 Hello everybody and welcome to another PMP end-of-month review. So what are we doing here? Well the painters motivating painters community on Facebook Which is a hobby community focused on helping you take your next step on your hobby journey every month we have an event wherein you can post a picture or pictures of a single miniature you've painted during that month and You can Put that up for review So what we're gonna do is spend about the next hour and I'm gonna go over Sort of doing the these reviews are gonna go over all the mentors people submitted We're gonna talk through them try to help people out as usual We do have to limit people to one submission into this a month if you want to submit. It's very easy I'll show you how when we when we're over on the screen here in just a second and And Try the more detailed feedback you ask for the more I can actually help in Trying to help you take your next step on your hobby journey If you'd like to become a member of the PMP and join this community of enthusiastic positive hobbyists We work very hard to maintain that as our community standard The link will be down in the description anywhere. You are from beginner to master level We would love to have you we welcome everybody because we've all got our own next steps to take so With that out of the way, let's go ahead and jump into it. So over here on my screen. You'll notice I've got this up if we basically When you come in here to the events Tab sorry, let's go back Here we go Sorry, I was already in the end for the thing. So if we come here to the painters motivating painters here We are on the home page. You'll notice the October event has already been posted when I'm doing this I'm a little late. I apologize. I was traveling abroad at the beginning of the month But if you come here to events, you will see all the previous months and if we go with our September submissions There you go, and then you can just make a new post and you're good to go So just drop that in with your pictures As it is, let's go down to the beginning Quick note on what I will say as always There is a video I will link down in the description that goes into detail on a lot of the things I talk about If I say you need more tonal variation or more contrast or this or that I talk about that in detail in the video linked down below so you can go watch that for reference Uh, I would love to spend, you know, lots of time on everybody's post. I really would But uh, unfortunately, there's a lot of people who submit these and I do have to somehow Get back to normal life. Uh, and so I don't have five or six hours to do this So I will try to limit my feedback and I will sometimes use those shortcuts, which are referenced in the videos Uh, but with that being said, let's jump right into it. So first off Stephen uh, smiley with his first ever submission said he was always a bit intimidated I don't and that's nobody should be intimidated. I I will always try to tailor my feedback to both You know where you are on your journey as well as what you directly asked me for I'm I'm not here to beat anybody up This is this is all just to help you take your next step You're not being judged against some objective standard or anything like that of of you know The highest of level painting it's about It's about helping you progress on your journey. Okay, so He says this is mostly gw contrast paints over brushing and dry brushing for highlights and contrast and a little edge highlighting Okay, so let's take a look King of ruin here, uh Yeah, I mean, he's suitably gross. That's for sure Uh, I mean, obviously this is we're in nergal. So great right off the bat There's a couple really really horrendous nergal submissions this month. So that'll be fun for me Um, all right. So a couple quick tips. I'm just going to cycle through the pictures here while I talk With the metals and stuff like that I think those would be good if they looked a little more rusted meaning like let's work in a little more different types of rust and coloration there, uh, if you don't want to go directly to have oranges you can use red rusts and and Pink rusts and yellow rusts and stuff like that that will align more with your color scheme But more tonal variation on that in general. I think would be good Uh with the bone charts protruding out of here I would love to see the same level of detail as you've got up here on these. I like the striations. Those are good I'd still like to see them transition to a little more, uh variation toward a brighter white out here at the top Um But other than that, I mean it's good You got all the little boils and pustules and things like that are well picked out They look suitably gross the yellow is a nice, uh cut out I would spend a little more time bringing more highlights into the face The face gets lost against all this yellow and red and the bright wounds and pus and stuff down here You see you want you want to make sure you're you're clean around here and you want to make sure you brighten this up So, you know add some ice yellow or some any kind of yellow more into your Uh Into your paint to bring up the highlights here push me a little deeper shadows Increasing the overall brightness and tonal variation on the face will draw my attention to the right place And that's always where we want to be focused and looking at the miniature. Okay Uh, only other note I have is always black rim your base your bases can be any color But they should always around the edge as long as it's black Uh, and by black, I mean black or a or dark gray or some near black type of thing Like this kind of overpainting where a wash is it's just it's the simplest last step Don't skip it. I'll notice it every time and it will always look bad Anybody can paint a black rim on the base always paint your rim Okay But yeah, cool stuff. Hope to see more All right Saying I've been who's uh says it says 10th month in the hobby and it's his latest painted model. Well, my friend You're you're doing some great work here. Uh, this is certainly a really fun Space marine. I love this guy's pose because it's so nice and open. He's a great guy to paint Uh, I don't remember what chapter this is. I've seen you share a couple of these online um They look really good The sword is nice, uh, I think you're you know, you could you could smooth some of that transition there Actually where I would challenge you on the sword is if you're gonna do something so big and bright and blue You could actually break this up a little bit It wouldn't draw as much attention if it wasn't so heavily saturated So having multiple reflection points on the power sword So like one here and then one here and one here and then one here So they kind of alternate, uh, is a good way to go So like here you've just got an alternating one to one pattern changing that to a two to two or three to two Would probably help, uh Bring that down some because right now it's pretty much the most eye gout like eye grabbing Part of the the miniature Uh, the only other note I would have is two simple things Uh saying so first off Your your gray white here is is really smooth and really nice I'd love to see just a little bit soft Subtle shading in here some more especially under the legs under the arms under this thing here Just taking that a little step farther I think would be really nice Because it would just add that contrast that would really pop out the white You could also push up into a pure white just in a few places edges here Center the faceline top of this it looks like you're still a little off your full white Um, so just really being like those those final touches of pushing the contrast I think would really help The other note I have is very small But this guy's walking around on what you've told me is some kind of dirty Dusty arid landscape you told me that because you made it this dry brown crackle stuff That looks like this that looks like dirt and then you had dead dry plants And yet his feet are pristine like he just stepped off the drop pod A little bit of pigment dust on the feet can go a long way to making your your Marine looks like he actually is operating in the theater that you've you've sort of set him in there. So there you go. Good stuff Okay, uh, Benjamin, uh says, uh, this is his first time participating in the review. Well, welcome Uh, basically he wants to know, uh, you know, what looks good and what needs more work in the future. Sure Okay So, uh, what looks good, uh the in general your composition color placements all good Things look, you know, pretty nice and clean. Uh, so I think all that's nice. Your gem looks real good I think, you know, the gems in general, there are many gems. I think they all look fine I think the extra touches to the purple are good Uh The I'm a little suspect on this stuff here. I don't know if that's texture or what's going on here with this Like gray part So I just can't Like I'm leaning way in I can't tell Like were you going for a stippling effect there? You'll have to tell me in the comments What exactly you were aiming at on that one that that confuses me a little um The other small tip I'll give you I I love the blue red and purple. I think that looks really nice Uh, I do like that you desaturated the red and made it rather dark. That's a great choice It would have been it would have been absolutely way too eye catching otherwise as it is now It's a very nice compliment. So excellent excellent pick there Be careful with this sort of airbrush osl It just looks overblown like it looks like you hit it this area with turquoise with your airbrush And what you want to get here is something where there's a defined area of glow Like an area is bright and then there's dark it very dark in the shadows And then there's a very thin glaze that colors out the rest So just be careful with that kind of stuff and then finally where I would tell you is The tonal variation on your skin could be a little farther So think about like how you'd work additional color tones into the skin reds purples brighter highlights coming up into yellows and whites things like that In general, you want to see skin as a fun chance even when it's a small face to do to add in a lot of different colors One quick final note. Uh, don't do this This thing you did here like I assume he's supposed to be some kind of sniper character from like his very long Rifle like I don't know what he's from or what gave me from but like this little bush that's supposed to be One it doesn't look like it's actually going to hide him So then it ends up looking cartoony like he's going like he's going to hide behind this bush like it's a looney tunes cartoon Uh and two you're just blocking off your model like you can see when we look at several angles here This is just blocking part of the model off. You generally want to keep Ground cover like this to be extremely minimal and near the ground So it's not actually covering part of what your model can see if you