Reaper Bushfire Relief & Bones 4 Miniatures: Animals!

Most animals in nature have neutral colors which provide valuable camouflage, but which do not fit my "color wheel" scheduling scheme; accordingly, I put several of these animals in their own batch.  In order to bring attention to the devastating Australian bushfires, I have selected models corresponding (more or less) with Australian wildlife.  Also, if you're looking for a thrilling adventure setting for your fantasy game featuring deadly wildlife, consider that many people describe Australia as a land 'where everything wants to kill you.'  Except the people; the people there are great.

Reaper Miniatures is helping Australian bushfire relief efforts with a fundraiser: for each purchase of Hope the Koala Druid by Jason Wiebe, Courage the Koala by Jason Wiebe, or the Australian Wildlife Pack by Andy Pieper, Reaper will donate $7.50 to the Australian Bushfire Relief Fund.  You can find out more about relief efforts by visiting Reaper or the RSPCA.  Australian legends tell of deadly drop bears, which look like giant koalas; when they hear a person speaking in a non-Australian accent, they drop out of their eucalyptus trees onto the hapless foreigners, viciously mauling and eating them.  Sure, they LOOK cute, but they are anything but cuddly.  Kangaroos will also beat the stuffing out of you, if they are provoked or otherwise in a bad mood.  I should point out that the minis I describe in this paragraph are cast in metal; the other minis I describe in this article are cast in Reaper's "black bones" plastic.

I understand that Australia's 'razorback' feral pigs are descended from domesticated farm animals and, although they will attack humans with deadly ferocity, they do not resemble the Dire Boar above.  The big lizard above is a Dire Crocodile, and I have painted it to honor the Australian saltwater crocodile.

For this Gulper catfish by Jason Wiebe, I was inspired by the beautiful colors of the blue salmon catfish (Neoarius graeffei), which actually has a slightly different fin configuration. If a giant catfish doesn't seem very scary, you should know that there are some Australian catfish who won't wait for prey to enter the water before they attack.

You will notice some colored orbs in this scene; these are sculpted as decorative carved pillar tops, but I have repurposed them as color-coded magical dungeon elements (like crystal balls and so forth).  As with my miniature painting scheme, I have used the color wheel as a motif in adventures ("use this ruby to activate the red portal, and this emerald to activate the green portal," for example), because I hope it's less frustrating for players if dungeon stuff has memorable colors, a distinctive appearance, and logical clues.  Plus, Bones 4 included 6 of these orbs, and the 6-spoked color wheel seemed a natural fit.

Bones 4 Miniatures: Green!

Because my color wheel clock points to green, this batch is all green monsters from the Reaper Bones 4 Kickstarter rewards.

I've still got plenty of goblins left to paint; here are 7 of them, decked out in dark green clothes.  I thought these goblins would get easier to paint, but I still miss areas on them; I think I'm finishing them more quickly, though.  In this scene, the goblins are the protagonists, using a mossy, algae-laden raft to salvage a wrecked ship.

Unfortunately for the goblins, the wreck is infested with malevolent pirate ghosts!

The North Shore of Lake Superior is a 3-hour drive from here, so I had an idea to adapt the Gordon Lightfoot song "The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald" to describe the shipwreck inhabited by these pirate ghosts, but the more I read about the song and the original tragedy, the more I felt that joking about it was in poor taste.

These pirate ghosts are cast in translucent fluorescent green plastic, so I wanted to paint them in a way which preserves this translucent vibrant quality.  Accordingly, I could not prime them with my usual white primer.  I found a recommendation to prime translucent minis with Testor's Dullcote before painting, but I took a chance on Acrylicos Vallejos spray matte varnish.  This varnish looks a little foamy when it goes on, but as it dries the foam disappears and the varnish preserves reasonable detail.  The dull nature of the finish and the translucent green material reminded me (perhaps appropriately for shipwreck ghosts) of beach glass.  I discovered that my acrylic model paint adhered very well to the Acrylic varnish, as I expected.

I wanted to paint these with something vibrant yet eerie that would highlight details.  I first laid on a wash of fluorescent chartreuse and fluorescent green, but the result turned too transparent upon drying, and basically disappeared.  Next, I tried a wash with non-fluorescent chartreuse and fluorescent green.  The paints become opaque when the figures are backlit, but I don't mind the ugliness; they're hideous terrifying ghosts, after all.

I put a GrimLight in one of these pirates, hoping the entire figure would glow like a lava lamp, but the material is cloudy enough and the shapes have so many twists and turns that they don't provide for much internal reflection nor allow direct illumination.  As a result, the point source of the GrimLight brightens up the immediate vicinity of the light element, but does not infuse the entire miniature.

However, the fluorescent effect is quite powerful, if you can light your game table with a UV lamp.

Bones 4 Miniatures: Yellow!

The color wheel rolls on, and this batch's color is yellow.  Except for the last (extra special guest) mini in the batch, these miniatures are all rewards for backing the Reaper Bones 4 Kickstarter.

