Ramius' Fantasy Log

[Ramius4]

So, I finally decided to start a log here. I have to thank Harry for his inspiring log. I too have loads of unpainted miniatures sitting around (staring at me accusingly)…

The tale of fantasy painters seemed like a good place to start so my main focus will be Dwarves, at least for a while. My painting methods are generally very simple when doing entire units. I’m not out to win any awards with my stuff, rather to have nice looking armies.

Dwarf Warriors: Here is the standard bearer of the first warrior unit.



And this is the result for a very old model. I didn't do any more than the bare minimum on this one. The rest will be more detailed like the model above.



Dwarf Longbeards: These are much more involved since I'm painting them before assembly. It takes a lot more effort with the multi part models, but it's worth it I feel.

And here is the test model.



Iron Breakers: These are very straight forward and since they're mostly armor, I'm relying on the beards and gold accents to bring them alive.

A lonely Ironbeard...



And a few friends he picked up...



And then a bunch more along with a Lord on Shieldbearers. The beards have gotten their first taste of paint. Still a lot left to do.

[Ramius4]

Here is what the Ironbreakers will look like (minus their shields).



And a couple more angles of my progress on the unit.



It looks a lot more intimidating from the top.



And finished up a Thane. Still getting the hang of taking pictures...





Comments and criticisms are always welcome

[Ramius4]

Just a little update. Ready to paint all the gold details on the Ironbreakers. I've been making some headway on those ancient warrior models though. Since I kept them rediculously simple, I may end up finishing them first. I'll add some shields to them as well too. I may or may not bother to paint their boots a different color, I need lots of core troops and I can always go back to them later on. I'm trying not to get bogged down with too much detail, which is something I often find myself doing.

At the rate I've been going, I may have my 2000 points ready for the ToFP long before the deadline. I may have to sign up twice with my Dwarves and commit to 400 points per month...

[Photographer]

Lovely gold!

[Ramius4]

Thank you very much The magic of shining gold with a bit of brown ink is a thing of beauty. For those who may not like the darker tone, a bit of orange ink mixed into the brown and diluted slightly with water also does the trick.

It's too bad GW doesn't sell their ink products anymore. Luckily, there are great quality, high pigment acrylic inks out there such as....

http://www.daler-rowney.com/en/content/fw-artists-inks

And those inks are far cheaper for far more ink.

To get a proper shine, you need as smooth of a primer coat as is possible. Unfortunately, some of the Dwarves I primed up for this had a bit of grit to the primer so the armor isn't going to be quite as shining as I would like.

[Ramius4]

Another update. I have the base colors on those ancient Dwarf Warriors (love the basic utility of these old models!). They’re pretty plain at the moment and could really use an accent color to offset the prominence of the bright beards (bright colors on purpose since I knew most of the models would be all armor). I also need to do some command models for them, which I’m debating if I’ll use the Command models from Skull Pass since I have loads of them, or perhaps some more classic models. They’ll be getting shields as well.

I’m definitely going to do the Shadow Grey for the boots. It works well with the purple I chose for my Warriors colors. Painting these is making me excited to see what my Skull Pass Warriors will look like all painted and ranked up. The Skull Pass Warriors armor is base coated and already looks better than these old ones.







I’m glad I chose the purple for the Warriors, I wanted something you don’t normally see. I’m also not a huge fan of the way GW mixes and matched colors within their Dwarf units. They don’t look unified to me. I prefer regimental colors (I’m sure the Dwarves can afford it!)

Just to point out what I was saying about a smooth primer coat being beneficial to the way I paint my armor, I’m including a picture of some Grail Knights I did years ago. Take a look at the armored horse head on the far right and how nicely it shines. That’s what I try for! If you compare it to the old Dwarves I did, you can see how the grainy coat of primer just kills the effect.



Just like inks want to collect in the recesses of your miniatures, a grainy primer coat creates thousands of tiny recesses for it to collect in. So it tends to just sort of sit on the model everywhere instead of running down into the details where you need it. When I go back and drybrush it then, things just end up being very dull and flat because your brush also will tend to hit these little grainy patches. Ah well, I knew as soon as I primed them I was going to have that problem, but it’s not worth stripping them down again.

And just because I can… Here’s a pic of a Bretonnian Sorceress I did back when 5th edition was still going strong. At the time it was one of my best paintjobs. I may have to update it at some point though, there are parts of the model I can do far better now (like the gold).



Back to Dwarves!