want to bring the concept of Someone hiding behind something then put it over here to the side and and generally just kind of do it on a larger base It's not as bad or obtrusive and also don't make a little stick bush. This looks like a miniature tree You don't make it like a bush like a significant sized bush, but put it to the side of him like way to the side of him So that way I can still see the miniature front on but I can still get the narrative of what's happening in that tiny diorama Okay All right, but very good stuff man. Hope to see more All right, so Reinhardt, uh, we've been working for a while here month to month He's been sending some awesome looking stuff and this month. He brings us the Uh, the man himself constant in valdor, uh from the custodies. He's been working on a custodies force And basically he says, you know, I put about 20 hours into this if I put another 20 and to push it further Where can he go? Uh, sure Okay, so I'm just gonna I'm going to cycle through. Um, while I talk about kind of some things that I notice um On the cloak I think the cloak is probably fine It could come up more It could have texture like if I was going to take another 20 hours The cloak would be a major area of focus for me and what I would do is look at brightening it up even more in places I would look at adding uh texture to make it look like it is some kind of cloak like satin or something So I would be coming in with lots of thin hashes Like this and then glazing them down and then hashes and then glazing them down and hashes And then glazing them down and stuff like that Uh, so that's kind of a thought um, the This blue that's right here Doesn't do anything like it's it's very bright. It's very blue And I understand this is with and without the back on the base um But this blue is like so bright and isn't moving in the right ways as you would communicate on the rest of the figure Like that is to say you've got this big matte chunk of this blue I would like to see this painted more like hair So actually catching highlights and having light light lines and light rings on it, you know that kind of thing I would focus some attention there Turning to the front of the manager Yeah, let's look at him straight on um What I would say is I think we could still I think we'd still probably go a little farther on the gold Especially against some of the details like you know We're we've been on this journey of pushing the shading up into the the gold And I think you're getting there. I think we could still go farther Where I really notice it is like where it's the most sort of obvious to me It's up here like in this space on the on his uh power halberd thingy um It just like I hope I'm not covering anything with my screen. No, okay. We're all right um the uh I just realized where my my face is and all this and I was I need to make sure I'm not covering anything um The I'd love to see more shadows drawn up here and here and like more edges picked out just generally defining it It's very bright Which is awesome. You're getting a nice high reflective gold But I want to see more control over the light like more Shadows pushed especially up here is where I notice the most here. It's not as bad. His legs look good Um probably a little more on like the feet and in this area drawing shadows up to one side to direct Suggest directionality of lighting Yeah, so that's probably where I'd focus my time those elements But overall it's uh, it's really cool. I mean heck of a heck of a cool piece That's for sure and I like the colors. You're sort of reflecting there through the the metal All right, benjamin brings us a big mordheim building. Hey excellent always down with that He says that he wasn't happy with the wood. So let's talk about wood Um, yeah, when you've got wood like this, I mean you've got so much of it the idea of Probably the idea of um, you know going in and painting individual striations is is mind numbingly insane So my advice is lots more when you're on sort of the wood phase lots more careful dry brushing And then the application of washes of different colors and types Go through different brown tones Use different dry brushes use ivory use gray Work some purples into the wood work some greens into the wood stuff like that Will create a lot more interest and variation and then you can also come in and just stipple the wood like literally take a big You know like a big stippling brush Right something like this There you go and just start like Popping the wood like that with extremely little paint on your brush and it'll start leaving little dots If you go out and look at trees and stuff like that That's what you'll see they have all these little imperfections and stipples and And like little points of different black and white in them So stuff like that can be really great. You can also add in some texture So here's a fun thing you can do you can get out some pigment or something like some typhus corrosion or something like that Mix it with some green ink Okay And then just start stippling it on around like corners and edges and it will look like moss It's another good way. It's a it's a nice simple trick to to get that microtexture that moss would have Uh, so there you go, but overall really cool cool building All right Zab Started working on his legion of gosh band for work right starting with his seneshow Trying to look work on his osl and his osl weathering and old fabric. All right, so let's take a look Okay, so On the osl portion of it Uh, we'll just kind of I like this. He gave me all three angles in one picture. Zang. All right, you know what? We're gonna we're gonna We're gonna make me smaller. I'm gonna shrink there. Um, there we go. Now. I won't be in the way of anything. Hopefully All right, so let's talk about the osl. I think that's your your your success here Uh by far like it looks good Uh, you could pop what what we really need is just to pop some of the sources a little brighter So here at the base of his skull that's flaming. I would like to see a little more yellow Same with maybe the heart of wherever the heat is on this axe You know just stuff like that a little more Brightness to the center to the hottest part right now The whole flame is rather consistently lit and I want to you want to see the source of that that Bright that light in an osl right but as far as the reflections and stuff go I feel like you're you're pretty good You're capturing it. It seems to be you know hitting at most the places. I would expect it to hit Um, you could probably draw a little bit more out here to this area of the shoulder like light would come down here Right, it would be very soft. So it's just some subtle glazes of light in there. You also want to think about um Materials with osl a lot. It's one of the biggest challenges of it. So like This is very matte black. It would have a subtle green tinge to it a little bit But this is steel theoretically right So it would be highly reflective and be like just grabbing and catching any light in the area So this would actually probably reflect green here and here Right because light is gonna light is traveling around here in this area It's not just like it's a lot of people think with osl Like you need to just draw a bunch of straight lines and that's true. That's a good first thought But remember light's gonna bounce off of things too So like this is reflecting off of his axe and coming back and hitting here and the environment around him and stuff like that Weekly, but just having that very light glaze of it there could could help As far as the weathering goes I don't see a lot of actual like weathering or rust or stuff. So I would say that You're fine. I think things look suitably old, which I assume is what you mean So, yeah, I think that's okay If you wanted to push the weathering you could do things like take the steel In the places that are just metal and you know adding some some rust and brown and orange and stuff As far as the texture on this goes It's good. Like you've got a lot of hashes in there. I need more Right now it's still a little rough and it's too short Like that is to say here in these internal areas. I don't have anything It's so starkly Uh broken what I would love to see is basically you do this This is an insane thing to say what I'm about to say. I know But I'd love to see you do all this twice So draw your lines out over almost the whole thing like avoid only the deepest deepest parts Then glaze it all purple and then do it again about this short So I had a weak texture here and a stronger texture here and it would sell a lot better So there you go. I hope that helps out Okay All right Leonard uh newest addition to the his dnd party victor the bloody Uh not yet finished but close. He'd like some cnc and any help regarding the flame on top of his crossbow Okay, and you will paint the ring around the base black. Good All right, so here my friend is where we need to have a conversation about lighting in photos so I this I can't do anything with and this I can't do much with Set your picture set your miniature down. Don't hold it your hand set it down somewhere Get a piece of a4 paper or something like that or open a book that has black and white kind of gray stuff on the front page of the book Go to gw's website. They have a pinned thing on the side of the community thing about taking pictures of miniatures But just put it up indirect lighting. You don't want to bulb directly on it You want light diffuse in the area take your phone Get a nice frame shot There you go Even lighting like this is too cold and direct. This is too yellow and direct like notice this shadow That tells me we're way too strong if I can see a shadow in the picture. We have too much direct lighting So it's very very hard for me to give you a feedback I'm not trying to beat you up over this. I just like to do this I need good photos because I'm not in the room with you that being said I will give you my best shot um So on the on the flame More yellow more orange that is to say you have too much white and it doesn't have enough of the fire colors in it It's more toasted marshmallow right now This should be if you want to have any white it should be the thinnest line of white and then even then it should be like I see yellow instead of pure white Then going up into a very very slow small band of yellow and then mostly orange And then it end like by orange I mean sort of a Deep yellow orange and then you can come out here into a little bit of red black at the tip for some carbonation or smoke Um as far as the red goes that's the biggest area where I would challenge you to improve like you wash to this and then that's where we stopped And I can tell that because I can see the coffee staining off of the wash And we don't want that so there's not much reason to wash Uh a shape like that. Anyways, it's got a lot of flats and not texture So in general you want to avoid washing stuff like that You want to