We start with some commoners in yellow: Nemesra the belly dancer, a cooper toting a barrel, and an agitated lady brandishing a torch and a rolling pin.  We can easily imagine these disparate characters as part of a caravan, traveling from town to town; offering services, trade goods, and novelties.

This caravan is guarded by an adventurer-type character: a golden dragon man.  And it's a good thing, too, because...

Here comes a tribe of yellow-garbed goblins.  This tribe has some extra goblins: an armored goblin and a goblin hero.

Maybe those goblins are not so much attacking as they are fleeing our extra-special guest miniature: Reaper's faceless horror!  From what I can tell, this monster is basically a blob with many toothy mouths and eyes, like a large gibbering mouther.  I purchased this to entice my wife into painting miniatures with me; my wife likes horror, and with a giant blob you don't really need to worry that it 'looks wrong,' so I figured it might be an interesting low-stress mini to start with.  But she soon tired of it, and she let me paint it.  To be fair, there are a lot of tedious areas on this model (is this the inside, or the outside?  Where do these mouths end?), and THEN I noticed all those EYES...

Hidden inside the faceless horror, there is a skeleton; presumably the remains of someone eaten by this monster.

Bones 4 Miniatures: Orange!

I'm back on the color wheel, and the color for this batch is orange.  These miniatures are all rewards for backing the Reaper Bones 4 Kickstarter.  That's right, I'm trying to use up my existing stock, rather than mail-ordering more unpainted miniatures.

On the left, we have an enormous pig with ginger bristles; I was inspired by Tamworth Pigs.  I tried to simulate the appearance of a ginger pig's bristles with multiple layers of selective dry brushing.

This orangey pig is pulling a cart full of pumpkins and other orange, red, and yellow fruits and vegetables.  I didn't put a base on the cart, because the cart is an inanimate object and it can't attack or dodge; the base is partly intended to indicate the space a character can move around in.

As if that pig wasn't scary enough, that cart is also defended by a bard and her dog.  Bards use arcane magic; it is only fitting that this vibrant performer is wearing the most fiery colors.  I decided to give her olive skin and dark hair to honor the rich and beloved heritage of Mexican mariachi performers, and their marvelous costumes.

I wish Reaper made more bard miniatures.  I've only seen 4 Reaper bard miniatures; 2 were females with stringed instruments, one is a Scottish-themed gnome or halfling with bagpipes, and one is the Pathfinder iconic bard.  Let me tell you that bards are fun to paint.  Drummers were introduced onto the battlefield by the Ottoman Empire, but fifers were brought in with Early Modern warfare; still, with portable instruments, they'd make for cool bards.   I'd like to see an evil spooky goth bard, and bards playing various other instruments.  How about a necromancer bard playing a (modified) skeleton like a xylophone?  Imagine a badass blues harmonica bard, or a cajun banjo bard, or even a space alien theremin bard; even though these instruments are much more modern than the Medieval period.

My wife used to have a wonderful blue heeler dog, and I wish to honor this beloved animal companion by trying to give the bard's dog a red heeler's orangey coloring.  Also known as Australian Cattle Dogs, red and blue heelers are sturdy and muscular, energetic, intelligent, and responsive with an independent streak, protective and easy to groom; which all sound like good qualities to have in an adventuring dog.  Maybe in Australia, they would call it an adventuring 'doggo.'  The model here is clearly some kind of heeler mix, because full heeler ears stand up straight, and this model's ears flap down.

Those heroes have their work cut out for them in the form of these 6 orange-clad goblins.  I've got dozens of these goblins, so I'm painting them in color-coordinated tribes for obvious battlemap and inventory reasons.  Also, they mesh with my color wheel scheduling system.

As if those goblins weren't bad enough, at the far right we have a large Crabman and his dire crab pal, ready to put the pinch on our adventurers and their vegetable cargo.  I don't have an airbrush, so I tried to achieve natural gradations of color through successive washes, selectively applied.  Some people are really good at this--much better than I am.  As with anything which requires practice, my technique is a work in progress.

Bones Miniatures: Commission Time!

Some friends complained that they couldn't find decent miniatures for their D&D characters, and I decided to order and paint some miniatures for them.  They didn't pay me.  I guess I commissioned myself.

A lady friend complained that all the female druid miniatures wore skimpy outfits.  She was playing a club-swinging shield-bashing druid who wasn't running around the woods naked, thank you very much.  Danra the Female Druid seemed to fit the bill, as a lady more like Xena, Warrior Princess than a sky-clad flower child.  Danra is the only mini here cast in metal; I wish Reaper would make more like her.  My friend's favorite color is blue-green.

A gentleman friend told me about his gnome cleric who worshiped the goddess of luck.  His favorite color is blue.  I love gnomes.  These gnome warriors are cast as part of the Reaper Bones 4 Kickstarter.

Love may be grand, but Lovecraft is grander; I therefore could not resist these frog-like Deep Ones.

