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Andrew Bird
Australia
Victoria
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My DooM Demons are done and dusted! And I mean literally dusted, as in: at one stage, I had to dust them off! Allow me to elaborate, but first, have a gander at the finished product:
Not too shabby, hey? I'm quite chuffed with them, myself. Well, that's the most important part of this post over with, so feel free to click that green thumb thingy and head on your merry way. However, for those suffering from acute insomnia, I offer the following long-winded and excruciating back story about them. It's quite literally about paint drying, so you be the judge of how interesting it might be to read...
Still with me? Fine, you've been warned... 
I began work on these guys at almost the same time that I began working on their predecessors, the archviles. This was before Christmas 2011, I'll have you know. It's all a distant memory now, but I think the reason I attempted this "multi-tasking" strategy was so that I would end up churning out painted miniatures faster. You know, I could work on one set while I was waiting for the paint to dry on the other set. HA! Foolish painter. It turns out that the drying time of acrylic paints is not the bottleneck in my process...
Anyway, after the initial spray-on primer, I attacked the metal rear-ends with a progressive dry-brushing technique. A heavy brushing of Tin Bitz, followed by progressively lighter brushings of Boltgun Metal, and then Chainmail. Look, I even took a picture of the step-by-step process!
After that initial step, I pretty much left them to their own devices while I began working on the archviles. You can see part of their drybrushed metal butts in the top of this WIP picture:
And then? Well, then Christmas happened, plus we had a lovely family holiday at the end of January, and lots of other distracting (but fun!) stuff happened. Eventually, I managed to kick myself back into gear, and finished off the archviles. Then, to keep myself fresh, I decided to have a mini-break from DooM, and painted up Stabbins from Dungeon Run.
(I have further things to write/rant about on the topic of Dungeon Run miniatures, but I'll save that for when they're all done.)
Finally, I could put it off no longer, and went back to my long-neglected demons. Much to my chagrin, the lazy buggers had not painted themselves, so I was obliged to pick up the slack. This is where the dusting-off was required, and a rather curious setback occurred.
To provide context, here is a picture of my painting workspace:
Yes, I don't have a room, I have a desk, with wheels on it. Insert obligatory Monty Python "Four Yorkshiremen" reference here, e.g. "Desk? You were lucky!" Most of the time, my darling wife tolerates "Little Wheelie" sitting around the house when not in use, as long as he's in an out-of-the-way spot. But he often gets banished to the outside deck, particularly when visitors are coming for dinner, or I've left it way too long between painting sessions. His outside spot is undercover, and thus well protected from the rain, but not from the cold, heat, humidity, etc.
So as it turned out, poor Little Wheelie found himself banished outside for most of the Christmas / New Year break, as well as a decent chunk of January and February. And all of my WIP models were sitting on top of him, exposed to all the wildly random variances of heat and cold that Melbourne simply loves to bestow upon its residents, regardless of the actual season.
Now, to continue the story, I elected to follow the "retro" pink flesh scheme, as per the original 8-bit graphics:
What with pink being a lighter colour and all, I started out re-basing the fleshy areas with an initial white coat. And that's where the fun began. The paint simply refused to go on - it actually started beading up like water on a well-oiled surface. I was utterly gobsmacked. In hindsight, I guess what happened was that the initial black spray-on primer (which is an oil-based enamel) must have somehow "cured" or "leaked" part of its oily-ness (oil-osity? whatever...) out onto the surface through over-exposure to continual hot/cold temperatures from being left outside too long. Very strange, but I've learned my lesson now - no more leaving partially-finished models outside for months on end. (Duh)
As for the problem at hand, I was completely at a loss of what to do, so in the end settled for sheer bloody-mindedness. I just kept on smashing the brush against the recalcitrant surface again and again and again. I got there in the end, but it was a long, bitter struggle - three night's worth of painting, just to get a white undercoat on six models!
