Mold Making and Casting

I have decided I'm going to try my hand (when I get home) at making some clear resin casts of various walls (ice, fire, force) and clouds (stinking, smoke, vapor).

Here's some of the preliminary research:

Resin Casting techniques: EZ Clear Resin

How to make a two-part mold

Mold Making: 2 piece mold

Mold Making and Resin Casting Your Own Sculpted Miniatures - Part 1

Casting Custom Scenery For a Model Railroad

Reaper's Craft Corner

Reaper Miniatures is such a great company. And their website really reflects that. Not only is the website a great place to buy their great stuff, it is also home to a great community forum for their customers.

They post their own spoilers, and by looking at the Greens link you can see what products are coming long before they appear in the catalog. There is a great wish list feature where you can window shop and keep a running tally of what your metal dreams will cost you when your lottery ticket pays out.

Perhaps best of all, they have a section of their website devoted to helping you learn how to paint, sculpt, build terrain--in essence, how to get the most out of the products you buy from them and therefore the hobby you are addicted to.

The Craft is a treasure trove of articles and tips and I really recommend you check it out: http://www.reapermini.com/TheCraft

Deep Rothe

I have always wanted a herd of Deep Rothe ever since I started reading the Drizzt books so long ago. The current NWN2 computer game shows them as really big cattle, and it is true that they are described in the back of the 2E book Drow of the Underdark as being like musk oxen, but they are also listed as being 4' tall. A four foot tall musk ox would look pretty silly. (I'm also re-reading the Drizzt books, and when he is on the Isle of Roethe, Salvatore describes them as coming up to between the knee and the waist.)

In my mind, they were always a little more like big horn sheep, so when a search for miniature musk oxen in any scale turned up zip, I did a web search for 25mm Big Horn Sheep. The best I found are an accessory for the Aegyptian line of War Gods minis from Crocodile Games. I got the minis six months ago...ordered them while I was in North Dakota over Christmas. I got six of them, two of each type available.

This is the conversion process:

First, take the mini and remove all flashing.

The next step in the conversion process is to roll out some brown stuff in a very small quantity and then spread it out thin like a pancake. Once you have a nice piece, press it to the side of the mini like you're putting a coat on it.

I want to say again how useful the 1.5x reading glasses are when working with minis. I got amazing detail as I pressed the Xacto blade into the brownstuff to furhter adhere it and also to create the thick hair of the creature.
The hardest part about working with brown or green stuff is cultivating patience. You really need to work with small sections and not mess around with it until it is hard. That is about 24 hours. When it is hard, you can add the next little section and sculpt detail without screwing up the work you did earlier. It takes a lot of time. I am not very patient, but I'm learning. Also, be very careful, but it is important to wet your xacto blade frequently so that the brown stuff does not stick to the blade and pull away from the mini. I've seen people use a small sponge in water, KY jelly, and other lubricants, but I think spit is the best and if you are careful, licking the blade is pretty good--it is what I do.
To encourage patience, it is a good idea to work on several miniatures at once. That way while one mini is hardening you can be distracting yourself by working on another one.

Or two.

Or six.

Finally, the minis are done and ready for painting. Again, I go back to the Compendium sheet to re-read the description and then get to work with my Reaper paints. These don't need a lot of detailed painting, so it goes pretty quickly. I used Woodstain Brown for the fur and Dove Gray for the horns. Black for the hooves and I also painted the snout like a cow's instead of like a goat, to make it seem a little more like the bovine aspects of the musk ox. Then the whole thing gets a thin black wash.

Ashcrawler

In my never ending quest to have all the monsters, I was working on the Excel Spreadsheet I've been compiling of every monster reference in my home gaming library so that I can quickly find which book any given monster is described in.

I was going through the Creature Catalogue (TSR) and noticed the Ash Crawler, and thought that the Massiff Star Wars Mini might work as a proxy for it.
The description says the Ash Crawler needs a tail, and this mini looks like it needs one too, so I whipped out the brown stuff and added the tail.

