LunchBox's WIP's

[LunchBox]

Well, I guess it's that time to get cranking again. I had a great time at Games Day meeting and talking shop with so many great painters.

 

I don't know if I'll make it back to a GD for a year or two, so the pressure is off...it's time to learn, practice, experiment, and grow.

 

The purpose of this blog will be to chart real progress through the course of the next year or so.

 

At Games Day, Mathieu, Alex, Vincent, (Jeremie @ Rcon) and a few others gave me some things to think about. Their top three crits were:

 

1.) Paint is too chalky

 

2.) Blending needs to be smoother

 

3.) Zenithal lighting effects are not nearly exaggerated enough

 

 

 

Without the pressure of a Demon comp looming over me all year, I can work on some fun stuff, and crank out a bunch of "practice" minis to throw on Ebay.

 

Here's the first one I'm working on. It's the good 'ol GD '05 LE Marine, to be painted up as an Ultra. The torso and belt are done, and I'm waiting to see what other colors I use before finishing the face-

 

 

http://coolminiornot.com/pics/pics13/img48a5e3a05871f.jpg

 

To address the crits in order as they pertain to this model:

 

1.) After painting a LOTR model the night before GD, I realized my colors were not chalky at all on that model. The primer seems to have been the culprit, more than the RMS paints, so I invested in a much higher quality white primer, similar to GW's spray.

 

2.) I'm working more on blending through glazes focusing on the middle, and adding transition colors; in this case it's a rosey red between the blues.

 

3.) I've shifted my pallet up to white from the shoulders up, and will progressively darken down the mini.

[ImperialTemplari]

Looking good as always Lunchbox

[wiplash]

wow i love it

the3 gold on the left part of the belt is particularly impressive and the blending is near perfect

[Brother Crassus]

if you are having problems with a chalky finished color, have you tried to glazing?

 

maybe post highlighting, or after every few highlights? it might make the color a bit more "rich"

[Corax_rg]

1.) Paint is too chalky

 

Huh, thats what i thought made your models stand out and i really liked it, but, they know a hell of a lot more than me :P

 

Looking good, i look forward to seeing your progress.

[CarbonBased]

What make and model of white primer are you using LB? I've been looking for good white primers.

[lionofjudah]

really like the new(er) blending...veery smooth transition. maybe a purple stage after the red for tonal purposes?

[Brother Blackbone]

Lunchbox,

 

 

For me to critique you is silliness, but I have some suggestions:

 

- Try some deeper, richer, more contrasty color combinations. Your latest work has been on the soft almost pastel-y side

- A different finish coat. A buddy of mine uses a mix of 'ard coat, PVA and water 1:1:3 that faithfully achieves a nice finish protecting coat for display models.

 

I wish I could've made it to GD to see your work in person.

 

 

- Blackbone

[LunchBox]

Progess:

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v492/lunchboxmtbr/umarinewip2-1.jpg

[GAR]

Howdy Lunchbox,

 

I can totally relate to primer and chalky finish. I am down in Houston and between the humidity and then so-so quality of primer I have had no end of trouble with primers and and almost fuzzy coat. Needless to say I have started all of my GDLA entries at least 3 times due to crapy primer.

 

That being said, one of the things I have been doing is to take a firm toothbrush and give my figures a good brushing tith the toothbrush to help break off the particulate that seems to crop up. It helps and if the primer is good, very little should come off. If it is bad, AKA, powdery as I have had a few times, then you had best go back and do it again.

 

Smooth blends are where it is at. The smoother the transition, the more impressive it is. I have to spend a good elgnth of time to get mine right, but when it is done it looks really good. There are several ways to do blending, I prefer wet blending, but it is more time consuming, for me at least, but I really like to results.

 

I don't know about the lighting. The Europeans seem to use much stronger emphasis than in the US, but they're style of painting is different that the US, typically. That being said I kinda do it till I think it looks right. maybe that is the wrong way to go about it, but I like it.

 

So far I like what I see on the guy you have, but I think the lighting on the chest is a bit too much and I would like to see more blue. A thin glaze of blue ink/wash would probably, in my opinion, be beneficial. But you do what you think is best as this is all subjective and good luck!

[lhg033]

love the deep blue on the legs (love the model in general!)

 

the belt is awesome.

 

what company is he from? would love to see how you pull of the white for first company on the weapons.

 

off topic - am i the only one who thinks i the first photo - headshot, it looks a bit like a young bruce willis?

 

lhg033

[LunchBox]

love the deep blue on the legs (love the model in general!)

 

the belt is awesome.

 

what company is he from? would love to see how you pull of the white for first company on the weapons.

 

off topic - am i the only one who thinks i the first photo - headshot, it looks a bit like a young bruce willis?

 

lhg033

 

I thought the same thing! He will be 1st co., but I'm doing NMM gold on the storm bolter, and blue on the fist. This particular mini is the worst cast I've ever received from GW. The metal is heavily pitted, and uneven in parts. I've re-worked his face twice more since the pic, but it still looks grainy due to the condition of the metal.

[Alpha PTP]

Hiya, Jeff. I may be a little late on saying this, but I am sad to hear that your Librarian met the floor in a not-so-friendly manner. I hate to see that you are selling them, but something has to pay the bills, right? :blink:

 

The blue looks pretty ace so far. It still looks a tad chalky, but I can hardly do glazing, so what do I know! I am going to be following your progress, my friend. Looking forward to another year of your models.

[Heretic Los Morte]

always a fan of your stuff lunchbox.

i have to say though, do you find gw white spray to be of high quality?

i dunno if it's just me, but every time i use their white spray it's massively chalky and basically ruins the models, cuz you can't paint over that junk at all

[GumbaFish]

This will be very interesting to see how you experiment to make yourself better, hopefully I can pick up a few things from it as well! Out of curiosity which white primer did you decide to use, that one looks like it covered really well and uniformly and I have had a darned hard time finding a white primer I liked.

