denizens of the internet, during my preparations for the Iron Painter competition to shame me were I to fail to complete a model per week; this gave me to motivation behind one of the most productive time periods of painting I have ever had. Once again I ask you to heap your shame, scorn, and derision upon me if each Friday between now and Gen Con I fail to present you with at least one of the models pictured above in its fully painted glory. I know I can count on you!

An Iron Painter’s Quest, Episode 7: Nightmares of My Own Creation

There is less than a week left until entries for Round 2 of the Iron Painter contest are due. At this point last round I was much further along with my entry than I am now, but this round I decided that I needed to order a model I couldn’t find around here and on top of that I decided I needed to do custom sculpting and conversion on it to kick it up a notch for the Iron Painter. I suppose I did bring it up on myself…

Reblog: So you want to airbush? A Beginner’s Guide, Part 1

I have previously mentioned another blog that really helped me in my research into getting an airbrush. While I am still learning how to master this black magic device, I am already excited by the results I am getting with my airbrush and am confident it will become a powerful tool in my painting arsenal; I wanted to share this blog post with you because I found it ridiculously helpful in my hunt. If you find this post as helpful as I did and decide to get yourself an airbrush, help a fellow hobbyist out and order yours through the Amazon affiliate store he has set up on his page. I hope this helps you all out as much as it helped me.
If you’re into listening to podcasts, and looking for a little beginners help with your airbrushing, give A Wyrd Place Podcast episode 5 a listen. They have a lot of the same advice as this blog post, but also have a few other nuggets of wisdom on the topic. If you’re into Malifaux and haven’t given this podcast a listen, they have a lot of good info on the game and hobby (although I do wish they’d put out episodes a little more often). If you’re not a Malifaux player (why aren’t you!?) and just want the airbrush info, you can jump to about an hour into that episode.
I am most certainly not an airbrushing expert (yet!) but these two sources really are what gave me the confidence in my selection of the parts of my airbrush setup.

Miniature armies, huge time sink.

As requested: airbrushing!

Asking for airbrush advice is a fairly common topic on miniature forums. And with good reason.  Getting one is pretty daunting and there aren’t many clear cut answers (such is art I guess).

That’s because just getting an airbrush isn’t enough.  What else do you need to make it work?  How do you make it work?  It can be a fairly expensive venture, so you want to keep trial and error to a minimum.

Welp, you’re in luck because I’m one to dive into things, so I’ll share with you all my trial and error and all I’ve learned in my 2ish years of using an airbrush!  Here’s comes the quick and dirty guide!

DISCLAIMER: While I do try to give more clear cut answers, these are still my recommendations ONLY.  I’ve geared this guide towards people that want more concrete answers.  I do…

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Fun with my Airbrush

While I have been waiting for the results of Round 1 of the Iron Painter 2015 contest and the announcement of the second round theme, I have been playing around with the airbrush I received as a birthday present from my parents. Yes, I know. My birthday isn’t until today, but I wanted to make sure it wasn’t damaged in shipping. Or something like that, I swear…

Hobby Tutorial: Quick and Cheap Homemade Wet Palette

When I started taking miniature painting seriously, I asked the good painters I saw what their number one recommendation is for someone to improve their painting. Invariably they said, “Thin your paints!” This is because not only does this make the paints go on smoother than if you used them straight from the pot, it reduces the appearance of brush strokes, and most importantly it takes advantage of the translucent quality of the acrylic paints we use as miniature painters; briefly what this means is that if you properly thin your paint the layer beneath your top layer will show through some where the top layer is thinner, giving you a smother blending of layers.

The addition of that simple technique to my painting arsenal stepped up my painting game immensely, but the one issue I ran into with working with thinned paints is that, like all paints, they gradually dry out on your palette thus throwing off the consistency of  your paints. The one tip that had been recommended to me to keep this from happening was to use a wet palette to keep my paints properly thinned. I had always been hesitant to pick up a wet palette because I wanted to spend my hobby money on more little plastic dudes to paint instead of on something boring like a palette, but then I discovered how to make my own wet palette on the cheap. In this hobby tutorial I will show you how to make your own wet palette for amazingly cheap.