Bertie Figures It Out - Project abandoned, photos lost.

[Bertie McBoatface]

Interesting fact: The oil paint on my Phantom has dried. That went on in much thinner layers. Hmmm...

[Muchmirth]

Bertie Ive only just jumped into this thread. Very interesting. The rat looks great. Did you do any more? Did it dry out ok in the end. You should beat yourself up as looks to have worked from pics.
  It’s odd but I am in exactly in the same position as you at the mo. I’ve tried, very very briefly and impatiently to paint too figures faces in oils as have admired the colours and blends and extra working time. It was a total disaster, none of the paint would stick to the face. Think I was rushing. I dipped the two heads in white spirit and will start again. Think I need more patients (what do you mean I can’t be brilliant after one go and manage to master a skill which takes years to progress?) I’ll take a tip from your thread actually and leave the oil to wick out on the cardboard for 30 mins or so. Then I’ll try blending the oils and thinners better. I have a dropper so might actually count the drops of thinner into the ratio of paint so can make a rough note for future.

 Will you keep going with the oils? 

[Bertie McBoatface]

4 minutes ago, Muchmirth said:

Bertie Ive only just jumped into this thread. Very interesting. The rat looks great. Did you do any more? Did it dry out ok in the end. You should beat yourself up as looks to have worked

 

He's dry but I've been too busy to return to him or this thread. I'll be finishing his eyes with acrylics because I know I can do that ok. I'm pleased with him and he's already made it into the display cabinet with his strange white eyes...

 

4 minutes ago, Muchmirth said:

What do you mean I can’t be brilliant after one go and manage to master a skill which takes years to progress?

 

It's a funny thing but I can't play my guitar any better now than when I put it into the wardrobe some years ago. I've even read a few books and watched videos. People say I should practise but I think that's just a waste of time. It was an expensive instrument - it should work NOW!

 

4 minutes ago, Muchmirth said:

 

I’ll take a tip from your thread actually and leave the oil to wick out on the cardboard for 30 mins or so. Then I’ll try blending the oils and thinners better. I have a dropper so might actually count the drops of thinner into the ratio of paint so can make a rough note for future.

 

Sounds like a plan

 

4 minutes ago, Muchmirth said:

 Will you keep going with the oils? 

 

Hell yes. I saw a model cavalryman on a glossy 'black' horse at a show some years ago and one day, I might be able to do that. I spoke to the painter who was just a person like you or me. I remember him saying that he just kept on going back to it and adding bits and taking away the bits he'd messed up ... for months, until he was happy. Patience, and practice, are the two steps to oil painting heaven. Probably.

 

And a less busy modelling life, I think. I have so much going on at the moment that I'm having to keep four separate notebooks to remind myself where I am and what to do next! I'm always in a hurry. If I wasn't already retired I'd be looking forward to it for the rest. As it is, the only rest I can look forward to.........

[Bertie McBoatface]

I love this hobby in all of its incarnations. That's why find it difficult not to start new projects before the old ones have been completed, and that's why I'm in a mess at the moment. In progress right now I have:

 

M3 Lee, interior, cutaway build in the GB

Archer/Tilly range diorama

Mutant mouse figure

Ripley astronaut full figure in two scales and a bust

Witch bust

Wooden ship's boat

Wooden fishing boat

Entropy GB 'admin and marketing'

Short story in support of 1/32 Mustang WIP

A39 Tortoise, Dingo armoured car and HMS Temeraire Entropy experiments

And the rest of my 'real life' which I manage to fit in somewhere, including planning for a house move!

 

Something's got to give. I have so many irons in the fire that the fire is in danger of going out. So instead of trying to do everything at once, I'm going to make my moddelling projects form an orderly queue and attend to them to completion, one at a time (possibly two). Nothing will be abandoned, but some will have to wait a while. Taking the long view, nothing will even be delayed. The single projects will get done a lot faster and more efficiently than if I split my time and energy over several. Over the course of a year, MORE moddelling will happen, not less.

 

This is one of the projects that is being set aside. It's not the shelf of doom, because I'm still really mojoed up about figures and want to carry on working on them. I just can't manage it at the moment and I don't know when I will be able to re-start. Sorry folks, This thread is now on hold. If you don't want to miss anything, put it onto your follow list and you'll get a notification as soon as I get back here.

