Those triangles on Grisban are a mess on my mini. I thought about freehand-painting them but I fear that the irregular sculp will sabotage my efforts. The same goes for the middle-section of his belly, which are just strait lines on my mini.

Did you freehand-paint over them or did you file them away before even starting with painting this model.

In case you did the former, how to avoid the problem that the color rather sticks to the sculpted patterns than to your freehand-forms?

btw. awsome paint-job, I check this thread regularly to see how you did the things I had problems with and so far you always surprised me. Although I still don't really like high-contrast paint-jobs, yours are the best and least cartoony I've seen so far.

how much to do mines ?

Those triangles on Grisban are a mess on my mini. I thought about freehand-painting them but I fear that the irregular sculp will sabotage my efforts. The same goes for the middle-section of his belly, which are just strait lines on my mini.

Did you freehand-paint over them or did you file them away before even starting with painting this model.

In case you did the former, how to avoid the problem that the color rather sticks to the sculpted patterns than to your freehand-forms?

btw. awsome paint-job, I check this thread regularly to see how you did the things I had problems with and so far you always surprised me. Although I still don't really like high-contrast paint-jobs, yours are the best and least cartoony I've seen so far.

Hey thanks, the triangles were not that bad on this sculpt although yeah some of the detail can be in very bad shape on some of these pieces. I paint over anything that is awkward, on pieces like this that are for my own games and collection and SO small I don't worry about it too much if it's odd shaped or disfigured in the cast. I just paint over it and "fool the eye" with fancy highlights and shading. A good example on Grisban would be his belly where that linework is. That detail was barely there on the cast so I just painted it all in while kinda following the barely perceptible lines. In the end you wouldn't know.

In regards to filing, all I do with these is just trim away the mold lines as best as I can with a super sharp xacto. Now, for my professional commissions I take as much time as I need to make sure the surfaces are free of defects even if that means resculpting pieces entirely. With these personal minis...I don't want to spend too much time on them in the prep phase, (or painting phase for that matter) I just draw the line between what I can live with personally and what I'd really feel the need to fix. But about the filing, with something like this if I were to fix it I would just fill it all in with epoxy and smooth it down flush then paint over that. This kind of plastic that FFG uses doesn't really file that well but it's nothing that filling in the detail with putty wouldn't cover up.

how much to do mines ?

Hey, thanks for the question! These took me about 8 to 10 hours to paint, gosh I don't think I could realistically charge you a price that would make you and I happy though. Because these are just little descent minis and not full scale high quality collectibles that I normally paint, but it still would take me as much time...man that's tricky. 8 to 10 hours is still 8 to 10 hours for me and I'd have to charge accordingly which, I personally think would be too much for a little mini like this. Thank you though

As expected your work on Grisban looks astounding Darkstar! The details are unmatched. May I ask what type and brand of brushes you use for the finest details? I assume the tiniest details like your work on the eyes are made with a needle or such?

Inspired I obtained the H&S Infinity CR airbrush, a wide range of Vallego Model Air and Game Air and accessoires in recent weeks. As a complete newbie I started airbrushing and painting the larger monsters first to get the hang of it. Primed, basecoated, blended colors and highlighted/shaded most of them. Next up are the fine details. Simultaneously I started on painting Avric with the character sheet and rulebook for reference at one side and your finished work on Avric on the monitor at the other side.

Thanks for sharing your work Darkstar! Still looking forward to see your work on a Descent miniature appear on your Youtube-channel one day!

I finished up Jain Fairwood before the weekend, here she is

Next in line is Leoric of the Book.

As expected your work on Grisban looks astounding Darkstar! The details are unmatched. May I ask what type and brand of brushes you use for the finest details? I assume the tiniest details like your work on the eyes are made with a needle or such?

Inspired I obtained the H&S Infinity CR airbrush, a wide range of Vallego Model Air and Game Air and accessoires in recent weeks. As a complete newbie I started airbrushing and painting the larger monsters first to get the hang of it. Primed, basecoated, blended colors and highlighted/shaded most of them. Next up are the fine details. Simultaneously I started on painting Avric with the character sheet and rulebook for reference at one side and your finished work on Avric on the monitor at the other side.

Thanks for sharing your work Darkstar! Still looking forward to see your work on a Descent miniature appear on your Youtube-channel one day!

Hey, thank you! I'm glad I could inspire you to get busy airbrushing and painting I love that airbrush by the way, I'll probably use it just as you did when I get to the monsters, especially the bigger pieces. Reference is great to have on hand while painting, that's a big bonus to painting these Descent minis, we've got artist's renditions to paint by!

