| Crazycavey | 04 Dec 2007 2:16 a.m. PST |
Hi All, Briefly I am trying my hand at sculpting miniatures, I thought it may be nice to document the steps I take from novice (1st ever mini sculpt) through to my current work… So if you would like to follow on the journey. Here's the link. dirtymac.co.uk/blog href="http://www.dirtymac.co.uk/blog/>LINK</a></p>
<p><a title="My Journey into the miniature" target="_blank" (My domain name is DirtyMac as I used to tech Apple mac problems for an ISP and this was my own in house tech page. So don't be put off by the word dirty…) I hope you enjoy… |
| SimonF | 04 Dec 2007 11:40 a.m. PST |
Looks like fun. Update frequently and this will be very interesting (for me) and also educational for you. A few bits of advice: Don't worry about using brown stuff right away. It's good for something that you need cured hard (like weapons to be cut/filed to shape) but you don't need to force yourself to use it – wait until you find yourself needing a hard-curing putty.
Draw your subjects before sculpting them. If you have a reference, copy it from a different angle or redraw it in the pose you're going to use. This forces you to learn the pose completely and brings to your attention any details that you may not be sure of in the design – you need to know these things in order to sculpt.
I don't mean to make negative comments, just firing off some random bits of advice in case they're helpful. If you post on here when you make updates, I'll be sure to check 'em out. |
| Crazycavey | 05 Dec 2007 2:57 a.m. PST |
Hi Simon.
Thanks for the tips, I shall get my charcoals out of the draw and do some sketches.
Critiques are welcome especially when they are constructive like yours was.
"What doesn't kill us makes us stronger".
And as its a learning curve I plan to learn more from my mistakes than I will from my successes.
I will keep the Journey updated on a regular basis (well as fast as my fingers can sculpt anyway.) |
 reeves lk  | 05 Dec 2007 1:54 p.m. PST |
You got guts. I would not even think of trying. Larry |
| Crazycavey | 27 Dec 2007 7:04 p.m. PST |
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| sekigahara | 28 Dec 2007 12:34 p.m. PST |
OY! I'm sculpting that snakewoman (the commisioned version) :-). Currently I'm a bit stuck over some details namely the scales on the tail, don't seem to get those to my satisfaction. Refreshing to see someone elses attempts at it.
Looking good for – what – your fifth sculpt?
Keep going! |
| Zephyr1 | 28 Dec 2007 3:54 p.m. PST |
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| greenfingers | 29 Dec 2007 5:12 p.m. PST |
Hey Gerald time for you to take a sculpting commision. I'm sure some would like to see copies of those in metal. You dont need to charge much just enough for beer money, or better still money for your misses stop her drinking ours. lol I'll drag you off to sgts Mess soon see Garry and see what we can do. The next process i think in your learning curve is to see moulds being made and cast. |
| Crazycavey | 29 Dec 2007 6:22 p.m. PST |
Sek – Thanks for the kind comments Alf, I saw the progress photo's of your snke womn. The Shape and Form with your piece is real nice it helps me guage how far off the mark I am by seeing a pro's work.
Concept art can be difficult to find so going to a winners section of a concept art competition seemed like a good idea ;-) It was a pleasant surprise to come across that page after I had started my snake woman. Yes I am up to the grand total of 5 finished pieces, but as I have mentioned to Greenfingers (my neighbour who has introduced me to sculpting miniatures a few months back) I believe their is 50,000 bad sculpts in everyone you just need to get rid of as many as possible before you can really earn some money. My work space has many a green corpse, severed hand, head and what not that just didn't make the grade so I'll continue to plod on and I reckon another 49,920 failures and I'll be their :-) But if I get some beer money on the way it would never hurt. Green – Yes its a deal Mike, but you realise once I see the mould making process you are giving me another reason to come over to your house for coffee or drinks, and i'll be picking your brains even more… lol Finally if your new to miniatures and would like to know how I did my scales I used tiny putty balls flattened them onto the body and graded it off so the next row of scales can sit on top. If I wasn't so keen to get onto my next piece I would have made the balls a little smaller again. I'll elaborate a little more on my blog on next months update. |
| SimonF | 29 Dec 2007 7:59 p.m. PST |
Just an idea for slightly quicker scales: you could use thin snakes of putty instead of individual balls, then press grooves in after they're stuck on to make the lumps that will be flattened into scales. Just a thought, haven't actually tried it out. :P About concept art: I have a bunch of drawings of characters in my sketchbook that I don't have the time to sculpt myself. If you're intereted, I could digitize them and you can see if there's anything there you'd like to try your hand at (it's all fantasy/sci fi type things). |
| Crazycavey | 30 Dec 2007 6:57 a.m. PST |
Hi Simon, yeh fine scan em and email them to me at gerald.evans@boltblue.com I have a look. |
| sekigahara | 30 Dec 2007 7:40 a.m. PST |
If you're doing commisions for beer money: Try 15 mm. I've just started some and the hourly wage is better even if the payment for each figure is considerably less. Because you can't get involved in to many fine details at that scale a 15 mm figure takes maybe 1/10 of a 28 mm figure to make in time and payment is usually between 1/4 and 1/6 of a 28 mm figure.
And you get the satisfaction of seeing your figure done and finished fast instead of fretting over it for ages. |
| SimonF | 30 Dec 2007 10:16 a.m. PST |
Here, I just put everything on Photobucket: link I hope something here inspires you. I'm interested to see what one of my drawings might look like if sculpted by someone else. Artistic license is welcome… |
| greenfingers | 02 Jan 2008 2:41 p.m. PST |
Caveys real problem here for commisions is that his historical knowledge is poor at best, so i've reccomended sticking to the sci fi fantasy market, because you cant fault the sculpts technically then. They can only be as good as the concept art. So thanks for posting that stuff Simon F, some pieces there look like they will really help him. From what i've seen it will not take long for him to be ready for commisions, I'd like to see some more attention paid to getting the proportions and animation sorted, again 'less is more' ie dont try to over dramatise the pose, keep it simple, the moulding process will be easier then. The detail and dressing the piece is really the 'easy' part, it just takes longer. One good thing about this sculptor is he's done this in bigger scales from a younger age and wants to learn and is paying attention to constructive critisism. It will not be long before he is snapped up by someone. And for you cavey, i've worked out the secret to being a good sculptor. You only need to work half a day. you do however have to work every day. you can even choose which half you work, the first 12 hours or the second. |
| Crazycavey | 22 Jan 2008 3:23 a.m. PST |
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| sekigahara | 23 Jan 2008 3:56 p.m. PST |
Hmmm, try using more light. Pics are a bit dark. I can't take pictures so look who's talking…;-) |
| Crazycavey | 14 Mar 2008 4:23 a.m. PST |
OK, i've worked out that sticking some paper over the flash is the trick to getting diffused light into macro shots so the Ogre pic's above have been re taken and re-linked above. So they should no longer be DARK. The other 2 have gone under the scalpel blade.So i'll up date them on my blog in due course. But I do have a new green if anyone wants to critique. [img]http://www.dirtymac.co.uk/images/Snow2.jpg[/img] picture
picture
picture Regards Gerald |