paint in shadows or something But here I mean you want to take your red and smooth this all out and create highlights So that would be my my best advice for you there That will help you a lot if you kind of go that direction of like just Don't end on the wash never end on a wash if you use them Super fine. They're a great technique. It's just afterward you need to go back in and put those layers over top Especially when you've got large flats because otherwise you get coffee staining like this So that would be my feedback for you Leonard All right Next up Uh, Andrew bringing us a Beautiful piece. This is a little experimental piece. He's doing Uh, trying to work with both watercolors for his background using like simple and interesting shapes and going for the more like, uh Cartoony sort of borderland style. So heavy black lines Strong hard divisions, you know something we normally don't do with miniature painting where we're obsessed with like ultra smooth Blends and transitions Andrew is bucking the trend and giving us a real piece of art here Uh, and I want to just this is the background. It's absolutely gorgeous. I love it But I really want to give you there you go this one this whole shot because keep in mind That is an actual miniature standing in front of that painted background. That's not painted on But he's done such a great job of that painterly element being captured There's a shot you have in here Andrew that I really do like where you see just how over the top He is with the green on that side There it is right And like when you look at it like that it looks so almost insane Uh to see those extreme strong colors, but when we flip back It's like one of these straight on shots. It just reads so perfectly, right? Um, so yeah, I mean Andrew my feedback is I think I would push some of the Stark highlights on the other side up a little farther Not quite as much as the Lightsaber as clearly if it was that right on the other side, it wouldn't be the lightsaber wouldn't be having that effect But like here on her like these these are reading as some kind of satin or reflective Material to me from how you've painted them So just like similarly having a bit of a light going in the opposite direction here where this is like you've low side Angled this one top side angling lights here with a starker line like a white here a white here And a thin white here and then here and on the boot and on the there You see I'm saying like basically going look at that. Hey knows it's a face Going one more level higher. I think on that side would really capture it, but I really love this Andrew. I mean this is just So freaking creative and she looks wonderful. The the tones on the face are so magnificently captured Um Yeah, it's great stuff Okay Liam following on from last month's submission Another imperial knight. Oh, you know, I'm in love with this So boom look at this big boy. Oh, yeah Uh, now we're in my wheelhouse. All right, so we've got big knights Um, yeah, all right some general feedback weathering and osl Um, the osl looks fine the airbrush is like less obtrusive on something of this side Yeah, I mentioned earlier about that but like something of this size. I think it's it's okay You do want to be careful when you do that Um, it can still help to like then still glaze back with the other color a little bit like here on the green and stuff Just kind of where it where where it pops out at me Maybe taking in a little bit of blue with a brush like a mid tone blue. These look a little overblown So like bringing some some mid blue back in there. So you just got a smaller area of white Heat I think would be helpful um The I think as far as the like the color scheme and all that looks great Let's get in with one of those close shots There you go. Uh, yeah, I mean I think as far as the damage goes, it's good. I would favor these On the green to have a little more dark on them than kind of the gray or steel you're going for where it's chipped away Like I think it looks right here on the white. I would do the same thing here like have this these chips be the same Dark color. I don't think there's any reason to have these be the lighter steel scratch and this not be like that um So I think darker chips in the green would would sell me a little better Uh than the sort of white chips you could have some of the white chips too Or the light chips whatever you want to say, but but I think I would favor the darker ones It'll stand out actually a little better Um, I like your scratches up. Let's go back to the head shot because that'll be a nice one No, I guess we don't have it that's close to get I like the weathering around here with the worn edges That's good. I thought there was one that was more zoomed in on the face Um, so I think that's good. I think you could use with a little bit more Uh, like I like some of the smaller streaks. I'd love to see some of that in the green I didn't see much of the streaking over there. Maybe I just missed it So if I did I'm sorry, I guess there's one there. Yeah, okay. Never mind. You got a few Yeah, I I'd like to see a little more of that. I think um Maybe like a couple nice long ones your streaks are very similarly sized So maybe break that up a little have a couple that are a little longer, you know to really like Somewhere where water would really gather and roll out but but all in all, I mean this is Really really nice work on this guy This is such I love this miniature this this particular You know these big knights the dominus class ones Um, that's by the way the basing looks good pigment on the feet looks great. He looks dusty like he's walking in there Spruce this part up a little more where it's not just like because this looks like just the base So still a little more mud or dirt or grit or sand or something just to kind of build that up a little more And give me a little more variation in there, but overall, I think it's really solid One small note on the plasma glow not the the glow itself is fine But I would make this line here a little hotter. This is about the same intensity as your light spots And this should be hotter than this. This is just a light Theoretically, this is hot plasma. So like you want to sell that and boost that up So there you go. Overall though, Liam's super great, man. I dig it All right, Thomas spite looking for feedback on the skin tones First time using scale 75 and he likes them also if possible attempted some Basically he was using Vallejo metals First of all, are you using Vallejo metal color? What Vallejo metal paint are you using? Because he says he still sees granular stuff like Vallejo has You know many different types of metal paints Vallejo metal color that specific thing not model not game not Uh, not air not anything metal color is the one he says he still sees You know sort of granulated stuff. Could it be because the rattle can primer? Yes Yes, that is what it's from Rattle can primers don't prime evenly. That's what they do. They make texture and that's why they're annoying Uh, and why I don't rattle can There's not much you can do with that. By the way, it's just like get an airbrush is the right answer. Unfortunately now as far as the Skin goes I think looks really nice. You've got some good tonal variation there You're using the low tones of the that skin set really well My advice would be to grab something that isn't in that skin set Uh, something like a high should yellow or an ice yellow and have a little bit of that mixed into your highlights That can actually warm it up really nice Um, you could also you know, there's basically some kind of yellow tone like that There's a there's a couple different yellows you can use. Um, but a desaturated yellow could be a good way to go Uh to help pop that up even more as far as really getting out the highlights You could also keep pushing the shadows like keep using that african and indian shadow To to really delineate those muscles and stuff like that, but you're on a good very good road here Like I think it looks good. Just keep pushing that contrast more with those tones Now as far as the uh shading on the metals go Good, I think you need to go farther is the short answer like here on the top What I want to see is it really be directional So like this being you know, like a silver spot then I should see something very dark sepia Slash purple down here on this and then so on and you know anti reflections and things like that I think is where you want to be Um, these little punch daggers they have don't highlight well. So I understand that Um, but yeah, just more of like especially with the steel You know again take this one to pure silver then have this go almost to black stuff like that There's a couple blades you probably see me do recently if you Follow my stuff where where this is what I do and the key is just even with that tmm You've got to push it super super high on the contrast Um You know like you you you go up the same amount with those inks or those paints Running from black to pure silver is your white, right? It's just like with nmm You want to run that whole gamut But overall very good. I dig them cool basis too It's a neat take on the sort of they look very much like they belong that like those bases are neat takes on the um Uh Silver tower there you go Sorry took a minute. I was like searching through the box names Uh, Alex shine, uh looking for criticism specifically the helmet and the mushrooms in the back of the armor wants to keep the model overall bright Sure. Uh, well, guess what on the helmet the key here is our old friend tonal variation Uh, I don't have a back mushroom. Oh, I guess just look at these. Okay. That's fine. Uh, I there's no back back shot on the medals See my previous statements. I just made so like especially his big hook thing Uh on the mushrooms the same thing my here's my best advice Go google mushrooms. Just like for stuff like this. That's just a natural thing in the world like these mushrooms I can understand these are fantastical, you know fairytale versions of these things But just go google real mushrooms. You will be amazed at the color and variation the way that they speckle and pattern and shift tones and have texture Excuse me And just do that Um Like have draw out some lined texture add some additional dots and speckles and stuff like that have them color shift slightly You know go from like green with a purple cap like Fungus is so fascinating in what it achieves with its its colors and sort of what's in it And just bringing out that variation is what you want to go for on on the loon face His armor his moon face the mac tonight face Um What you should what you want to push there is into more Like light rust tone So if you watch my recent video on the imperial fist yellow, you'll see what i'm talking about But you want to come down to something that looks a bit like that That's valet home model air light rust that can be your shadow color there Even maybe a tiny bit