Monday, 29 January 2024

YEAR OF THE DRAGON

 I thought I'd do a Roger and get two challenges done from one model (a very canny man ! LOL) this year Keith at angrypiper has set a challenge and you've got all year to complete it, and it's simple paint a Dragon, to coincide with the Chinese year of the Dragon, all Dragons count, so I was a little gutted as I'd recently painted two Coatyl's which are South American Dragons, so I was surprised last week when searching for a bit in the bit's box and found a third Coatyl body, I've no idea where this one came from, unless it was from a friend who gave me a bag of lizardmen bits and it was in there. I had a pair of resin wings that had lost a couple of feathers, which I thought would represent battle damage, and greenstuffed them into the body, I made up another tree to tie into the previous two pinning all the sections together to make it stronger to take the weight as I did on the previous ones.


And here it is with the other two.


I've also got a second Dragon done, one of my Zodiac Dragons. Haven't I already painted one of these, the answer is yes, but that one had a sad end at a show, when a young child decided to see if it could fly ! As I am no longer going to shows I thought I'd push the painting further so I shaded the blue with red, and highlighted with yellow. I've included a shot of the original painting below for reference.


While I'm showing some Fantasy bits I thought I'd show the latest bits I've done for my client. First is two more pits


Next are two columns I've done one fallen down with a crushed adventurer underneath.


That's all for todays post, so until next time stay safe and have fun !

Cheers Dave

22 comments:

  1. Oh man, I can't believe (well, actually I can...) that a kid threw your mini at a show!! That sucks. Wait till Kuribo reads about that, he's going to have nightmares next time he enters something into a show!

    The dragon looks good and the new Coatayl is a nice add. The Frostgrave pieces are always fun to see too. Hmm, Dragon Challenge...I've been meaning to paint a dragon for a long time now and there is a chance my players might encounter one. Could this be the year?!

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    1. Thank you Brian, yes unfortunately the parent was distracted looking at my products and didn't see what was going on, luckily he couldn't reach the other shelves where there were bigger items ! LOL Hopefully it won't give Jeff too many nightmares ! LOL
      I didn't want to leave it too long on the Coatyl, and forget how I painted the other two, although I did vary some of the colours for a little variation, and happy with how the Zodiac Dragon turned out, I think the red leather ties in better with the triad of colours used on the scales. As I don't play Frostgrave, doing this scenery has given me chance to play with the scenery for it. The more the merrier on the Dragon Challenge, I'm hoping to do another to tie in with Monster May(hem) as well, but more on that at a later point.

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  2. Oh, wow, they all look terrific. Those Coatls are truly mesmerising, and the dragon is amazing. Pretty cool work!

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    1. Thank you Suber, with Dragons being normally so large, they may as well have a bold colour scheme as it would be hard for them to hide ! LOL Really wanted to push the Zodiac Dragon further than last time

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  3. The Coatls look great together as a unit, like a flock of Macaws.

    Nice looking Zodiac Dragon too, tis an interesting concept. Hopefully no flight lessons in its future haha.

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    1. Thank you SD, as the wings were inspired by Macaw colouration, that is a great analogy.
      I did all twelve of the Zodiac animals, but I'm still rather partial to the Dragon, hopefully no more flight lessons ! LOL

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  4. What a tremendous post Dave, so much to enjoy. The dragons are so good, but I do like the pits too.

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    1. Thank you Michael, hoped there would be something for everyone in here, and do like to keep things varied ! LOL

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  5. nice painting on the dragons.
    the pits are cool and ominous too; but how many pits does one person need? 😁

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    1. Thank you Stewart, was a fun break from the norm on the Dragons.
      My client needed four pits for a particular scenario in Frostgrave, but as each one has been made to look different, they could be used for other things as well like a undead spawning point. Hopefully these wont be too ominous as my client and his opponent completely avoided the area of the Monolith I ainted for him, as they both found it scary and foreboding ! LOL

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  6. John@justneedsvarnish1 February 2024 at 14:23

    Oooh, I like these dragons, particularly the zodiac dragon! :-) Busy trying to work out how I can get a dragon into the painting queue somehow!

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    1. Thank you John, they have been fun to do, that would be an interesting change of pace for you, much like the Ork's and Ogre of recent years.

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  7. Lots of great progress here but that blue dragon is really a highlight. Chinese dragons look the coolest in my humble opinion and so to see one brandishing swords is even better! You chose an excellent color scheme for it as well. I've seen a few larger scale minis that incorporate this style of dragon and one day I'd love to tackle something like that myself.

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    1. Thank you Jeff, my favourite has always been the Coatyl, but the Chinese dragon is very iconic, and I've enjoyed doing each one I've worked on, as I've built 3 including this one. The hardest thing I've found doing triad colour schemes is getting everything else to tie in, I think this has been my best attempt so far. Would love to see what you do with a dragon one day.

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  8. Another great Coatyl! The Zodiac Dragon looks fantastic too, love what you've done with the scales.

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    1. Thank you snapfit, I do like Coatyl's ! LOL it can be a bit time consuming with the triad of colours, but think the end result is worth it, and luckily enough I sculpted the scales with plenty of definition ! LOL

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  9. Those Coatyl (all three) look very nice - and the basing of them using trees works really nicely. The Zodiac dragon looks really cool in an entirely different way, and horror story aside, the new one does look a step up from the previous one which was no slouch of a model either.

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    1. Thank you Azazael, they have been fun to do, and certainly stand out with their bold colours ! LOL I enjoyed the original build and paint of the zodiac dragon, but wanted to see if I could push the painting further this time, to challenge myself.

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  10. Went to go leave a dragon-related comment on Roger's blog but he's got that setting that closes his comments after a rather short amount of time!

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    1. Next time I'm emailing him I can let him know that your interested mate.

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    2. No worries - maybe I should get a dragon painted first though!

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    3. I'll point him in the right direction when you do mate.

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