My Longbeard Standard Bearer, all ready to complain about something! I must’ve had the flash on because the green is a bit washed out looking… Eventually I’ll add some freehand on the banner, for now I can’t decide what I want on there.



I'm really happy with how much I've been able to get done in these last two weeks. Literally more than I've painted in the last year!

Thanks for looking!

[Ramius4]

Also on the painting block. Some distinguished gentlemen to lead my army into battle.



Cleaning off shields today for both the Iron Breakers and the old Warriors.

So far these are the colors I've chosen to paint for each unit type. Any ideas or suggestions?

Lords – Regal Blue (Bright Orange trim)
Engineers – Red and White trim
Runelords and Smiths – Black with gold

Warriors – Purple
Longbeards – Green
Thunderers – Burnt Orange
Hammerers – Regal Blue
War Machine Crews – Red and white trim
Iron Breakers – Iron
Slayers – Orange hair of course!
Miners – Baby blue

Trim for all units - Tausept Ochre/Bleached bone
Boots and cloaks - Shadow grey

[Ramius4]

No updates for a few days, haven't been feeling well. Anyways, I made a bunch of progress on the skull pass Warriors before I went down

So... After all the work on the Iron Breakers and those old Warriors, it ends up being the Skull Pass ones I will finish first (you can see my standard bearer for the unit back on my first post). Go figure. As a side note, doing the skull pass warriors illustrated to me just how much those old ones need another accent color to set them off. I may also do some more work to their faces as well. I wanted to do a fast paintjob, but not a bad one!

Thanks for looking! C&C is always welcome

[SamVimes]

I love those old dwarf minis. Perhaps the boots, gloves, and/or the belt could be painted in a contrasting color. Maybe teal or bright red or even yellow. At this rate you're going to finish the whole army before November!

[Ramius4]

Thanks for stopping by Sam Yeah, originally I had intended to sort of 'ignore' most of the details on those old warriors... It's just not working for my as is though, they need more work.

I'm going to stick with simply shadow grey for their boots so they tie in with the other warriors. The small bit of pants cuff and the belts I'll probably go with Tausept Ochre since that's what I did for the Longbeard trim. Beyond that a bit of work blending the faces better rather than the sloppy job I tried to get away with Oh, and of course the shields.

I'm undecided if I'll use spare shields from the newer warrior kits or if I'll use the ones from the 6th ed Dwarf models where they had a choice of 3 different icons to put on them. I already have 20 of those painted up with the purple background and gold dragon on it... I had been hoping to save them for the classic Imperial Dwarf models, but may change my mind.

[Ramius4]

Here's my first finished entry for the ToFP

I know it's a pretty unusual color scheme for Dwarves, but that's the point for me. I didn't want them drab and flat looking on the tabletop. I want them to stand out from the crowd a bit. Besides, I figure if anyone can afford the expensive dyes for common troops, it'd be Dwarves!

STILL TO DO: I may eventually add some more gold such as on the weapon runes. First I want to get the entire army to a fully painted stage where I can go back and add the finishing touches.

Comments and criticism are very welcome!

POINTS : 20 Dwarf Warriors with hw+shield and full command 205

[SamVimes]

Looking good man. Surprised that it's the BFSP dwarves that march out first. They look a little glossy; are you going to spray them with varnish at some point? I'm curious what the bases are going to wind up being. I think a snowy/rocky style base would look pretty spiffy.

[Ramius4]

I was surprised too The models required the least preparation (filing and basing) though and so were good for block painting because of the uniformity of the models. I didn't have to mess around with adding shields or painting anything in parts. The Longbeards for instance I made from the multi-part kit, and are coming along slowly since they are painted in pieces and then glued together.

They're really not quite as glossy in person, although I do like a little gloss for miniatures that are used a lot for gaming (as these are). I think my pics come across extremely glossy because half the time I forget to turn off the flash!

Sam, I may just have to use your suggestion for the bases. I've gone through so many different ideas on basing them that my head may explode. I need to make a decision! I'll be waiting until most of the army is painted before doing any basing though so I've got time!

Thanks for looking

[Ramius4]

Here's my nearly finished (had to show it off) unit of Longbeards for the next month of ToFP. I'm going for 30 models total, but I might wait to add a few more. There's still a few pouches and touch ups to do, so they're not technically done yet. And I still haven't figured out what I want to paint on the banner. It's either going to be runic in nature or something resembling the masks the longbeards wear.

Anyways, here's my crappy pics... Someday I'll figure out this photography business...

