I have a quick update this time around because my fiancée’s surgery was on Wednesday and it has certainly been a busy week. I’ve painted a bit less this week than usual which is to be expected considering the circumstances. Thankfully the surgery went well and she is hopefully on the road to recovery. I don’t know if I will have much more time to paint this upcoming week because I’ll be “house hunting” or to be more accurate, condo hunting. I hope to have some good news to share on that topic in the nearish future.
But enough of that, let’s talk about the one thing I painted! I got my first glowing ghoul done. The two that I own have been sitting in my backlog taunting me as I’ve been excited to paint them but also kind of unsure about how would be best to go about it. I finally decided that I just needed to get stuck in and start messing around with green paint and figure it out. Thankfully, that worked well and I’m very happy with the final results. This is one of the more colorful Fallout minis I’ve painted and I think that fits this enemy type pretty well. I also feel empowered to knock out the other glowing one in the near future which is great. As I’ve said several times, I can’t wait to play a ghoul-centered scenario in the future and this is another step in that direction.
Unfortunately, I did receive the new miniatures I ordered this week and am not satisfied with them. I bought a Scibor High Elf and a Chaos dwarf and while the dwarf looks pretty decent, the high elf has a lot of casting issues and I may never end up painting it as the quality doesn’t appear to be there. I had a great idea for a diorama for the elf so it is a bit disappointing. I’ve found that you have a 50/50 chance with Scibor to get a quality resin cast with them. While they’re affordable ($12 with shipping for a single mini), I think most of us would rather pay more and get a predictable and higher quality. So its back the drawing board for me. I’m still chipping away at my Fallout backlog which is just under 20 minis now but I know that I could use something a bit different to paint in the future too. I have plans to get some terrain ordered soon but I will also do some more thinking about what other projects I can take on to add variety.
Fortunately, I think I may just be able to squeeze a game of Fallout in before this weekend is up so perhaps you’ll see a battle report next week!
Kuribo's Painting 
Nice work on the Goul and I hope your fiancée recovery goes well along with the condo hunting.🙂
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Thanks, mate 🙂 It is going to be a busy and tiring few days I am sure.
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I’ll just echo TIM’s comment, Jeff, and hope all goes well! 🙂 I know what you mean about getting a mini that is not up to scratch and I sometimes wonder how much quality control goes into the manufacturing and dispatch process. I’ve found I can sometimes use milliput/greenstuff to repair minis, but doing this with figures is more difficult than with vehicles I think!
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Thanks as always for your kind words, John! My first thought was that I might be able to repair it but because there are issues with the elf’s face, I think it will be difficult to get this one to “diorama” quality and I’m not sure if I want to put time into it, only to be disappointed so that is why I will likely move on and be glad it was a fairly cheap miniature.
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That ghoul is cracking, you’ve really created the appearance that it’s glowing. Glad to hear your fiancée’s op went well and good luck with the house hunt. Try and get yourself somewhere with decent light for painting and plenty of space to store miniatures and let your fiancée worry about everything else!
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Thanks for the kind words on the ghoul, mate! I will definitely make sure to get the storage space sorted and I can’t let my fiancée take care of too much because she likes the idea of a fixer upper more than I do. I’m not about to replace my current hobbies with home improvement! 🙂
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Good luck with that – I look forward to you changing the name of your blog to Kuribo’s House Painting 😉
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Ha, if that happens we’re all in a lot of trouble. Thanks for the laugh, mate! 🙂
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That looks very good and all the best to you and your fiancée! Might be worth contacting Scibor with a pic of the mini if there are plenty of flaws, I’ve found that manufacturers are often quite happy to send replacements.
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Thanks, Mikko! I know what you mean about manufacturers being generous about setting things right, especially Games Workshop. Since I ordered this from a gaming store in the US and not Scibor directly and because Scibor is Polish, I probably won’t bother in this case. I probably should and I’d probably get a replacement but I imagine the inspiration/motivation will be gone by then so I’ll let this go.
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That ghoul looks great. That glow effect definitely works. Love the contrast of the white pustules and green skin. The base introduces some nice specks of colour, too.
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Thanks, mate! I’m really glad to hear that people like it. This is one mini I really wanted to make sure that I painted well so its great to hear that others think I hit the mark 🙂
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Wonderful glow effect on the ghoul Jeff, and great your happy to progress with the second.
Do hope all goes according to plan with your fiancée recovery and the condo hunting.
As a manufacturer I know I always take an email from a customer as a matter of pride to sort out any problems, and always try to give everything that leaves the workshop the once over, even filling in little air bubble holes that can sometimes arise
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Thanks for the kind words on the painting and life, Dave! I’m glad to hear you take those extra steps as a manufacturer. I think the elf I ordered might not have necessarily passed that test if they looked it over a bit more closely. As the saying goes, the sculpt was close but no cigar!
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Those Glowing Ghouls are almost always a nightmare in the game and I figured they would be hard to paint well. My first though on seeing yours I thought it was a bit darker than the game but then I looked closer and saw the magnificent color transitioning. Wet blended? It really sells the glow affect. So, great work as usual.