After that ordeal, the pink skin tones were a veritable dream to apply. About the only complication was the paucity of pink paint to be had. The Citadel/GW range was completely lacking (at the time), and although I had a pot of P3 "Carnal Pink", it was way too light to use as a base coat. In the end, I went to a craft shop, and got a fairly high-end tube of artist's paint. "Brilliant magenta", I think it was called. It was a bit thicker than I was used to, and darker than I wanted, but nothing that a bit of watering down and mixing with the Carnal Pink didn't solve. Then the usual wash (Baal Red), re-highlight with original colour and a final line highlight of pure Carnal Pink to finish it off.
Then all that was left was the horns, eyes, claws and teeth. Easy enough under normal circumstances, except that they were all still coated in that nasty, greasy black undercoat. And stubborn brush-smashing would most likely ruin all the work I just did on the pink shading. Lucky for me, Games Workshop has just released a new range of paints, some of which are in fact semi-solid gooey compounds which are custom-designed for drybrushing. So I bought a pot of white goo (Praxeti White), and generously daubed it on the remaining trouble spots. Not the use for which this stuff is intended, but hey, it worked like a charm!
The final touch (which I almost forgot about) was my ongoing "tri-colour" theme that I'm trying to work in to the paint jobs of all these miniatures. After examining the rear metalwork, I found some tube-like things near where the ironmongery joins the flesh, and promptly painted them up in the appropriate R/G/B colours. Clearly visible, whilst also being fairly subtle.
So there you go. Hopefully I've either entertained you a little, or at least cured your insomnia. Next up, I'll be tackling the really big boys, starting with the Mancubii. I have two very fond hopes for these guys:
1) I won't have to wrestle with any of the paint this time around.
2) I'll finish them before Games Workshop releases their next line of paints!
Thanks for reading, all the best.
Thu Apr 26, 2012 11:56 am
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Andrew Bird
Australia
Victoria
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Hang on a sec, let me just dust off this blog a bit...
There we go, good as new. I hope none of my avid followers have been getting too despondent waiting for an update. Hah, I wish. Anyway, I won't bore you with details, but suffice to say my painting schedule has been yet again interrupted, this time with a mix of legitimate real-life interference, but also a significant amount of me just faffing around and procrastinating. I'm back on track now, hopefully I can get a reasonable amount of progress done before I (no doubt) go and derail myself once more.
In any case, they're way past due, but finally completed: the DooM archviles!
I gotta say, of all the work I've done to date, these dudes would have to be the results of which I am least proud. In case you're wondering (and I don't blame you if you are), they're meant to have these pyro-kinetic gland thingies in their forearms, and my intent was to paint them up to look like they were incandescent, just about to go off in a painful, detonating blast. Sadly, it just kinda looks like they've got coloured balloons attached to their wrists, and not very convincing ones at that. Note to self: more research required on how to best emulate the effect of incandescence with paint and less than 5 square millimetres of surface area!
So yeah, a bit of a let down, but mostly due to the failed attempt at creating glowing forearms. I'm quite pleased with all the other areas, but the bulging wrists really are the focus points of these miniatures, and it's a shame I couldn't achieve what I was aiming for.
Anyway, for those interested in technique: I started these dudes off with white spray primer this time around. All my previous efforts have been with black primer, but I was thinking ahead to what I wanted to achieve with the wrists, and decided that white would be the safer bet.
Now came the wrists. Oy, so much effort, for such a mediocre result! *sigh* ... I created my own little "mini-washes" with each colour (red, green, blue). Essentially, mix together a spot of paint, a generous dollop of paint retarder (a clear medium used to stop acrylics from drying too quickly), and a drop or two of water for good measure. I then carefully brushed this mixture just around the base of the wrists, trying to keep the nucleus of the "bumps" white. I then made successive mixtures, with a lighter and lighter shade of each colour (and in the case of red, I cycled it through orange and then to yellow), and again carefully applied each layer, getting closer and closer to the centre of the bumps. I did this about four or five times, I kid you not. Alas, I am not the world's expert on making washes, and I spent a lot of the time fighting the pigment with my brush, trying to get it into the spot I wanted it to go. Which is a bit silly, really - the point of washes is that pigment goes where it wants to go, which is down into crevices and cracks, as opposed to up gradual slopes! Ah well, lesson learned...
After I got the wrists looking, if not great, then at least passable, I proceeded with my standard production-line strategy for the rest of the bodies.
