The Saxon Invasion and the End of Camelot as we know it...

Further Adventures In Camelot...

The Shadows Over Camelot project has come to an end with the Saxons being finished.

As many of you know, I was unable to paint in the last two years, and this project has been

my return journey back into miniature painting.

I had many opportunities to experiment with techniques I used to use all the time.

Because the quality of the miniatures was poor, I didn't have to worry

about the possibility of screwing things up as I painted. I know that's a worry

of many miniature painters, and prevents some hobbyists from even painting at all.

Read the words!

There is information in 

the written word.

The Picts. Do They Even Plaid?

Shadows Over Camelot

The Four Picts

Not much of an invasion force.

Below: Here they are, first with just the primer, and then with a 

brown wash to show the details, what few there are

with this quality material.

Notice the faces. They look very expressive if

you're never planning to paint them. 

When you start painting the details though, 

you  realize how odd the details are.

Below: I tried something new. Usually I'm painting NMM, but I've been 

using metallic paints for most of this project.

In this case, I wanted to paint bronze metal. I mixed

green paint into my metallic bronze paint.

Below: These are the colors I'm using for my flesh tone.

I hadn't painted skin in a long time, so remembering how I need to

approach it took some experimentation.

Here we have one and most of one done. Two others have a base coat applied.

Below: Plaid britches. What do you want? They're Picts, not Scottish Highlanders.

Below: I used the same green process on their kilts as I used on Merlin's cape. 

Then I used some purple wash in a few areas to deepen the shading.
And I'm sure you noticed that the bronze is done. I used the same gold process on them 

as I did on Merlin's gold staff tip, except I added some Liquitex Silver Ink to 

the mix for a bit of sparkle.

Below: Here they are, all finished. Front view and then back view.

Interesting to note how the faces look so different when each

figure was the same.

Coming Soon...

The Saxon Invasion!

More thrilling adventures in Camelot!

A return to Camelot, and the finish of Merlin...

Shadows Over Camelot

A fun board game with lots of

fun miniatures to go with it.

Below: Work in progress photos of Merlin, starting out with no paint at all.
You can see the low quality of the material I'm working with.

Below: Adding the teal robe, and the brown cloak.

 Below: Here's the palette of colors I used for my browns. I like to move from one 

color to the next quickly, dipping my brush in first one and then another

and then back again. This quickness creates opportunity

for wet blending in some areas.

Below: The green cape, and the palette of colors I used. I started with a red, a green,

and a yellow. You can see that I mixed the green with the red to get a rich

brownish color which I used in the shading. The yellow was mixed with

the green for the highlights.

You can see how I move my colors around on the palette, not being

afraid to mix them up as I go.

Below: The flesh tones are done.

Sadly, I didn't get a play by play or a picture of the palette as I went.

Below: Trying my first Non-metallic gold since I started painting again.

And the hair, staff and pouches are done.

Below: Here's my palette for the Non-Metallic Gold.

A red-purple, a bright yellow, dark umber brown, white.

Again, you can see how I move my brush around the palette, 

taking from first one color, and then another, back and forth. 

Mixing as I go.

The soda cap is usually filled with water, so I can dip my brush to add a 

little extra to the paint as needed, or to do a down and dirty brush rinse 

without having to return to my main rinse cup every time.

And Finished! 

Tomorrow, we invade the Pictish lands...

Shadows Over Camelot Quest Objectives; Grail, Excalibur, Lancelot's Armor

Above: The Holy Grail finished.

Below: Grail work in progress.

Above: Before the brown wash was applied.

 Here's my palette of colors for the marble effect. I never did use that dark brown color you see.
After I got the marble done, I used a dark brown wash from the Vallejo line of washes. I didn't bathe the model in wash, but carefully added it to the recesses, to give the model added depth and bring out the details. I touched up the metallic gold with the same wash as well.
Again, you can see how I put all colors on the palette, and paint and mix as I go, with my soda cap full of water to thin as I go.

Below: Excalibur, as handed to the King of the Britons

by Nimue of the Lake.

Below: Lancelot's Armor, a work in progress. Primed gray, and metallics applied.

Lancelot's Armor finished!
I used my new brighter, less orange yellow. Mixed it with a little purple for the shading. FYI, mixing bright yellow with a dark red-purple makes an equivalent to the old GW color Snakebite Leather. I use this combination a lot in my NMM gold.

Thanks for following along. Coming up next, the Siege Engines, and then Anglo-Saxons and Picts.

I best get painting!

Turns out it takes less time to make the blog posts than it does to paint the miniatures. 

You remember Sir Kay, right?

 The post about Sir Kay's face was a couple weeks ago, but here's some more about him. He's finally finished.

Here's his character card, which I used to determine the colors.

You remember his face right?
Awesome detail, as you can see.

 Here's the silly face I had to paint on him, because you can see that there were no actual facial features. Only suggestions of features.

This is the palette of colors I used. 

The blue is for Sir Kay. The red was for King Arthur (previous post).

You can see how I put out several colors, ranging from my lightest light to my darkest dark.

I lay them all out on the palette so I can go from one to the next over and over, rather than painting one layer, and getting the next color out, and painting that layer and so on, while each one dries.

This way, there's more opportunity to take advantage of the still wet paint for blending wet into wet.

 Et finis!

And Sir Galahad...

  

The yellow cloak would prove to be a challenge, but mostly because as I returned to painting after a couple years, I had to throw away a lot of dried up paint, which left me with only one yellow to work with, and that was an orange yellow. It proved to be too dark for what I wanted to do. Adding white to it didn't help much. You can see the orange color in the picture above, and how different it is from the artwork on the character card, which is what I was trying to match.

I called it finished, in frustration. 

A couple days later, after picking up some new paints, and finishing all the knights, they were ready for a matte varnish, to finish them off.

If you'll remember me mentioning Sir Tristan (the purple knight) and my problem with the Reaper purple ink bleeding with the application of the clear coat, you'll notice Galahad's tunic. I used some of the same purple paint mixed with the ink here. When I went to clear coat him, the purple ink bled into the brush and before I knew it, that color was all over my yellow cloak, making it more orange and even darker. I set him aside to dry.

With the new yellow paint I got, lighter and brighter, and no orange in it, I repainted the cloak. Here's the finished Sir Galahad:

So the Knights of the Round Table are done, but the game is not over.

The next post will show the painting of Excalibur, the Holy Grail, and Lancelot's Armor, the three objectives the knights may win by completing quests in Shadows Over Camelot.

We're Knights of the Round Table...

Here are four more knights. I have no work in progress shots of them, unfortunately.

It turns out you have to train yourself to stop and take pictures as things progress, and I painted them before I realized this.

Sir Tristan, the fourth knight shown here, was the surprise pain in the ass. I used a Reaper purple ink mixed into my paint, and didn't realize it was water soluble until I was brushing a clear matte varnish on. Surprise!

It was more a surprise when I went to clear varnish the next guy, who had a yellow cloak, and the brush was not as clean as I expected. More on Sir Galahad later. He's not featured in this post.