Tsathogga, Part 2

 I've been painting away in fits and starts on Tsathogga, The Frog God - today was the first weekend day I've not had to work at all in roughly a month-and-a-half and moreso, I actually had an opportunity to get some decent work in on this guy's underbelly. (Not complaining about working per se, more about the lack of free time...) There's been a few other pics I've taken of various color stages on his underbelly and neck, but when it came right down to editing pics tonight to post something, I don't really think they showed anything worthwhile compared to this last one - essentially I went through a number of color changes, from greyish-green to pale grey to fleshy and finally, to this point which ends up being a combination of all of them!

 While I think I probably should go back and add another layer of highlighting, between how this looks photographed and the feedback I received at this season's first meeting of the Michigan Historical Miniatures Club earlier this week, I really think I ought to just push on and start adding coloration to the rest of the figure. In case my as-yet-untried airbrush masking skills crash and burn I won't have so much to redo, or more optimistically, when I get the rest of his skin tone and blotches and stripes and things blocked out I can decide how exactly to lighten up the underside a bit more - cool colors, warmer colors, more grey, and so forth.

 Feedback, as usual, is always appreciated - especially any suggestions on how to approach realistic contrast of a figure at this size (again, he's almost a good foot long from tip of his front hand to back of his hindmost foot). I'm guessing the easy answer would be to "exaggerate the highlighting and shading even moreso," but that's something I consistently struggle with, even on much smaller figures.

Tsathogga, Part 1

 Since shortly after GenCon, I've been working on a limited release casting of Tsathogga, the Frog God, from Center Stage Miniatures. This has got be one of the largest figures I've had the pleasure of painting, and definitely the largest resin casting I've ever worked on. Roughly a foot in length and molded from light grey resin, the detail on this figure is amazing - assembled from multiple parts, it surprisingly has minimal mold line issues and no bubbles in the copy I received. In all honestly, the trickiest part about assembly was pinning the arm and resculpting the gap where it meets flush with the body - other issues with the casting were fairly minor; I had to fill a few small cracks in the base near the body where the resin seems to have separated as it set, similar rough cracks in some of the deeper folds in his skin, and I had to dig out what I assume was solidified mold release agent in some of the deeper crevices on the body.

 I've made some progress in painting since this initial pre-primer pic and hope to post that shortly, but essentially I'm currently working on the figure in sections and trying to take as much advantage of the fine details already sculpted onto it as possible. I'm envisioning the underbelly as pale and sickly-looking, with blackened extremities on the upper body, pale, dead eyes, and a bright colored tongue to offset the rest of the more muted palette.

 If anyone has suggestions or tips on working with larger size figures versus the usual 1" tall scale that I'm mostly used to, by all means comment or post links. I'm trying to do this big guy as much justice as I can, since it is truly an awesome figure.

Back From the Dead! (Again!)

 It's been over a year since I last posted anything on this blog and, well, suffice it to say I wasn't exactly in the painting mood any more for a long, long while for a number of reasons. Recently, though, I've been spending time with a good group of friends who convinced me to go to GenCon with them. I found out there was a painting competition and although I had missed event registration by a long shot (I think it was July at this point) and I've been working a job that occupies roughly 6-7 days of my time on most weeks, I figgered I'd make the best of it and even see if I could crank out an entry to put in!

 In no particular order, I'd like to throw out a few "thank you's" from GenCon (albeit belatedly): to my wife, Jennifer, for lots of support and well-wishes; friends Jason, James, Will, Charlie, Paul (and Wendy!); Lyn Stahl - you rock!; Meg Maples (of Arcane Paintworks and Privateer Press fame); Drew Williams, sculptor extraordinaire; Izzy (I'm horrible with names, but you were very kind and an awesome artist!); Justin McCoy, aka 'misterjustin' of Secret Weapon Miniatures - it was great to finally meet you in person after all these years; the folks from Reaper Miniatures (Shannon Stiltz, Jen Kaufman, Martin Jones, and several more I'm sure but I suck at remembering names); and the awesome gentleman painter at the Privateer Press booth who critiqued some of my figures. If I've forgotten anyone from that crazy week, there's no offense intended - I feel I was in amongst a lot of great company; a little fish in a very large pond, as it were.

 And yes, I did finish a single figure entry, a Reaper Miniatures Wraith Harvester... mostly in the 3 days leading up to the painting competition deadline, where I got to sit at the GenCon demo tables upstairs and hobnob with greatness. My entry didn't turn out as well as I had hoped, but it made it past several of the initial cuts so there's that - I also got some good feedback on it and I'm fairly sure I know why it didn't turn out as well as I had hoped (and more importantly, how to improve on that in future). And then there's the "old school" converted Games Workshop Chaos Lord of Slaanesh that I painted several years ago and put in just for the hell of it as a second entry - oddly enough it ended up on the shelf right below the single figures that placed, which I'm to understand means in the selection process that the figure I painted up specifically for the competition was rather underwhelming compared to one I just put in as an "afterthought."

 With any luck I'll post some pictures soonish here and make this "hello again" wall of text worthwhile, but not tonight - It's late and I've got work in the morning.