Zombicide - fully painted...

Well...
When I was crazy with this game a few months back I was so into it I thought I can finish painting them all in 3 weeks.  As it turns out, and as things in real life caught up, I had just finished them all last week, ie, almost a year... haha.
It's not the best of my work, but they are done.

Still very happy with the storage.
[Full blog entry: http://51-cent.blogspot.hk/2013/07/foam-storage.html]

And am still very happy with the transparent basing.
[full blog entry: http://51-cent.blogspot.hk/2013/08/litko-base.html]

The glass shards are actually hard plastic glued on to it.

I used to use blue dices for them, but then on they look too similar to the survivors so I just spray painted the clear bases blue.

The extra zombies that I just can't resist, they are very good indeed.  I still got a few more being painted but those don't count as the original plastic set aye? haha
[full blog entry: http://51-cent.blogspot.hk/2013/07/HassFree.html]

The team of proxy survivors, not as good as I wish them to be but good enough as gaming pieces.
[full blog entry: http://51-cent.blogspot.hk/2013/08/Zombicide-Proxy.html]

The mass of them look very imposing.

I need to make those contrast happening with these light blue runners...
[full blog entry: http://51-cent.blogspot.hk/2013/08/litko-base2.html]

Adriana's Proxy - Zombicide Kickstarter Exclusive survivor proxy miniature

I had had very high expectation for this miniature until I again realize that I can't do African skin tone...

I don't think I have any ways to save her but to repaint... I think the pants is a complete failure.  The face, something that I am usually good at, was a failure too... I like how the top and her boobs appear though.

Troy's Proxy (part 2) - Zombicide Kickstarter Exclusive survivor proxy miniature

Well, not that there's anything wrong with it, I am not gay. Having said that, I am very happy when painting this guy. Male muscle is so much easier than female bodies, especially for this tough guy with strong muscles. So with the dark and light spray painting method the contrast is really happening here.  When I hold him in my hand, for the very first time my eyes told me that I am holding something much bigger than the miniature: the higher contrast created the illusion of size.

By the way, it is very hard to look for quality and detailed miniature fitting for modern days (or post apocalyptic) 30 mm miniatures.  I think from all I had seen so far, tales of war has the best and most detailed men and women miniatures.  Frankly some of the face is a bit off , I'd put that down as artistic styles, but in general they are of outstanding quality and details.

http://www.taleofwar.com/shop/

"More zombies?"

One small regret is that I really should have gone all the way with the air brushing.  By that I mean using air brushing the skin and pants before starting brush work. My problem now is I had invested so much on Reaper's paint and I really don't want to invest yet again in another line of paint, being paints for spray paints.  Yes they say the paint is also good for air brush, but alcohol based paints are a lot easier to handle than water based ones.

He is very heavy because of his size

 Again I haven't done the final highlights to him, I figure that I will go through all of the zombies and survivors and go back to them.  I am using them all as game pieces anyway and interested to see how general gaming wear and tear does to these miniatures.  Also I need to learn how to spray paint protective varnish on them later on...  Metal miniature gives the good feeling of sturdy and weight when moving it around, but they also chips other metal miniature easily.  Without varnish I am guessing it will get damaged easily.

Got to be proud of the middle bit of that vest

Troy's Proxy (part 1) - Zombicide Kickstarter Exclusive survivor proxy miniature

The fast and easy way to paint is to use air brushing a lot.  First is to lay down a layer of shadows at spots that doesn't catch much light, like the inner fold of vest, area under the arms, in between the legs, neck, etc 

by the way, these are pictures taken with my mobile so they looks a bit off and the color isn't too rich.  Will have better pictures in the next post.

Nato Black

Then depending on whether I want to play with lighting, in this case no, air brush thin layers of white or light color.  Here I just used flat white.  I was again in a rush coz I am not feeling confident with my last paint job, so I stopped there.  What I could have done, is to air brush the base coat for them.  I think it will do that for the guy in suit as that's what the mini is all about, his suit.

Tough guys

 One thing that made me proud of myself is how I had done his skin.  From my collection of Vallejo Pigments I mixed black pigment with white pigments together to from a grey pigment.  Then I lay it down with a very thin skin paint.  While the paint is still wet, I applied another layer of pigments on it.  In hindsight I could have mix muddy brown with black to create the sense of dense hair at lower part of the head.

 What I had also down is I had and thin painted the skin areas too.  The light/shadow air brushing function as a guide and also the dark paint at the shaded area makes painting on deeper skin tone color easier.