[Starks333]

i finally got some time to think on it for you and heres what ive come up with:

 

1.) Paint is too chalky- not enough layers believe it or not the chalky effect is i believe a result of the fact you dont build a basecoat solid and work form there so the primer is always showing through slightly...you can solve this by doing extra layers in stages you want a smooth finish on the paint, i think this is the reason

 

***the latest mini and photos seem to of solved the problem, it looks like more layers have been applied and the chalkyness removed, however some still seems there mostly in your highlights(on the lower portions) i suggest avoiding the use of the primers effects to brighten your colour as a way to create highlights, thats generally what causes the chalkyness

 

2.) Blending needs to be smoother- the above should help, more layers, highlights can be a bit thicker than the rest of the layers so you can actually apply them...its always easier to shade than highlight, so remember that

 

3.) Zenithal lighting effects are not nearly exaggerated enough- often times you can avoid pure white or using whites simply by applyign some yellow around the highlights, or orange, these colours tend to draw extra brightness out of the highlight as your colour transitions from colour to colour to highlight...this however is a bit trickier with a blue...you can mix in bronzed flesh(or a variation of) to the blue until you hit a soft greenish blue, then start adding beige....for other colours you can nuance in pure colour(if using a stronger tone like a snakebite) if you look at jeremies blending model(where he goes from 0 to hero) he applies yellows before the blues, this way they arent being affected by the blue layers under, since there is no blue layers under

 

**NMM IS AFFECTED TOO!!!....your nmm is the only thing seemingly unaffected by your light, its extremely even all over and actually takes away from the lighting youve done...make sure to include the nmm in the lighting effect

 

and to answer some other things:

 

-GW skull white(both primer and paint) are excellent, most of the top fantasy painters use them and have no issues, having a bit of texture is good because well thats what your paint sticks to, some primers dry too smooth and therefor defeat the purpose of a primer on a mini

 

-wet blending while smooth lacks in the transition department, you can never get the same level of transition out of them, this is why successive glazes/washes can be more effective, and generally creates softer and more gradual blends

 

-lighting is the most important concept in 3d figure art, because it is what creates shape, without light defining where colour/highlight/shadow placement is there is no shape, and it will be flat...zenithal lighting has the object of drawing focus to the important part(the head) and is NOT A EUROPEAN TECHNIQUE...thats emphasized for a reason....view any good art, and you will see colour and light used....there are many ways to use it however, zenithal lighting is simply an effect created in classical painting to draw focus to the head...it is actually a natural occurance that things closer to light are brighter however ;)

 

-as for lunchies colours, the reaper range generally has limited colour choice, and the ones that are good are usually very greyed and bleh...this is why his stuff will seem less rich...have to use rich colour to get rich colour :D....P3 has the richest colour, however GW can create some very nice colours as well

 

 

:)

 

 

Alex

[LunchBox]

Here's some more stuff:

 

This first guy is what I'll probably lean my Patriot Guard army towards. I also thought a lot about what Alex was saying, being that true metallics fit my "style" better

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v492/lunchboxmtbr/newscheme1.jpg

 

 

A little more progress on the Ultra...I screwed up and based the right armor band on his arm too dark, and had to fight with highlighting it up for literally 2 hours. I also re-touched some areas on the chest, and face.

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v492/lunchboxmtbr/aureliuswip-1.jpg

 

And this is just a little something I'm doing for a friend...not too involved, and good practice for freehand.

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v492/lunchboxmtbr/babannerswipfront-1.jpg

[Midas]

I like the pose and base on the grey guy! I've never tryed white priming. hmmmmm......

[Starks333]

remember what i said about your freehand...act as if its a model, emphasize and create those shapes

 

i think the easiest way to control highlighting freehand on banners(in accordance to light and not the actual image) is to paint the image as if its unaffected by light, and then apply extra brightness or darkness after, to create the effect of the banner having shape and casting shadows and such

[LunchBox]

I worked on both models last night...the running guy is a bunch of stuff you don't wanna see; basecoating glazes, stuff like that.

 

However, between layers, I worked on the Ultra's gun. I still need to tidy up the "black" on the gun, I slopped some nmm colors on it, and need to smooth it out a bit, but I like it so far. I also went back and tidied up some spots on the armor, and glazed down the lower chainmail a bit.

 

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v492/lunchboxmtbr/aureliuswipgun-1.jpg

[WingsOfTheFalcon]

I really have no idea how you paint so well, it's outstanding and truly an inspiration.

 

I also really rate the conversion of the GD miniature, great job!

[wienas]

I'm loving the NMM on the gun. Great contrast!

[LunchBox]

I response to some questions I've been receiving, I'll post this up. I talked about basecoat glazes, and said it was boring. It didn't even occur to me that others might want to see the foundation work that goes into creating smooth colors. Bad on me, because without a solid foundation from which to build, none of us would get anywhere.

 

The pic below is basecoating...about 20 glazes of RMS Dark Elf Flesh, 10 glazes of Dark Elf Shadow, and just a couple of RMS Walnut Brown.

 

I have detailed wip shots of the knee pad taken every 5 glazes, with the colors used, and how they were used. I'll probably post those up in the tut section at some point this weekend. *Yes, I slopped some of my basecoating on the "finished" knee!

 

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v492/lunchboxmtbr/newwipbasecoat.jpg

[Terminatorinhell]

where is the body of that model from?:

[slah]

I really really like that grey - looking forward to the tut!