Top Hats vs. Zombie Cake Toppers

This couple wanted a Victorian theme for their cake topper. I loved making the old clothing, and firearms.

And the hat just tops it all off:

 

 

And some Victorian Zombies to go with. Or against, as it were.

 

These two were a little more modern (with the Uzi and assault rifle) but the top hat remains one of the greatest of all possible hats.

 

Halo Spartan Cake topper

Here are some recent cake toppers that are quite a bit different from the usual bunch that I make. These two actually started life as official Halo Reach action figures, and I altered the faces and weaponry to look more like my clients (and got rid of the signs of action figures on them (like screws and gaps where the joints are). 

Oh, and I repainted them too. Here they are:
 
 

Bookending with the Color Wheel

Ok, so it has been a little while that I've been looking into all of the wonderful things to do with color theory, and I've come out with a few things to share. 

The first one is a technique that I've come to call Bookending. First off, let's have a look at the color wheel.

 

 This is one of the simpler versions, but that's what we're looking for here. Colors that are on opposite ends are complimentary. Essentially, that means that they have nothing in common (if you mix them together, you'll get brown and grey).

 In elementary school, my teachers always told me that complimentary colors just look good together. I never totally believed them, and they never had any other uses for the color wheel, so I ignored them.

 Until recently, when I decided to see what happens when you use them both on the same color of a mini. The jacket on this mini is painted green and shaded in red.

 

Since the two colors mix together on this mini, the tone of the color becomes more neutral. Even still, shading in complimentary colors creates a more dynamic look for the shading or highlighting.

 But what else can you do? Well, I decided to try shading in one color and highlighting in the shade color's compliment- both of which have nothing to do with the base color of the area. This way, both colors are present on the miniature, but they are never directly mixing together (ie- they don't turn brown). The results are the opposite of what I got before:

 

 This guys was the first bookended mini I did. I actually painted him using the same base colors as this mini:

 

But the difference is stark. The bookended mini is a great deal brighter than the one that is not. That is the same blue I used on both of them, but the purple shading and yellow highlighting really makes it brighter. Even the brown has become a fairly saturated color. From there I decided that bookending would define the aesthetic of my own Super Dungeon Explore force.

 

And later, I started thinking about using these methods to really define the way that light alters the colors on minis.

This last one is an example of taking the entire mini and shading it with the same purple and highlighting to the same yellow. I tried to make him considerably more neutral (most of the paints I was using were very de-saturated). Here's the result of that.

 

Atlantic Coast Charity Cup minis

The Atlantic Coast Charity Cup is an NAF sanctioned Blood Bowl tournament to be held on the 13th of July at Virginia Beach (Virginia). 

I suppose it doesn't always show up on here, but I'm a huge Blood Bowl fan. While the tourny is a little too far for me to travel, I did get the opportunity to paint up a few minis for them.

 One of them is the tournament mini they had commissioned (this is the 'studio' paint scheme for him). I really loved painting him, he's got such character.

 

 And the second is an Ogre star player from Willy Miniatures.

Malifaux 2e Public Beta is up

So, like many wargamers, I spent some time this weekend looking over the new Malifaux rules. Yes, this second edition has come sooner than we would have liked, but honestly it looks like they've kicked it out of the park with this one.

 I haven't playtested the minis yet to see how the balance has changed- and let's face it, some Malifaux characters were over powered before. But it looks like there have been some pretty significant improvements overall.

 And maybe more importantly, they've kept the core of what Malifaux is about- character driven skirmishes over resources and objectives. Only, it looks like they've made it more-so than ever (and their artwork is as creepy as ever).

 There are simply too many changes to name here, so you should probably go and have a look for yourself. And as this is a public beta, go ahead and send them feedback. They're asking for it, after all.