Then I painted the vest, again that's something made me very proud of it. Thanks to the air brushing the highlights are already there.  So most of the painting was really to paint the shading area.  After that's done I mixed the paint with white and done the highlights.  I again used the pigment to give the vest more textures to make it looks like suede leather. I had painted the shot gun while I was paint the two girls. There's a gap between the wrist band and the arm, that's where they connect.  I'd fix that up after I connect the other arm.

**UPDATE! he is done! check it out! http://51-cent.blogspot.hk/2013/08/Troy-proxy2.html***

Vallejo Pigments
http://www.acrylicosvallejo.com/en_US/pigments/family/19

Claudia's Proxy - Zombicide Kickstarter Exclusive survivor proxy miniature

You know, this miniature could have been very sexy and I could have used a much more ... attractive miniature than Berkeley.  But I kind of running low on cash and the order of these proxy stacks up pretty fast,so I had resort to use a more ... standard miniature from Reaper.  Besides, I favor ranged weapons over melee, so I don't have much love for Claudia.

(http://www.reapermini.com/OnlineStore/chainsaw/latest/50153)

and what could have been....

and what I ended up with.  It was another late night and I started after 1am.  I see this as a speed painting challenge and see what I can come up with within a short time... After painting her up, I found that Berkeley is actually a fine, balanced miniature, the level of detail is pretty balanced, there are spots that are not as good and pretty hard to get into, but overall it's a very good modern days post apocalyptic survivor miniature.

She was done in two nights.  I picked her out of the group because there isn't too many flat or large surfaces. Covering off larger area really call for air brushing.  I like how the yellow turns out, I got a bit carried away with the black + yellow mix so the shadow area looks more dirty than shadow.  

The pigment didn't do the trick this time as it behave more like thick paint than dust. But there's still the texture happening.  The footprint is a bit bigger than I had expected, perhaps my next batch of base need to be a bit bigger... or just get two sizes of blue bases...

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Check out the rest of the Zombicide Kickstarter Exclusive Proxy project!

http://51-cent.blogspot.hk/2013/08/Zombicide-Proxy.html

Ivy's Proxy - Zombicide Kickstarter Exclusive survivor proxy miniature

I have another trip lined up at the end of month so I was in a rush again.  I can always go back to them of course but I guess it won't be soon.

The miniature I painted this time is Ainara, from the Street collection of Tales of War.

http://www.taleofwar.com/shop/product.php?id_product=124

So she comes with a tiny base with a few bricks on the ground, it's pretty good actually.  I was a bit surprised that she comes with a Katana.  Actually if I haven't picked her as the Sniper girl the katana would make her look awesome too.

There's a number on her card, I guess this might have been a limited edition.

 The first step is to get her a hand.  Modifying the two hands the comes with her would be impossible.  So, ironically I took a hand from my plastic zombies box and fit in it.  The scale looks pretty close.

this was the original idea I had for her, having the gun over her shoulder.  But later on I haven't went with this idea because changing the hand into gripping the rifle is just too hard for me.

I was a bit stuck on her to do army green, but then after a while I figured out how: just do the shadow for a 'washed' effect.  I think it works.

 So looking at this picture I guess I already lost interest half way through, her upper body scale is a bit off, her lips is a bit too big, the hair is a bit messy, the half coat is too big... etc etc. I did manage to rest the sniper rifle comfortable on her hand though.
I guess all of the survivors could use a bit of dark lining....

 and from now on, I should really use more air brushing.... air brush for the base coat then highlights then hand brush on the details... the time for masking would really pay off.

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Check out the rest of the Zombicide Kickstarter Exclusive Proxy project!

http://51-cent.blogspot.hk/2013/08/Zombicide-Proxy.html

Zombicide - Kickstarter Exclusive Survivor proxy project

(picture heavy post)

I guess one of the reasons why I got hooked up with Zombicide so much is because I am putting my paintjobs into play, and it's a major drive for me to try painting other miniatures that I won't normally paint.  That's good coz I need to learn how to paint guys too.

I got into this too late though, totally missed the time when this game was still on kickstarter.  I missed it THREE times actually, therefore I won't have any of the kickstarter exclusive promo survivors... For the time being proxy can still work (ie, replacement miniatures) but going forward when the zombivors kick in, ie, zombie version of the survivors, I won't that good a zombie replica of them.  Oh well.

I made my order with FRP Games, the one stop on-line miniature web store for me since I started painting. (http://www.frpgames.com/) The shipment arrived right after my trip, excellent timing.  The sculpt for some of these are truly impressive, I hope my painting could bring out the best of them.

