Wednesday 17 June 2015

Female Mage on Stairs [WIP - Dress]

Despite an initial reluctance to start work on Dark Sword's Female Mage on Stairs largely due to a less than adequate primer coat applied during my early days in the hobby, in the end I couldn't resist giving it a go anyway. Other than some lost details (such as buttons) on the upper portion of her dress and potential roughness showing up on her skin, I believe I can still make it work ... somehow.

Dark Sword Miniatures' Female Mage on Stairs, work-in-progress on her dress
Dress colour scheme is a mixture of pastel pink, peach and orange
A semi-botched primer coat means it'll be an uphill battle all the way when painting the mage

Early progress on the Female Mage on Stairs centred on achieving suitable contrast as well as smooth transitions on her dress's light pastel colour scheme. I would like to believe that my understanding of colours and acrylic paint techniques have improved up to a point where I could do both. But credit is also largely due to the well sculpted dress which made the overall process easier.

Beautifully sculpted clothing complements the ...
... equally well sculpted hair
Her hair will be painted to either contrast the orange sash or complement the pink dress 

Going forward, I am tempted to go off at a tangent with regards to her overall colour scheme. To give you a hint about what I mean, the mage's hair will be painted to either complement the pink dress (status quo) or to contrast the orange sash (the tangent I am referring to). Both are appealing choices and for the moment I am at a lost as to which path I should take ... perhaps the road less travelled.  

The many folds in her dress made achieving contrast on a light pastel colour scheme that much easier
Achieving a contrast and smooth transitions for the mage's dress was a key priority at this stage
Going forward, there is a likelihood her overall colour scheme could go off at a tangent 

Coming in only two separate parts, the Female Mage on Stairs was easy to assemble and looks deceptively easy to paint. It's anything but. Painting 28-mm figures from the Dark Sword Miniatures line never fails to be a challenge and it's proving no different for the mage. While the bad primer coat isn't helping, it's the very simplicity of the miniature that makes it difficult to paint well and create a 'wow' factor if you will. But since I always find myself improving, however slightly, when working at such a small scale, it's a challenge worth taking. That I get to paint her in Asian skin tones is icing in the cake as I haven't had much opportunity to do so in my miniature projects. Best I get to it then.

22 comments:

  1. Is there a particular reason you didn't just strip the primer and start over? (just curious). I like the color transitions so far!

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    1. Thanks and good question. I guess I didn't strip the primer and start over due to:
      (a) Not being sure how Dettol would react with the Tamiya Primer, previously I used Dettol only on the GW acrylic 'primers'.
      (b) Past experience with stripping paint or primer has shown me that sometimes the paint/primer still sticks stubbornly to the nooks and crannies. So it's a trade off between how bad the paint/primer is to warrant bath time with Dettol and leaving it alone ... this time the latter won out.
      (c) I was too lazy this time round :)

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  2. Oh that looks soft and yet has good contrast. Nice work :)

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    1. Thank you Zab ... I was pretty surprised that I managed the contrast seeing how pale the pastel peach and pinks were. :)

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  3. Amazing. Cannot find the words! What a beautiful paintjob, so sweet, so... peaceful, if you know what I mean. There is something about this one that immediately catches my eye. Truly lovely!

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    1. Thank you very much Suber. She is sweet for now but I am not sure if my next colour choice will ensure she stays sweet or becomes a different entity altogether.

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  4. Great work so far ! Love the dress color !
    Greetings

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    1. Many thanks Mario. I always wanted to paint a peach and pink combination. I'm glad it turned out fairly well.

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  5. Excellent start. The peach and pink look great together.

    Hair to contrast with the orange? Blue?

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    1. Much appreciated Finch. Good suggestion but I was actually thinking of another colour based on an anime digital painting I came across online. I am almost afraid to try for fear of messing it all up but then again; no pain no gain I suppose.

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  6. Like they said - looks good so far.

    It's strange how we all have our own habits, isn't it? I always paint the flesh first on any model, I suppose because it makes the figure feel more "real" to me. Do you always do the clothing first? Or work from the ground upwards? Or am I making too much of this?

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    1. Thanks Colgar. My approach to painting miniatures is actually varied in that I sometimes paint the flesh first as was the case in both Wood Elf Goddesses http://bit.ly/1Le8Kec and also in many others. But in this case, I wanted to get the dress right first ... it just kinda felt right to do the dress first. So you could say I am a haphazard painted with no clear set way of working; for now at least.

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  7. That's a great start, nice choice of colors too

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  8. Marvelous work on the dress so far! I'm sure you'll make this a piece of art again.

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    1. Thank you Moiterei. I hope I won't disappoint you with my future choice of colours.

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  9. Great start F.E.M.
    Perfect colour choices.

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  10. What a splendid creature...and a splendid dress color!

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    1. She is indeed a very beautiful sculpture; thanks too for your kind words on my choice for her dress colour.

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