Glad to hear the operation went well. Wishing her a speedy and full recovery.
Good fortune to you and enjoy the hunt!
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They certainly are, mate! They can really take a beating as I recall. I forgot to mention in this week’s post but finding any good images of Glowing Ghouls was really tough. I ended up using the minis on the box art as a guide. I think in the game, the colors are actually duller and less vibrant but painting a Glowing Ghoul like this should make them look good on the table, so I figure that is a good reason to eschew “realism” to the video game.
In terms of how I painted it, I started off thinking that I should start off with the dark green and then glaze the brighter areas over it. That didn’t work because of the bumps on the sculpt so I had to use layering. I’ve found you can layer and then use a glaze or two to smooth it out which is faster than just glazing so I use that a lot on gaming pieces. Hopefully that wasn’t too much info on the painting process! 🙂
I didn’t find any condos that I’m ready to put an offer in today but I learned a lot about the market and enjoyed it more than expected so we’ll see what I can find in the next week or two. There were some places with great storage so that gets me excited for what I can do hobby-wise in the future! 🙂
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Glad the surgery went well and hope for a speedy recovery! After several days in the yard mowing grass, power washing, misc spring things I wouldn’t mind a condo!
That glowing ghoul is great, quite radioactive! What brand of paints do you use? Don’t need a step by step but curious about your general approach when painting.
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I can believe it! I grew up in a house that had about 1.5 acres of land and lots of grass to mow and I was lucky my Dad did a lot of that as I have minimal interest in lawn care and gardening. Between that and home improvement and a family, I’m not sure how someone has many or indeed any hobbies but that is perhaps a whole different topic!
I only use GW paints though I’ve dabbled with Vallejo. One day I might try the more premium paints out there like Scale75 but GW’s paint is so ubiquitous and easy to use that I’d recommend them to just about anybody.
In terms of process, I think using a wet palette is a good idea for anybody who paints. It makes it easy to mix paints and play around with their consistency as needed. I have a cheap one for watercolors you can get at Michael’s so it doesn’t need to be fancy. Lahmia Medium is also a great thing to use for thinning GW paint. I don’t use water to thin paints very much anymore because Lahmia Medium gives it a smoother and easier to work with consistency in my opinion. Those are a couple things worth thinking about. I’d say if you want to try and improve your painting results, try using layering for shadows and highlights and I bet you’ll see some quick improvement. Washes are good for tabletop standard but I think you’ll find that layering is surprisingly easy to use and while slightly more time consuming, it delivers much better results.
The other piece of the puzzle is training your eyes to figure out what colors you need to achieve certain styles or looks. Painting LOTR really helps with this because you can reference photos from the movies and try to figure out the best paint to match that look. Practicing that skill really helped me improve as a painting and it is kind of hard to describe how to do it but if you can manage it, you’ll find that color choices become easier and you have an easier and easier time getting the exact results you want on a miniature. I hope this helps and let me know if there is anything else you have questions or are curious about!
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Thanks for the info, I knew you were a fan of wet palette (I actually have a ceramic tile from a home improvement project that I mix paint on) and I appreciate all the information you just gave!
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You’re welcome and let me know if you have any other questions. Always happy to help!
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Lovely job on that guy, and the base is really well painted too. Good to know your fiancee is OK!
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Thank you, Matt. I appreciate your kind words! By the way, do you have a blog as well? When I try to access the one connected to your profile, it takes me to a dead link so I thought it couldn’t hurt to ask!
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I do have one: https://pmpainting.blogspot.com/ Have fun!
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Great job on the miniature. It really looks like it glowing to me; almost like you used some sort of hi tech glow in the dark paint. 😀
I wish your fiancée a speedy and safe recovery. And good luck on the house hunting. I’m in the same boat as I’m planning on moving myself this summer. Hopefully we’ll both come out on the other side in a better place to have more hobby time. 😀
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That is good to hear. Mission accomplished I would say! 😀
Thank you and I hope your house hunting goes well. I assume you’re like me and are just moving across town so to speak but if you’re changing cities then I hope it goes smoothly and isn’t too stressful. Having done that once, I’m in no hurry to do it again! 🙂
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Yeah, just moving within the same town but still gonna be a lot of work. ☹️
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I would normally like this but that doesn’t feel appropriate. If nothing else, you can rest easy knowing I’ll be dealing with the same issues halfway across the country 🙂
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First, best wishes on the fiancées recovery and good health. Second, remember on real estate location, location, location are all that matter! Third, great looking glow on the figure. Agree about layering, though I use everybody’s paints and thin with Vallejo thinner or thinning medium in a plastic palette. Clearly your technique bears out well here.
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Thanks, Mark and I completely agree on location. I’m hoping to live an even better and more exciting location than I currently do so we’ll see if I can make that happen. Glad to hear others value layering too. It is not a new technique but I think it will serve anyone who learns it well.
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Nice work on the Ghoul! All you need now is to go over a few bits of it with flouro/UV paint and then take some pics under UV light for the full on glowing look!
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