The first couple pics the Champion isn't in the front rank because he wasn't quite ready.









With the Champion...



The colors are basic and that's my intent. Eventually I'll go back and add some highlighting and take care of any areas I feel are a bit flat, but for now I just want a good, clean, tabletop standard paintjob.

In the past I would've went all the way into the detail work, and I probably would have given up by now. Doing it this way I actually get things done

[mrtn]

Nice start to the army. I like the bronze (or whatever it is, a copper alloy anyway ) on the Longbeards.

I think you should finish the basing, that would make the army look better as a whole, and really round it off.

[Ramius4]

Nice start to the army. I like the bronze (or whatever it is, a copper alloy anyway ) on the Longbeards.

I think you should finish the basing, that would make the army look better as a whole, and really round it off.

Thanks mrtn for the kind words. It's just shining gold with brown ink over it, thinned about 25% with water. In person it doesn't look quite so coppery/bronzey

I really should finish the basing I know I like samvimes suggestion of a rocky/snow look, but after thinking about it a bit I'm not sure I'll do that. These are all securely glued to their bases and I don't want to rebase the entire army in order to properly do rocks (well over 300 models).

Anyone have any suggestions?

[SamVimes]

I don't blame you with not wanting to re-base them all. How about a light drybrush of codex grey over the top surface of the normal base, and then applying a "snow" mixture (mine's white glue+water+snow flock) over ~70% of the base top. That way it'll look like snow on a rocky surface without resorting to ripping up all the models to put cork stones down!

Nice Long-beards btw. Do you have a rune or design planned for the banner?

[Solun Decius]

The Dwarves are looking nice there!
I usually glue my troops to the bases and then put basing material on afterwards (at least my 40K ones). If you have a fairly fine or mixed size modelling sand you can spread glue onto whatever is visible of the bases and put sand on that. It'll only go as high as the soles of their shoes, so there's no need to lift them off the bases. Then you can paint that as ground and add tufts of grass or patches of snow. Even if some if the glue or snow stuff goes on the sides of their shoes it usually looks natural anyway, that they sink just a little bit into the ground. It won't obscure any noticeable part of your paint job.
Do you start by painting the entire models in metallics, before painting the colors over that?

[Ramius4]

Nice Long-beards btw. Do you have a rune or design planned for the banner?

I'm thinking I'll do a design based on the iconic Dwarf faces represented on many of the Dwarf shields. Something like the face on the shield of the standard bearer himself.

The Dwarves are looking nice there!
I usually glue my troops to the bases and then put basing material on afterwards (at least my 40K ones). If you have a fairly fine or mixed size modelling sand you can spread glue onto whatever is visible of the bases and put sand on that. It'll only go as high as the soles of their shoes, so there's no need to lift them off the bases. Then you can paint that as ground and add tufts of grass or patches of snow. Even if some if the glue or snow stuff goes on the sides of their shoes it usually looks natural anyway, that they sink just a little bit into the ground. It won't obscure any noticeable part of your paint job.

Yeah, I'm an old hat at basing so I know the process. I think I'll track down some fine grey or tan colored gravel/sand along with the snow flock. It's just one of those things I wish I had done some rocky basing with a little height to it before I had glued them down, know what I mean? Trouble is, I don't like to wait to use the stuff I buy, it gets used in games loooong before it sees paint So basing just wasn't planned out yet.

Do you start by painting the entire models in metallics, before painting the colors over that?

Normally it's not something I'd recommend, but yes I did do that with the Dwarves. Metallics are generally difficult to cover up due to the low opacity of most paints, so a few coats are sometimes needed.

There's a couple reasons I did it this way. One is that I used a black undercoat and was going to need a few coats of color to get a solid color anyways... So getting a little sloppy with the metallic parts really wasn't going to affect how much effort I was putting into the colored parts to begin with.

Another reason is there are lots of areas on the miniatures where metallics go, so I find it easier to get to them in one step rather than painting each area individually or trying to 'paint around' other areas.

My process for it is just 3 quick steps after they're primed:
-Wetbrush the model with Boltgun metal.
-Paint Black Ink thinned with about 25% water over the entire model (this creates a nice shiny metal after the next step).
-Finally, lightly drybrush any metallic parts with Mithril Silver. I try to be a little more careful where I apply it at this stage, but it's not a big deal as it any mistakes will be covered later on.

Thanks for the replies and ideas guys Comments are always welcome!

[Frankly]

Some really nice work there. Nice colours!