This is not much of a sculpting job, I realize, but that's exactly why you look for proxies that are very close to what you're after so you don't need to do a lot of detailed sculpting. Once I had the tail on and patiently waited for it to harden, I read the descriptions for the creature in the Creature Catalogue, and then looked at the 2E version in the Mystara Monstrous Compendium Annual.
I painted a base coat of Reaper Pro Paint Dove Gray and let that dry. Then I gave it a light wash with watered down Reaper Master Series Woodstain Brown. I painted the eyes red, because that was handy and it looked nice and I had extra after I painted the tongue. When it was all dry, I put black dots on the eyes, painted the hight lights with more of the Dove Gray and then added a few Stormy Gray shadows (Reaper Master Series).

Lastly, I touched up the base with Reaper Master Series Pure Black.
I like a glossy varnish on the minis, rather than dullcote or matte. I think because when we were painting minis back when I was a kid, we all used Testor's Enamal so even though I'm painting in acrylics now, I still don't think they look right without the shiny top coat. Everyone says I'm crazy, which I do not contest, but I have started photographing my minis before I put the sealer on them, just to avoid reflecting the flash and deflecting the negative comments from my pro friends at Reaper.

Sharn Scratchbuild

In my never ending quest to have all the monsters, I decided to try my hand at scratchbuilding a Sharn.

I had a bunch of blue plastic gene stealers from Warhammer and noticed that some of the parts might lend themselves well to the conversion.

First I cut the parts off the plastic minis and arranged the ones I needed to use for the conversion.Then I took a little brown stuff and attached the hand and claw tri-arm assemblies and attached two torsos with heads together.

Next, I took the twin torsos and used green stuff to attach an unbent paperclip to it as a skeleton. The wire I attached through a slotta base to the cork I use to hold the sculptures I'm working on. I filled the slot and connected it to the clip using green stuff.


The next step was to attach the arm triads and to begin to build up the body using combinations of brown and green stuff.




The results are pretty good, I think. I wanted to post the images before I did the painting because once the whole thing is painted black there might not be any way to really see the individual parts as reflective of the steps.



Not sure if I will do another one of these, not likely to run more than one sharn at a time. :)

XanderXereus' Tutorials on Mold Making and Resin Casting

Studioworx Sculpting Videos

I will post some of the videos here for easy reference, but you should check out all of his videos at Studioworx's Channel on YouTube.



























Unfortunately, on many of these he uses a background music track that somebody put in a notice about copyright violation. Fortunately, YouTube just blocked the audio track and didn't delete the account or the videos themselves. There isn't a lot of narration anyway, as the videos are done

Creager Studios Sculpting Tutorials: Heads

Here is are additional videos on sculpting...designed for larger models, but you can appply the techniques to smaller miniatures as illustrated by Will at stormthecastle.com in a previous post.

Storm the Castle Sculpting Tutorial

There are some excellent tutorials for miniatures at Storm the Castle

Part 1:


Part 2:


Part 3:


Part 4:


Part 5:


Part 6:


Part 7:


Part 8:


Part 9:


Part 10:


Part 11:


Part 12:


Part 13:


Part 14:


Part 15:

Reaper Miniatures 03202: Hats and Helmets

One of the best (and smartest) things that Reaper does is encourage people to modify their miniatures and to also learn the craft of sculpting minis. They put out a really excellent array of accessories to help their customers do exactly that. There are lots of tools, brushes, tips, and so forth but they also have always allowed you to order individual parts from any of the minis in their line so that you could add those bits to other minis you are working on or to your own sculpted figures.

They have a nice line of armatures, bases, and so forth...but now they are also starting to put out individual bits just for this purpose. This current catalog cycle they have included demon wings, angelic wings, and hats.

They've had various weapons and stuff for a long time, but I'm thrilled to see them expanding this aspect of the hobby.

Even if you aren't using them for sculpting or scratchbuilding, they make ecellent dungeon dressing as is.

Kopru

This is the reason I needed the Kna, who are racial enemies of the Kopru. The Kopru is listed on page 69 of TSR 2501: Mystara Monstrous Compendium Index.

