Reaper's Dark Maiden

The Dark Maiden was my only entry for ReaperCon this year. I was hoping that I was going to pull in that elusive gold medal with this one but it wasn't to be. I spent the first four months of this year constantly on the road for work which just didn't allow me to work on this mini the way I wanted to. I'm lucky I managed to finish her off at all, I think the paint may have still been wet in a couple of places when I turned her in. I know she wasn't gold level at that point, I just didn't execute the way I needed to. She did get a silver but this time I'm going to chalk that up as a failure. I wasn't upset with the result but I knew when I put her in that Silver was the best I was going to get this time.

I'm already prepping pieces for Genghis Con XXXVI and ReaperCon 2015, this time I should be able to get the gold.

I was really trying to get a peeled paint effect on this one and for the most part that worked out pretty well. I wasn't happy with the yellow band and the green vines and I should have gone back and repainted it but I ran out of time.

Actual Painting! British Colonial Trooper

I needed a little motivation to get painting again. On the Lead Adventurers forum they have a Colonial showcase going, and you get a little badge if you post a newly painted miniature. So I have managed to get a mini in the last three they have done. So these things move fast so I painted this guy yesterday and did the finish work today. He's not to bad, not one of my best but he's solid and that's kind of what I'm going for right now. Get the skills worked back up.

So here is a little WIP from Monday to today

Prepped and Primed

Skin

A little red

Some Blue

Green facings for the 24th. I did watch Zulu, twice, while I was painting him.

Final details and a little pigment to get him dirty. I wasn't brave enough to try to do black smudges on his face

Finished Front

Finished Side

Finished Back

Leveling Up - Color Matching Brand to Brand

Now I'm a self admitted Reaper fan and I'm heavy user of both their MSP and HD paint lines. However, I don't let that stop me from trying out other brands (I use Vallejo, some P3 and a smattering of GW along with a small selection of washes from Secret Weapon). Since I have been collecting Scale75's ScaleCoat paints I thought I would push forward with some color matching and see if I could match the six Reaper colors that I have been using to create my six color wheel. The ultimate idea would be to create a six color wheel using the Scale75 paints. I'm using these six colors from Reaper because of a question I had asked Anne. Of course she didn't just give me a quick answer, she responded on the Reaper forum and pretty much hit a home run with it. Not only did she list the six Reaper equivalents I asked about (and they are only equivalents not exact matches) she told us how to do our own color matching. So that is what this particular exercise is all about seeing if there are any close matches between the "Reaper Six" and Scale75.

So here are the colors that make up the "Reaper Six" along with their, roughly, artist color equivalents:
Republique Red (61108) -  Cadmium Red (a warm red)
Crimson Red (29801) - Alizarin Crimson (a cold red)
Ultramarine Shadow (9187) - French Ultramarine Blue (a warm blue)
Sapphire blue (9016) - Cerulean Blue (a cold blue)
Clear Yellow (9095) - Cadmium Yellow Light (a warm yellow)
Sun Yellow (9008) - Cadmium Yellow Medium (a cold yellow)

We need to compare swatches of color directly against other swatches of color. To do that we are going to make a tool that will surround one color with another to get a good match. I know that sounded weird but basically we are going to make squares of color and cut the middle out. We will lay the open square over the color we want to match and see if we are close. The pictures probably explain it better:

Took one of my art journals (with perforated pages) and layed out a series of squares. The big square is 1 1/4 inches on a side. The square in the middle is a 1/2 on a side. That leaves 3/8ths of an inch for our color on all four sides of the center square.

So something like this

Cut out and ready to use

Important point, You should label the colors on the back, in case you forget what you were using, and you may as well put the stock number as well.

And from the front

A selection of the Scale75 ScaleCoat Blues plus one yellow (there are only two yellows in the whole line right now, a sad deficiency)

Now with the Reds plus the only other yellow

Reaper Color Matcher using the "Reaper Six" and the two Scale75 Color Matchers trying to see if we can emulate the "Reaper Six"

The Blue Color Matcher (plus a yellow)

The Red Color Matcher (pluse a yellow)

Republique Red is pretty close to Antares Red (Reaper Color Matcher on top, normally I would compare against a swatch of color but I didn't want to get the paints back out)

Crimson Red is a bit darker than Deep Red (the darkest red that Scale75 makes). Probably close enough in the long run.

