With time to kill, as the Oathmark army is now stacked in the display cabinet and I have no game to play in the foreseeable future, its time to add units to get that variation I wanted for other army compositions.
First up, it’s time to get that dragon finished. The box said Young Red Dragon so I suppose red it will be. While I am using reds and on a bit of a fire theme I looked out a Fire Kami from the painting queue as it seems apt to do that while the base coats dry on the dragon.
Its a strange living flame sculpture from the Bushido game by GCT Studios.
It is supposed to be conjured or summoned by another flame orientated chap from the same faction, so I may as well get him done at the same time. I must dig out the Bushido cards and find out if he has a name for you all. I should also paint the chains at his belt and wrists, as well, now that I see them…
And done! You may or may not believe me when I say that this dragon was a pain in the arse to paint. Not as bad as the Reaper bones but a pain for a number of reasons.
Some were reasons I may have avoided (like doing the base first and then realising it needed to be held on a drill bit to paint and dry).
The biggest issue is the soft plastic and so called undercoat. After painting most of the red on the body and a couple of other parts I looked at the legs and noticed that quite a lot of the paint had rubbed off while I was holding it! As I had done this in a red contrast paint a second coat darkened the area that was repainted and effectively meant I had to repaint whole sections to get the colour to match…
It’s not greatly obvious in these shots but the wings were in a different position each and every time I went back to it. The English summer is here early and the shed gets warm. The soft plastic sags in the heat of the day and contracts back to the original position it was packaged in as it cools (usually when I want to get a paintbrush down its back).
Its also very unstable on its base. The model came packaged with a 100mm round base (Supplied by Wizkids for added stability), no wonder they thought it needed something this large.
Just using a small base layer in a larger movement tray proved to be too wobbly still. So out came the magnets again.
At the point of noticing the paint rubbing off, and realising I would need to varnish it, I had finished the base and could not safely stand it without a base to spray it. Masking the base was my last resort.
After all that faffing about I can say two things for sure. It’s done and I won’t be doing another soft plastic figure again for a while.
The finished dragon looks ok, but I lost the desire to do anything more than a simple paint scheme with it. When every time I picked it up I needed to patch up a new scratch, I lost the desire to invest more time in it. Which is a shame, as its actually a great little sculpt.
Steinberg Shed Space 
The dragon does look good, but it sounds like it’s been a nightmare! 🙂 I’m surprised at the effect of the heat on the plastic at what are not really excessive temperatures as far as some plastics are concerned!
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A few days ago I went into the shed. 32 degrees outside. 50 degrees inside the shed. No shade in the garden… Dragon in its IKEA glass cabinet (in a shaded spot within the shed). Serious tilt on the flying stand and a worrying case of wing droop. Soft plastics (with a similar consistency to rubber hose) do not like this sort of heat. All the bones and Wizkids stuff seems to have a similar set of issues. I should really try to stick to hard plastics in future…
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I had problems with a Bones model. The paint would not stay on, and the primer never seemed to cure. I finally finished it, and do t want to touch it in case the paint is still a problem. More varnish? Lots more varnish?
It looks great finished!
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All the soft plastics I have painted have been slightly tacky or shiny when finished. Usually an issue if you use spray primers, but as the Wizkids stuff is supposedly pre-undercoated…
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I tried painting over the “preundercoat”. Paint still didn’t stick well!
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Looks great- like the fire effects. I’ve only limitied experience with bones stuff.
Cheers,
Pete.
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Read the Reaper website info on ‘How to paint Bones’ before you start, that’s the advice I could have benefitted from before I started my first….
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It does look good. My few bones figures I painted ended up semi tacky. It kind of put me off. They are lovely miniatures but I think I will stick to hard plastic from now on.
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Hard plastics are definitely more reliable. How is printed resin as a material? Is it easy to prep and paint? You seem to be printing and painting tonnes of the stuff lately…
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Not tried resin yet, but the PLA paints up fine. I use cheap car spray and then use either army painter/GW paints for the miniatures or artist acrylics for terrain.
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And that proves my lack of knowledge with these things. Is the filament used to make your scenery a form of plastic then? I am guessing it gets heated and is then used in layers to build up the shapes. I see a lot of people getting into 3D printing. It hasn’t drawn me in yet but I can see it getting more cost effective and suspect, as a result, more and more people will get involved.
I guess up at the top of the world, access to a local game shop is limited, so printing your own is an effective way to get figures to use.
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Soon I will be able to test paint some resin as I got a new printer. The pla is is heated and extruded though a metal end and as you say is built up in layers… normally mine is set at 0.2mm. The resin one is a UV hardening resin that uses light to fuse it together… a whole new learning curve.
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Well that seems like you have embraced the high tech quite fully. May I ask if the new resin printer is still fairly high cost to buy and run or if it is now achievable based on a normal hobby fund.
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No worries mate. It cost £199.00 so it was pricey. But let’s say when I did my 15mm desert war with the Ender 3 which actually cost the same 18 months ago. A Flames of War tank would have cost me ..let’s say £3.00 (probably more than that) the one I printed cost 17p including electricity. A roll of filament cost me £18 and it weighs a kilo. I printed two whole armies plus buildings plus all kinds of other crap out of the same kilo. Up front costs are high, but once it gets going then it saves in the long run. The resin is a bit more expensive at £27 for a litre. But it will work out cheaper in the long haul. I expect to use the resin on balls ups and test prints, but once dialled in then I am sure I will be pretty happy with the results. The resin has silly detail levels and I want to do a lot more in smaller scales hence the additional machine.
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