To answer your question about brushes, I only use Winsor and Newton Series 7 brushes when I paint, I'm just used to them after 10 plus years of practically daily use. For the tiniest details I pick them out with a W&N series 7 Miniature size 0. They taper down to a single hair. I usually don't paint with the Miniature series 7 as the normal size 0 is plenty fine, but for the tiniest of details I lean on it, otherwise it doesn't hold enough paint to be too helpful usually and I prefer the standard size.

These are the best descent minis I've seen! Have any more heroes or monsters done? We must see more! Keep up the awesome work

Awesome!!!!!!!

These are the best descent minis I've seen! Have any more heroes or monsters done? We must see more! Keep up the awesome work

Awesome!!!!!!!

Hey thanks you two I'm glad you're enjoying them!

To answer your question 455, I plan on painting ALL of the collection of figures from this game over time. I just picked up every expansion and hero and monster pack available last weekend and over time I will get around to painting it all up.

May take a year or two total but I will get there. I've got a birthday coming up in a couple of weeks and I've got the Lieutenants coming down as "gifts" to finish the collection, and as another 'gift' to myself I'll be picking up the newly released hero and monster box around the middle of the month from my FLGS. I'm stoked!

I'm painting these hero figures alphabetically in order, and since I just acquired so many new heroes, I had to start at Alys Raine from the Manor of Ravens set. I've almost got her done as of this evening and I should by rights have her posted up here tomorrow in a finished state. Then it's on to the next!

Next year (just around the corner already can you believe it!) my plan is to paint the monsters and lieutenants, one per week and put up a weekly video on my youtube channel showing how I went about painting these. I'll be leaning on painting those with my airbrush, especially the larger monsters so if you guys have an interest in watching others paint or want to pick up a pointer or two from me as I go, then watch this space I'm the kind of guy who gets stuck in to multi-year long mega projects and sees them through, so this will be a fun ride over the long haul and I'll end up with a ton of content for Descent fans (and miniature fans) on my channel over time, which it sorely needs anyway.

Can I interrupt your alphabet and request you do Roganna the Shade from The Trollfens next?

Next year (just around the corner already can you believe it!) my plan is to paint the monsters and lieutenants, one per week and put up a weekly video on my youtube channel showing how I went about painting these. I'll be leaning on painting those with my airbrush, especially the larger monsters so if you guys have an interest in watching others paint or want to pick up a pointer or two from me as I go, then watch this space I'm the kind of guy who gets stuck in to multi-year long mega projects and sees them through, so this will be a fun ride over the long haul and I'll end up with a ton of content for Descent fans (and miniature fans) on my channel over time, which it sorely needs anyway.

Hurray! Can't wait to see those Darkstar!

Having all Descent 2 stuff and awaiting the latest Hero & Monster Collections, I have an entire line up of miniatures to paint in upcoming months... Progress has halted a bit, but seeing your fantastic results is the hint to reserve plenty of time on a weekly basis for this grand project.

Well I was looking forward to Leoric, but whatever.

Keep up the good work and don't get stressed about it

Alys Raine is done. Resculpted her face and hair a bit, the mini was a little lackluster for such sweet character art. Not much, just enough to fill out the volume of her hair and balance out her features more. The mini I had was very...sallow and narrow.

Can I interrupt your alphabet and request you do Roganna the Shade from The Trollfens next?

I'm sorry to let you down man but I'm going to carry on alphabetically, no offense intended, I'd just rather tackle this project in my certain approach since I paint miniatures for a living and it's very rare that I get to paint minis for myself and my own enjoyment. Rare as in it never happens, I'm super busy and had to carve out two hours a day to paint for myself by literally waking up two hours earlier. Which is now 4:30 am!

Next year (just around the corner already can you believe it!) my plan is to paint the monsters and lieutenants, one per week and put up a weekly video on my youtube channel showing how I went about painting these. I'll be leaning on painting those with my airbrush, especially the larger monsters so if you guys have an interest in watching others paint or want to pick up a pointer or two from me as I go, then watch this space I'm the kind of guy who gets stuck in to multi-year long mega projects and sees them through, so this will be a fun ride over the long haul and I'll end up with a ton of content for Descent fans (and miniature fans) on my channel over time, which it sorely needs anyway.

Hurray! Can't wait to see those Darkstar!