of true rust And then you want to just bring up those highlights In like here and on his nose and the top of his eye the armor of his eyes and out here on his big Chin piece so again just more tonal variations the right answer, but uh, yeah cool stuff. I dig him All right It's dicey. Hey, what's up, man? He's got a lot of models. This is like So many models dude. There's so many models He's got a lot of photos painted through everything. We're just gonna cycle through here Great looking war bands. It's a lot of streams I know you were you were pushing to get this whole box that painted. So it's very impressive She got the whole thing done plus all the monsters all our death chickens here and the harpies Very nice. Yeah, super cool I mean across the board I would say like things I see is you want to you want to increase the tonal variation on stuff in places But overall it's a heck of an accomplishment, man Just to get this whole thing painted is is pretty impressive. So way to go He streams all the time when he's painting Uh, you just look him up under dicey guy and it's it's really fun. He's a great dude and this is great work, man All right So scott uh reaper bones Cave troll hanging out in a dim cave Use a new round one Rock and crystals. Okay, sure uh All right as for the picture in last month's review You said to make a more uniform background and not such a dark picture Hey, look at this and you know what you did it. This is so much better. Like this is so much better. This is great Okay, so let's give you some feedback here. Uh, so we have the classic curse of purples here Uh purples are very difficult to highlight with because lighter purples have a bunch of white dumped in them to make them Look more light color because whether or not purple is actually a color is a bit questionable as to whether it even exists But anyway, how they lighten this maybe color is by just dumping white into it And so what happens is you get these incredibly stark transitions when this happens you need to go back to your original color And glaze like your your mid tone and glaze some of that in okay Like uh, glaze some of this purple over the edge to smooth it out. It's a lengthy process purples a tough color to paint with Now as to does he look like he's in a dim cave? Yeah, sure. Absolutely Uh, I think your biggest opportunity to missed opportunity here like the skin looks great You got the overall lighting and coloration, right? Uh, I like that all this is drained out like your red is desaturated the gray and stuff like that I I would like to see maybe a little more in this gray a little more texture or something just to kind of Give it a little more life, but that's a minor thing. It doesn't really need to be it's it's fine enough I think a real opportunity here was with these gems So if you go back and look at my how to paint warpstone video You'll see I tackle a bunch of gems just like this And you'll see like the level of contrast I go to in there And I think ringing him in those really bright blue gems that look like they're like fluorescing in the minimal light Would have been a really amazing touch my last and final note is stone especially especially Stone in a cavern Is not just slate flat dark gray. Okay. I've probably done this on a previous one But I'll do it again now stone caverns Okay, there's a good one See all this green and brown and all this stuff worked in like or here we've got these amazing like no You can't see it because it's up. Yes stupid. Sorry. I keep forgetting that it does that No, no No There we go So you can see how you've got all these different lustrous colors and stuff in here Different greens. These are all like, you know sort of carls bad caverns and things like that But even with a lot of these where they're more natural What you're going to see is like lots of different color tones. They get trapped in here There you go kent's caverns. See all this like rusty orange and stuff that gets trapped from iron oxide Uh, here's some nice stones. Where is this blanchard springs caverns, right? Look at all the greens and yellows and browns and stuff that's here Where look where everywhere that water is touching regularly. Look how much green and stuff has worked in there, right? So the point is is that like in dank underground caves You're going to have other colors so More color But cool stuff. I like it. Uh, this is great Okay Dwights, uh having trouble highlighting magenta and cyan without the colors being desaturated Tried starting with darker shadows. It just seems flat to me. How would you recommend? I highlight those colors Also, could you recommend a way to improve the contrast in general? Okay, sure Uh quick note be careful with bases like this like I love the mask dancing You might have wanted to use the slightly shorter pillar. There's a slightly more broken one In I love tall bases. I know this is going to sound hypocritical coming from me But in general you don't want the thing that they're standing on to be taller than them Just a small note She's fine. She's right at about at the level. You're like you're pushing the level of sanity here But just be careful of that You're right on the line Yeah, the answer is uh more deeper colors like I think your blue is You know probably fine. I mean the answer is you work in a thing that's not white And then or here's two options. I'll say it this way depends on what you want to go for Here's option the first use a bright white or gray Put in your highlights with just the white or gray then glaze over with the cyan And after a couple glazes what you'll get is a hyper bright intense cyan But also taking your colors deeper Into shadows is correct. Like what we have here is a lack of shadow colors. Okay And what I mean by that is if we took this photo, okay Uh, so let's copy this image and uh, let's see actually let's just go Yeah photos, okay Stop it. Nope. It's not gonna let me do it. All right. I was gonna try to turn your picture black and white But I don't have a good way to do that turn your picture black and white And uh, and you'll see what I mean. In fact, hold on one moment All right, so as you can see here, I set the photo to black and white And what you notice is stuff like the skin Looks flat like there's just nothing there because there's no tonal variation. This is the easiest way to test Your actual sort of your your tonal variation across a piece If you turn it black and white and everything looks basically the same color, then you haven't varied anything right um As far as like alternating the hue. So what we need here is more depth of shadows and those kinds of things So to go back to our regular one here What we see when we compare the difference like look at the claw You see how it's mostly the same color What we need to see is draw down into darker purples and in fact in general purple is going to be your good color here So like drawing into taking that cyan and adding a little bit of purple to it or something like that And getting that into your shadow color same here on the claw, right? Probably the same in the skin um And that's what's going to help you get that kind of that kind of contrast So there you go Dwight. Hope that helps Sorry, I refuse to be defeated by that A great tip in general and something I do very commonly when I'm painting is I'll pause in the middle of what I'm doing and I'll take a picture of it with my phone and switch it to black and white um So there you go All right evan Uh painted a fire spray from x-wing extremely happy with how it came out. I would say so looks pretty sweet Uh, what would push it that extra mile without completely changing styles? Okay, sure. Yeah It's a vehicle. So I mean, you know, it's it's always tough to say you've got some nice damage and variation Like the little, you know, your little light there looks cool Uh, okay. So as far as the reds go, I actually think the other way could help like a little bit of modulation into the darker tones Could could help you there. I'm not doing another turning of something black and white, but that would be the point um The reflection on the carapace looks a little stark like that is to say the transition between here where it's reflecting in here Maybe it's a little bit of a turquoise transition here would be good um The panel lines look nice and strong Just trying to see if there's anything else that's Catching my eye. I wish I had one from the other side, but I don't I guess kind of there a little bit Yeah, the panel lines all look strong. Um, I would say just yeah Like darker tones in the reds is probably a good way to go um I think you're rusting and you're weathering all looks pretty solid Maybe a little bit of other. I think the other thing I would say is maybe a little Um, decals or tiny freehand designs like ships tend to have insignias on them and things like that Just little call signs numbers little hazard symbols. Just they can be very utilitarian I'm not saying to come in and like start, you know doing Uh, you know pictures all over the thing But just like little symbols and letters and numbers and things Uh, like serial type numbers kill counts Even like on panels like here's a here's a fun simple trick Let's say you've got a little panel like this one right here Like why is this a panel as opposed to one flat piece? Well, I don't know I haven't looked at the like, you know manual for this thing But maybe it's because it opens up into a bunch of wires and stuff and so it's dangerous So you can put a little hazard symbol there like a tiny little hazard sticker the like decal kits from Knight titans have those kind of things they can be great on just little stuff like that to just add little peaked spots of visual interest and those the kind of things that take the vehicle Way up to the next level into that realism level when you've got just those little tiny details little serial numbers little warnings Little things that like the humans who live in this world that work on it You know if this is a working ship And it was manufactured somewhere There would be those call signs of things that that people did with it Think about your car like if you have your car it has uh, you know Little it has like you're making model on the back like, you know honda civic and then if it's a version of it, right, you know Coop or whatever, you know something like that Little tiny things like that can um or if you pop the engine You'll see little little stickers and little warnings pieces in places like that just just things like that can be good touches All right, the last bard from kingdom death. Where can he improve open for all feedback? All right Okay So let's see if we can let's see if we can take this up into full screen without Nope didn't make it that much bigger. Okay. The pictures are small Fair enough. Uh, we'll just have to like deal with that man um So my answer is the blue Could use a little more variation here and in these parts. I think the head of