Weekly Waffle #372 – Get to the chopper!
29th March 2025
For this week’s Weekly Waffle I’m continuing with the left field approach. Taking my inspiration from a free mini that came with an order from We Print Minis. I didn’t really have any idea about using it in a game I just thought it would be good fun to paint. And I could try out some different techniques without having to worry about ruining a mini I actually need.
So this week I bring you Arni in his roll as John Matrix in Commando causing chaos as he sets out to rescue his daughter. If you haven’t seen the film which rock have you been living under. But if you haven’t seen it this mini lines up with the end of the film. It’s a really nice print and didn’t need much in the way of cleaning. Although you can see the fine print lines so it would need more cleaning if you were looking at it as a display piece. But for the table top and as painting exercise it was good to go.
From the start the thing I wanted to try and make stand out was the skin. The exaggerated muscles just seemed to scream out and gave me clear volumes to work with. Start with something that is clearly defined and easy to hi get to grips with. Then hopefully that will help me on minis that have less definition and need the painting to do more of the heavy lifting.
But before I tell you about the mini I thought it was worth giving you an overview of what I did for the base. There is nothing fancy about it but I think it looks nice. I had been looking of an easy way to do what I hope is a good looking urban base. The key has been trying to find a product that can give me the texture I needed on the base. I have previously used a lot of Citadel products but you don’t get a lot in a pot. So I gave some AK Interactive Asphalt a try. It’s a large pot that comes in at a good price.
Using this over a couple of pieces cork sheets to give the effect of a broken road. Painted up with a simple dry brush and a couple of different washes to add a little bit of staining. I really like the end result and I’m going to give some more of these textured pots a try. They are way cheaper than the GW alternatives and I think they are good value for money. Mix a couple together on the same base and you could have really nice effects.
The other thing that I think makes the bases look nice is simple addition of the yellow line. It’s easy to do and just adds something extra to the whole thing. Lifting the base from the ok to the quite nice. Especially when the mini has a colour scheme that fits in with the base.
But what do you guys think.
I’ve started to feel that the mojo is starting to wain a little bit this week. I don’t know why because I haven’t really been pushing myself and I am enjoying what I’m painting. I’m wondering if painting the same sort of things is getting a little bit monotonous and I need to mix things up a bit. So I’m going to switch things up a bit over the next few weeks.
Switching back to painting some Infinity I’m hoping will help top the mojo up. I want to paint up some basic troop options for some low point games. These aren’t as heavily armoured as the Immortals I have already painted. So the colour scheme won’t be quite the same. There will be a lot more cloth which is going to be a new challenge.
I have some references pictures to work from so I’m not starting from nothing. The challenge will be which bits I decide to do with the air brush and which with the brush. I’m thinking that anywhere there are cloaks then the air brush would be the best or for a smooth finish. But I’ve never painted the armour with just a brush.
So either way these will be a new challenge. But I think that if I want to improve my painting, and get the mojo flowing again, this is the way to go. Keeping things fresh and challenging myself.
I’ve also been thinking about some simple painting exercises to try different things. Something along the lines of finding something in my bits box that I have a few examples of. Probably some old marines. Then painting them using a single colour. I can have lots of different values to the colour but I can only use one.
The idea is to get a better understanding of the impact a colour has on different parts of a miniature. And how those different values add dimension to a minin. Something like going from a very desaturated dark value in the recesses. To a super saturated version of the same colour for the edge highlights.
I think this could be a really interesting experiment. The big thing I think I would learn from this is how far you can actually push the shadows and highlight for something. I know this is something I need to improve and this could be a good way to do that.
At the end of day with all of these types of things they are going to go wrong at some point. If I’m using minis that i don’t need for games. And in some cases they haven’t see the light of day for years. Then it doesn’t matter if they look rubbish. As long as I can work out why they are rubbish, learn from that and then make the next version better. That will be really good win.
The only real downside I can see to this is that whilst I’m practicing this sort of thing I’m not going to be able give you a painted miniature that week. Or at least not a game ready miniature. So I may have to think about that a little. But I suppose having the test mini fully painted still counts, it’s just that I may not like the result.
Anyway that’s it for this week. A little bit shorter than normal but I hope you have enjoyed Arni and I’ll have more for you next Saturday morning. Until then I hope you all have a great week, whatever it is you have planned and I hope see you all back here again for more shenanigans next week.
