After a late update last week, I was always going to be up against it this week to have much to show off and that is indeed the case. Its a modest update but it sparked some ideas that I thought were worth sharing and hopefully prove to be somewhat interesting as well.
I worked on Hondo’s gauntlet more this week and also tried to paint some gold emblems on it too. The gold part bogged me down because I tried using a new scheme that another painter created and my results did not look like theirs (which is okay) and in fact, looked a fair bit worse (which is not okay). Fortunately, I am somewhat comfortable painting warm gold so I played around with it until I got a look I liked better. It also took a really long time to get the paint as smooth as it is. Its not Golden Demon-level perfect but that’s okay because it still looks pretty good, I reckon. I’m not 100% sold still on how the gold looks but at the same time, when I took pictures of the mini, I was much more impressed with it. That doesn’t happen that often for me, truthfully so I guess I should consider myself lucky.
So as you can see, I made fairly minimal progress overall. I’m not sure about the Gold and Copper being used together but I need two different metal colors and I can’t use Silver/Steel because neither will stand out against Hondo’s gray fur. This is a good mini to tackle as it presents you with some tricky color choices to try and solve.
Speaking of color choices, working on this mini made me realize that there is a lot of value in finding a Warhammer project that will help me address some of my weaknesses as a hobbyist. When it comes to small scale miniatures, I reckon I can improve in:
- Converting/Kitbashing (there’s only one way to go but up from my current skillset)
- Basing (you can never fully master this one)
- Color choices and color theory
So how might I do that? Well, forget a lot of what I said last week and think smaller. I think a series of miniatures in different schemes like painting every chapter of space marine would be a great way to work on colors. Its a fairly easy way to ease into converting and kitbashing. Basing can easily be implemented into that too, of course. There’s about a million space marine chapters these days and I don’t especially enjoy painting them (it takes a long time and I find them as a subject to be a bit boring) but a more reasonable and interesting goal for me would be to paint one of each of the Chaos Space Marine legions. There’s ten in total and there’s a mix of ones I’ve actually painted before (Black Legion and Emperor’s Children), ones I’d enjoy painting (any of Khorne ones and Thousand Sons) and ones I never thought I’d paint in my lifetime (Death Guard and Night Lords). It doesn’t really matter if I get the project done either. I can just try to learn and grow from it as much as I can. If I get bored of it or decide to abort it before all ten are done, that’s no sweat. Though of course, having ten of them all next to each other will look nice and appeal to any fan of Chaos too, I would imagine.
Truthfully, I tend to think of display painting as showing off what you already know and what you’re good at. I think a project like this would help push me to try new things and take on new subjects. Its also a lot easier than it used to be to buy bits and individual models. I don’t want to buy a whole box of 10-15 miniatures so I can pull a single one out and paint it, after all.
I’m also reminded of something I learned studying creative writing. Everyone goes into fiction writing wanting to write a novel and yet few do. Even fewer people are able to successfully get one published. You’re better off writing short stories and mastering those before you focus on writing a novel. In other words, its great to want to complete huge dioramas or miniatures but ultimately, you’re probably better off improving at smaller miniatures first so you can turn around and use all those skills on something even bigger and more impressive.
So I think this is the direction I’ll go in at least for the next display project or two and then when the time feels right, I’ll jump into something big and diorama-like, like I discussed last week. Its a little unfortunate that I’ve figured all this out now once I started a fairly large miniature that’s going to take a few weeks, if not a month or two to finish but alas, here we are. Its a classic miniature painter’s dilemma!
Kuribo's Painting 
Loving the different tones of metal on the gauntlet, keen to see where this goes!
I think that chaos legions challenge is a great idea, pushing yourself to not retread ground is the best way to learn and improve! Looking forward to it!
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I’m glad that you like it, Nic. Its a little more gaudy and cartoonish than I’m used to painting but I figure that fits this setting pretty well anyway. I’m glad you like the Chaos Legion idea too. I’m going to try and stick with this idea (or at least get one painted haha!) before I come up with any other project ideas 🙂
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Hondo is looking good and the gauntlet is lovely. Chaos legions sounds like a great project, especially given the amount of variation in each Legion between the HH schemes that many warbands still use as well as the many modern variations of each. You could easily do half a dozen variations of the four dedicated legions just for a start! 👍
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I’m glad to hear you like it so far, mate! I’m working on some other parts now and its nice seeing it start to come together. You make a very good point on the Chaos Legions too. I’ve seen some cool alternative color schemes that would be good fun to try out so watch this space!
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Looking great! I’m very impressed by how warm that gold is on the gauntlet. You can almost see the burning buildings creating the fire to reflect on it 😉
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Thanks, mate! If I pull off a burning bridge in a diorama in the future then I would be pretty chuffed 🙂
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I don’t think my awe at your hobby skills could really get any higher but if you can do a burning bridge then I’d be even more amazed than I currently am!
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If I managed that, I think I can retire from the hobby and know that I accomplished everything possible haha!
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Great progress on Hondo Jeff, You may want to darken the tones on the lower half of the gauntlet, as light wouldn’t reach down there, and you wouldn’t get extreme highlights either.
A interesting project, as you want to improve your converting and kitbashing, you could get a box of standard chaos marines, and then convert them to fit the chapters, as they all essentially use the same template.
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You might very well be right on the bottom gold parts. I took pictures of the mini when it was primed and some light does hit the top of the bottom X’s and the edge which is why I applied a darker highlight overall. Its hard to tell that in that particular photo though. I’ll give it a second look and make sure I’ve got the details right on that one.
Your idea is a very good one as well. I’ve considered doing that very thing! There’s certain legions that require some conversions (or finding really old models which is too rich for my blood!) so I reckon that will be good for me to work around.
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I like the gold and copper together, I like the difference but still the sameness if you get what i mean.
10 legions of Chaos Space Marin!?! I’m glad I never got into Warhammer, my backlog would be even bigger. I’m envious of the warhammer community in that they get decals and conversion sprues, I wish LOTR would give more conversion sprues.
How did it get to be June already?
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I’m glad to hear it and that does make sense. They both stand out against the fur and armor color which this miniature needs.
Each Legion is mostly fielded as its own army, I think. So if you like Chaos Space Marines, you’d likely pick the one that you find most appealing and that’s all you would paint for your army. In older editions you could mix and match to some degree but it was somewhat limited, I think. You would pick a legion and then maybe dabble in another. The downside to all this is that it means you’re painting 100+ miniatures in a similar color scheme and I could never manage to pull that off without getting bored first!
I was just talking to my wife earlier and I still thought it was spring so I’m struggling with the time flying by too…
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the gauntlet looks really good so far.
I can’t really offer advice on the other stuff. But you’ve got some time to think about it as you wrap up the big ape. 😀
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I’m glad to hear you think and so that’s definitely the truth. There’s still plenty of time for me to change my mind yet again, I’d say! 🙂
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Very nice Jeff he is a big boy 😃, love the copper look👍🏻
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He’s probably 3 or 4 times bigger than what you usually paint, Pat! I’m glad you like the copper as well.
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The gold and copper look good to me, Jeff! 🙂 I think I’m lucky (or maybe not) in that my historical minis cover quite a range of colours!
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I’m glad to hear it, John! You do have a lot of variety across the miniatures you paint which is good. I don’t think one can’t paint camo exclusively in our hobby and not get bored eventually 🙂
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