this creature looks good And the skull thing on the back looks good But the the like the the blue in these upper areas looks a little flat I think the other option is probably just continuing to push your skin tones Into more variation like in general. I like what you've got going on here. We've got a nice tone Uh, but I think it could go a little farther. We could work some deeper shadows I'd love to see even a little more highlight a little more of like the yellow creamy Reflective highlight pulled out Maybe a little more sepia tan tone pushed in like you've got it nicely But pushing it back off those highlights into some places like the top of her leg under her knee here within the joint of her arm Uh in between her her her breasts just like places like that here under her chin Probably here on her nose just pushing sort of the contrast up in that The thing that really jumps out at me is those little yellow fins They just aren't doing much like you have a transition there, but they're not It's just a weird mod like it's a weird sculpting choice by the original by the sculptor to have these big giant things poking out um Yeah, I'm not sure what I would do with those those are those are interesting. Um They just feel a little Like they feel a little disjointed from the piece and I can't place why to be honest You could it might be because we're running Almost the colors of non-metallic gold, but you're not really doing non-metallic gold Like you're just kind of running like a dark brown to yellow So maybe turning them into like real non-metallic gold is the answer where you've got the full contrast up and they're edged Maybe that would help sell me a little more Um because they just they feel like I don't know what material they are right now I don't know what their purpose is. I'm not sure what they're supposed to be So I think doing something like that could really help But overall it's you did a really good job with her the colors look nice I really like your color choices your composition is good your placement is really good the application is clean Yeah, looks cool All right There we go. Okay All right, alex weir, uh, wondering if you get some feedback on the captain bit red in the face Uh, but he was originally visiting on on ice any tips for highlighting red armor Sure. All right Yeah, I would pull some of that red back out of his face I mean if you know, he was a bit red in the face You've got the right answer like you already knew that So you didn't need me to tell you when your brain tells you something like that Listen, your brain is correct. Okay Uh now as for like edging red, it's tough Um, one of the things I like to do is just edge it in a nice bone color like pick a nice yellow Like a quite yellow white I will do all the edging in that and then I will go back around and glaze all of those edges with Uh red something like blood letter works fine or red ink from vileo or whatever Um, you may also just want to look at like a really ultra bright intense red so like chimera colors the red or Nocturna miniatures makes a bunch of red like they make like, um Well, it's the name of it Fiery flame or something like that. That's like really intense orange red You could look at like if it's if it's got the pigmentation You can get there. You could also try something like, um I've used this several times, which is cadmium red light from golden It's a heavy body acrylic. This is like pigment rich as all get out You need flow aid to get it working and running enough, but um But this will pop the heck out of red edge highlights in one step That's what this is a great color. It's so like I said, it's cp Cadmium red light rouge to cadmium clare rojo cadmio claro Yeah, sure. Anyway That's a good one. You can try So all those are the options that would be basically what I what I my advice Only the thing that jumps out at me from this is again We've got a problem with our our base in our background. I like your your core of the building dig that looks Nice, uh more colors more tonal variation. We're just too blue. I need some pits some scratches some streaks Some runs some something there. I need browns. I need greens. I need I need color I need life So yeah, you get the idea overall very good though. I like them. This is great By the way, the pattern on that cloak looks fantastic very very well done Like the servo skull and all that stuff came out really wonderfully And I do like all your contrasts and your deep colors on the red I think the contrast you're running on the red looks really nice all right maroc Uh looking for some feedback on the osl how it works on the metals and some advice not approved the infect would be most appreciated All right. Well part of the challenge here maroc is we've got so much of it, right? You've got a steel dude And there's a lot of green going around here um You know looking through it part of the problem is We've got a couple different like it's it's hard for me to necessarily identify The directionality of the light Uh, I understand it's coming from below like you've told me that through some places But in some places it's not as strongly identified. So let me see if I can unpack what I mean here Let's take this arm just an example because this will be a good way to go So he's holding his arm down And it's not really Against the the light like it's kind of shielded from the light if it's coming from this direction, right? Now it bounce around and bounce off him some But the the the challenge here is we don't have any shadow opposing the osl So like I feel like you're casting some good light Uh, especially on the metals it just needs the shadow to help bounce against it So like if the green is going to hit this side mainly Then darken this side of the arm Or something like put me a complementary shadow Right if if the green is here hitting this part of the metal and making it bright to then make the top of the shadow Make this the dominant light source because your your lighting is very extreme. It's told me that that's what's going on Right So I need shadows to counteract like you've inverted the the light scheme Um, so I need more top shadows to show that that bottom is where it's lit from In the same way, he's very evenly lit up this side of him on the flesh So I like your metals more than I like the flesh because he's just green all the way up evenly Right and it it wouldn't be that way Like this would be very intense and have lots of these yellow reflections like you've caught here on the knuckles and stuff You would see that here and then this part would be mostly gray with like just some green worked in And you want to avoid like there's kind of a harshest line here You want to avoid that this glow should be weaker than this as we travel farther from a motivated light source It should generally get weaker And here it's too similar So I think that would be my main feedback for you, but overall he's I mean Insane as always you're a madman All right Paso second submission ever So he's looking at yeah this this shaman from blood rage. Oh, I'm very familiar with him and yet again osl um, so Let's take a look All right. So first off on the flaming sword way too much like white. I know that in the picture Let's look at the picture Like this seems like there's a lot of white, but it's not Like that's actually quite a lot of yellow white and plus the artist has the luxury Of taking up all this space out here with orange We don't have that right like there's no I can't paint the air around this thing So you've got to shrink that down Um, it would also help you want to like Picking out these lines and stuff and making them Do something like have darker colors and things like that will sell the effect So the the motivating source here is a challenge because it doesn't it doesn't feel like fire It's too much way way way too much white If you want to get that hot source make the runes white Then edge them in that yellow or put a little dark line beside them And then have this go yellow orange and orange and up to red black Right and make sure you smooth stuff like that out because that's a hard transition there now As far as the actual glow on him goes Um, yeah, that I think is pretty good. I'm just curious as to why This is red and these aren't like you jumped colors here. Hold on. Let me go back to this one This was what I'm saying Like I don't get what this coloration is Doing here Um, I like all the light on the skin. I think that actually looks rather nice I think you captured that well. I think it fades. Well the shadow on the back side is is nice and strong That's good Um, I would cast even this part side here like in a little more shadow So I think overall that's good. I just don't know why this is pink I'm not sure if you're trying to reflect red flame here But that's not actually what would be happening. Like this is all just a light source and it should all be like this So the gold thing Like looking at him. Are you mimicking something in the picture? No, because like here again, you can see it's just this is lit Right and sort of this is not um See, I don't know what's going on there But other than that, yeah, I think it's good got nice blue sort of weak lighting on this side This looks real orange. Yeah, I think I think your your flesh work is really really strong I think you did a very admirable job of capturing that there Um, I would have a little bit of weaker light coming out to here and here on the edge of his face You got a little bit there I guess on his face a little bit more out to here like capturing on some teeth Here on this side glinting off of this metal just that kind of stuff You want to pop those out just a little bit like have a little bit more of that light traveling that just very weak reflection OSL is really really really hard because It is the most complicated thing you paint lots of paint people when they start painting. They're like, oh, I'm just going to do some OSL It's really hard. You're trying to recreate One of the most complicated effects you can because we all understand subconsciously how light works and can easily spot it when it's wrong Like your brain just has a subconscious bias To it and we'll notice when things are off So There you go, but overall. Yeah, cool. I think you did a great job Especially on that like that right side of him you captured that reflection really really really well All right Jamie Lannister I I read through this earlier. So but he's got a lot of questions and I understand why the that's like that so Why we have the big bass all right, so Let's see if I can get some closer shots here. Why are my arrows not working? Apparently I cannot scroll through your post So we're gonna have to do this the annoying way Okay, so you have the black and white photo, but this is a good example Right, like notice his skin is all the same color without contrast Stuff like that like the pants all the same all this is just gray So, you know, you want to watch