Golden Grey-a-thon 2009

Now this will come off as shooting myself in the face... But I have to get it off my chest.

So, this year's Games Day UK has come and gone and with it the mini-painting contest of mini-painting contests: Golden Demon UK.

Games Day/Golden Demon Chicago bullshit

I have a bunch of stuff coming up, as I have said, but I'm just going to post one quickie first to highlight what has recently happened at Games Day Chicago ('tis the season of fantastic minis again!).

Apparently three minis that were entered (Warhammer Single, WHFB Monster and Open) and subsequently won those categories, weren't entered by the painter of the miniatures, but by a collector who had bought them off the painter. To make matters worse, the painter seems to have been in on this.

It's stuff like this that practically makes me fume from the ears in a comical display of rage and hate. It's keyboard-banging inducing. It just is one step below bribing the judges. Why oh why do people continue doing this and think they won't be found out?

Dave Taylor puts it succinctly at his blog.

One of the minis concerned.

And it's not like the case of the well-meaning collector who entered one of Aña's minis a few years back. He did so in Aña's name at least. This seems like regular cheating.

On a totally different topic: I have finally gotten round to reading Xenology. I recently bought a mic as well and I am thinking of doing something slightly different as far as reviews are concerned. Essentially make it an audio review. And no, I am not Yahtzee or trying to be: I'll be speaking slower.

A note on photographing miniatures

As a little warm-up on my intended blogs on mini-painting, or more specifically, colour schemes and what they bring with them, here's a few points on how to photograph your lovely minis. Actually, it more concernes the inevitable digitalization of them.

1. For the love of God/Allah/the Brahmin/Khorne/whoever!: DON'T save as JPG. Why? Because JPGs compress file size by "mixing" adjacent colours to a mid-way approximation, and they get worse the higher the compression value.
I don't have to say why this is a bad idea as far as painstakingly painted minis are concerned. I have seen fantastic minis, blurred practically beyond recognition by JPG-formatting. Sad, really.

2. On that subject: I know CoolMiniorNot.com has a width limitation (as well as a size limit), but it has no length limit to submitted pics.
Use this to your advantage!
If you still have to show HUEG pictures of your free-hand, link in the artist's comments to a Photobucket account or similar, where such size-restrictions aren't imposed.

3. Use a neutral background for your minis. And have good lighting. Preferably day-light bulbs. Curse you EU for forbidding the sales of ordinary damn bulbs from next year! I have to stock up on these now!

4. Macro is your friend! Don't forget to turn this on when photographing minis. Not everybody has access to a fancy system camera (although I am looking at a Canon EOS D40 currently), but most compact cams have a macro function. My current even has a special "Best Pic"-mode for miniature photographing. That's luck!

That's all I can think of at the current. I will now go back to my lizards for a while. You can follow that progress over at my Twitter account.

The subtle art of miniature sculpture

You might not have realised it, but sculpture, especially miniature sculpture, is a very subtle art indeed. And it is very different from standard sculpturing. And I am here to tell you why. Okay, I do not have any kind of actual education on this subject. All I have is more than 10 years of miniature painting to fall back on.

Here's the thing:
When you sculpt a miniature that is meant to be cast in metal or plastic, packed up and sold unpainted, you must take two things into consideration, apart from making a kick-ass mini, obviously.

In a way, you could call me a pot-head

I have played Warhammer...-esque games for something uptowards ten years now and I have been painting scale miniatures (my fondest memory being getting my hands on an Airfix 1:72 scale Messerschmidt Me 262 Schwalbe at age 10) for many years more. I still have my first Spitfires and Me 109s lying around somewhere.
This means I have a very particular relationship with the paints involved in creating these little pieces of art. Strangely enough, I consider the glue more as a tool than helpful friends, as in the case with my paint pots and brushes.