I discovered while painting these I want to get better at it.... and I remember how relaxing and fun it is to paint, but first I will need to get some better brushes... I currently have a large selection of brushes from many manufacturers and always find myself going back to certain ones as if the others were not even there.... to every thing you want to do in painting miniatures, there is a paintbrush for the job... DON'T buy cheap brushes.... This was another lesson I learned from HMGS Hobby University... more importantly from Heather and John! You will instantly see a marked improvement when you start using good brushes... I'll talk about brushes and paints at some point I am sure... primer too!
For now, I'll get back on topic....
Like I said above.... I need to concentrate on fine detail work and faces.... These are better than table top quality in my opinion, but they are far from master pieces.
I was able to complete the figures using only a few paints.... for flesh tones I used two... Iron Wind/Partha Dwarf flesh as the drybrush and War machine flesh from the Cygnar pain set. I used a few shades of browns, from both Games Workshop and Ral Partha. I cannot remember what their names were... The leather work was all Games Workshop black with highlights in grey from Ral Partha. The armor was done with a base coat of Iron Wind Chainmail and drybrushed with GW Boltgun metal.... The lance hafts were a GW brown, no highlights. Again, I went to Ral Partha for their bronze as the GW shining gold, no matter how much I shook it, would not turn gold, but rather kept that coppery color... I'll go back and mix it better later.
The bases were simple enough... basing gravel glued down with Elmer's school glue, painted flat brown from Iron Winds, drybrushed with GW snakebite leather and then the base band was done in the shinier GW Balor brown I believe... (GW changes names with every edition it seems). The scenic effects were DP9 for the static grass and Army painter for the flowers.
The final models got a seal of Army Painter matt varnish. I usually hit them with a couple of coats... just enough to start looking on the verge of glossy, but remaining the flat finish... I do this because I don't like shiny, but lots of people will handle them... when they get used... I want all of my figures to be durable.
Boromir is up next and he will be a quick study. I have painted many of him dressed that way on foot. I have also been doing a lot of research online and there are still some very nice examples to look at for inspiration. Below on the left you can see the bright green rail road saw dust I used back in 2000.. it was all the rage back then. I have to go back and find him shot full of arrows as I want to complete the set... I believe the figures below were also painted up around 10+ years ago.... I know the one dynamic action pose is the plastic figure from the re-released Mines of Moria box set from 2005... so these were painted in 2005 and beyond.
After Boromir will come more warriors of Minas Tirith. I started painting them a long while ago... I honestly think I painted these and about 8 others almost 10 years ago... and now I feel the need to get back to them. They should be an easy paint as they are basically 2 shades of flesh, black for all leather and exposed clothing with grey highlights, steel highlighted with boltgun metal and gold on some shiny bits.
I have about 30 more to go, including heroes and command/standards. I chose this group of 6 to get me started.... 4 spearmen and a couple sword and board. I am hoping to someday do some serious battles in and around Osgilliath. One can dream, right? I just hope to live long enough to enjoy playing with them!
I think after I get through some of these, I will have to switch up to some orcs or Uruks... maybe even some Warmachine, 15mm Napoleonic, Flames of War or even sneak in some one off 1:144th WW1 Shapeway planes or 1:1200 ACW Langton ironclads!! Who knows.... having options means I will never be bored or have a lack of interest into what I can do next!! And, God only knows how many projects and miniatures I have that have yet to see the light of day!!!
I have to add, I was asked by a close friend last week.... not only why I started the blog, but why all of a sudden have I been feverishly working on my mountain of miniatures.... My answer... I was inspired by a close friend who blogs a lot and the thread topic on The Miniatures Page (TMP) "Why do you share pictures of your miniatures"....
Life is short my friends.... enjoy it! Always make time for your loved ones, but also.... always make time for YOU!
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