I suspect I was watching Sweetheart, the Survival Horror retake on The Creature from the Black Lagoon, while painting these Deep Ones.  I recommend it!  Sweetheart was genuinely scary for me, and if you think bulky amphibious man-beasts are too comical to be considered a serious threat, Sweetheart might be a thrilling wake-up call.

Another option is The Shape of Water, a Twilight treatment of The Creature from the Black Lagoon (or so I hear).  Bear in mind that in H P Lovecraft's stories, 'normal' people are often (at least partially) SEDUCED into the creepy amphibious lifestyle of the Deep Ones, which (like a creepy vampiric lifestyle) offers eternal life, albeit in service to dark forces.

If I was going to paint more of these guys, I would make sure my green 'back' colors were more distinct, because most of these guys look like they're the same color green, although these greens all came from separate bottles.  I would also figure out a way to transition the back color to the belly color at the edges; maybe with dry brushing, maybe with a seam of mixed color.  I might also research frog spots & stripe patterns.

I thought this incorporeal lady with the scythe was pretty cool, so I purchased this mini so I could paint it to look a little like Marceline the Vampire Queen, who similarly floats around.  I call her a 'wraith,' but in D&D 'wraiths' don't use weapons, although 'ghosts' can.

The Deep Ones and the female wraith with the scythe are cast as part of the Reaper Bones 3 Kickstarter, but during the Kickstarter campaign they were bundled with large packages I didn't want; so I ordered them because now I can order only the miniatures I want, à la carte.

Finally, we have a Marilith demoness, a Warg-like monster, and a sword-wielding Wraith I found in my Reaper Bones 1 Kickstarter rewards.  Shockingly, I still have most of my Reaper Bones 1 Kickstarter rewards minis left to paint, taking up precious space in my house, and yet (as you can see, above) I went and ordered more miniatures.

Bones 4 Miniatures: Red!

I was hoping to get these guys done before the end of November, but The Holidays happened, and I found myself busier (and less inspired to paint demons & devils) than I expected. 

During the Renaissance period, nobility would wear red clothing dyed with carmine, a deep red pigment derived from kermes and cochineal bugs; red is a liturgical color for Christianity, and the color worn by Roman Catholic Cardinals.  Red is also the color of anger, sin, and the devil.  Here, I draw from both noble/divine and base/diabolical associations. 

For these knights in shining armor, I wanted a deep red color which commanded a sense of authority and noble purpose.  Of course I was reminded of the Crusaders, and the deep red stripes on the American flag.

These goat-headed demons are referred to as "Minitaurs".

These larger devils are from the "Bedeviled" series: including a "Ravager," a "Flayer," and a "Tormentor."

I don't like fighting devils and demons in D&D; as monsters from another dimension, they often have immunities and special qualities that make them frustrating challenges.  In contrast, when you fight a vampire or a dragon; yes, they are formidable opponents, but you usually know where their weak spots are.  And then there were the 1980s anti-D&D witch-hunts, because if kids play a game wherein they slay an evil demon, of course they must be worshipping the devil.  Paradoxically, devils and demons aren't even interesting or fun; unlike imaginative owlbears or gelatinous cubes.  My dislike of devils and demons contributed to my delays in finishing the paint job. 

Reaper Miniatures once posted an image featuring some of their new demon miniatures, with a knight included for scale.  Reaper added captions, with the big demons remarking along the lines: 'hey, lunch must be early today,' whereas the fearless little knight observes: '4 demons against 1 knight?  I LIKE THOSE ODDS!'  That knight's attitude often inspires me, and I hope you will bear those sentiments in mind even if you fear the knights in these photos are mathematically outnumbered. 

Bones 3 & Bones 4 Miniatures: Bone White!

White is the color of sugar and cotton and flour and paper after you bleach out all the nutrition, lignin, and other natural goodness out of them.  Similarly, after you remove all the meat and blood and guts and other good things out of a person, you're left with a white, white skeleton (DON'T TRY THIS AT HOME, by the way).

So for white, inspired by Halloween, I painted skeletons.  Bones 4 only included 6 skeletal creatures, so I included 6 skeletal characters from Bones 3.

In the front, we have the Bones 4 Bog Skeletons and the Maggotcrown Ogre Juggernaut.  Any evil necromancer will tell you that you can never have too many skeletons to do your bidding.

Real bog skeletons turn black from tannins in the bog water,
but that would be hard to see and it would look just plain weird.

In the back, we have the Bones 3 Undying Lords boss skeletons.  I have to wonder if these guys were once an adventuring party.

That's the Grim Reaper in the back, waving.  "I'll be seeing you!"

You might notice that the arms and armor used by these skeletons have a brownish hue.  In D&D 3.5, skeleton monsters are basically mindless automatons which fight until they are destroyed.  I imagine they don't care much about the state of their equipment.  I tried to imagine their metal equipment had a good deal of rust on them, but the rust would wear away at edges, joints that would grind together, and points of impact.  So I tried to put down a rusty steel color, then I would dry-brush the high-wear areas with a bright steely color.  On the Juggernaut, I added extra brown rusty splotches to the rusty base coat.