stuff like that, right? Like you've got the photo there Okay, so let's just look at him when we're doing stuff like dirt lines I know some of that's work in progress You want that to be a smoother transition As far as textures go um I need like I would you need more actual texture Like right now we're just it's not I'm not capturing any of that texture One of the other problems you have is that your finish is still very satin even going into glossy at some point Oh now all of a sudden I get arrows. Okay, fine And you want to make sure that gets nice and flattened out like here I can see these light reflections. This is if if he's got that heavy texture you want Then it's not satin. It's wool like, you know, it's sort of like jamie at least from my reference in the show He's often dirty when he's wounded there, you know, everything in that world is just dirty muddy awful And only like Daenerys gets to walk around Unsullied Get it. Okay. Anyway, everybody else from from westeros just looks like they rolled around in the mud for five days Um, and they haven't seen a bath ever so the Like my point being is that if you're if you're gonna work with those kind of textures You want to look into things like hashing and scratching and what is the texture of wool Versus the texture of leather and really capturing that stuff in there And then you want to make sure it's very very matte because all of those things would not be highly reflective Especially when they've been out and in the elements for a long period of time And you're you're sort of what you're trying to sell me here with this big piece Is that he's alone in the wilderness? No problem. Um, you can do that on a smaller base I like I would highly and strongly recommend you to stay away from Bases of this size. Um, one of the ways you can sell it is a background a background You know painting a background is a good way to go Um, but just having the ground be kind of flat around him You could shrink this by about 50 and still communicate the same thing Okay Um and still communicate sort of the emptiness to it Um, but nonetheless, I I get what you're going for and if he is out here in the wilderness like that then He's going to be quite dirty So, you know when you have like like the watermark on the cloak where mud has come up It needs to be like repeatedly soaked in because this cloak has fallen in water and then dried and fallen and dried And so you want to work in like these thin glazes of Color that have slowly come down and soaked up and so the bottom is almost, you know Black brown and it gets lighter as it travels up the cloak because less and less of it has seeped in over time So that's what I would say but uh overall like I love that you're doing the diorama piece I love that you're telling a story. It's uh, it's great stuff. I think it does communicate that So I think your color choices are nice because you went all muted. You didn't go anything super bright I support that fully Excellent choice there. He doesn't feel like he's you know, high born like he's jamie in the gold armor or whatever, right? he's He's you know dirty and alone in the wilderness. I think you captured that well, so All right. Well done, Greg All right So hive tyrant First submission here spent a lot of time on this one. There's also a first time using a lightbox Don't try that right hoping so help you take your pain to the next level. Well, I hope so too, man And I'm glad you posted. So let's go cycle through the pictures here Okay, so my biggest advice for you is going to come out in this picture This will sum up most of everything I would say as far as color goes. I've got no issue with any of that I understand you're probably painting to a specific Hive scheme and I think the colors work fine So I think that's all good Work looks clean. Um, so good, uh, which is really a which is a A strong testament on models like this because they got a bunch of different nonsense going on And these like those those wings with those bones in the middle are really annoying to paint. So, um, well done Now It's all variation Okay, that's the answer. It's all tonal and and text and sort of texture variation So the wings are too flat. What I mean by that is they're all just sort of this cream color We have very little variation. You got a tiny amount down here near the edge and that's about it I need to see a lot more in there big leathery bat wings Okay I hope this doesn't return any inappropriate search Okay So like, yeah, this would be good. And once again, you can't see it because it's under my stupid head Okay So you can see how there's all this variation in the wing see this texture and this scratching I really hate that google moved the image to the side. Why why google? Why do you just change things? It's like they hire people who just have no other job like to change things Things that were perfectly fine. Okay So you can see how these have all this texture and this variation from like dark up to very light That's the kind of stuff you want to try to capture in there, right? Um So here Right is another good example where you can see the like veins and stuff through it So you can you can vary by light you can vary by Uh texture any of those kinds of things But like I need more where the wing is stretched and thin here in the middle It should generally be lighter getting darker toward the part where the skin is more condensed On the hive carapace things like hashed texture where you're just taking a very sharp thin brush and going In successively lighter grays here toward the edge will add a lot of life to like to to tear in a carapace Um, so I think it's just you know continuing to work as to Bringing up your tonal variation finally in the red you've got some good variation in there You could push that farther, especially with some brighter highlights I think would be the way to go um, you can see my previous comments about you know highlighting red where you can You can use a very vibrant red or something like that or you could paint a little ivory and then just glaze it back down with the actual red color Something like that, but overall I think this is really good work. I like all the colors using I think it's just a matter of of increasing that tonal variation and you're good to go All right All right, so let's keep going Damien With some blood for the blood god finished up as slaughter priest use some of the gray skin painted tutorial Uh feedback on the color scheme and tips regarding painting rivers of blood on bases. Sure okay, so With the skin, I mean the main element there is we need some more tonal variation If you if you look in the tutorial You'll see how I talk about creating different shadows and stuff using purples and darker grays and things like that to create Different colors in there. So I think that's mainly where your challenge lies because the skin is a little flat um now as to The color scheme. I mean, it's fine. I think it works just fine There's not much on him to be honest. So if the skin works, then he basically works Uh, so yeah, I mean you don't have anything clashing or anything like that So I think for the most part you're good with the bones Again, go watch the video that's linked because I talk about bone transition in there some And like the bone needs more tonal variation Uh, same with the metals. I would say so again also in the linked video Uh now as to rivers of blood. Um, yeah, I mean in general There's lots of ways to go about it in general If you're gonna do like you want to have something that's really earth And then you want to do either a resin pour and use blood for the blood god over top Um, that's a good way to do it or use some uh liquid text gloss gel medium Um, there's gloss gel uh to then like create actual river You know sort of waves and stuff in there something like that There's a lot of different ways you can go about it But you need more to it like it doesn't look like you're standing in river blood right now It kind of looks like you're standing in just red um So you want to make sure that you've got a distinction in elements there like put down some texture Some piece of cork and then build around it with some grit and sand and stuff So it doesn't just look like a piece of cork never just use cork It always needs to be just you're using cork to build mass and then you're building on top of it And then put the blood around it. Um, I like using a deep crimson Resin pour which will be transparent and quite light color And then you take some blood for the blood god and you just lay down a layer Over the top of that and that's a good way to do a river of blood. So, um It's what I did for my dark oath war queen. So Uh, yeah, that would be my advice overall though very cool. I like him with gray skin I think it looks really nice. So I think you got a great idea there Okay So Sergei uh echo from the mystic, uh battles pantheon Do wanted to do some translucent cloth And uh, he wanted to paint white tattoos But not sure how to do tattoos. They're lighting the skin. Well, it's very very hard is the answer Okay, so the answer on the skin is tonal variation I spent some time looking at this one earlier because it was a fascinating piece to match the art You've got good reflections in the light here, but her skin doesn't vary enough. Let's go to the source artwork. Okay So notice how the artist has lit her from from basically over her left shoulder, right? The light is back here somewhere behind her And what's happened then is the artist has created this really strong light line here on the edge Of her and on her face, right in here But look at how dark he's taken some of these elements here Right these like dark purple blue tones that are in here in the shadows. Okay Down here you can really see where he's playing with the light here. I mean like if you look at her feet This is an amazingly strong shadow, right? So that's number one We need to we need to increase that similar variation on the skin, right? Like we're getting the shadow that this light you have overhead of her is casting But look at her foot here and her foot here Compared to this Okay, that's where you see the strong difference in light. All right now As to Like the translucent cloth works well enough. No issues there Um, you could you could do some some more soft glazing just to get it even Now as to the white tattoos again because he put so much of her in shadow Like look at how little of her is actually lit in normal skin tones. This is all very very blue Right. This is very blue purple skin. So he's actually made the skin extremely dark And that's how he's using these light tattoos because he made the skin completely in shadowed Imagine like in your mind turn her around. So we're looking at her from her left side Where this is the amount of light and think about how much these tattoos are showing The answer is almost not at all. You can tell because look where the light line here meets the tattoo. It