But for this entry, let's look at some prettier pictures of them.  Here we will talk about the reasons why they are picked as proxies.  I made one error with Rick but I love that miniature too much so I'd just let it pass.

a nice collection of miniature from famous manufacturers such as Tales of War,  Knight Games and Reaper

[[[**UPDATE** here's the line-up as of 22 Aug]]

[[[**UPDATE** here's the line-up as of 22 Aug]]

This shall be Claudia.  The Reaper model, Berkeley is good but I think the official one has a lot more character.  The official Claudia felt more noticeable and more worthy to be considered as the main character of a movie.  The resemblances are: both are female, holding a chain sword and wearing a vest.
[[[**UPDATE** She is ready to fight! ==> http://51-cent.blogspot.hk/2013/08/Claudia-proxy.html]]

I had an eye for this miniature from the Tales of War for a long long time.  This game gave me the perfect excuse to get her.  As it turns out Jannet is a lot taller than the rest of the crew though, but I think that fits with the 'Loud' skill Adriana got.  I haven't seen the official sculpt but aside from the pants, and the need to think about how to handle the hockey stick, I regard Jannet  as a very good proxy. The best part I think it's the attitude Jannet shows.
[[[**UPDATE** She is ready to fight! http://51-cent.blogspot.hk/2013/08/Adriana-proxy.html]]

Well a black one piece night nightgown is arguably more sexy then tank top plus bulky pants, for Ivy I think it's all about, again, the attitude and her weapon: a gun.  So it will take a while for me to mod the right hand, plus a bit of sculpting of the fingers, it will be fun.
[[[**UPDATE** She is ready to fight! ==> http://51-cent.blogspot.hk/2013/08/Adriana-proxy.html]]

Fon is almost like a fat ... brute version of Troy.  I am guessing Troy is the main guy in the comics/ TV show walking dead, a reluctant hero (or at least that's how I see him).  Fon seems to have the same kind of vibe about him.  The down side is Fon costs a lot more than the rest of the proxies... With Fon, past of the cost goes to the very neat crocodile resting behind him, and the Hell Boy alternative hand.  I guess I could make use of the spare parts in the future some how....
[[[**UPDATE** He is ready to fight! ==>http://51-cent.blogspot.hk/2013/08/Troy-proxy2.html]]]

Yes this is the error I made.  Originally I picked someone else but I ended up picking up officer Terrell from Reaper.  Oh well.  A local guy got too much bones on hand and he offered to see some to me at a discount, so I guess this Terrel could rest in my mini stock pile for a little while first....
I love using this Survivor, the skill 'Steady hand' would make cover fire easy and driving around a breeze.

hmm.  I didn't really care about this guy and frankly I don't like his movies either.  So I got a biker thug to be his proxy.  Mustache, two pistols, vest and jeans... close enough.  70% perhaps?

I am a Fan of Bruce here, got to love the classic like Die Hard 1 and 2, and finding him a close proxy is too hard.  So I just gave up and find a mini that can give the sense of "Tough", that's Nick's starting skill which  think would be very handy, making him very... tough.   As it turns out the facial expression is pretty close, a bit of mod needed to make him more of a zombie killer than a bruiser though.  40% perhaps?

Originally I thought of getting the Cat girl from knight models as proxy for Ivy, but I gave up that idea as it gets too expensive and I got some other close enough mini sitting around the shelf.  No idea who this El Cho is suppose to be, and I never saw his movies neither.  Need to mod a lot to make the Penguin's Thug into a non-criminal miniature.  The lower mask is a bit of a give away though...
 The other Thug in the pack will be used as Dave.  I guess I need to mod his arms into holding the cocktails, plus I need to sculpt the bottles too...
Oh well.

Yes, I admit, aside for the pose Frank doesn't look Marvin at all, in fact, one is a Caucasian and one is an African American.  But I looked for too long and I can't find one that looks 'Marvin' enough, I just have to give up. And again, Frank is more Eastwood then Jackson.

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External Link

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Tales of War: http://www.taleofwar.com/shop/
Hasslefree: http://www.hfminis.co.uk/
Reaper: http://www.reapermini.com/
Knight games: http://www.knightmodels.com/nueva/

FRP games: http://www.frpgames.com/
And most important of all, FRP had been my one stop shop for all my miniature needs.  Coolminiotnot shop is okay but FRP got a bigger range and better prices :)