Clear Yellow is a tad lighter than Sol Yellow. Again probably close enough for our purposes

. 

Sapphire Blue is a bit darker than Mediterranean Blue. Mediterranean Blue is not as "cold" as Sapphire Blue. 

Ultramarine Shadow is a bit lighter its closest match Navy Blue. Navy Blue is not as "warm" as Ultramarine Blue

I didn't even bother comparing Sun Yellow against Tenere Yellow. They aren't even close. In fact I might argue that Tenere Yellow isn't a yellow at all, its almost ivory in color. I suppose it might be a yellow tone.

So that's the tool. Its small enough to fit in my journal that I'm tracking my ReaperCon 2015 projects in and that will also help flatten them out. I'm thinking I need to mount them on a thicker stock of something. I'll figure that out later.

Painted Prototypes

I have decided that the basic idea behind the display bases and the diorama base are sound, I thought it would be good to get a little paint on them and see if they will pull off the whole "in context" concept that I'm looking for. Obviously the diorama base does that so I'm not particularly worried there (although the floor on the interior does need to be raised above the street level). The display bases on the other hand do need to convey a setting without overpowering the mini. I slapped some basic shapes and colors on to see how they might come out.

Matte Board sucks up paint like you wouldn't believe, so I primed them first.

The diorama base for "Steady Lads"

The display bases in the traveling configuration. I can also display them this way if space is tight on the display table, I'll need a couple of little lazy susans to pull this off I think, or some kind of small spinning display.

Up close and personal. I"ll use magnets to hold the display bases tight to each other.

A little paint on "Steady Lads", Again this is just a concept study, I just want to make sure things are working and get an idea for colors.

The floor and the window both need to be elevated above the sidewalk. That will give another distinct elevation that should add interest. I'm hoping to be able to make the room narrower. This will  depend on what I can do with the conversions.

From the front; "Orbit"

From the front; Dr Who?

From the front; Terror From Outer Space.
I really like how the continuation of the lines tends to flatten out the background.

From the front; Cover Shot
I'm trying to get the feel of a Victorian era "man cave" complete with trophies mounted on the walls. I'm quite excited about how this one is going to go together.

Showing off one way to utilize the display stands. This is for both travel and when space is tight at the display table or case.

Right now the painting is pretty rough, but I didn't want to spend to much time here. There is just enough paint to let me see if the basic concept of providing a context for the entries is going to work. I think I'm on the right track. Now to see if I can build them out of something other than matte board.

Leveling Up - Experimenting with Color Theory Part 2

This week my Republique Red arrived in my Reaper Miniatures order. I went back down to the workroom to do a new "primary" color wheel. The light finally went on that the reason you use six colors to create this wheel and its variants as that each primary color has both a warm and a cold version which is why sometimes when I mix red and blue or blue and yellow or yellow and red I don't quite get what I'm expecting. A cold yellow and a cold blue are going to create duller greens than a warm yellow and a warm blue. So that little bit of understanding will really help in my color choices especially for the dioramas, maybe a little bit for the display base pieces as well.

So here is the new version of my Reaper Color wheel. I'm still having issues with the shades and the grey tone so I have left those rings empty again. I may go ahead and do the alternate rings, matching up say the republique red with the ultramarine blue to see what range of purples that creates (that would be a warm red combined with a warm blue). I might pull out my Scale75 Scalecolor paints and try the same exercise with those.

Starting at the top: Sun Yellow (9008),  Clear Yellow (9095), Republique Red (61108), Crimson Red (29801), Ultramarine Shadow (9187) and Sapphire Blue (9016)

Adding in the secondary colors (1:1 mix)

Adding in the tertiary colors (approx a 1:1 mix of the secondary and the primary on that side)

Adding the "tones" just adding white in a 1:1 mix

Adding the "tones" for the secondaries, again white in an approximate 1:1 mix

Adding in the "tones" for the tertiaries (even more approximate!)