Thursday, April 12, 2018

The Guardian (2)

Hi all,

thank you for your comments and suggestions.
Reacting on the several sword and spear comments I decided to take the spear away.
Right now I simply lowered her arm.
I'm not sure if I keep the pose and what I will place in her hand. I'm considering to give her a signal horn. Let me know what you think!
So now it's time to consider the background.
Here I placed a sample background I downloaded and printed - it's not mine!
To counter the shadows and give it a separate atmosphere I will now add lights to the background.
I have some 12V LED that also work with a 9V block - this way they are less bright.
To house the LED I had to build another frame around the existing frame
To provide access to the rear and the LED (as well as protecting them from spray primer later on) the new frame has to be removable (slide-on-slide-off)
Just enough room to hold the LED strip
Voilá
With this the background looks very different - beside it being a different print out *wink*
I think this will be very cool!
And when adding regular ambient (room) light it balances nicely.
Depending on the angle you may get a glimpse of the actual LED
So maybe I have to add a thin milky glass cover to the LED....
Right now I sit here looking at the images with a smile on my face as my plan seems to work :)
What do you think?
Any feedback, suggestions, ideas?
Signal horn or something different for the left hand?
Thanks
Klaus

Wednesday, April 4, 2018

The Guardian (1)

Hi all,

Sorry for the delay, but currently my attention span is slipping and I'm jumping from one unfinished project to the next...

I had sculpted a big guy (25 cm tall) and called it "Shore Leave", but didn't finish him :(
Something new caught my attention.
I found a small peace of wood in my shed as I was preparing logs for the wood burner.
It is really small, but it caught my attention and an image of a guardian on watch came to my mind.
Once this idea was in my head, the "Shore Leave" had no chance :)

So while I had the basic idea of a guardian standing on an outcrop of rocks, I still had no real idea of any setting or details.
But looking at the little piece of wood I was thinking about how I could realistically use it as a base or plinth.
It would have to positioned that the one flat side was the top and the other was the rear - so that it really looked like an outcrop. With this in mind I started some sketching.
Over the last one or two years it became fashion to build vignettes or dioramas with a painted background integrated - just like these here:


So I wanted to try something similar, but also try to give it a bit more "depth".
So I sculpted a frame for the little piece of wood



With the idea to draw the landscape then into the background




Probably with a city in the background, maybe an airship?





The basic frame was done with SuperSculpey. Once that was baked, I built a frame of plastic card around it and filled (and integrated) everything with Milliput.

















And a first positioning test.

















 I added some flag stones and other details with GreenStuff


































The base model is a "female armature" from HassleFree Miniatures ( http://www.hfminis.co.uk/shop?product=female-armature~hfl503&category=accessories~converting )

















With GreenStuff I sculpted a bit of chain mail as well as some armour to the legs



















































Then I added a bit of a tabard, flowing in the breeze

















The piece in the front flowing a bit stronger

















 Together with chest and shoulder armour this already looks quite cool


































Last night I added the rest of her boots as well as a first draft for the sword and spear



















































So what do you think?
Anything still missing?
I look forward to your feedback, suggestions and critiques!
Cheers
Klaus