Work on my new Malifaux crew has been awfully slow. Part of it has been my unfamiliarity with the colours. I’m not particularly comfortable painting skin, particularly on females. As a result I’ve spent a heap of time downloading tutorials, watching videos, pondering and general procrastination. The Russian vehicle commission (which still has a handful of Hinds to complete) also took some time. Anyway I’m playing Malifaux at Cancon which will happen at the end of January. So I’ve only got 4 weeks to get as much as possible painted. I would rather not run any unpainted miniatures, but we’ll see how far I progress.

I started with the face as it’s the deepest part of the model. I snapped a work in progress picture with the Macro lens to try and get it right. One thing I’ll add about this lens is that I’ve not found it to ever make a miniature look good. It shows way more detail than you can ever see with the naked eye. However, it does serve me quite well when it comes to finishing up a model: a quick snap and you can see every little flaw – the major ones which you might want to correct.

One thing you might notice is that the eyes are just a single, dark colour. I tried a couple of times to do more, but they are just too small. I’d estimate they’re 1mm wide, and a fair bit under 1mm high. I think at that scale it’s just too hard. If the eyes were bigger and more exaggerated (as they often are with this scale) then I think you could. Maybe it’s just me, but everything I tried was either impossible to see or just made a mess. I went with the same colour scheme as the studio art, although I’ve probably got more blue in the dress. I liked the colours: the light Caucasian skin, the red hair, blue dress and pink flame all sit nicely together.

I’m really happy with how she’s come out. It’s taken a while to get her painted, but the skin, hair makeup and dress are all looking good. I’m even pretty happy with the flame. I toyed with the idea of doing some lighting of the rest of the figure with the flame, but I really don’t want to stuff it up. As a result I’ve left it off, but that would complete this model. I might come back to it at some point in the future. My best idea was using orange for the colour on the cheeks and else where on the model. It means the makeup doesn’t look clown-like and instead fits in with the rest of the model.

Now the ever present colours listing,

• Skin:
  • Base Coat: 67% Flat Flesh (VMC 70.955) & 33% Basic Skintone (VMC 70.815)
  • Mid-Tone I: Flat Flesh (VMC 70.955)
  • Warmth: 50% Flat Flesh (VMC 70.955) & 50% Bright Orange (VMC 70.851)
  • Highlight I: Basic Skintone (VMC 70.815)
  • Extreme Highlight: Pale Sand (VMC 70.837)
  • Shadow I: USA Tan Earth (VMC 70.874)
  • Shadow II: Flat Brown (VMC 70.984)
  • Shadow III: German Camouflage Black Brown (VMC 70.921)
• Dress:
  • Base Coat: 67% Black Grey (VMC 70.862) & 33% Dark Prussian blue (VMC 70.899)
  • Shadow I: Black Shade (VGC 73.201) diluted
  • Highlight I: 75% Prussian Blue (VMC 70.965) &  25%  Black Grey (VMC 70.862)
  • Highlight II: Prussian Blue (VMC 70.965)
  • Highlight III: 50% Andrea Blue (VMC 70.841) & 50%  Prussian Blue (VMC 70.965)
  • Buttons: Silver (VMC 70.997)
• Hair:
  • Base Coat: Flat Brown (VMC 70.984)
  • Highlight I: Cavalry Brown (VMC 70.982)
  • Shadow I: Black Shade (VGC 73.201)
  • Highlight II: Dark Vermillion (VMC 70.947)
  • Highlight III: 50% Dark Vermillion (VMC 70.947) & 50%Bright Orange (VMC 70.851)
  • Highlight IV: Bright Orange (VMC 70.851)
• Vambrace & Hat:
  • Base Coat:  Black Grey (VMC 70.862)
  • Highlight I: Luftwaffe Uniform WWII (VMC 70.816)
  • Hightlight II: Medium Sea Grey (VMC 70.870)
• Feathers (Hat):
  • Base Coat: Andrea Blue (VMC 70.841)
  • Hightlight: Deep Sky Blue (VMC 70.844)
  • Shadow: Blue Shade (VGC 73.207)
• Flame (Right Hand):
  • Base Coat: Magenta (VMC 0.945)
  • Shadow: Purple Ink (VGC 72.087)
  • Highlight I: Magenta Fluro (VMC 70.735)
  • Highlight II: Light Flesh (VMC 70.928)
• Boots:
  • Base Coat: German Camouflage Medium Brown (VMC 70.826)
  • Sole: Chocolate Brown (VMC 70.872)
  • Shadow: German Camouflage Black Bown (VMC 70.921)
  • Highlight: US Field Drab (VMC 70.873)

I was also messing around and figured I’d upload a picture of my work station. As you can see I’m a really organised kind of character and like a nice clean space. You can see Colette and Cassandra as well as the PC monitor with some pictures I was using as colour references for the face and chest. My paints are off to the right; Vallejo all the way. The lamp’s a nice daylight one which is really bright that was another present from the ever present patient Mrs. The great thing about this desk is that it sits in our living room where the rest of the family is, so it means I’m not consigned to solitude while painting and I can check the TV and be part of our day to day life while hobbying.

Next up is Cassandra. I think I’ll stick with the studio scheme. Again I think it looks pretty good, it also is separate from the other colours I’ve used. That means it will be light skin again (probably the exact same colours as here), a bright red dress and blonde hair.