WHERE HAS MY MUSE GONE? So recently I had lost my muse and I have spoken about losing my mojo, to which I think I mean, inspiration. I believe we’ve all been there in some way or another and the longer you’ve been doing ‘your art’ the more certainly you’ll have found yourself in a bit of a creative lull. My Facebook friends regularly suggest various ways to get the mojo back whilst others insist on a break, to clear the head. I think in the past couple of days I have had somewhat of a moment of clarity regarding
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Golden Demon Winners Challenge – PRELUDE Last year, I was lucky enough to win a gold demon at Golden Demon Classic at Warhammer Fest with my Hell pit Abomination of all Hell Pit Abominations. In the summer, I went to the Golden Demon Winner’s Day at the GW headquarters in Nottingham, a yearly celebration of those, who won demons that year. There we were all invited to take part in a new project at White Dwarf. A challenge… as readers of White Dwarf may remember they have had ‘Eavy Metal challenges a couple of times before, where members of the ‘Eavy
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It seems like I can’t stop painting in light and colour or at least I keep coming back to it. Well to tell the truth, all painting is either in light and colour or monochromatic, but I tend to make pieces that somehow emphasize the light and colour, where the light sources themselves are the main characters. Here I have composed a little tutorial on creating a night scene only lit up from within by colourful light sources using slightly Fluorescent Paints. Using Fluorescent Paints to Achieve Light Effects with your Figures – the Prelude After a conversation with a
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Legend of Raistlin – the PRELUDE A flash of nostalgia – Raistlin Majere is one of my all time favourite characters from fantasy literature and is obviously my inspiration for the Legend of Raistlin. I remember reading Dragonlance where he is one of the main characters, many years ago, it was one of the first fantasy novels I ever read. I played a lot of Advanced Dungeons and Dragons back then, that’s where I started to paint miniatures at first, they were gaming pieces for that. I also got a lot of inspiration from the paintings of Larry Elmore, he
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Worn Leather Texture – the PRELUDE Lately I’ve been giving more attention to how I can create the look of different textures on various parts of my figures. For a long time I used to focus on just getting extreme enough highlights and shadows for good contrast and then a smooth blend between them. As I started to feel more confident there, I turned my attention to making the various parts actually look like the materials they were supposed to be. A wool coat looks different from a satin leather and both of those look different than a shiny piece of
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Regrowth – the PRELUDE I bought the Selvambi miniature from Aradia last october, I think. I really like the sculpt by Olivier Bouchet, it is very much alive I think. The tiny Sprite like creature has a certain animalistic vitality to it, her face resembles that of a fox and a deer at the same time, as well as hooves for feet. I think it is quite a feat to include these animal features, yet still keep her fairly human. At the same time Selvambi has a distinct female vulnerability to her. This duality in the sculpt spoke a lot
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Napoleonic Dragoon – the PRELUDE This article will present a walkthrough on the painting of a 54mm scale Napoleonic Dragoon using acrylics. The specific figure is Pegaso Models’ Imperial Guard, Empress’ Dragoons Officer, 1806-15. Napoleonic figures are among my favourite historical subjects to paint. Of all the different eras, they have some of the most colourful and detailed uniforms. Of the various Napoleonic units, the Dragoons may not be the most colorful, but there is something about their slick uniforms that draws me to that subject. The Empress’ Dragoons, also known as the Dragoons of the Imperial Guard, were formed by
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Object Source Lighting – the PRELUDE My newest piece Valaska Sin is both an exercise in working to a tight deadline, so my painting was forced into a no-nonsense mode where I had absolutely no time to stop and think, and a study in source lighting, mood and ambience. These two exercises work surprisingly well together, because alternative lighting and moods are much better achieved when you work in an intuitive and spontaneous way rather than over thinking and analysing everything, which can easily happen when you set out to do something different and have too much time to do
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Kristian.
acrylics, anatomy, Building a scenic base, creating ambience, Fantasy, figure art, figure painting, figure painting tutorial, glazes, Hasslefree Miniatures, Historical figure painting, Kristian Simonsen, miniature art, miniature painting tutorial, mood, object source lighting, OSL, resin, sci fi painting, secret weapon miniatures, setting the environment, skintone, step by step and Weathering.
acrylics, anatomy, Building a scenic base, creating ambience, Fantasy, figure art, figure painting, figure painting tutorial, glazes, Hasslefree Miniatures, Historical figure painting, Kristian Simonsen, miniature art, miniature painting tutorial, mood, object source lighting, OSL, resin, sci fi painting, secret weapon miniatures, setting the environment, skintone, step by step and Weathering.
Kristian Simonsen – the PRELUDE I am the newest member of the figurementors team. You may remember me from my article last year on my piece “Before the Battle“. I come from Denmark, I am 43 years old and the proud father of two teenage boys. When I am not painting or modelling I am a train driver working evenings and nights driving the commuters of Copenhagen home. I have been modelling since the tender age of 6. I grew up in the eighties building tons of WWII plastic kits. This has founded a deep interest in history that has been
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PRELUDE I think it is really important to remember and respect those master painters who were the trailblazers for our world of figure painting. It is something that has resonated with me even more since I dictated the interview with Alfonso Giraldes (to be published soon), where he spoke of the importance to know our history and that one of the reasons why figure painting is not considered an Art at present is because it has no history, no text on what came before now, no one remembers who started which trend or created the techniques we now take so
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