A detailed account of my various commission/hobby projects.
Malifaux – I have a regular client that sends me stuff after Gen Con each year and doesn't need it back until the following year. This is really cool as it gives me plenty of time to work it in, but somewhat bad because I tend to push it back for hotter deadlines.
Read MoreMalifaux – The weather finally broke and I was able to get all of my recent Malifaux commission sealed. My client requested GW Purity Seal for the finish so I have to be very careful about the humidity levels when I'm sealing these models. (and with young children in the house I can't just spray in the basement like I used to).
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Malifaux – So I finally finished up the Neverborn Hockey Jersey I was working on. Figuring out the front logo was a bit more difficult than I anticipated as just embroidering it to the front of the jersey wouldn't give the look I wanted. The jersey looks really great and I'm pretty happy with the results.
As a follow up to this I just wanted to direct people to another post which detailed the process of making the jeresey. This was a custom job and I have no intention of mass producing these, however I'm always on the look out for new and interesting projects so if you're looking for something special please just use the email me link to contact me directly to discuss the project.
Some of the other projects I've done are motorcycle style patches for a gaming club, custom dice bags, award patches, jerseys and other random things.
Malifaux – To pair with the Ortega family commission that I've been working on is a Lilith's brood crew. I've blocked in the colors and started with the washes. My client wants them to have ebony skin with read hair, green eyes and purple. At first I thought this was going to be a really weird scheme to pull off, but after experimenting with different mixes and shades I think I've found the solution.
I started with a dark gray skin tone and then used a black wash to build up the skin to almost black, this way when I go back to do the highlights and detail work they won't become too gray. For the hair I'm going with a orange color that will be subtly different on each of the models. Lilith will be decked out in a white corset with a purple cape. The mature will have white hair and a purple toga.
Rather than having traditional metal weapons, my client requested that the sword be made of bone. This is going to be interesting to keep the white and bone contrasting without clashing to badly. Inspiration hit me at a knife store in TN, where they have knives with many different types of blades on display. I'm going to do the blades similar to a "stag" antler color, much like the knife my wife gave me for our anniversary [ happily married for 2 years :) ].
Malifaux – I just finished up a third set of young nephilim for a client. They match the other sets keeping with the different hair colors to tell them apart. Oddly enough one of the models had a miscast arm and was missing the other one. Rather than try to get a replacement I just went through my bitz box to find something that would work. The vampire counts ghoul arms actually look better on this model then the arms that come with it. The baby hands make me think of that dumb Burger King commercial.
In other news I've almost completed the victorian board.
The cobblestones are painted and the manhole covers are just about done. I began construction on the buildings this week. I noticed observing people play on my other boards that nobody ever goes into a building. So for the victorian city I'm not doing interiors, instead I'll add lots of balconies, fire escapes and flat roof areas. If someone wants to go inside maybe I'll keep building interiors with the board. I began by cutting 9"x9" MDF boards for the city blocks. The buildings are based on 3" equals one floor that way it's easy to calculate damage (when my Belles lure someone off the roof). I'm also constructing the windows from card stock rather then cutting them out. I think that will speed up the construction process and make these more durable structures.
The new year has brought some new commissions, currently I'm finishing up several Young Nephilims that will join the Lilith crew I painted last year. I'm not a huge fan of the "dancing sculpt" but the angry looking model is pretty cool. As with the other models I painted for him, my client wanted the hair/loin clothes to be different colors to distinguish between the duplicate sculpts. The models are based on Dark Age Lava Inserts, which are a really great product.
I'm also trying to get my own crews ready for the casual league that starts next week. I've got all three of my Resurrectionists crews base coated. The league is escalation style, so every two weeks you have 5 more Soul Stones to buy minions with. I'm hoping it will be a great experience.
Christmas means many new games to enjoy. I was lucky enough to receive Smallworld and have played over a dozen times since Christmas. The mechanics are simple and a game won't last more than and hour and a half (playing with the maximum amount of players). My wife enjoys it as well as the rest of my gaming club, in fact it has has dominated the last few game nights. Yes it's that addictive. There are also several expansions that add new races and abilities, I would imagine both are must haves for this game. I'll discuss Rogue Trader, Ticket to Ride, Set and Set Cubed in future posts once I've had a chance to play them.
Malifaux – I've been working on a commission recently and thought I should post some WIP shots. The client provided the Dark Age lava bases and wanted his brood to be an off skin color. Given the basing I decided to go with a red. He has three sets of Terror Tots and I painted the hair different so it would be easy to keep track of damage. I'm going for a very vampiric look with Lilith as I think it ties her in with the tots as well as her abilities.
I also want let my reader's know about my painting service. For tabletop quality simple schemes I can paint your models for $8-$12 each depending on the complexity of the model and/or scheme. For display pieces or more complicated schemes the cost would be higher.
Malifaux – Today I started making some of the specialized terrain from the back of the book. In order to make sure everything is fair and even I'm using the plastic CD's that come in CD-R stacks. I've been saving them for some time as well as AOL and old software discs. They fit the description of at least 3" so I've made 2 graveyards, 1 scrap pile, and several swamps. I picked up the gravestones at Micheal's (they are on sale for 25% so you can't use your coupon...lame) and they seem to work well for covering terrain.
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