It seems a running theme that with every new mini I paint I try some new technique, and this time it’s no different. I made it a point to paint more monsters so that I could expose myself to different textures and more organic color palettes. As you’ll probably notice with the Spectator I tried my hand at blending from one color to another. It was made more difficult because of the scaly nature of the miniature but I think I succeeded. Don’t get me wrong, I messed up several times to get the gradient just right, but I think it came out really well.

The new techniques I tried were: new method of putting paint on my wet palette, blending, and using glossy varnish. Usually when I put paint on the palette I figure out what kinds of paints or mixtures I want and then combine those paints immediately on the palette. This time around I put the individual paints on the palette and mixed up what I needed as I went along. This allowed me for far more control to achieve the blending effect I wanted. Blending was very fun to try my hand at. The texture of the mini made it a good challenge, but I periodically tested out the colors I mixed on my hand and used that to gauge if it was what I wanted to get the blending to work. Finally after all the painting was done I varnished everything with a matte varnish, except for the eyes and tongue. For them I used a glossy varnish to give them a nice shine and I think it came out amazingly. It really gives the mini some fun depth to it. Perhaps the only thing I was not entirely happy with was the veins in the eyes. The damaged iris and pupil came out great, but I think I should have thinned down the red and blues to make it look more natural, but other than that this was a knockout.

Thanks for reading Dungeoneers, I hope you enjoyed this new installment. If you liked what you read please consider donating to my ko-fi! Till next time.

The base coat paints I used are Reaper MSP and Vallejo Game Color:

• Body: 1x naga green, 1x marigold yellow, 1x candlelight yellow
• Tongue: 1x brilliant red, 1x monarch purple, 1x desert sand
• Eyes: 1x marigold yellow, 1x desert sand
• Gums: 1x monarch purple
• Teeth: 1x mountain stone
• Damaged Iris/pupil: 1x mountain stone, 1x desert sand, 1/2x marigold yellow, 1x dragon white
• Veins: 1x brilliant red, 1x heather blue
• Tentacle pupil/mouth: 1x pure black