The first time I saw the WOTC Half-Illithid Lizardfolk, I thought how much cooler it would have been if they'd made it a kopru, since that is what it looked like. Here is the WOTC fig:

So, when I got to the Korpu entry in my work on the 2E Monstrous Manual I'm creating, I decided to scartch build the mini myself. Take that, WOTC!

I started by cutting the half-illithid in half...hmmm, something very wrong about how that sounds...and then using a tiny drill bit to make a hole in the torso that I could stick an unbent paperclip into for my skeleton. Then I put the wire in my sculpting block vise and started making green stuff. I should have taken a picture of that first step, but I already had the body made before I remembered that I wanted to.



Then, exercising patience I have had to learn to develop, I let it harden before putting on the remaining flukes. Once it was all hardened, I based it using a plastic slotted base that I put a coat of brown stuff on, using that to attach some cleaned up rocks. The rocks hid a central "pillar" of brown stuff that I used to attach the Korpu to the base. Then, before it hardened, I pushed some lichen into the crevices so that it would stick to and disguise the brown stuff--leaving only the rocks showing.

My sculpting skills are still extremely rudimentary, as are my painting skills, but I'm not out to win any contests...only to have the most complete range of monsters my PCs might face that is possible. Given that standard, I'm very pleased with the results.

Dwarven Forge

I've been doing postings over at The Severed Head Blog of my Player's miniatures as they proceed through the current module, Doom of Daggerdale.

They actually played all this stuff a year ago, but I'm trying to catch up so that I can record their history in real time with images from the digital camera. One of the rooms in the module is an abandoned dwarven forge, and there just isn't a lot in the way of dungeon dressing to equip such a room. I tried all over town to find something, even looked into a dollhouse fireplace and bellows...but nothing. The closest thing was a plastic representation of an outdoor brick grill I saw at a train shop, but the guy told me that it went for huge bucks because it was only made in the 50's and nobody does anything like it anymore...then he told me a million stories about model trains with a Lord of the Rings theme and I barely escaped with my sanity.

I decided that I would have to make my own out of brown stuff, and I got this toy plastic haystack for 99 cents and cut part of the bottom off for a base. Then I used the bottom part of a dice box and an upsided down metal base from Reaper and started adding on bits of brown stuff rock. I used a match to burn out the hole in the side for the fuel, and discovered that brown stuff both melts and burns.

I probably could have done a better job if I weren't in a hectic hurry, but I'm fairly pleased with the results. I stuck a couple of Reaper shields on it to make it more dwarfy, and then let it harden. I snapped the pics for the blog before painting it, figuring that if they bump into the forge again it will look different that way.

At any rate, my dwarven forge!

Painted Horgar

The original Horgar sculpt I did, now painted and ready to make my PCs lives miserable.

Aboleth is finished!

Well, it is done. The aboleth green I posted yesterday all painted and ready for someone to stumble into its underground lake.

Enjoy!

An Aboleth brought my camera back!

This is my best sculpt to date. I realize it is still pretty much in the "formless blob" genus that I've been working in, but I do think I'm crawling up a little further out of the ooze.

It is a composite sculpt, using the Reaper Giant Scorpion as a base. I laid the scorpion body out on the one inch grid battle mat I have and got a sense of proper proportions from the monster description. I was using the illustration from the Night Below monster supplement, and when I paint I will probably use the color card illustrations as a guide...though they are a tad on the pink side for me. The savant is distinguished from the normal aboleth by size and by the bony ridges on its top.

I was very careful with this one to build only a little at a time rather than my newbie "do it all at once" method from before. On the scorpion body I built up the front and eyes of the aboleth, using brown and green stuff to keep the parts clearly identified.

I used the same technique on building up and attaching the scorpion tail, after using toenail clippers to lop off the stinger.For the flukes I broke off the ends of the scorpion claws and glued them together, reinforcing with green stuff, then attached to the rest of the tail.

