Off Topic: My 2 real world websites.

Hi, this is a bit off topic today. In the real world I am part of a small band and have a new real world blog with a friend about music and gadgets etc.

My bands blog is:
Power Cord-The Bands Blog

My blog with my mate is:
Chill Zone

Thanks for reading. Please check out the blogs. I know some of you have real world blogs too so we will link to them if you link to us.

Jacob out.

Tutorials: What should I teach.

Hi, from the poll at the side I can see people are liking my tutorials. Now this post is not my content but more a question. I have a few ideas but what would you guys like me to do a tutorial on. If you have an idea on something that you struggle with then post and I will try and find a solution then post a tutorial on it. I want this blog to be a two way thing so please, post if yoy have an idea.

Discussions:Miniture likes and dislikes mini series: Metal V Plastic.

Ok, time for the part of a small series of discussions where I will ask a question talk about my point of view then let you lot take it up and run with. This will only work if you give your opinions so please comment.

Metals
General: I quite like metals for there detail. I don't mind characters being metal but I don't like massive kits like dragons being metal.
Pro's: It's sturdy and strong. Has very, very good detail and is quite easy to clean. Plus it encourages people to use greenstuff because it is harder to convert.
Con's: It will shatter if dropped on tiles (as a general rule). Spray doesn't cover them as well as plastics. They are expensive, and following on from one of the pro's they are hard to convert.

Plastics
General: Plastics are slightly more delicate than metals with things like spears but have some bad sides.
Pro's: Cheap, relatively durable and very easy to convert plus lots of options on sprues.
Con's: Can bend if preassure is applied for a while, not quite as much detail as metals though the moulds are getting very good now. Lots of cleaning of mould lines and flash.

Conclusion: I like metals for some of my characters because of that extra touch of detail and the fell of a heavy model but for rand and file and your main units plastic is great because of all the options and the cheapness.

So guys, discuss away. i want to hear your views. Can you point out any other pros and cons. I would love to hear fom someone that really loves using metals on loads of there army.

P.S. How is this posting almost every day thing going for everyone. Do you like it.

Jacob out.

Polls: What would you like to see more of. Please vote.

Ok, this time I have put up a poll on what you would like to see more of. Please chose your top 3. If you have any other ideas then comment on the bottom of this post. I will still do bits of all these things but I want to see what people think.

So in the words of Big Red the great. Right column ATTACAAAAAAAAAAACK!!!!!!

Salamanders/WoC: Marauders half sprayed, 3 rhinos and 2 speeders fully sprayed.

So, I ran out of spray half way through spraying the marauders but I did mannage to do the rhinos and speeders, info bellow each pic.

The whole lot.

I really like the look of these guys, the musician has a converted musical instrument. They cound as having spears (not throwing spears) and hand weapons and shields.

Overall these are my favourites they count as being armed the same as the other unit but I didn't want them looking exactly the same.

Now for the flail guys which are a really useful unit and I really like using them.



Now for the 40k. As you can see all the stuff is sprayed. At the time of posting two of the rhinos have the green on them and one has the metal started.

Here is a little peak at what is to come. It is WoC but you can try and guess what it is the start of. All will be revealed in a few days.

Thanks for reading everyone and please comment if you know what that greenstuffed thing will be.

Tutorials: Tabards2, The writing/detail.

So, this time I am back with the second part of my tabards/scrolls etc tutorial which is the writing and detail. ther are lots of things you need to think about when you paint the writing onto a rabard I will run through them below the pic.

The first thing is colour. If you have done the parchmenty type thing from the last post then either red or black works well but if you have done a different colour more thought has to go into it.

Red goes with most things. Blood red is best i find. Blue can work for runes if you want them to glow but that is a tutorial in it's self. Black works well but on nparchment I preffer red for a more bloody look. For the guy above I chose black because I had a very deep red on the tabard, I think it worked quite well to be honest.

The second thing you need to think about is the balance between symbols and writing. I will give a few examples using dashes and punctuation to show you.

1 Standard)

-------------- --------------

------- --

-------------

-------

----------------

Withe the standard it is just line but you have to make shure that you have some variation though all of the log lines should be the same length.

2Standard with symbols (my favourite)

>>>>>'''!'''<<<<<>

---------------

--------
------------

---- --- --

,.

~#~
"

This version is the same as the standard but you have something at the top and some symbols around the bottom and sides. This is what I do most of the time.

Now onto the actuall how to bit. Most of this is about brush control. What I do is I get a very fine brush and have a practice on a bit of paper. the more you paint in this way the better you will get. So, when you learning you can just do something le and x at the top but if you want to go to town try and do a little immage. if you can do an aquila then you are going to find the easy. Anyway after the top symbol then do a long slightly squiggly li9ne and the top line of script, then either do another line the same length or one about half as long. keep repeating this process until you have enough script I reacon about 3-5 lines for a loin cloth and 6-8 for a tabard. After than you may want to add some extra symbols. You can do crosses x's or you can try and do images.

The only other thing you need to do is put it with some other guys and see if it looks good.

Thanks for reading I hope you found this useful. Makeshure you check out yesterdays guide on how to paint the parchment/tabard.

If you guys have any other tip then please comment away. I would really like to get some discussion going on this.

Thanks for reading.

Tutorials: How I paint parchment, tabards, scrolls etc. The easy way

Hi, when I was away I was painting my WIP marine squad and I had the parchment tabard thing to do so I thought I'd show you how I do my parchment.

1: Colours)The 3 main colours are: Tallarn flesh (base), Elf flesh (main colour) and Bleached bone (highlight) though other colours are used in the tutorial.

2: Base coat) Apply tallarn flesh over a black undercoat for a nice even base. Sory for the awful pic but you get the idea.

3: Main coat) This may take a few layers but make shure you get this stage right.
4: Highlight) Now just hit the hard edges with bleached bone, you can add white over multiple coats if you want multiple highlight staged but I just stick with straight bleached bone. It's quite hard to see in this pick but it makes all the difference.

5: optional: wash) Now this is where you have to make a desicion between aged or new. If you are going for a new scroll then skip this step but if you want an aged scroll (in my opinion the better option) then wash the whole thing heavly with the fantastic Devlan mud wash.

quick tip: the wash may pool or run into one side of the scroll. On this model I had to do 1 coat with him upside down and then another with him standing up to get a good coverage.

6: kind of optional: detail) Thia stage is kind of optional but it makes the tabard look a whole lot better. I have just done a bit of text and a couple of symbols using just a few colours.

Thanks for reading and I hope this is useful. Next i will be doing a tutorial on how to do that writing and symbols etc on tabards. Hope you come back.

Jacob out!

Notes: Things to come. (I have a few).

Ok, so I have just got back from and internetless week away and have been working on quite a few things. Here is my current list of things to come in the very near future:

1) A tutorial on painting parchment, tabards etc.
2) A tutorial on painting writing on tabards parchment etc.
3) An update on my almost finished space marine squad.
4) Regular project updates.

Thanks for reading and I hope to get back into posting regularly.

Jacob out!