Here are all the parts cleaned up with the mould plugs removed. They were small plugs and only a few seam lines here and there needed to be attended to. The spade handle, the head of the spade and the pick handle were a bit warped. Immersing them in some boiled water soon had them coaxed back into shape.
I’m using Reaper Miniatures paints, their Bronzed Skin trio set for this. I’ve used quite a few different brands of flesh paint over the years and these are the best I’ve come across- the fact they come in these sets of three (and there are others for lighter skin tones) makes everything just that bit easier to do.
Below you can see the 1st highlight and 1st shadow colors have been added to the skin. For this I thinned the relevant paints 50/50 with the base color.
Below you can see the difference between the unblended side of the face (on the left side of the photo) versus the blended side. Still, this is very far from finished- much more work to do!
Karl that’s a beautiful bust your painting there. The sculpt is very detailed and crisp. Your flesh painting is coming along beautifully.
I have used vallejos for a good 30 years and tried the reaper flesh paints and they worked great, I felt they blended a little easier but that could just be me. I recently tried Life Color flesh set and I really can’t decide which is better of the two. It doesn’t help that I don’t paint figures often at all. Did you use a slow dry medium or something to blend the colors? And do you use a wet palette?
Over the years I think I have used most of the major paint brands- AK 3rd Gen is the only exception I think- no particular reason, just never bought any. Scale75 Artists range, Reaper and Vallejo are my usual brands. I only use a wet palette for blending in this scale- and I use the glazing technique to do most blends. I will use Vallejo Glaze Medium on smaller areas and in smaller scales- depends on the figure really. Best thing about using the glazing technique (with distilled water) is each coat dries very fast. Other mediums really slow it down a lot meaning you can’t progress quite as quickly- but you do have more control and time to blend.
At this stage I take stock of the progress- often when smoothing the transitions between the 1st highlight and shadow you will shrink those areas of light and shade in order to smooth the skin. This is beneficial if you are seeking quite youthful, smooth and unblemished skin. For older skin (or for more contrast) you might need to go back and re-apply some of those shadows or highlights. For this I work cautiously and slowly via glazes of my 1st highlight and 1st shadow colors. I mostly kept the highlights drawn up toward the high points of the face where I felt some contrast was lost. For the shadows I didn’t do too much but I did start to add in the beginnings of wrinkles- most notably on the lower neck and around the sides of the eyes.
Right now I’m doing a similar job as I’ve just described on the hands and arms. I’ve also begun the second highlight color on the face- once again applied quite sparingly with a glaze.
Below you can see how I have deepened the shadows on the left side of his face (on the right of the picture) versus the as yet to be worked on opposite side of the face.
It was then time to add in the areas of high blood flow on the face- which appear more pink or red- typically the cheeks, forehead, parts of the ear and nose. I have also concentrated a little more red around the eyebags to suggest fatigue and around the nose to suggest both sun damage and heavy alcohol use.
In addition to adding the skin blemishes I tried to impart weathered and damaged skin around the knuckles and fingers- Gold prospecting would have been a very hands-on job and would not have been gentle on the skin! I can’t say I’m entirely happy with the effect though.
At this point the skin on the face is more or less finished- the lips and hair will be next. On the arms/hands I have to do the veins and nails before then tackling the arm hair.
I’m not very happy with the way the arm hair turned out. It didn’t get off to a great start- I wanted the growth direction to be the same on both arms but messed up on the first stage- the growth on one arm was going opposite to the other! Luckily the paint was very light at that stage so easily corrected. I think my paint strokes are too long and a bit too uniform- I reckon I will have to get a bust with bare arms to practice this technique on. But for this bust that is the flesh and hair all done.
Right now I am working on the hat and some leather parts of the trouser braces. I will get some photos of that up shortly.
Usually that would be just about enough for many painted parts but the texture on the hat meant a bit more work was required to really bring out the dried out, damaged and worn look.
First thing I did was use a dryrbushing brush and a light brown color to pick out the high points in the texture, being careful not to obliterate the paintwork already done.
Then it was time to use a very dark brown color, mixed with Vallejo Glaze Medium, to pick out the various tears, splits, dents and scratches and also to darken the area around the hat ribbon.
@metalhead85 - Many thanks Richard- I was really surprised when I put that initial base coat on. I knew the hat had a rough-ish texture but the primer grey didn’t really show up all the little areas of wear very well. So I was delighted when I saw how cool it looked with that first coat.
@SSGToms - Very nice of you to say Matthew- as I said in the post I really enjoy painting textures like this!
@18bravo - Thank you for checking in Rob! I googled Todd Hoffman- big bearded miner on TV am I right? If you mean by your comment that it would have been harder to paint a more hirsute character- well sort of. Darker hair on the arms would require a bit of a different approach- but from what I learned here I think dark hair might have been easier- the grey was quite difficult to judge against the skin- how much was too much or too little etc. That’s why I’m going to get a fig I can practice this on!
For the tools in the kit I went ahead and painted them but as I did so I noticed they looked a bit flat and nothing I did with either paint or pigments changed that. Instead of looking like heavy, cast iron tools from the 1850s they looked like cheap mass produced tools from a discount gardening store. So as I stripped the paint off I was wondering what could I do to make them look more realistic- I thought a bit of texture might help- perhaps better portraying the rough casting techniques of the period.
The anti-slip was painted on then stippled with a sponge applicator. Once dry it was sanded a little before being primed. Then I sanded it a little more before starting to apply the metal colors.
Oh, I missed this one. It was a pleasure reading about the process and seeing the photos. Great work all around, but the face is something special… well done!
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