For the four big tentacles I used four tentacles I clipped off the Reaper Miniatures Stone Lurker (their version of a Roper, which I use for a Yochlol). Although my skill level is not particularly skillful, I think this is a reasonable enough sculpt of an aboleth and I'm excited to find a way to use it in my campaign. I don't know that it is sculpted in a way that would allow casting--you'd certainly have to remove the tentacles--but I'm not in the manufacturing business so this is likely to remain a one of a kind. I'm going to prime it and paint it later today and will add those images when it is finished.

I think it would be easy enough to do another, if I did want to do a casting of it, but next time I'd do a regular aboleth. Afterall, too many Savants and not enough aboleths would be a real problem.As this post demonstrates, I have my good camera back. The theatre department I used to work at doesn't use this camera very often--which is how I was able to borrow it for six months last time--so I proposed that I'd buy it from them for about half what a new one would cost and the promise that they could borrow it from me whenever they have occaision to use it.

I'm really pleased to return to the photographing and sharing of my miniature collection

Also, if you have comments on the greens, so long is it is constructive because I alredy know that I'm not really very good, I'm eager to hear them. Without feedback and suggestions I'm not likely to get any better and I'd really like to.

The Horgar--Acid Spitting Grub of Doom!

Well, it was a big hunk of green stuff, but I have another in the amorphous blob series of rudimentary sculpts. The Horgar is my most recent scupt, completed this morning.

Working my way backwards through my mini collection, creating a 2nd Edition Monstrous Compendium sheet for each in Publisher 2000, and using an image of the miniature for each entry instead of the artwork from TSR, I am now up to the H's.

I saw the page for Horgar and knew that nobody but me was ever going to make a miniature of it, so I did. If you click on the link above for the image, you will see that the beastie itself is a blob of green stuff, etched with my sculpting tools to look like the broken rock that makes up its crusty skin. I hadn't intended to mount it on a base, but my 6 inch glob of greenstuff kept sticking to the table so I had to.

Fortunately I had a large metal base from one of the Reaper minis I have that stood well enough without a base...I think it might have been that huge hill giant with the tree trunk for a club. Anyway, it looked super dumb just sitting there on the metal base, so I got some brown stuff out and made some underdark terrain to dress it up a little. I think it looks pretty good. It will look even better when I paint it black with the hot red magma peeking out between rocky plates on its skin.

Who'd have thought I'd ever have a Horgar to throw at my PCs? Not them, I'll tell you that much for nothing.

Happy Birthday to me...and my Lamprey

Today is my birthday, don't ask how old you 3.5 edition playing whippersnappers. I'm staying home in the basement doing nothing but working on organizing my D&D stuff, adding more pages to my comprehensive monstrology cyclopedia, and prepping for our session on Saturday.

This morning I came across the compendium page for Lamprey and didn't have a figure for it...so I tried my hand at sculpting one.

I'm still lousy at sculpting, so I am learning the ropes by doing figures of creatures already described as amorphous blobs.

I'm fairly pleased with how it turned out, though green stuff is soooo hard to work with. I got something I sort of liked--though the feelers on the front were really hard to do because they kept drooping down and touching other tentacles and sticking.

I put it in front of a hot light to help dry it out and instead of drying faster, it melted and drooped more. I need to get some of those clamp/clips on an articulated frame so that figures can be held in sideways positions while they harden. That would keep them from drooping down to the table top.

This fig does have a wire skeleton, but the wire must habe been too thin, because the weight of the green stuff was heavy enough to make it droop. Can't imagine my troubles if there was no wire at all.

Anyway, let me know what you think--but don't be too harsh, I'm still learning!

Nabassu, Pazuzu and Nalfeshnee, just another Demonic Sunday!

Ok, as promised, here is the Nabassu demon that I cobbled together from some Reaper parts and green stuff.

I'm pretty pleased with it. The main body is a Reaper mini called an Attercop, which is their version of the Ettercap. It really fit the look of the old TSR artwork for the Nabassu, except that the ettercap is fat with a big butt instead of bony with protruding hips...still, the three fingered talons and legs were just about perfect for what I was trying to re-create.