disappears Right So the artist has tricked you Because you saw this and you said normal skin and then you painted normal skin, but it's not It's not at all, right? It's very very dark blue purple skin It that's incredibly in shadowed, right? And then he came in and against the dark of that skin He used and this isn't actually white. It's a very pale flesh color But he's used a very pale Caucasian skin tone to create these tattoos So the answer is if you wanted to do them, you'd have to darken the skin considerably. Otherwise, it's just not gonna look Like it fits much Lighter color tattoos in general are tough unless the skin tone itself is very dark And even then it's still challenging But you could try here you would want to use a very pale flesh tone And then you would want to glaze your mid-tone flesh tone back over it. So That's my best answer. I can give you if you don't want to go in and like really really redo a lot of the shadows and set her in a very cold tone Okay, Juan Francisco Gonzalez Hidalgo greatest name in the pmp bringing us his first three all contrast marines uh, yeah, I've been following these and seeing these on uh on You know the the socials as it were and I think these are looking great, man For for all contrast work and then with the highlights and stuff. I think these look absolutely fantabulous It's a great example of what contrast can achieve Um, my biggest advice for you is be careful on some of your edges Like the thing that leaps out to me the most is stuff like here On the shoulder lines where that's kind of rough Right. So going back in with the original contrast color and neatening those lines like this one's pretty good These two look a little more rough. I think is what I would recommend Uh, but overall, I mean, you know for what you're aiming at here. I think you were very successful Uh, I think the the white scar guy here if that's what that dude is. I think that's what this guy is supposed to be Is that right? I don't know I think he could probably have a little more shadow. So maybe a little of the like What is it? Um Like that space wolf gray is a really weak Blue black shadow You could very lightly like maybe mix that and some contrast medium like 50 50 And just kind of glaze a little more of that around here on like the shoulders and stuff like that Could be a way to pick some of that out. But overall, I think these guys came out wonderfully Uh Their eyepieces look really good. The armor plates have really nice transitions. It's great This is a perfect example of what you can accomplish with contrast paints. They look wonderful Proud members of their legions all and you've Frankly, you can stop you've already painted the best one. Your imperial fist is done So I don't really know what the need is to go any farther. I mean, you've already got the best one done. So there you go All right next up philip engel Uh looking for more improvement on skin tones that look alive Well, the answer my friend is tonal variation. That's right It's I'll if you took a drink every time I said that in a video You would be dead of alcohol poisoning by the time we got to the end Um, but nonetheless, it is the answer, um, you know, and that's sort of true around everything here like the steel the red the copper like we need more variation the tones but To like I'll give you we'll draw it out and I'll try to be very specific here with what I'm saying in like his face So like you need two things when I say tonal variation. I don't just mean in Contrast in in brightness, although that's part of it, you know Having like the top sides of his his like I don't have a I don't have a snout But the top sides of his snout here popped out Uh and here in his ears and then darker contrasts here, you know working in Uh a deeper color like an African shadow or a black leather or something like that like a purplish tone Into the deeper colors of the skin and then working some reds in between to transition between uh between the two In general human beings recognize red in skin as life. It's blood. It's just what we recognize Like there is a built-in subconscious Thing to that. That's why vampires even though they're like full of blood Because they drink blood are always drawn and painted as being extremely like pale because they're death Right there. They don't have life in them Um and so to to represent that artist classically turn them into this pale Gray white purple that's devoid of the red that we see as life, right? um So working those kind of tones in is how you'll you'll step up the the The sort of living feel of them, but overall, I mean this is a good And by the way kudos for painting a doom flare like my goodness, uh, this is not an off-scene model So i'm i'm digging it. Um, but you know, it's it's well painted your little touches of osl and stuff are good I like all those um the colors and paints are all cleanly applied. So you you've got a nice you've got some nice work here I think your your next step is just to increase that that contrast in several different ways all right debon uh lord of plagues, uh, all right, so He said the photos are struggling to capture the contrast Um, yeah, I mean well first of all it sounds like you've got too much like I read your description here. It sounds like, um Your you've got too much direct light on them like you don't want that much direct light like you're blowing it out You'll need to adjust your camera brightness down Because you're you're over flooding the aperture with light um, but that being said I think that Although in reality those colors might be there. They're not there enough Like this does need to run down into a deeper and we'll we'll go to the one Yeah, like on the painting desk here Like this is your painting desk and even though it's indirect light like yeah, that just needs to be darker Like we want to run more contrast. My advice to you is go look at people like david soper And and in fact here, we'll just do it together. Shall we? david soper nervel all right Okay, nope. Once again. Can't see it. You'll find a better way to do this Okay, so this is in this uh You know, this is like this green No, let's go to the closer up one. This is in sort of a green yellow hue But notice that there's actual black that shows here like he's got this navy blue It's actually like a navy blue color. He's using but Notice how dark he takes that down right like look at how deep these shadows are especially near the lower parts of him Right up to that That's the level of contrast like that's where you want to run if you're if you're trying to get up to that that full fledged contrast there, okay So that's what I would say Um Whereas here. Yes, you're making that transition But it's not it's not going as far as it could the other thing I would say is you can pop it out by with these pits and stuff in the armor Make sure you do something with these don't just let them be darker Put like you have this weathering and stuff But you've you've managed to not weather all the parts that I would expect to be weathered on the axe What I mean by that is like these pits are rust holes where where weathering has Pitted away the metal These should be the homes of orange rust Right out here is still metal so like You need to invert on the axe This should be the part that's brown Black metal maybe tiny bits of orange these should be brown and orange really heavily pitted and stuff like that And you know you can use the orange on the lower parts to kind of cheat and make that your edge highlight almost there Um, so yeah, just when you think about when you think about how this armor is weathering These are pits that are happening because of weather and wear and tear and rust So like you want to turn these brown have some streaking coming out of them stuff like that So I hope that helps Devin, but overall I mean it's it's good. You've got the right colors down I like your transition. We just need to again go farther things like your horns here are really well executed on Running this transition is really nice classic nervel light to dark Looks good that I really dig Okay, alan thomas Uh, basically what he's looking at is is feedback on texture. I won't read it all out Um, but let's let's talk about feather texture Okay, so All in all alan, I think it's good. I mean, you know, you were kind of wondering whether or not sells and my answer is Yeah, I think it sells just fine um I think you could you know, like if you want to do some Different things you could work in little colored stripes and stuff in there where he's treated the feathers because clearly he's built That you already have like the white stripes Ha ha But you could uh, you know, you could You could have some other colors in there like you could work a subtle blue in there Because you got some touches of blues and stuff in this so you can actually have like some blue stripes worked in where he's You know, he's painted or treated the feathers. They're not he's not a real bird So, you know, he made this little costume for himself Uh, he can he can put colors on it if he wants to Uh, because you've got these blues here It could be a nice way to bring it out and that would also help vary it up But I think your slashes and your hashes are good. Um, yeah, I mean, I think overall it sells It's actually not at all what I would what I would say is the challenge. Um You know with the feathers you got a nice strong central line somebody told me what the name of that is once and I don't remember But there we go. You get this good. Whatever this little center bone thing is or cartilage piece. I should say Um, your hashes are nice and varied You've got lots of different visible texture in them. I think that works Now as to the leather itself one of the ways you could distinguish that is more random stippling and scratching You've got some good scratch and stuff in there You could go farther with some actual stippling effort and like kind of Jamming it around to really vary that out You could also work in subtle brown tones not like don't think Like oh, I'm going to get out this color brown and I'm going to go nuts. That's not what I'm saying Right. I'm talking about like you're going to get out a black brown You're going to very softly glaze in some of those deeper browns like a rinox eye type thing or something Right where you're just subtly working that color in um That can be a a good way to just kind of Like if the wings have a slight blue tone and the leather has a slight brown tone Even if that's extremely minimal it will still read But overall I think this guy looks fantastic Um, I would say you've got you know tonal variation on the skin as usual is very not as usual I just mean that's a very common piece of feedback I give Uh, you know just some more some more highlight and transition on the skin I think would be good, but overall I like his skin tone I just need to see a little more color and and variation in there, but yeah looks good Okay, Jim