Having all Descent 2 stuff and awaiting the latest Hero & Monster Collections, I have an entire line up of miniatures to paint in upcoming months... Progress has halted a bit, but seeing your fantastic results is the hint to reserve plenty of time on a weekly basis for this grand project.

There's so many miniatures in this line that running out of steam is an understandable reality! I'm glad I can serve as an inspiration to you.

Well I was looking forward to Leoric, but whatever.

Keep up the good work and don't get stressed about it

I got Leoric's face and hands done at least so when I get around to him I've got a headstart. Painting minis is my stress release haha. I get something good on Netflix to listen to and just tune out the world...only stress I have is when the shows I watch start to run out of seasons! Almost to the end of Warehouse 13 and I'll miss that corny show when it's run out

the mini was a little lackluster for such sweet character art. Not much, just enough to fill out the volume of her hair and balance out her features more. The mini I had was very...sallow and narrow.

Yeah it's a pity. Some hero miniatures of the expansions are a complete letdown from the base game quality wise. With the worst offender being the Shadow of Nerekhall minis (which is a shame, because it's an awsome expansion gameplay and mechanic wise) This is also true for some Hero&Monster packs (I think no. 1 and 4). I think it's really sad FFG doesn't want to do anything about it but oh well.

What did you use to resculpt them?

Awesome job (as always), darkstar! Alys and Avric look like they got their armour from the same outfitter.

You're work on Alys is really wonderfull (as always, and jaleaous as ever) but, as I thought, the minis is lacking of detail and is not so great, even with your work.

What did you use to resculpt them?

Hey thanks DaMaz, I use Magic Sculpt to do almost all of my conversions or touch ups on minis. This material is my preference over Green Stuff. For me at least, it's easier to use and has less of a learning curve...although it's still ridiculously challenging to sculpt anythign for me, definitely not my strong suit, but I still feel the need to modify minis from time to time, especially if the face is going to let the mini down once it's painted.

Awesome job (as always), darkstar! Alys and Avric look like they got their armour from the same outfitter.

Hey thank you JSM, indeed they must be getting thier kit from the same stall in Ahrynn!

You're work on Alys is really wonderfull (as always, and jaleaous as ever) but, as I thought, the minis is lacking of detail and is not so great, even with your work.

Thank you rugal, I appreciate it

Yeah some of the minis are quite nice actually but some of them, yeah, even a nice paintjob can't save them. I really like some of them like Corbin though, he's looks great and can't wait to paint that guy. Some of the monsters are pretty bad too but some of them are amazing like the new Giants. It's very 'hit and miss' and I'm definitely thinking about proxies for some of the minis that I don't like such as the Goblin Archers. I have lots of ideas about proxies...

Augur Grisom is done and here he is:

I love this little mini. He's just got so much expression and character in his expression. Such steely resolve! But by little mini I mean...these Descent minis are tiny and to top it all off he's a dwarf! I can only imagine my feelings about this scale by the time I get down to Tomble or Ravaella, the gnomes/halfling types...I may go mad by then. The upside being, that when I paint my 'normal' minis they seem like I'm painting on a mural...so I've got that going for me at least which is nice

Got to admit that Darkstars paint jobs are impressive but makes them even more impressive is the size of them compared to say Citadel/GW mini which are bigger (28 mm scale), am loving the 2 dwarfs as they are my favorite characters in the game I seen so far.

I want them ... all of them ...

Where do you live (mwahh haa haa haa haa)?

Got to admit that Darkstars paint jobs are impressive but makes them even more impressive is the size of them compared to say Citadel/GW mini which are bigger (28 mm scale), am loving the 2 dwarfs as they are my favorite characters in the game I seem so far.

Thank you! They are quite a bit smaller than what I usually paint that's for sure ! Looking forward to getting to paint the giants heh.

I want them ... all of them ...

Where do you live (mwahh haa haa haa haa)?

Hide your minis, hide your figures! Haha thank you for that

I want them ... all of them ...

Where do you live (mwahh haa haa haa haa)?

Had the same idea, but let him finish before finish him off and stealing all of thoses !

I want them ... all of them ...

Where do you live (mwahh haa haa haa haa)?

Had the same idea, but let him finish before finish him off and stealing all of thoses !

All right ... I suppose that gives us time to hire a private investigator ...

Hey darkstar,

sorry mis post, what i wanted to ask is how hard is it to create a face for these minis? the new tahila is missing lips

Absolutely wonderful work again! You sir are amazing and an inspiration.

Maybe a dwarf ranger next? Or a human champion with a large sword?