Expanding the party

I started painting up one of, what I thought was my last, Lieutenant models and lost enthusiasm as it is a big old dragon and I lost most of my painting time due to lock down. Undeterred, I switched to painting my hero versions of the ally/lieutenants I had just finished as they are small enough to be able to make progress in just 20-50 mins painting each session. Add into the melting pot that I have been watching some amazing video tutorials/listening to painting podcasts and I became inspired start experimenting with more textures and consistency in using glazes instead of washes. Results below:

Finishing up Lieutenants

Finished two more lieutenants for Descent and realised I am up to 10! One left to get the whole collection for the expansions I have already painted the minions for. Haven't really scratched the surface of the Hero and Monster packs yet though.

The sculpt on this one was really good and it felt a lot more like painting a GW model for most parts.

Going solo for the first time

A while back Will sent me a text saying he had been playing through Some Mansions of Madness scenarios that we had attempted (and thoroughly died at). At the time I thought it made sense given the strong narrative nature of the game and the fact that there are so many variables that you can get tons of replay. I have recently started thinking about how easy it is for most of my favourite games to be played solo as they are cooperative games, or at least have cooperative modes like Descent. So I thought I would embark on a journey in to the dark, and stereotypically lonely, world of solo play by playing through some of the Descent campaigns. 

Today I sat down for about an hour and a half and played through the first mission in the Rise of all Goblins campaign that I have previously played and filmed on the Missing Geek channel. 

As you can see it all fits quite nicely on to the currently unclaimed computer table, just don't ask for a shutoff the rest of the room as it is covered in foam trays!

Finishing another Lieutenant

Finished up Ariad as my first lieutenant from the Labyrinth of Ruin expansion for Descent, and was a classic case of feeling pretty terrible about it half way through then rather pleased with myself at the end. I started to really focus on some of the advice I had been listening to on the Trapped Under Plastic podcast about the application of time on different painting jobs. particularly how you can spend time on key features rather than the whole model when painting model that are actually going to be used for games rather than show pieces.

Really pleased with the use of a pale green to caret the gems on the chest and head to contrast the red tones as this wasn't on the art work but I thought it would add a more Queenly air and break up the gold.

The neck bandarges were annoying at first but after I had finished I felt they really helped make the head  and bodice stand out from each other.

Really wanted to try NMM gold but I am actually pleased with the way the metallic parts have come out, especially the face 

My go to for bandages would always be the beige cloth kind but the art was clearly blue/grey tones and I think it worked a lot better in the end, even though it meant I had to make a few visits to the games store to pick up the different greys I needed as I went along.

Finishing up painting, finally!

It turns out that a full time job and parenting are a distraction from painting miniatures, who knew? So it has taken me quite a while to get my act together and finish off the last of my lieutenants from the Descent base game. Really happy with how it turned out especially as I hadn't painted in a few months so always takes a while to get back on the horse.

Tried out a couple of lighting effects (eyes and belt buckle) and generally happy with how they turned out

Still a surprise how much the shading/highlighting changes when you varnish a model, though with time you start to subconsciously plan for it

The wings are far more purple then the art (see below) but I didn't have the confidence to go for a near ly completely black model

Tried going lighter on the face but it just went a bit pinky so settled for matching the wings

Don't think it is too far away from the art work, wish I had had the confidence/time to practice NMM to the standard needed to do this art in full but there are so many more models to paint for the game that I will take greater pleasure in getting one step closer to completion!

Getting back to work and wishing I was painting!

This is the time of year that my painting takes a serious holiday as I am trying to get my head around the new academic year, so I thought that I would just reminisce about the progress I made over the summer. I managed to finish off the monsters from The Trollfens and five the Lieutenants packs from the base game. It is great to be able to focus on a single miniature to try out some new techniques like source lighting!

First every attempt at source lighting and very pleased.

Descent update!

Image dump of the progress I have made on the Descent models as I have now finished all the minions for Labyrinth of Ruin.

Love these models so much, can't wait to get them on the table.