42mm samurai: A little Ikko ikki work

Well, my desire to paint has definitely returned. Now, I just need to find the energy after the still- (ever) busy work day. I won't do a step-by-step of postings, per se, but I will post pictures after each evening that I manage to get any significant painting finished.

This evening, I managed to get a couple colors thrown onto my ikko ikki monk. I knew I wanted to paint his pants white, and his shirt some off-white or drab, but I'm not quite sure what color to do his armor. Any suggestions?

I think, so far, of all Steve's samurai, this one is my favorite. I don't know why; he just is. Once I get the colors chosen for the armor and lacings, I think this figure should paint up rather quickly.

Sorry, I didn't keep an eye on what specific colors I used; I just grabbed offhand what jars looked good to me. My oriental flesh recipe is the same as my caucasian; I simply used a different base color (I think it was Foundry Dusky Flesh light (6C), mixing it with each subsequent highlight from my base recipe.

42mm Samurai: First paint applied

I don't normally post such a small step, but since it's been almost two months since I last put paint to something, I figured I'd celebrate the tiny achievement with a post. It's been years since I went more than a month without painting something.

I chose to do the flesh first (I usually do it last) so as to make the figures come "alive." This way, they will beckon me to finish the job each time I walk past the painting table.

I like Steve Barber's samurai sculpts; they look good and paint up easy! I wish he would do more, but understand that sculptors, like painters, get a yearning to do different things along the way. Steve, if you're reading this, if you ever do more samurai, I'd like some unarmored fighting samurai so I can play Kurosawa-type games.

Priming under way (and here's more envelope art)

Samurai are sitting in their first coat of primer. In the mean time, here's another piece of envelope art for your enjoyment:

42mm Samurai: Weapons made

Nothing major going on; I just hammered out a few weapons for my latest batch of samurai. This photo does, however, show what the Ikko Ikki monk (far left) and Samurai standing with yari (second from left) look like.

I don't plan on any major conversion work on these other than the weapons and the back banners that I'll add later. Still waiting for bases; they've been ordered and have been shipped. I hope to at least get these primed by this weekend.

Samurai arrived but...

...It's been so long (relatively) since I last painted that I hadn't realized I was out of bases. So this evening, I ordered some 40mm lipped bases (what I base my 42mm samurai on.) Ah- it just hit me: I hadn't ordered any bases lately because I've been basing my large-scale figures on poker chips. I think my samurai would also work on the poker chips, but they're already based on the lipped bases. Oh well.

Anyway, these (Steve Barber) samurai look nice. One of them is an Ikko-ikki monk which looks better than I expected. When the bases arrive and stuff gets assembled, I'll post some pics. The other poses I have are a samurai standing with a yari, samurai attacking with yari and an ashigaru kneeling (wearing helmet) with a yari.

While we wait for bases, I'll just keep posting my art from letters (and elsewhere.)

I also enjoy drawing on envelopes

I draw on just about every envelope I send through the mail. Unfortunately, I don't have many scans of them because the envelope art is the last step before I drop the letter off. But I scanned this one (addresses left off for privacy, of course):

Still waiting for samurai; Here's a squirrel

That's right: I can paint giant robots, AND cute little squirrels. It's also meant as a piece of incidental art for  my letter-writing (hence, all the white space.)

Quick piece of Giant Robot art

Of all the things I've drawn, I can't remember the last time I've drawn a giant robot. So here's a quick one. It started off as a doodle, and went from there. (In case anyone is interested, it's watercolor pencil, ink, brush and pen on paper.) Since it's on regular old paper, I'm gonna write a letter on it to a couple cousins with kids who like this kind of thing. (And yes, the robot is saying, "Petoo, petoo," as he devastates his enemies with his plasma eye disintegrator rays.

In the meantime, I've had a piece of old masonite for a while trying to think of something to paint on it; I think I'll try a giant robot in acrylics (complete with background sky in ominous, cliche reds.)

Also- 42mm Samurai are on their way, so hopefully miniatures will be returning here, soon!

Reruns: Caveman Attack!

Sort of a sequel to my popular Waiteri Scouts photo (seen here.) This is the whole tribe.

Reruns: D&D

Here are a few of my D&D figures as requested. Also- I think my painting drought is soon to come to an end; Taking pics of my samurai led to me ordering a few more of the zen warriors. Not much -- an ashigaru, a couple samurai, and an ikko ikki monk -- but still enough that might snap me out of this funk.

Reruns: 42mm samurai

As requested, here are my 42mm samurai (by Steve Barber models). I use these to play a "reskinned" Red Sands Blue Sky. For those familiar with the ruleset (by Two Hour Wargames), my samurai version is less of a skirmish and more a a duel. (I do one or two samurai with a couple supporting ashigaru per side.)

Eyecandy reruns

Just so that my blog doesn't get too stale while I'm on a painting hiatus, here are a couple new photos ("eyecandy") of stuff I've painted in the past ("reruns.")

If you want to see new photos of anything you've seen here before, just drop a comment, and I'll take the photos. At least I'll get a touch of photo practice if not painting practice.