Never be afraid to paint outside the lines

Tag: Raffaele Picca

Tribe Chief Morrow—finished

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I only made a few changes since the last workbench post, the most significant being the addition of a plinth. This was done by a friend of mine, and it came out great. Thanks!

I managed much better photos this time, which is kind of amazing since I never take good photos. I’m still kind of shocked by how well they came out. So I did something I never do, which is upload really high res pictures. You can see all the brushstrokes!

I also entered him into the painting competition at KublaCon, and was thrilled to take home best in show, despite some other very nice stuff in the case. Now I have a cool dragon trophy.

From the workbench: Tribe Chief Morrow, part 2

I’ve been having a ton of fun painting Tribe Chief Morrow. He paints up super quickly, so I only had time for a few sets of photos before he was finished. When I left off in part 1, I had just finished the skin and leathers. Next I tackled the metals.

Tribe Chief Morrow - tackling the metals

Tribe Chief Morrow - metals (left)

Tribe Chief Morrow - metals (right)

Tribe Chief Morrow - metals (back)

A lot of the takes on this miniature have extremely corroded metalwork, but for mine I wanted it nice and clean, to really show the beaten metalwork texture. I’m really happy with how it came out.

Tribe Chief Morrow - final WIP

At this point he’s pretty much finished. I want to clean up the hair around the breastplate a bit, and I need to obtain a base. Luckily on the second count I have a friend who makes marvelous wooden miniature bases, so I’m looking forward to what he comes up with. I’m still thinking about tweaking some things, so if you have any suggestions, please leave them in the comments!

From the workbench: Tribe Chief Morrow, part 1

Last weekend I received a nifty little package from Germany. Inside was Forged Monkey’s Tribe Chief Morrow bust, a sweet little gorilla bust sculpted by Raffaele Picca, who is a great sculptor in addition to being one of my favorite painters. The cast was amazingly clean, with only one small bubble and almost no mold lines. Cleanup took only ~15 minutes, and I have very high standards for cleaning a cast before I start painting. I was so excited I started painting at once.

Tribe Chief Morrow - starting with the face

This is the first mini I’ve primed black in a long time, but given the black gorilla skin and many metal areas, it seemed convenient. I started with the face, as that’s the most important thing to get right on any figure, but especially a bust. I always like to find relevant reference material before I start painting, and for this bust, I was inspired by this adorable baby gorilla.

Tribe Chief Morrow, step 2 (right)

I originally went with red for the leathers, but wasn’t happy with how it looked and switched to yellow. It still looks a bit odd, but I think that once the metals are painted it will fit much better, and provide a nice warmth contrasted with the black. Of course, this was when I started kicking myself for priming black, but a few coats of menoth white highlight provided a good base for the yellow.

Tribe Chief Morrow, step 2 (front)

Zebra-skin provides striking patterns, and seemed appropriate for a gorilla chieftain. The larger stripes are how most of the body looks, and the finer stripes underneath are from the zebra’s head. No Zebras were harmed in the production of this blog post.

Tribe Chief Morrow, step 2 (left)

This guy is incredibly fun and quick to paint. I highly recommend picking up a copy for yourself!

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