 

(My attention will initially be concentrated on the Lee cutaway, because that's in a GB and has a deadline, and a deadline is always good for keeping me moving.)

[Muchmirth]

That sounds fair enough Bertie. 

[Bob68]

Bertie,

I hope you get back to this, as a returning modeller your candid blogs on your various builds in all areas do provide an insight and inspiration! Please keep it up 🙂

[Bertie McBoatface]

12 hours ago, Bob68 said:

Bertie,

I hope you get back to this, as a returning modeller your candid blogs on your various builds in all areas do provide an insight and inspiration! Please keep it up 🙂

 

thanks for your interest Bob. Unfortunately, I'm something of a butterfly when it comes to modelmaking. I flutter from genre to genre blown by the slightest breeze. I painted a figure in the recent Blitzbuild GB, and have done at least one more outside this thread. To be candid, I'd forgotten this completely! 

 

I may come back to it in the winter.

[perdu]

Winter has come.

[Bertie McBoatface]

@perdu

 

Not this winter, silly.

[Bertie McBoatface]

Hey @perdu Maybe it was this this winter, silly me.

 

 

Now that's classy packaging. Not a picture, no instructions at all. It's worse than wooden boat kits. 😁 Not really, it's not difficult to work it out, though finding the colour scheme will be a challenge.

 

 

Ready for his season in panto as principal boy. He's very butch! 

 

I've spent an hour and a half fettling the moulds today and he's almost ready for priming. He's dry fitted for these photos

 

 

This is old skool resin out of a silicone mould. The sculpting is beaut. 

 

 

Very Grand Opera!

 

 

There were bubbles. And seam lines and pouring stubs and flash. However, I got this cheap in an end of run sale so the moulds were tired. It might even be a second grade figure. It's fine for me at the moment. My most challenging figure so far, by a long way but have you noticed its great advantage? 

 

Apart from the face, which is in shadow, NO FLESH!

 

 

And the face isn't bad.

 

[Muchmirth]

Oh man I really like the look of that! Are you going to use oils to paint it with?

[Bertie McBoatface]

56 minutes ago, Muchmirth said:

Oh man I really like the look of that! Are you going to use oils to paint it with?

 

I haven't thought that far ahead yet. It's the sort of quality figure that would benefit from the oil paint's blending abilities. All that drapery. On the other hand, it can also be done with acrylics, and done quicker too. I think I'll start with acrylics and maybe finish off with oil. That's what I did with this one...

 

[Muchmirth]

Sounds like a plan…. That one is very cool too! 

[Bertie McBoatface]

2 minutes ago, Muchmirth said:

Sounds like a plan…. That one is very cool too! 

 

It's my best one so far. I was very chuffed with the leather armour and I think that's all acrylic. Oils are so difficult!

[Bertie McBoatface]

I spent some time priming Henri today.

 

 

I'd found some air bubbles in the neck of the cloak/greatcoat thing and while filling and starting to sand them, it occurred to me that if it was still snowing in Henri as he rested in the shattered Russian garden, that's exactly where the snow would settle.

 

 

I decided to make a feature of the defect and taking this filler, I stippled it onto the figure in places where I could later use the texture as snow or frost.

 

 

For example, here's a crust of ice on the cannonball. That would have been very cold during the night after the battle and surely would retain some of the snow.

 

 

All of the upward facing parts of Henri's clothes received their frigid dusting. Maybe he's been sitting there all night watching over his fallen comrades? Maybe Henri is wounded and waiting for the Russians to come back and finish him off?

 

 

Once the snow was done, I gloved up and washed every part of the figure and base with isopropyl alcohol (rubbing alcohol) and then soapy water to remove any mould release agent. A hand made figure like this is very likely to have some kind of non-stick coating which is good for moulds but bad for paint. From now on I'll try never to touch the model with bare hands.

 

 

I mounted the pieces of resin on holders - cocktail sticks for the smaller pieces and bigger sticks for the base and torso. and sprayed the first coat of primer. 

 

to be continued...

[Bertie McBoatface]

 

I used these primers. I haven't used them before because of the smell. I bought them on impulse ages ago and thought I'd try them in my airbrush spray bay. If I sprayed in short bursts, the extractor could keep up with the fumes. I think the thinner is xylene so the very black primer dried fast. I left it alone for a long time though as I could still smell the aroma of curing paint very faintly. 

 

Despite the smell and the awkwardness of using rattlecans, I liked not having to clean primer out of the airbrush. All I did was flush out the nozzles with a little xylene.