Base coat of Dheneb Stone
Wash the Dheneb stone with Ogryn Flesh
Then, re-highlight with Dheneb stone, and then a final line highlight of 50/50 Dheneb Stone/Skull White.
Eye cavities were a simple drop of Badab Black wash. The mouths were achieved with a base blob of Baal Red wash around the whole mouth/tooth area, then picked out the teeth with Bleached Bone / Skull White. Toe claws were picked out in the same scheme (no red wash though). Bases were done with a careful application of Chaos Black, and drybrushed with Boltgun Metal.
So there you go. While I am disappointed with the end result, I doubt I'll spend too much time lamenting my mistakes, for a couple of reasons:
1) I am still a learner, and mistakes are a valuable part of learning.
2) I seriously don't have any friggin' TIME for useless regret, as I have a mountain of unpainted plastic/metal still awaiting my attention!
Thanks for reading, hope you enjoyed the read, or at least learned how NOT to paint an incandescent effect! Next up on the schedule, we start to get into the big boys (i.e. minis taking up more than one square): the Demons! Good news is that I've already made a start - here's a sneak peek of the progressive drybrushing effect on their shiny metal butts:
All the best (but don't hold your breath for the next post),
Birdman.
Mon Mar 19, 2012 10:45 am
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Andrew Bird
Australia
Victoria
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Gudday.
In my previous post, I promised to tackle the DooM archviles. And indeed, that is what I am diligently doing. However, just for the sake of variety, I decided to attempt the odd one-off miniature once in a while. I then interleave between painting my run-of-the-mill monster production line figures, and the unique miniature. It keeps me interested, and it allows me to attempt some more advanced techniques and detailing - stuff that I'm happy to try out on a single figure, but which would drive me utterly insane attempting on an army.
So, which miniature did I choose? Surely one of the unique heroes from any of my existing games, I hear you say. Oh no. Being utterly inundated with an existing mountain of unpainted miniatures, what is the only logical thing to do? Order a copy of Blood Bowl, of course! 
And not just the 24 figures from the base game, but a few special characters as well! Namely: Ernie Dingo!
This was a special promotional figure churned out by the talented folks at Greebo miniatures for the Southern Shrike Bowl of 2011. I didn't attend the event, but the organisers had some extra stock, and I was able to source it through a polite gentleman from the ausbowl.com portal.
So, what "special techniques" did I try out? Well, green stuff sculpting, for one:
Yep, the cracked-earth "Aussie outback" base that you see is 100% courtesy of yours truly. Oh, and Games Workshop, I suppose. Quite an interesting challenge, but easy enough once you get used to the texture of the stuff. Once mixed, just lump it onto the base with a mini spatula, then slowly spread it out like a recalcitrant lump of butter. Water on the spatula helps a lot. I got it into a nice flat(ish) shape, then let it set. Once that was done, I simply attacked it with a craft knife, and cut out the gaps between the cracked sections. Took me a good evening's work to cut it out to my satisfaction, but I was very happy with the results, and I'm even happier now that he's all painted up.
Another technique I tried is the smooth blending on his armour. I started off with a yellowish-orange, and worked my way gradually up to a bright yellow highlight right on the tips and tops of the armour. Wet palettes are an absolute must for this kind of thing.
And other than that, I tried to cram in as much painted detail as my hands and eyes were capable of. My hands did a respectable job, but alas, my eyes simply are not what they used to be, and I was required to call on the services of my brand new Dork Visor (tm) to assist me.
(In case you're wondering, taking the thing off actually makes me look even more ugly.  )
Well, that's it for now. Apologies for those of you tuning in expecting to see actual DooM miniatures - next time I promise!
Cheers,
Birdman.
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Andrew Bird
Australia
Victoria
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Ahem. Yeah, g'day. Long time between posts and all that. A fairly serious health issue in the family caused me to put all my grand painting schemes well and truly on the backburner for an extended period of time. Things have settled down a bit now, though, so I've been able to cautiously resume my efforts.
Anyway, in my last post I promised to tackle those irksome trites next up, and true to my word (if a little later than originally intended), here they are:
Man, they may be irksome to deal with on the board, but they are ten times that on the painting bench! No bases, which made it quite a challenge to secure them properly for the purposes of base-coat spray painting, not to mention just simply holding them while trying to do the detail. Probably 20% of the paint intended for these guys ended up going on my fingers instead.
