Merry Christmas

Unless you love, your life will flash by.

Chris

Half-life in miniature painting

This is a topic that got my attention during the last couple of years and seems increasingly important to me.

Half-life is the period of time it takes for a substance undergoing decay to decrease by half. The name was originally used to describe a characteristic of unstable atoms but may apply to any quantity which follows a set-rate decay.

This wiki-quote says it pretty much. Transfered to the world of miniature painting, what does this mean? From the very beginning of my hobby, I have always been active on the internet. Sharing ideas, communicating with other painters and presenting latest projects made me a way better painter than I could have become without this endless source of visualized information. At that time, certain miniatures accompanied me on a stony ground for many years, serving as inspiring models.

Nowadays, much of the before said seems to change dramatically. While the exchange based on partnership on the internet still works very well (maybe even better than ten years ago), I sense a quickened "consumption" of painted miniatures. Sites like cmon and dozens of forums across the globe boost this trend without being aware of it. I can see (and rate) hundreds of minis every day, making the hobby a dull routine rather than a precious moment. Personally, I think this development harms the value of a miniature in many people's minds (again, without even being aware of it).

What was the latest miniature that made you pause and stayed in your mind for more than a week (-two weeks? - a month?) ?

I will never forget Goatman's bretonnian lady....

Chris

Sudden inspiration

As I mentioned before, I feel a real lack of spare time at the moment. As I need at least 2 hours to really get into painting, I don't even take a brush into my hands at the moment. As my creativity can't bundle at the tip of my brush, I think about future projects and look for inspiration. My largest source, the internet, provided me with this awesome image:

Perhaps I will give this a try in 54mm. A similar canoe is available at La Meridiana Miniatures, now I have to find the fitting Native American.

Chris

Real life keeps me busy

....sorry for not updating my blog lately. I suppose there won't be any changes here until Thursday. Take this unseen picture of an older paintjob as an apology.

This is nothing special, wasn't intended to take part in any kind of competition. I am not satisfied with the yellow parts at all, what might be one reason I didn't paint anything yellow lately. ;)

Chris

Space Marine Update

I found some minutes to paint yesterday in the evening - first time in many weeks. I painted some scratches on the fist, took me about 30 minutes.

Chris

Sad news....

.... one of my favourite miniature manufacturers, Elite Miniaturas, will close it's doors this year. A great loss for fans of historical miniatures. Time for some panic buying.....

Chris

Games Days 2011

Games Workshop announced next year's dates for most Games Days, here we go:


France         May 22nd                 Le Parc Floral de Paris

Spain           July 3rd                     ...................................

USA            July 30th                    Chicago

Australia    October 1st                Australian Technology Park, Sydney

Italy           October 16th             ...................................

Germany   ?????                         ?????

UK             ?????                         ?????

 If you have further information, let me know and I will update the list....


Chris

Life is like a box of chocolates.....

...you never know what you're gonna get.

Well, today a got a nice little box from Art Girona with an awesome historical miniature inside. I like a dramatic pose on a miniature, so I had to buy this when I came upon it incidentally. The quality of Art Girona's miniatures is close to flawless, the amount of details is reasonable (I don't find to much time for painting at the moment) and the mini's facial expressions are unique and have a high recall value.

Here is a picture of the box art, this is NOT my paintjob.


This is an English Dragoon from the English Civil War (1645) in 54mm. The cannonball is not included.

Here is a shot from the front:

..and from the back:

The quality of this sculpt is absolutely satisfying, there were some minor mold lines and the surface is a bit rough here and there, but thats nothing some thinned layers of miliput and sanding paper can't handle. I hope to find some time to paint this guy in near future. We will see.....


Chris

Quote of the day...

"There are people who, instead of listening to what is being said to them, are already listening to what they are going to say themselves."

                                                                                                                           Albert Guinon

Holy Moly...

.... I absolutely did NOT expect this enormous amount of hits in such a short period of time. Many thanks to the monkeys over at massive voodoo, wo linked to my blog and all the other people who spread the news. Free bananas for today, guys!!!

I just took a new photo of the Space Marine. This is the current state, the powerfist and parts of the arm are not yet weathered. Although most of the blendings won't be visible because of scratches, I try to paint them in an acceptable quality (just for my inner balance^^).

The green colour is a mix of Dark Angels Green and Hawk Turquoise (60%-40%)

The lights are painted by adding more and more Bleached Bone.

The shadows are painted by adding Scorched Brown to the base colour.

Scratched should look randomly distributed, but they never are. I paint about 70% on edges because this is the most likely place to get in contact with any kind of objects. 30% are spread across the remaining surface. I might do a tutorial about painting scratches, if there is any demand.

Happy painting,

Chris

Marissa von Carstein

Although this is not a new miniature, I felt it could be worth loosing some words about it in detail. Marissa is my personal tribute to Jeremie Bonamant, who has been a huge inspiration over many years for me and has set new standards in fantasy miniature painting. Back in 2004 he won the Slayer Sword with his Marissa von Sonhan at the German Games Day, which can be seen here: http://coolminiornot.com/67632

From that day on, I tried to improve steadily and put a lot of effort into miniature painting. Jeremie inspired me with every miniature he painted and I steadily followed every new step he made. Much of my own success and even some parts of my "style" are heavily related to him. 

The entire miniature was painted over the years, starting with the base. Originally I intended to put a Wood Elf on it, but never managed to find a decent miniature in the Games Workshop range. After about 2 years in my wip-box, the base was revived. Incidentally I came upon the miniature of Lucrezia Belladonna, a miniature from the old Dows of War range. From that day on, I knew I wanted to bring Jeremies story to the next chapter. Marissa, a former aristocrat from the Empire, had a rendezvous with a vampire of the Carstein family. Today she still wanders across her former land, looking for prey.

It took me at least one more year to find a suitable horse for the lady. I started with the Green Knights mount but scrapped that plan for various reasons. Finally, I decided to use an undead horse and do some tiny conversions.

All in all, Marissa including base and mount were painted over a period of at least 3 years.
This miniature won a Bronze Demon in Fantasy Single at the German GD 2010, what made me very happy.

Chris

Duke of Bavaria

Time for some advertising...
In 2011 the annual Duke of Bavaria will take place for the 11th time in Ingolstadt. It is both a historical and a fantasy painting competition judged in the international open system (plenty of medals). You can expect up to 1000 entrys in the entire competition. Hope to see you there...


Chris

Some music...

...that I just came upon when I saw "Last of the Mohicans" some months ago. This song somehow catches the atmosphere when I look outside the window and see the winter.



Enjoy....

Chris

Welcome....

...to my blog, my batcave, my atelier, my refuge, my boards and last but not least my showroom. At this place I will present my latest projects, share my thoughts and write some painting tutorials. If you have any wishes, questions and/or remarks, feel free to contact me.

There are still some things to do about the design, more links to useful sites will follow as well. Just give some more time...

I hope this becomes a place that provides inspiration, eases your mind and answers your questions.

The first picture on this blog shows a Space Marine that I am currently working on. I don't exactly know if this will become a serious try for some kind of a contest or just a relaxing paintjob. Feel free to tell me what you think about this guy.

This miniature was available at a Games Day some years ago but I never really liked to pose. For that reason I decided to switch one arm and use my Dremel to remove some unnecessary rivets. Took me about 10 hours for the conversion and painting so far....

This is it for the moment, Chris