Finally Painting again!

Well,

I finally picked up the old paint brush last night and painted up two Copplestone figures, one of which looks like Indiana Jones. I also finished 10 Indian (from India) troops that I started a few months ago. I also painted up 8 Orcs for Lord of the Rings on Sunday. I still haven't gotten around to taking pictures of them because I'm not happy with my lighting set up.

But I have been wondering why I haven't been painting lately, I guess it's the "Painters Wall" that most painters seem to hit. That's were you loose all interest to paint anything and just let stuff sit. I really don't know why I hit this "Wall", I have been busy planning & Playing LotR. I have had interest to paint, but just couldn't get motivated to do anything.

I must have gotten over that wall last night since I finished 12 figures. Now some of my friends will give me grief, because I dipped the figures and didn't "Really" paint them (Rob!). But I like they way they look. So I think I will explain my painting method so folks can better understand what "I" do.

When I get a figure, the first thing I do is clean up all the mold lines & flash left on them, once that is all done I mount most of my figures to a 1" depth gauge. After this I spray the figures in either Flat White, or Flat Black Krylon spray paint. I don't use GW or other companies primers, just regular old Krylon Black or White. Once the primer is dry I then will use Liqutex "Stucco" on the bases to add a ground cover of sort. Then I'm ready to paint.

I usually use GW paints or Old Ral Partha paints, and only recently have I started using Vellajo paints. I generally do some "Color by Numbers" sort of painting, which means just painting the base colors on. Once I'm satisfied with the look, I will then "Dip" the figure in MinWax Satin Tudor. But I'm not really dipping the figure in, I brush on the Polyshades. I keep a bowl filled with mineral spirits right next to me while doing this so I can control were the stain goes. I have had allot of people ask me about that, you just need to watch were the stain pools up at & use a little bit of mineral spirits. Once the figure has dried i then shoot the figure with Testors Dullcoate. now some people stop there, but I then go to painting on the figure by highlighting the colors with the original base color & sometimes even use a lighter shade of color. Once I'm satisfied with what the figure looks like I then will finish the base by adding color & ground cover to it. And there you go, figure ready for duty on the playing table.

Now this gives a more realistic look to the figure in my opinion and doesn't have that cartoon look that seems to be so popular. So all in all there you go. I hope to get pics of the figs soon, but will be out of town this weekend with the wife at Disneyland. So hopefully when I get back I will take a few pictures.

Hmm, come to think of it, know I know why I painted the Copplestone Indy figure, the wife & I were talking about the Indiana Jones ride at Disneyland! Hey, who would have guessed that Disneyland would get me to paint again...

TK