Phillips about the 30th mini that he started the closest to finishing Hey, you should start finishing them take them all to being done Uh, there's a few bits left like the back and the handle the axe to do Do you have any videos on painting chains and chainmail? I do not but I I mean it's I'll I'll mark it down for video the short answers is not that much different from metal You treat it as one big volume and just make sure everything's you know sort of edged And then he says like should black lining should you be black lining everything to tidy it up? Yes, probably Because you want nice dark areas just to separate all these things right like all these things need to be separated And well defined. I think your skin tone variation here is really nice This is like I see lots of reds and purples and highlights So I think that's looking really good the metals are looking good Yeah, I mean I think just really separating the elements and making sure we've got nice crisp highlights on them Is is where you want to go next To be completely honest, but yeah, like you can see it around you want to make sure like the mouth A lot of this isn't necessarily all just black lighting. It's adding the the deepest shadows, right? So you don't necessarily have to trace a black line you could take like just a dark Blue black and push it up against here Right, and then that's how I often achieve my contrast between elements is I just I manually push a shadow Into the area that separates everything right and then sometimes I'll come back in where you don't have enough room to do that And we'll just black line like around this thing or the hand of the axe or something And you also don't want to truly use black in most cases. That's it's too strong. You want to use like A brown black or a blue black or something like that, you know something. It's a little softer But good stuff great work on the skin okay Jared Happy with the current point in this model, but it'll come back to it when the rest of the warband is done Can you list a few points you see to adjust or tidy up? Okay, sure um sure Well, it's the only picture we have so So I'll I'll stick just to this. Um, the gold needs some work. It's uh pretty flat still Like that is to say especially in things like separating between all these elements of the fan should have a dark line in it All these recessed things should have a dark line in it, right? Like so gets yourself some dark brown or black ink and give me some nice separation points in there Something like what you did with the gold bird down here. Same thing kind of with all the elements. Um Like they need a little bit more That it feels kind of smoothly airbrushed right now, right and like I can still see the speckling from it So like some actual just glazes to tidy up over and then like actually really strongly separating the various elements of the fold You got it nice up here for whatever reason this this one's stuck really nice. So I like that um But like having a little bit more separation there and kind of around these things kind of what we were discussing last time I think would be good My actual tidy up step for you would be mainly in the tufts of hair around our cypher lord here That is to say, um The Do more work picking out individual lines like follow these hairs and give me some more individual texture In this because right now it's just kind of a purpley pink mass and there's not really much uh To to separate it there. So like actually give me go in with a lighter color and draw me some thin lines Uh to and and you know same or a dark color and then you know really draw down the the dark separations But some thin hashes, you know following the actual texture of the thing there. I think is what you want to do. Okay all right But overall cool. I like the color scheme. It's very zinchi. It works All right, david vestiburg worked a lot on increasing contrast this many Uh, we're looking at so basically saying the red isn't showing in the picture Which is a problem of photos in general But it also means that there's just not enough contrast if only under the bright light doesn't show the contrast You need more contrast I mean, it's that that simple answer like hold it. It shouldn't just show under one type of light So like if it if you have to get it directly under your painting light to really see it Then you need to go farther because you should be able to walk around your house and just hold it under any random light You have and it should still show more or less, right? And my guess is and here's the test do what I did earlier Take a picture of this and turn it to black and white and my guess is it's going to look mostly gray okay, so I can see where you're pushing keep pushing like you need to work some dark browns or purples or brown blacks into their Uh, you know into the into the shadows here. Let's actually go into the photo Um, you know up in here and in here And under this knee, you know on the sides of his head those kinds of things are what you want to what you want to push And then with the highlights Go in with either and as I you know kind of the same thing I said earlier with the edging the edge highlight question either Either you know go with some ivory and then red glaze over the top so you get an ultra ultra intense red or Uh, you can use like something that is red orange and really really really strong And just do a couple layers of it to really build that up But the real key with red is all the red game is all in the shadows Right, it's all in making the the soft shuttle subtle deep shadows So that's where your contrast needs to live here. You need to push more into the low tones And that part by the way isn't going to get washed out on camera The the red to orange and stuff cameras will wash that out. It is just what happened some Okay, so like some of this probably does show is more orange and more bright in reality I have no doubt. I don't think you're lying to me because I've had that happen a hundred times in photos Just it's the nature of like how digital things How digital cameras capture that red orange part of the spectrum It washes it out but You need to push the darker contrast That will make the brighter part pop Because you can't rely on just the red to red orange again turn the thing black and white. It'll look mostly gray Okay, so there you go. Hope that helps David All right, finally t-bo working on his piece for an upcoming painting comp first try to diorama Uh, mainly looking for compositional feedback. Okay Uh, a couple quick painting notes on just stuff that grabs me that'll just easy touch up stuff um some more darker shades on this side of the the The miniature because this is casting a light which you've nicely captured here everywhere But then this is still the same brightness. So this shouldn't be glowing this much if this isn't darker. There's too much ambient light um Yeah, I think that's probably make sure the base connection to the actual diorama You've built is nice and solid like I can see a crack line there. So just make sure that's smooth over the top Uh Other than that composition wise. I think it's I think it's fine. Um This is satiny So be careful of that um The I would say some of the smoke should get darker black But I think that overall It's good. I'm not sure that I'm drawn to him and that's the challenge Because this is really bright and it's kind of drawing my attention away And there's not enough over on this side of the diorama to draw me. So like if we split it You know down the middle most of the weight is over on this side as far as light and sort of elements of the piece Um, so like some more mushrooms that are bright red yellow over here could help um Maybe doing something up by him like I'm trying to think of what would kick it up Maybe really popping this bottle out to be very bright yellow would help Maybe pop in his little bug friend out Some bright dots on his cap might help Uh, you know just stuff like that. I'm thinking of that'll like that'll help us really focus our attention here I think weight on this side is is your biggest challenge if there were like two squags over here It would feel more balanced Right, that's part of the challenge right now is that it's the piece is really really weighted this way Um all your light and visual interest is happening over here, too So Yeah, I think that's just part of one of the challenges I almost wonder If this wasn't rotated around some like if the whole piece if this guy wasn't slid around maybe like 10 degrees that way And this guy was pointed more and like that. So the piece was more like Rotated around like actually the pieces if that wouldn't help balance it some That's that about I don't know just some thoughts overall. I think it's a really really cool piece I like your lighting. I like the osl. I think that all sells I think all of the transitions on everything look good. I like his is like night blue robes I think those look really well I think the shading and work on his like chin and nose piece look really good The bottle looks good all that looks great. So I think that's probably your your biggest challenge I hope a couple of those things help but good stuff. Tebow and gotta tell us how you did But all right, that brings us to the end So as always, uh, I hope this was all helpful if uh, like I said, if you want to join us on your hobby journey feel free to click the link below and uh, and And uh, you have to answer the questions quick note There will be three questions if you click to join you must answer all of them If you do not you don't get in that's how it works I don't care how real of a human being you look like you either answer all three questions or you don't get the accept That is a hard and fast rule if you answer two of the questions, you don't get in if you answer one You don't get in three questions three answers It's the minimalist bar to clear but you gotta clear it So at any rate, thank you all to everybody who submitted truly awesome work this this month. This is great I I love doing this every month. It's so amazing So thank you all for submitting. I hope to see more submissions next month But as always I very much appreciate you watching. I appreciate everybody who's in here Um, I do this once a month But the heroes of this community are all the people who are sharing feedback Answering on posts being positive. This community is all about positivity about constructive criticism and helping people take their next step So if you see as you're going through your day The chance to respond to a question to give somebody a shout out to drop a like something like that You can do some great work and make somebody's day better with such a minimal effort So let's all join together share in this wonderful hobby We all have and continue spreading the the positive hobby vibes and taking our next step together But as always I very much appreciate you watching this one and we'll see you next time Bye. Bye