Hinton

Just out of curiosity: do you post over at CMoN and, if so, what name?

Thanks for the comments, all. Good suggestions; definitely some things to think about and work on. @Wren: Unfortunately, there aren't any other mini painters in my area. I know that studying the work of others in person would probably help me, but since the high quality professional stuff also costs a lot of money, I just can't afford it. As it is, I'll just keep looking at minis online and trying to improve. @matty: The grainy look of the picture is probably more the result of my photography than anything else. Something else I need to work on improving.

Well, the contest is over, so I can post this now. If you voted or commented in the FF contest, then you probably saw my entry (DD1). Yeah, it needed a lot of work. At the very least, I did get some ideas from a couple of you, so I learned something. Always important, I think. Thanks to everyone that commented on my entry; I do appreciate it. Anyway, since my diorama/scene setting needs a ton of work, I decided to go ahead and pull them off their shared base and give them their own. I also touched up a few things before re-basing them, so hopefully they've improved a little since being seen in the contest. Sonnia: Siobhana:

Personally, I think they should make a season of shows (which is usually 24 or so) and then just run them, one per week until the end of the seaon. Enough of this "run a few episodes to see how it's going to do" crap. You just can't tell how good or popular a show will be if you don't give it time. It's like the networks are afraid to take a chance. I understand the studio's point of view that if they make that many shows and then don't run them, they lose money. However, considering how many millions they make from the successful shows, they can afford to splurge a little. They may not realize just how popular a show may become if given time. Look at The X-Files: Fox was ready to cancel it, but they took a chance and look how it turned out. Firefly was a great show, but Fox axed it before it really got a chance. Look how many fans there are of that. I say screw the focus groups and the Nielsen ratings. In this day and age, all a person has to do is look on the internet to find out how popular (or unpopular) and well-liked (or hated) a show may be. That should be their guide.

Ok, not going to spoil it if you haven't seen the latest episode, but it kicked ass! Still quite a few questions, but Linderman is finally revealed and it's not one of those deals where it's the last 20 seconds of the show, either. What really cheeses me off is that there won't be any new episodes until April 23rd. That's right; a month and a half. Considering how this episode ended, it's going to be a long wait.

...I had more experience painting ...I knew how to layer properly ...I could highlight correctly (never seem to bring them up enough) ...I actually had some kind of artistic talent

She has a face?

Rusty? You suck. :tongue2: Seriously, those are really good. My favorite is the crossbowman; very nice colors. Good to see that you're starting to feel a bit better and able to get some painting in.

Welcome to the boards!

Yeah, different is one way to put it...

Well, I haven't seen Ghost Rider yet, but I had already planned on waiting for it to come to DVD; just not a GR fan. X-men: the movies were ok, but, like GR, not a fan of the comics. I believe that there aren't any plans to make anymore X-men movies, but Wolverine is getting one. FF & Superman Returns: blah. Yeah, there were come kind of cool moments in both, but they seemed kind of lacking. The original Superman movie with Christopher Reeves was kind of cool, but like most movie series, the ones after just got worse and worse (Nuclear Man??? Give me a break!). The Spider-man movies were great! Love Sam Raimi! Since he's back directing the 3rd one, it should be good. The first Batman movie (with Keaton; not the one with West and Ward) was outstanding. I think they stayed very true to the spirit of what Batman was. Batman Returns wasn't all that great. After that, it headed straight for the crapper; Joel Schumacher should be shot. The latest one was okay, but I didn't think Christian Bale made a good Batman. I like him as an actor; the mantle just didn't seem to fit him - literally. The Hulk was good when it was a series; the movie was an abomination. I had such high hopes for the movie and Ang Lee just bent it over and anally invaded it. Sorry, but the Hulk was always one of my favorites and what they did in that movie was just wrong. The movie that I'm both looking forward to and dreading at the same time is Watchmen. It's an amazing comic. However, translation to film rarely works, so it could easily get screwed up. If it works, it'll be great. @Eric: V For Vendetta and Akira are a couple of great movies; especially Akira. And yeah, get the subtitle version. In fact, all anime should be subtitle only; no more English dubbing!

Welcome to the boards, DC.

That's really good! The painting and basing are simply outstanding. Good luck with the contest.

I got into miniature painting in a kind of roundabout way because I wasn't looking to get into the hobby. I played D&D and other RPGs when I was younger. I knew that some people used miniatures and some even painted them, but I never got into it myself. In fact, there was a time when I was co-owner of a gaming store and we carried minis, paint, etc. and I still didn't get into mini painting. Several months ago I was hanging out on the forums for an online game I used to play. One day, someone posted a link to some project a guy in France had done where he had built a model of the cathedral from the video game Diablo (the original). Some of us got to discussing building things like that and why people would do it. One person mentioned Hirst Arts and posted a link. I headed over to that site and was simply amazed at what some of them could do with little plaster blocks. I ordered a casting mold and started building little things with them. Shortly after that, Bruce Hirst was asking for miniature painters for a project he was working on. A few people posted and I was absolutely amazed at some of the paint jobs. They were so intricate, so detailed and so smooth. Bruce often mentioned using Reaper minis in his models, so I checked them out. After looking at several minis and well they were painted, I knew I had to try it. I ordered Ragnor, picked up a few paints and brushes from the local craft store and dove right in. Over time, I found other sites (such as Wyrd) from other painters. That was about 6 months ago and I'm really glad that I finally got into the hobby. Like others, I don't game anymore (mostly because this is a small town in Nebraska; I don't think are any gamers here) and just paint for the love of it.

Good to hear that you're doing better, Jester.

With many thanks to Duende, I now have my very first dragon. She was kind enough to send this to me and I'm really looking forward to painting it up. It's going to take a while, so I'll try and post pics whenever I make some headway on it; they just might be few and far between, depending on how things go. Rampaging Red Dragon by Thunderbolt Mountain (you were right, D):

I honestly didn't predict Simone being the one to die. Should be interesting to see what develops because of her death. Now that Peter has better control over "his" powers, he could be a lot of fun. It's good to see that he's gone from a kind of whiny, wishy-washy character to a more intense one. The show just keeps getting more and more interesting.

Welcome to the boards, Michael.

Is Duende questioning the reality of a certain someone? EDIT: Ok, I see it now.

Yeah, I saw that. I've already pre-ordered mine.

Very nice color on all of them. Hard to believe that these are, for the most part, simply dipped. Great, great work.

The Crystal Sheen dries completely solid in about 24 hours. It takes a while to set up, but once it does it's absolutely solid. No fingerprints on that stuff.

It's a 2 part mixture (resin/hardener) called Crystal Sheen that I picked up at the local craft store.

You're welcome. I did think about adding some kind of coloring to it, but decided to hold off. The base is a piece of polystyrene foam cut into a circle. I then hollowed out a little over half of it to a depth of about 1/8 inch to hold the resin.