Furthermore, all of these miniatures had suffered some degree of warping of the legs. Not a single one of them had more than three feet on the ground, and the worst of them looked like he'd met the wrong end of a fly-swat! Anyway, there's a tried and true method for dealing with this - the ol' hot-and-cold water treatment. Dip the mini in a cup of hot (as in, just boiled) water for a short period, and once the plastic is all nice and bendy, contort those warped limbs into the desired pose and hold for a while. Then, dip into a cup of cold (ice) water, and Bob's your uncle. Of course, this procedure would have been a whole lot easier if I'd been working with minis that had fewer than six recalcitrant limbs...
As for colour schemes, these guys (unlike the imps) had no nostalgia-based colouring to inspire me with, being a new monster that was introduced in DooM III. And, as much as I enjoyed playing the DooM III video game, if I was to take my colouring inspiration from it, then pretty much every monster would be a pale, mottled flesh colour with (of course) the odd splatter of blood.
So, I decided a lighter tone than the imps was in order, and settled for GW Iyanden Darksun as the foundation. Then, my standard procedure: wash (Devlan Mud is your friend), re-highlight with original colour, and a final edge highlight with a 60:40 mix of Iyanden Darksun and Bleached Bone. The teeth had a similar treatment, but with Bleached Bone as the base and the very tips of the teeth highlighted with skull white. Rinse and repeat for the tongues, but with Blood Red as the base.
The eyes were a bit of a challenge, and given that they were of a decent size (at least, in miniature terms), I decided to try my hand at the "reflective gem" effect. So, a dark shade as the base, a lighter shade applied along the bottom, but offset with a tiny dot of white near the top. Not sure if you can see it in the photo, but it came out reasonably well for a first attempt. Fingers crossed, I'll get better at this and other techniques as I practice more, and will be able to enjoy at least a few years of being a moderately-skilled miniature painter, before old age kicks in and robs me of my fine motor skills.
Anyway, after having done the eyes in the obligatory three colours, I decided that (a) the difference in colours wasn't really that prevalent, as these guys have their eyes on the bottom; and (b) I'd already used the "different coloured eyes" motif before on the imps. So, I decided that these guys, being the pesky little duct-scuttlers that they are, are probably subject to wading through all sorts of dubious substances. As such, I tried to make it look as though their legs were stained with dried gore/green goo/blue slushy. It could probably have been done better (not enough "splatting"), and certainly with a little more subtlety and blending of the colours, but overall I'm reasonably happy with the result. There's certainly no need to squint in order to determine which flavour of trite you're up against!
Well, that's it for this post. Hopefully the next won't be so long in coming out. The good news is that I'm now done with "dozens" - the remaining DooM monsters only come in sets of six or less - yay! Stay tuned for: the archviles!
Thanks for reading,
Birdman.
Thu Nov 17, 2011 11:58 pm
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Andrew Bird
Australia
Victoria
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Ugh, bit of a slow month, this one - at least in terms of miniature painting. Real Life conspires against me, constantly demanding my attention! Grr.
Ah well, a snail's pace is better than none at all. Having recently been pointed at the Miniature Painters' Guild, and in particular their ongoing monthly painting contest, the Golden Turtleback, I've decided to try and enter it every month. As such, my absolute worst possible pace will hopefully not fall below one "set" of minis a month.
Anyway, enough rambling. Ladies and gentlemen, I proudly present - the DooM imps!
(My apologies for the poor choice in background scenery)
I agonised over colour schemes for a little while, but in the end decided to go with the retro look of the classic DooM I and II imps. They look almost cute by today's standards, but those fellas had me soiling my pants back in the day. Ahem...
Colours used:
As per usual, all minis prepped with Chaos Black spray and sealed with 'Ard Coat + Dullcote.
Skin: Vermin Brown, washed with Devlan Mud. Highlighted with Vermin Brown again, then a final line highlight of 1:1 Elf Flesh:Vermin Brown.