 

 

Here's the snow on Henri's greatcoat.

 

 

I stuck him together and onto the base with blutac and sprayed the white from above. My two small trolls, Tom and Harry*, were primed in the same way a while ago but I used acrylic primer on them and then Tamiya white paint which you can see is not as white as the spray cans. 

 

 

*I finished with my little Dick last week. 

 

 

The white primer has made almost all of the highlights and shadows for me. 

 

 

The lights are very bright, although I will enhance the effect even more with a brush. The shadows are black. In theory, all I need do is apply some transparent colour on top and Henri is parade ready. In fact I'll be pushing the contrast as far as I possibly can in search of a Grand Opera effect. I don't want him lifelike - I want Henri to be transcendent!

 

 

Taken apart and laid flat, the shadows no longer make sense but this is the best way to see how Zenithal Highlighting works.

 

Message ends. (I'll be posting longer updates in several instalments now as Britmodeller has become very unstable and I'm frustrated when I lose lots of work. Four times recently. I'll indicate when the update is actually finished, if I can remember.)

[ERK]

Interesting  the  primer  you use,  I  have only  ever used  Vallejo  Acrylic Surface Primer  Black,  it  goes  on well   even brushed  as  it shrinks  down onto the  surface  -   but it can leave a  slight sheen  to the  surface.

 

Erk.

[Bertie McBoatface]

1 hour ago, ERK said:

Interesting  the  primer  you use,  I  have only  ever used  Vallejo  Acrylic Surface Primer  Black,  it  goes  on well   even brushed  as  it shrinks  down onto the  surface  -   but it can leave a  slight sheen  to the  surface.

 

Erk.

 

I tried that stuff ten years ago and rejected it because it came away with masking tape. I'm sure it's been improved since then but once bitten twice shy. 

 

My regular acrylic primer is Stynylrez from Badger. I'm out of every colour except grey though so I'm using up the other stuff I own before I restock. I only use it on figures. On AFVs I have found that Tamiya acrylic paint with their lacquer thinner is fine straight onto the plastic. However, I don't use masking tape much on AFVs. 

 

I like a primed surface for brush painting. It's easier somehow. 

[ERK]

32 minutes ago, Bertie McBoatface said:

 

I tried that stuff ten years ago and rejected it because it came away with masking tape. I'm sure it's been improved since then but once bitten twice shy. 

 

My regular acrylic primer is Stynylrez from Badger. I'm out of every colour except grey though so I'm using up the other stuff I own before I restock. I only use it on figures. On AFVs I have found that Tamiya acrylic paint with their lacquer thinner is fine straight onto the plastic. However, I don't use masking tape much on AFVs. 

 

I like a primed surface for brush painting. It's easier somehow. 

I use  it  on my  28mm   figures   as  No   masking  is needed  -  just  Acrylic  (Vallejo)   paint layers  ontop.

 

Erk.

[Bertie McBoatface]

2 minutes ago, ERK said:

I use  it  on my  28mm   figures   as  No   masking  is needed  -  just  Acrylic  (Vallejo)   paint layers  ontop.

 

Erk.

 

Stynylrez sticks very well but is a swine to clean out of the airbrush! It's too good!

[ERK]

2 minutes ago, Bertie McBoatface said:

 

Stynylrez sticks very well but is a swine to clean out of the airbrush! It's too good!

Yep  I have enough issues  with  my  airbrush   keeping it  clean,

 

Erk.

[Bertie McBoatface]

1 hour ago, ERK said:

Yep  I have enough issues  with  my  airbrush   keeping it  clean,

 

Erk.

 

I need a new one. I've worn the chrome off the inside so it's brass now and paint sticks to it all too well

[roginoz]

So have I but it's gonna have to last a bit longer as my go-to brand has hiked their prices up beyond my wallets ability to keep up.

 

Keep making birthday noises but they fall on deaf ears !! Obviously I'm not sufficiently noisy........

 

A Bertie figure build !!! What's not to like !

 

Merry crimbo 'n' stuff, Bertie.

Rog

 

 

[Ratch]

2 hours ago, ERK said:

I use  it  on my  28mm   figures   as  No   masking  is needed  -  just  Acrylic  (Vallejo)   paint layers  ontop.

Me too, no problems.

[Bertie McBoatface]

 

That's my reference material sorted.