For the head I used one of the Reven heads. This image calls them orcs, I'm not sure if Reven are orcs or what, as I've not yet had the time to really explore Reaper's Warlord materials. They're pretty cool, though. Anyway, the head had the right kind of evil eyes and tusks for a Nabassu and after adding a thick mane of green stuff it was very easy to attach the head. The green stuff also helped to attach the large feathery wings, which again came from a Warlord mini, but I don't remember which one. An angelic paladin of some sort.

I thought about using black primer, but went with white instead so that the white hair of the beastie would be more brilliant. I think it turned out pretty well.

As you know, I've been on an obsessive quest to try to get figures to replicate the artwork from the old TSR manuals, especially the demons and devils.

One of the demonic lords is Pazuzu, and while the Reaper miniature for "Pazzuzu" isn't exactly like it, it is close enough for jazz. The TSR description has Pazuzu with four feathered wings, but I like the way this one looks, so I've changed the description in my own Monstrous Manual. There was no scratch building on this one, but I do like the paint job. I'm a long way from being anywhere near as good as the expert painters around, but I'm making some progress and all I really want are painted minis to play with, not to compete with.

Lastly, the Nalfeshnee. I've had this mini for over ten years, and I bought it painted from a much older guy I worked with in Iowa City, who had a lot of minis in his basement he was willing to sell. I got it dead cheap, but I have never seen another one and have no idea who made it.

Other than the Reaper "Boar Demon", this is the only nalfeshnee miniature I've ever seen. The Reaper mini is much more detailed and demony, but this figure is a nearly spot on perfect rendering in lead of the artwork from the TSR Monster Manual (except for the bat wings instead of feathered wings), and thus, one of the brightest jewels in my collection.

Anybody know who made this? Leave me a comment.

I'm going to the dungeon to eat worms....

As you know, I'm working on rudimentaray sculpting...and not wholly successfully. I tried to make a wraith using the Reaper dollies and green stuff and was utterly unable to even create "a vaguely human cloud".

I think I'm better with more monstery monsters at present...less to compare them to. In reverse order alphabetizing of my monster collection, I got to the worms section and decided to try my hand at creating a Tunnel Worm and a Tenebrous Worm. (Click on the links to see the original TSR artwork from Monster Manual II, for reference only and review purposes only, no copyright infringement intended.)

For the Tunnel Worm, I first took a rubber caterpillar I had that reminded me of it.

Next, after studying the original TSR artwork for a long time, I crafted the head in brown stuff and gave it green stuff eyes. The mandibles were really difficult, as were the two clawed tentacles.

Finally, after it cured, I primed and painted it.

Another view.

Is it my imagination or does this thing look like a Zanti Misfit?


For the Tenebrous Worm, I again used a rubber caterpillar I had that reminded me of it. About the right shape and body structure.

Then, (again) after studying the original artwork for a good long while, I crafted the head out of brown stuff onto the rubber caterpillar. The mandibles were a little tough, since they had to be very thin and jut out from the head. I had a hard time getting them not to droop. At this point I preferred to work with brown stuff over green, because it isn't at tacky as the green stuff and firms up faster. I hated to paint it, actually, because I really liked the contrast between the brown stuff and the green body of the existing caterpillar...but the Monster Manual says these things are black and grey...and if I weren't a stickler for accuracy, I wouldn't be making my own miniatures. Curse my obsessive compulsive disorder!

Finally, I primed and painted it. This one was a little harder than the other worm, because the entire caterpillar had to be painted, not just the horns and mandibles. The spray on primer didn't stick very well to the rubber...duh...but once it was coated in paint and then sealed, I didn't have any problems. I'm sure it will crack and chip if I it gets bent at all, but most of its life it will sit on a shelf and when in combat, I'll be controlling it, so I think I'm relatively safe. That frothy stuff isn't rabies, it is just Reaper brush on sealer, and I was too impatient to wait for it to dry before I took the pic. I have got to learn some patience....

Post your comments, I'd love to know what you think.