Teeth: Bleached bone, washed with Devlan Mud (Hell is not reknowned for its Dental Plan), re-highlighted with Bleached Bone once more, and a final watered-down application of Skull White on the tips.
Toes/claws: Similar to teeth, however the washes were Baal Red / Asurmen Blue / Thakra Green.
Eyes: To the designer at ID software, responsible for giving the new-look DooM III Imps eight eyes each: KISS MY AR$E. You bastard. I started off trying to dot them out individually, then gave up in despair. In the end, I managed to work it by sloshing the whole eye-cluster area with white, then the desired red/blue/green. I then painstakingly painted around the eyes with Vermin brown once more. Yeesh.
Bases: As per the zombies - Chaos Black, dry brushed with Boltgun Metal.
Self-Appraisal:
I'm pretty happy with these guys as well. And although it's nowhere near as prominent as the zombies, I managed to keep my "three colours" theme going, so I'm pleased about that. I may possibly have been a bit heavy-handed with my line highlighting - looking at them, I now observe that I've highlighted areas that realistically ought not to be lit up. We live and learn, so I'll hopefully remember that for next time.
Next up - those pesky trites. Thanks for reading, hope you enjoyed it!
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Andrew Bird
Australia
Victoria
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So, having decided to get my DooM miniatures painted, I had to decide what subset to paint first. I chose the zombies, because they are the iconic low-level monster across this entire game franchise. I still remember hearing that haunting wheeze when I first fired up DooM all those years ago on my 386 (ah, memories). Plus, I have yet to decide on a colour scheme for the more demonic monsters.
So, here they are, all finished and ready to shamble:
Colours used:
All zombies were initially sprayed with GW chaos black. (Unless otherwise specified, all paints are from GW/Citadel).
Flesh: base coat of Rotting Flesh, washed with Thakra Green, then re-highlighted with Rotting Flesh once more. Wounds were filled in with Red Gore. Eyes were first splotted with Baal Red wash around the eyeball, then a dot of Skull White. Side note: I am NOT looking forward to attempting pupils for the marines!
Blue zombies:
Shirt: Ice blue, washed with Asurmen Blue, highlighted with Ice Blue, then line highlighted with 1:1 Ice Blue : Skull white.
Pants: similar method, but with Regal blue as the base and 1:1 Asurmen Blue : Badab Black as the wash.
Green zombies:
Shirt: As above, but Goblin Green base, Thakra Green wash.
Pants: Knarloc Green base, 1:1 Thakra : Badab wash.
Red zombies:
Shirt: Skull White undercoat (I've learned that much, at least), then as above with Blood Red base, Baal Red wash.
Pants: Mechrite red (no white undercoat required - yay!), and black:red wash.
Homer Simpson:
When initially picking out a wash for the skin, I was undecided between green and red. I ended up choosing green, but this guy was the necessary casualty. Rather than start all over, or (ugh) attempt to strip the paint off, I decided to get a little creative with this one. So, I highlighted the skin with Golden Yellow, and painted his shirt white. Then, I got a bit distracted, and wasted half an evening making the world's smallest doughnut out of a tiny coil of stripped electical wire and green stuff. Still, it was enjoyable, and if I'm not going to allow myself a little bit of fun here and there, I might as well pack away the paints right now. You can't see it in the photo, but the top of his head has two thin black lines painted across it, and he has a zig-zag running across the back of his skull.
Bases:
Re-brushed with Chaos Black to remove all evidence of clumsy painting around the feet, then lightly dry-brushed with Boltgun Metal.
Finishing touches:
Once completed, all models were sprayed with a Gloss Varnish (GW 'Ard Coat), and this is the state in which you see them. In a little while, I shall spray a final layer of Testors Dull Coat.
Self appraisal:
All in all, I am quite pleased with the outcome. The eyeballs are a little bit skew-whiff on a couple of zombies, but given that they're zombies, this is probably forgiveable. Note to self: invest in magnifying head apparatus. Also, the black gap between shirt and skin is perhaps a little bit too wide, but at this stage of my painting expertise, I lacked the confidence (and eyesight) to get the colours any closer together.
