cardboard workspace revamp part 1

well, my OCD went crazy. I bought myself a hot glue gun and after staring at the chaotic mess that was my work area I devised a plot to improve the workflow of the whole area.

Here the painting area the  most commonly used spot. I added shelves on the side of the paint catcher and then fabricated a few compartmentalized bins that fit on the shelves

This is a small shelf that catches odds and ends that really don't have a home. simple but sturdy and the most important part cheap to build.

Finished model bins on the top of the rack I put my paints on and again some more bins to catch the bottles and bottles of paint and the other paint acessories







This was one of my more productive nights when it comes to making things look and function better. the process of building shelves like this is very simple and again cheap. they are fairly sturdy if you put enough support sections in them. they can also be wrapped in fabric or some other material in order to make them more of a display piece and possible add some rigidity to the finished peice

once again......

Andy out

Basing your Miniatures: application of technique

Well, as promised I'm back again with the second part of my basing. In this post I'll attempt to give examples of different ways to put all you basing components together to make what you visualize in your head a reality.

 These are examples of a few different ways of applying the first layer of your base. generally I apply then in layers to give more demensions to them

 This is what water effects gel looks like applied over a light layer of sand.
Water effects is used for exactly what its name implies. but can be used in many ways

 This is baking soda applied over basing glue(white glue essentially) with this you have to top coat it with finish very soon after applying it as it doesn't bond nearly as well as I hoped it would.
This as you can see would be a snow effect around some stati grass or perhaps on a models shoulders

 This is super glue and baking soda. It leaves a textured effect and instantly dries. with this you can raise areas by applying layers or leave a texture on something you want to have a pitted and worn appearance.

 This is basic cork board. cork board can be used to make a broken stone effect or used to make risers for grass or other basing. I personally prefer to use it along with baking soda, foam bricks and sand to layer up around the separate pieces to make a ruined effect.

 This has three of the techniques I use applied to it. the first layer was two part epoxy clay. then I inserted magnets into the clay. I left a valley down the middle which I stacked some foam brick punching in and filled the gaps with sand.
The magnets make the model easier to transport or make it so you can change arms, if your model comes with multiple options.

 Here is the cork board as the first layer, around the edges I applied foam bricks and sand making the transition flow a bit more

 This is the other options available with water effects. by adding necrotic green to it and shaping divots into it, it gave me just what I needed to make a nurgle base

 This is a cork base with the sand, brick and baking soda applied to it. it made for a wonderful ruin to mount my skull cannon model to.
Another recommended technique for paint the base it use washed rather then all paint. I lay down a base coat of what ever color most of the base will be then I wash it back a bit and put a few high lights in by dry brushing a bit

 Here are the bases for my plague drones. using the necrotic green mixed with water effects and then washing it with reikland fleshshade(citadel wash) I came out with a lovely rot patch fit for papa nurgle himself

This is a base for my flamer of tzeentch. again water effects with orange was applied and the reikland fleshshade was used to wash the color back a bit









The only major technique that wasn't covered was two part epoxy clay. with this you just cut a piece off and mix it then shape it to whatever you want. its the same as sculpting with clay, you can also wet you tools/fingers and it comes out smoother then it would otherwise(fingerprints are bad mmkay)

This ends this post and remember when your are glued to more then one thing, its time to take a break


Andy

Miniature bases, the how and why of the thing

There is a variety of way to base your miniatures. the usual methods are getting sand and stati grass from you local hobby store, or gathering other materials from you environment. theses are the simplest methods. I've ran across different methods that I will share with you here.

Here is some of what I use on average. some type of glue on average its white glue, but sometimes super-glue will be a better choice.
  Some type of sand or grass is also very useful,  I sometime use baking soda to make snow effects or with super glue to add a layered look to the base before I apply sand or grass.
  The tube in the middle is a two part epoxt clay that works for sculpting whatever you need, it is paintable and dries very hard

 This is the glues and adhesives I use on average, there is a gap filling hobby glue(purple lid), white basing glue, Average everyday super glue and finally a water effects acrylic gel that you can add pigments to or apply baking soda over to make some interesting snow and ice effects.

  These are the current materials I use for base work, the two containers in front are sand and statigrass from games workshop. the baking soda is something I just recently learned about and started  using just today. as previously stated you will need some glue. white glue doesn't discolor the materials when you apply them to it, the superglue will make it seem a bit wet looking

This is craft foam, it is 99 cents from hobby lobby. cheap and dirt way to cut or punch shapes for whatever you need. as you can see I have punched quite a few rectangles out of it that make tiny bricks for rubble piles on my mammoths base. they are paintable and absorb some of the excess super glue making them more ridgid

 This is cork board, it can be used as stone slates or any number of terrain features. I haven't use much of this but the bit I used on one of my reaper mini's does look decent.

  If you model's come with bits and bobs that you arn't planning to use then use them on bases. An example is I used left overs from praetorian and a damaged immortal with epoxy to make it look like my mammoth had accidentally killed some of his own men

   This is a few of the tools I use on average. clay sculpting tools, files, exacto knives, tweezers and a paper punch to make craft foam bricks









This post will have a follow-up displaying what each material looks like when it is applied. now I must return to the wonders that seem to leak out onto my mini's.

Don't forget to pet you pets, they really like it

Andy out

assemble the skorne

well so far so good all of my skorne models are fully painted. thus I bring you a look at my small and humble collection of warmachine / hordes models.

Enter the mammoth himself, Mr Stompy. The skorne gargantuan

Well, here we go again. the model of the week is the skorne gargantuan mammoth, also know as Mr stompy in my circle of friends. the lesson that I re-learned with this model is remember where all your smaller bits are before you start priming and painting. this project took me the better part of a week to finish and it looks amazing. all that is left is fixing all of the whoopsies and clear coating him

 From box to birth, this model is huge. the base alone is the size of a CD and the model stands half a foot tall

 Here is a view of the box standing inside my airbrushing enclosure. as you can see by looking at the brush sitting next to it, it is a fairly large box

 Here is the box that is inside the main box, I know a box inside a box. here is the main body and arms/legs

 here is the full kit inside its plastic containers. the box on the right contains all of the tassels and frills that you can put on the model. there are a ton of them and they can be a pain in the butt to glue on.

 Here is the main body laid out for assembly. the cannon pieces ended up assemble before this picture was snapped.

 here is the mid point on the painting the paint list will be included. as usual I used a full array of metallic paints and it looks wonderful

 Over the next few pictures you will see the different details that slowly come out

 Rear view of the mode, some details weren t picked up by the camera there are 11 "gemstones" down each side painted in metallic purple

 the chains are painted in sterling silver and the copper detail is in antique copper

 the boney details such as horns and nails are painted in territorial beige. the thing i dont like about the apple barrel paints and many of the craft grade paints I use is they take several coat to full coat the area. onthe flip side once you get then built up enogh(thins coats at a time) they look very good

 The areas that look like chain mail are painted in gunmetal grey and then were washed back a bit with Nuln Oil

 The base isnt finished yet (JB weld two part clay epoxy) the bits sticking out are parts from damaged models and spare bits Ive collected over time. the idea for the base is Mr stompy doesn't care and is too big to care. he'll run over his own people as much as the enemy

 heres another view to make sure everything is up to date

 back view

Here  is the full array of paint used on this model;

Folk art antique copper
Folk art gunmetal grey
Folk art sterling silver(very little)
Folk art pearl white(very little)
Folk art sequin black
Folk art metallic plum
Apple barrel territorial beige
P3 Iron hull grey
P3 Blighted gold
Citadel Nuln Oil (wash)