Is there any aspect of the hobby you really want to try but haven’t done yet because you’re somehow afraid of it?

• I’m with @sundancer on this one – OSL is terrifying. That said, I’ve just printed some cyberpunk guys sat at computer terminals, that would look amazing  with osl painted faces, gazing into the screen…

What was the most daunting/scaring/intimidating thing (of our hobby) that you’ve done that then turned out to be easy as pie?

• Painting eyes. I went from sploshing a face with wash and pretending it was ok to painting ten pairs of eyes in an evening. I paint eyes now. Just paint them first, before *everything* else.

What aspect/technique in out hobby caught you off guard? (Thinking it would be easy just to have it bite you in the rear end)?

• Realistic shading. I discovered quickshade and it really does improve a paintjob by about 1000%. That’s my technique – basecoat, wash, highlight. But all my minis look like cel-shaded flat cartoon characters. They don’t look terrible, but it’s a look I’m a bit tired of. I’d like to get some realism with my shading – I’m trying with zenith highlights etc. but then “old me” kicks in and paints right over it and does the 90s style blacklining and solid primary colours again!

Speaking of flat, brightly coloured cartoon characters, here’s this weeks music. I was introduced to it by my eight-year-old nephew and while I hated the characters, I eventually had to admit I quite liked the song. Maybe it’s just because it reminds me of him when I hear it.

(these are the guys I’m going to learn OSL on)

(I paint eyes now)

Yeah screens. Maybe it’s the early days of cyberpunk. Like in the 90s when the internet was “cyberspace” and a 3d virtual reality place you went and hung out as an avatar, rather than a series of forums where you sit and… well, type, basically. Cyberspace never *really* happened but a niche few still strap on headsets and pretend it’s cool (I’m looking at you, Oculus users). In the same way, I reckon plugging straight into the matrix will only be for the kinds of people who currently do everything from the command line in Unix.

I think there’d still be screens. After all, we’re supposed to have flying cars by now but setting fire to putrified dionsaurs and leaving rubber particals on tarmac, just like we did 100 years ago isn’t just the norm, it’s also the blueprint for the future. Even if you plugged straight into your brain, I reckon you’d still need a screen, if only for debugging purposes!

I’m looking forward to the future when we ditch flat screen monitors and go back to great big hulking CRT tubes like we did in Total Recall 😉

Hello all, happy weekend(ish). Not just going to lurk this week, my hermit impression is getting all too convincing at the moment.

Pledge, minimum to varnish some 15mm tanks. Hopefully, get some more FoW British painting done.

Questions of the week:

Is there any aspect of the hobby you really want to try but haven’t done yet because you’re somehow afraid of it?

Not really. I try to keep the mindset if I broke it I can fix it as well. I still can’t get decals right 100% of the time.

What was the most daunting/scaring/intimidating thing (of our hobby) that you’ve done that then turned out to be easy as pie?

Proper layer painting. Yes being able to either blend wet paint on the mini itself or know the perfect watered downness for a semi-transparent glaze is very impressive and useful when you nail it. If you have two paints to blend then just have them next to each other to mix on a pallette, you need a mid-tone then just mix it. Most of my painting now is chosing one colour I like then adding either ivory or charcoal paint to make shades/saturations of it.

What aspect/technique in out hobby caught you off guard? (Thinking it would be easy just to have it bite you in the rear end)

Weathering, chipping especially. It’s so disheartening when a painting step near the end of the process takes a mini from great to mistake.

Maybe a little close to the bone, but for some music

@horati0nosebl0wer  – I can see how it looks like that just from the head, but no, it’s one of the vampire/gothic minis from last month’s Vae Victis Patreon. The mini is wearing a full bustle (? is that the right name?) with a massive bow on the back and lots of drapes and ribbon; it’s more 18th century than 23rd 😉

Nice weathering vids.

1. Is there any aspect of the hobby you really want to try but haven’t done yet because you’re somehow afraid of it?

Non metallic metals. I feel like I’d never be happy with it and be constantly adding layers or stripping minis. Though OSL is also a no from me. 😛 Best I will do is let a little glaze seep over onto the edges…

2. What was the most daunting/scaring/intimidating thing (of our hobby) that you’ve done that then turned out to be easy as pie?

Painting faces of Witch Elves (or the Dark Elves of that aesthetic). It took me a while to do it, but once I finally got my Sorceress finished with the make up and such it wasn’t so bad…just time consuming a bit.

3. What aspect/technique in out hobby caught you off guard? (Thinking it would be easy just to have it bite you in the rear end)

Several times I’ve made errors in the number of sub-assemblies… Too often I build a model thinking ‘this is good enough’ then realise there are so many areas that are next to impossible to reach with paint. 😛 Not quite a fixed technique, but still.

As for pledge, work continues on my Aggressors. It’s taking me a LONG time, but the inspiration and inclination just isn’t 100% there at the moment. I really want them to be done soon just to put another update on my project log… I may have to do something that isn’t Ultramarines next to break up the system a bit, methinks.

In other news I recently re-found this gem that I thought I’d share.

@blinky465 Bustle gowns… I see you’re a man of culture. Unfortunately I cannot find the ecard for “Bustle gowns… business in front party in back”. I duly agree to the sentiment.

@m30wm1x Good work. I can say that playing with Vallejo mediums and slapping on Secret Weapon pigments has been my bag and works so far. The details of doing details really means that you’re in the hobby.
I think that weathering and texture painting is a skill set developed at a certain competence level when “gritty realism” becomes something you look for

@crazyredcoat NMM is easy once you see the metal as just swathes of color. Imagine the monochrome black/white value scale as all other colors. Add blue to the spectrum and you have silver/steel. Take gold the same way through an umber, sepia, light brown/beige, yellowed bone/sand and then white. Brass/copper is tricky because of the orange/green undertones. It all sounds off when you think pure pigment from the bottle but if you’re glazing the hints of color blend well.
The harsh transition in where light hits is the key for textures. Think about the edge highlights to space marine armor and you’ve got good footing for the glint of metal weapons.
I’ve read numerous interviews in Juxtapoz magazine with ultra-realist painters and their chrome is phenomenal when showing off cars. The mirror finish is not something I plan on doing with my own work any time soon.

Ahh Tom Lehrer.. he had a great one for Wehrner von Braun regarding rockets. I’ll leave it there as it cuts close to the line on politics. I laughed at the end where he talks about the Chinese and it ties in nicely with the Fallout story arc.

Now all I can think of is Six String Samurai

Now some music after the movie