Still not 100% sure I needed to go with the green/red/blue scheme (for those not aware, the minis in DooM all come in these three distinct colours, and are used for the purposes of scaling to the number of players), but I like the variety. They do look a little bit "bright" for zombies, and buggered if I know how I'm going to continue with the RGB scheme for the remaining (butt-nekkid) monsters, but nonetheless I'm pretty happy with the results.
Thanks for reading, feel free to post comments/criticism/advice as you see fit. Next up (in a bit of a while): the imps!
Cheers,
Birdman.
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Andrew Bird
Australia
Victoria
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G'day all.
I find myself in what I suppose must be a fairly common situation around here: I have a heap of games sitting on my shelf, all with various amounts of plastic miniatures sitting inside them, all eagerly waiting to be painted. And, as much as I tried to discipline myself time and time again not to buy a new game until I'd finished painting the minis from the previous ones, I simply can't help myself.
My list of unpainted games is certainly not monolithic, but when you paint at the painstaking speed that I do, and consider that each game has a decent count of miniatures, it amounts to quite a lot of work to be done:
DungeonQuest
Dungeon Twister 2: Prison
Earth Reborn
Space Hulk 3e
Descent: JitD, WoD, AoD and ToI
Wrath of Ashardalon
The situation came to a head a couple of weeks ago, when I was up in Sydney for a work conference. The conference was completed, and I had a couple of hours to kill before needing to check in at the airport. Naturally, I decided to browse one of the local game stores. The very friendly staff member smiled, weclomed me and asked if I needed any help. I smiled back, and politely stated that I was just browsing. I spent ten minutes or so just wandering the aisles, with my hands shoved firmly and resolutely in my front pockets, away from my wallet. I was doing just fine, right up until I saw it.
DooM: The Boardgame.
Now, a little background: I'm an old computer gamer, and only recently converted to board games. Both Wolfenstein 3D, and DooM hold a soft spot in my heart. At the decline of my computer gaming years, I also played the much later version 3 of DooM, and enjoyed it immensely. I have quite a few friends around who are also old computer gamers, and I've been itching to get them around for a board gaming session. I've just been holding out for the right game to do it with. Anyway, on with the story...
Steady, I told myself. You've read about this one, and although it would be a fantastic game to introduce for a game night, it has serious balance issues, and apparently needs the expansion in order to be remotely playable. Besides, you're a completionist, and both this and the expansion are out of print, so you'll just drive yourself nuts if you get this and can't get... wait, what's that sitting next to it? Oh.
DooM: the Expansion
To my credit, I didn't purchase them immediately. I spent a good half an hour in the park, arguing silently with myself first. Pretty weak defense, hey?
Now, I've become quite good at secreting large-ish boxes around various parts of our property, so that my darling wife doesn't discover them straight away. However, it's pretty damn hard to hide two massive boxes when you're coming home from the airport and all you've got is an overnight bag. My long-suffering wife finally blew up at me, and demanded that I stop buying games that I never end up playing.
I will play them, I said, just as soon as I finished painting them. And then she gave me the Look.
So, I'm going to dedicate as much spare time as I have (which is not all that much, having a couple of young kids to raise and all) to getting these damn miniatures painted. My initial priority was Space Hulk, but that has now shifted to DooM. My eldest is just turning seven, and although we have played Space Hulk (with unpainted minis) before, the finer subtleties of strategy will be a few years in coming to him yet. But DooM - oh yes, I dearly wish to invite my old computer gaming buddies over for an evening, and bring this baby out. And, wanting to make a good first impression, I'll need it to be looking top-notch.
Hence this blog. It will serve a few purposes:
1) It will be a running journal off all the painting I've done to date. Posts will include pictures (of course!), but also I will annotate them with colours used, and any techniques that I've learned/tried out. As to how exciting a read that will be for anyone, well, I'm not forcing you to read it, OK? 
2) It will (hopefully) also serve as a motivation to continue painting. Posts are likely to be few and far between, but as long as I make some sort of progress on a regular-ish basis, I can be content.
3) Maybe, just maybe, someone out there will find my posts useful, entertaining, or informative. Bit of an ask, but you never know...
My next post shouldn't be too far away (as I've already completed the minis in question), so stay tuned!
Cheers,
Birdman.
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