My Paint Station

This is the view from where I would sit to paint my models. I used to paint in my living room but decided to move into my study room instead after I got that lamp you see the photo. I secured it in a way that I can sway it to my right to add as an overhead light source for photographing my models.
Turning to my right is where my computer and a very basic photography set up is. A piece of blue paper act as the background for my models. The 2 other lamps will be placed of either side of the model for illumination.
From the 1st photo you might notice a small table in the right background. This is where I put most of my unpainted stuff, reference books, Cry Havocs (Rackham monthly publication) & other odds and ends which are related to miniature painting.
Finally the basic stuff which you'll need to get started. The blue can is a primer while the grey can is a matt sealant. Also you see 2 W&N series 7 size 0 & 00, not the miniature ones though as I couldn't get them here, which size 0 is almost the only one I'm using from start to finish. A piece of white tile act as a very nice and steady palette for me to work on. It can be easily clean using water and gentle scraping. Lastly a steady pair of hands and alot of patience and passion is all you need to enjoy this hobby for a long time.

Kelzaral Finished (Updated)

Well sinced I finished painting him today and still got some time before I go to bed, I took a couple of shots of the finished model. I'm pretty happy with the final results. Its quite close to what I had in mind. I did a small experiment with this model. I used some glazing medium(Vallejo), mixed with flat base (Tamiya) and water in the ration 4:2:4. Its my own mix which I used to water down my paints.

Basically, the glaze medium shouldn't be used this way but rather used on its own to thin paints w/o using water. My idea of this mix is to have something that would extend the drying time of my paints, at the same time holds the pigments together and finish matt.

In the past, my paintjobs tend to finish glossy before adding a matt sealant. This is because I used alot of thin glazes and the continuous brush strokes tend to have a polishing effect on the surface. This result in a slightly glossy finish. After using the mix, this problem seems to be eliminated.

Updated with a new photo. You might notice a slight change in his skintone. I feel it looks freakier this way. More angles of him in my gallery.

Some More WIP of Kelzaral

Getting to the final stages of this model. Managed to clip off the slab under the model without much trouble. I had in the past had serious damage to the paintwork when doing this. This time round I had weaken the slab before painting so it was easier to clip it off. Painted up the base and pinned him onto it.

Tomorrow I'll finish him up so that I can bring it down for a match up this Friday at a LGS. He will be my main character for the army. Hopefully he come back victorious then I'll take some pics for submission into the Iron Painter 3.

300 Review

After watching the movie 300, I must say I'm not very entertained as I was when I watched LOTR. Although some people claimed that after watching it, they get adrenaline rush to wanna pick a fight with 50 people afterwards, it didn't have that big an impact on myself.

The plot itself was pretty simple, the Prussians wanted world dominance while the Spartans refuse to give in. As a result the King lead 300 bare chested men with well toned 6 packs, which in actual fact you probably see less then 20 of them to battle,or rather slaughter all sorts of enemies thrown at them.

The animations were pretty cool, but after having seen too many of these it didn't awe me that much. There were some fantasy monsters thrown in to add to the excitement as one really can't expect to see much if it was just 300 Spartans killing thousands of men.

Overall, it's a show worth watching, for the male audience, there's a few scenes with bare tits and for the female, they probably felt entertained as well watching well-bodied men fight in their swimming trunks.

2 New Entries

Added 2 new models which I painted up for the Femme Fatale II online painting contest. One of the entry, Wazabi, won 1st in the fantasy category. Needless to say, I'm more than happy! More angles of this 2 models in the gallery.

Some progress

I painted the gargoyles underneath today. I gave some of them blue fists, pink cheeks/nose just to break up the otherwise all dark brown lower part. The skin of the gargoyles was also given a glaze of green. This main part of the model is more or less done now to move on to the arms and then I'll post a shot of the assembled model.

Kelzaral The Diabolical

After a week of no posting, I'm ready to show another WIP of the model that I'm currently painting up. Actually there's another 4 minis that I'm working on bit here & there. Thought I'll showcase this one as it might very well end up as my entry for the 1st round of the Iron Painter 3 contest. The theme this time round is "Flesh of a Different colour".

So what's the Iron Painter contest about. It's an online painting contest organised by Wyrd miniatures, whereby people from all over the world will sign up online as contestants. When round 1 starts, the painters will be randomly paired with a common theme to paint up whatever mini you like. The judges will judge the entries based on the theme, technique & overall aesthetic. The lower scoring of the pair will be eliminated. This will go on until 2 remains for the final face off. I took part in the last Iron painter and was lucky enough to make it to the last round but did not win eventually. Hopefully I'll do as well, if not even better this time but the level of competition has risen even higher with talents from all over so I'll just have to see how far I can go.