Drazhar is done! It took quite a while but honestly, it was a pretty enjoyable road to go down and the results hopefully speak for themselves. Here’s a look at Drazhar and I’ll share some parting thoughts on him afterwards.




Here are my closing thoughts on this project:
- Drazhar really is the best thing I’ve ever painted which is always a nice feeling.
- I just realized I forgot to put any grass tufts on the base like I had planned. Since the base is quite busy, maybe that isn’t the worst thing in the world. I think I’ll leave it as it is.
- Accidentally breaking off the tassels on the bottom of his swords was a happy modeling accident. I like how he looks now better than if they remained intact.
- A little over a year ago, I wanted to enter in the Golden Demon pretty badly and honestly, I can’t believe how much better of a painter I am now than I was at the time. I’m much better positioned to enter a competition in the future (assuming it comes back to Chicago!).
- I encourage everyone who wants to get better at painting to pick a mini they really fancy and take their time on it. Paint it as best you can, using the best techniques you know. You might be pleasantly surprised at the results. If you practice painting in this way, you will improve over time too.
- After wanting to paint something Dark Eldar for a while now, I finally did it. I’m kind of impressed because almost every newish model I like in Warhammer is due to nostalgia for an older faction I used to collect and paint but Dark Eldar is not a faction I liked back when I played and painted 40k in high school. Full credit to GW for making them a lot cooler than they used to be.
- I hope you enjoy seeing the final results and I appreciate everyone’s patience and interest as I kept showing week-by-week progress on Draz.
If that wasn’t enough of a victory lap, I thought I’d take a look at the last three Warhammer 40k minis I painted and see what kind of growth patterns emerge. Here they are:

These are in chronological order so the left side is what I painted the longest ago and obviously the right is most recent. While I’m proud of things on each one of these minis, if you look closely you’ll see some areas of growth. The level of contrast gets higher and higher as you go left to right. The way I painted the metallic parts has improved over the course of these minis too. While the skulls on bases is getting a bit tired, these three make for a nice triad of display pieces. I really need to get myself a little case to show them off when I move to a new place this summer along with a couple other pieces I’ve shown off before.
As regular readers would have probably guessed, with Drazhar wrapped up, I’ve thrown myself into painting Fallout minis. I have already gotten some stuff done but I’ll hang onto that for next week’s update. I’m having delivery troubles with UPS now (I can’t catch a break) so something I was excited to get and start painting hasn’t been delivered but hopefully for next week, I’ll have a fun variety of things to show off regardless. I’m already enjoying switching back to painting for gaming and with any luck, I’ll crank out plenty of stuff I need to play more Fallout in the coming days.
Can’t argue with Drazhar being the best thing youโve ever painted! ๐ Well done, Jeff! I was maybe more surprised at the end of this shared journey to find out he had a head! ๐
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Thank you, John! I’m glad to hear you agree with that sentiment ๐ Unfortunately, the head fits kind of strangely and if you try to assemble this miniature and then paint it, you’d like be in for a world of pain or at the very you wouldn’t be able to paint all of the model very well!
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He looks fantastic, and it’s been great watching the model come together over your updates.
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Thanks, Dave! I appreciate your kind words and support ๐
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Absolutely astounding work mate. Obviously seeing it stage by stage I could tell it was going to be a work of art but seeing it complete is something else. You should be very proud. I donโt think it even needs the tufts to be honest.
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Thanks, mate! I’m really glad to hear you like the final results and I agree on the tufts. I’m not going to bother with them on this mini.
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Worth the wait! I always go back to what GW shows to see what you have done on your version for comparison – there is no comparison! They should have yours there. FYI, one of your hashtags on Instagram has a misspelling, it’s #paintingwarhammer vs #paintingwarhanmer – you should get the recognition you deserve.
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Thanks, Bret! GW generally paints their minis well so I always take pride in trying to outdo their studio team. Thank you for catching that hashtag too. I had no idea! Why in the world that mispelled hashtag exists and is somewhat popular is beyond me! It would be an honor to show up on GW’s site should the opportunity ever arise as well.
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Very nicely done indeed, an excellent piece from sure. It was fun following your progress too. I think you are right not to add the grass tufts, the base really doesn’t need them at all and some accidents do work out for the best! ๐
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Thank you for the kind words (as always), TIM! Its funny how a couple of accidents both paid off this time. Usually I’m not so lucky ๐
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Brilliant work mate! You really bring the figure to life. I admire your patience, discipline and artistic skill.
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Thanks, mate! I know Warhammer isn’t your jam so I appreciate you still following along and commenting all the same ๐
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Amazing work, the contrast is unreal! Superbly painted, your other two Warhammer minis are still great but this one takes it to an even richer and deeper level. The model is also smaller than I thought, so that’s even more of an achievement. A true inspiration! I can’t see how you could improve on this one, he looks so perfect.
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Thank you! Contrast is always key when painting for display I think. Of course, it is great to apply contrast (the style, not GW’s paints necessarily!) to tabletop minis too if you want them to stand out and look great. Some of the details on Drazhar really are tiny and painting all of them took longer than I expected so I’m glad that people such as yourself have enjoyed seeing him painted up. It made all of the time spent painting well worth it ๐
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That is jaw-dropping mate, very well done indeed! Your work is always of a very high standard but you’ve outdone yourself here.
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Thank you, mate! I appreciate it and always happy to do my best on any kind of elves I can get my hands on ๐
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Good man – elves need any help they can get! ๐
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I wanted to say I’m not going to dignify this with a comment but I think I pretty much already have ๐
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Meh, itโs alright I guess….
(LoL)
I think itโs a spectacular paint job and Iโm very pleased that you are satisfied with the results , you probably being your biggest critic. ๐ golden demon here you come.
I enjoyed reading your closing thoughts on the project.
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There’s always one troll who shows up ๐ In all seriousness, thank you for the kind words and who knows, maybe there will be a Golden Demon by next year. I’ve thought about painting up an MESBG as well as I can and a painting competition would certainly motivate me to do that. It will be interesting to see when conventions return in the US. I’m guessing it will be close to 2022 if not, in 2022 before that happens. Thanks as always for the support! ๐
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Reblogged this on Azazel's Bitz Box. and commented:
If you enjoy the stuff I do here, you might also enjoy Kuribo’s work as well. Don’t comment here on this model, go check it out on his blog! ๐
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Ooooh was hat is one sweet miniature. Awesome work
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Thanks, mate! I appreciate your kind words ๐
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And now in English… oooooh that is one sweet miniature. ๐
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Haha, no worries! At least you didn’t leave the comment in Welsh or some other language I’d never be able to sort out ๐
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Welsh would have been easier than the crap I wrote….however this is in fact about the only Welsh I really remember… dim siarad cymraeg…
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Fantastic work- a stunning miniature.
Cheers,
Pete.
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Thank you for the kind words, Pete! ๐
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That looks amazing… the blue does work! My old metal Drazar thinks he looks just fine and wants to let you know that the less tassels, the better… ๐
I might take up on that challenge… because as much as I did, I came out with my best so far!
But this…!? Wow… Skill, patience, good eye… and the hands to go with it!
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Ha, well I did chop a couple tassels off anyway! ๐ The painting you see here happened because of practice, patience, and a constant desire to learn and improve. If you focus on those three things, you will continue to improve over time.
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