Ranger with Chain

L has finished his Ranger - I think it took about 4 sessions (we paint in blocks of 2-4 hours at a stretch).

Here's the fig with some of the colour blocked in.

And here he is completed, all drybrush-work and washes done.

Nice detail. Good face and I like the highlighting on his pants.

Grey, Black and Yellow

Cream camisole (Plum), yellow poly satin blouse (Bliss), grey pinstripe vest (aka 'the boob vest') (Dots), black pleat front skirt with bow and pockets (Plum), black striped tights (The Bay), granny shoes (The Cobbler); black stone earrings and silver/black hinged bangle bracelet (both The Cobbler).

I got this blouse and its identical twin in cobalt blue about a month ago at one of those really chi-chi expensive boutiques - they are both size Large which is ridiculous, and just goes to prove how random sizing is - for only $15 each. Boo yah! I can always find a bargain.

I'm looking a little puffy in front, partly because this skirt has a goofy 1/2 bow smack dab in the middle, and partly because light-coloured satin shows everything. These tights are history - I blew both toes on them. Damn!

My office has decreed that April is "Denim Month" - oh, joy. It's bad enough that "office casual" has degenerated into grubby khakis and sloppy sweaters; must we also be subjected to horrid jeans and sweatshirts every day now? I dislike casual Fridays - I just don't feel professional at work unless I am wearing "work clothes". My casual denim looks on Friday are usually miles dressier than what most people wear. Ah well, this will be a challenge for me to see if I can do a whole month of work casual. Oy.

Mummy

Another entry in the Egytian theme:This was one of the first pieces I did using floor polish. Yes, floor polish. We add it to the paint (plus a bit of water) on a palette before applying it to the fig. It thins the paint down but suspends the colour evenly, whereas with just water, the pigment tends to settle which results in an uneven wash.

Base colour is laid on, then thin layers of paint are applied (making each successive layer lighter) to "lift" the colour and give depth. You can see this on the bandages and on his loincloth. As opposed to drybrushing (where most of the paint is wiped off the brush before you drag the brush across a high texture (see L's Elf for an example), the floor polish method gives you a bit more control with the paint as well.

L's Figures

Here are some of L's recent figs:This is Lolth - she's some sort of spider queen. Definitely evil.Gorilla Gladiator with Victim. Nasty end for the human gladiator. Good gore and blood!

An awesome giant! I like the rhino head he's using as armour, the patchwork leather pants and his creepy tongue hanging out. And yes, he does have 3 arms. Wouldn't want to run into him!

Elf mage. Superb detail work on the robes, both the highlighting on the blue and the coloured parts. The coloured bits are done by painting that area then dry-brushing over it with silver.

Painting

Usually, when people first see our figs, it's when they are all done - if they are interested, we show them our painting area in the den, where there are always a few pieces in progress.
L and I have been painting together since we first moved in together (about 12.5 years ago) - we started out on a little rickety desk that barely held all of our paints, brushes and other stuff. When we painted at the same time, it got pretty crowded.

A couple of years ago, we bought a big U-shaped desk for the computer & printer; we use one arm of the U to set up all of our painting equipment. It's a nice relaxing hobby - we put on some music and just sit and work on our figs. The cats visit us (they always want to sit on us, but their fur gets in the paint and they tend to move around & jostle us). Today, we listened to Leonard Cohen and The Cure. The hours pass pleasantly.These are our paints. They are a mix of Testors model paints, Partha Paints, Citadel Colour (Games Workshop) and Reaper Miniatures. Some of them are pretty old - we keep them from drying up by just using the colour from the lids and adding water when needed to thin them out a bit. There aren't many places in town to buy paints anymore, so we try to conserve what we've got.
The tubs of what looks like sand are our modelling materials: dirt, sand, grass, pebbles. All different shades and sizes. These are great when a piece doesn't have a very interesting base, or when working on a larger grouping on a big base. Equipment
From the top: Zap-A-Gap (best glue out there for glueing figs together), a pen (for scale), 2-ended blade for poking putty into tricky spots, Xacto knife for carving moulding flash off, 2 needle files (flat, triangle and round) for sanding down rough spots prior to primering, primer brush (the red one), and my brushes from biggest to smallest: a 2/0, two 3/0s, two 4/0s, a 5/0 and a 10/0 (that one's for doing eyes and fine detail). The putty is for filling in gaps when glueing a larger piece together. A close-up of my brushes (L has his own set):

New Figure

This is what figures look like when we buy them:This will be a Pit Fiend with a ball of fire in his right hand. That's his head and the ball of fire on a piece of metal on right. My next job here is to sand all the pieces down, glue him all together, fill any cracks with putty and then primer him. He's going to be a big job, but will look great when he's done. The big pieces like this tend to make people ooh and ah, but the small figs are actually harder to do.

I'll post the Pit Fiend's progress as I work on him.

My Closet

I am lucky enough to have a walk-in closet all to myself. I am even luckier that we were able to afford to custom build it so that it's all swanky and can hold all my shoes.

It used to have just an ugly mirror at the end, a ball light with a pull-chain and some skinny shelves at the end on the right. For hanger space, it just had a long bar on each side, with a single shelf above that.

What a nightmare that was; my shoes were always jumbled all over the floor, my sweaters were all stacked up every which way on the shelf, and my purses were haphazardly balanced on the skinny shelves.

But no more! Behold:

I have a mini chandelier, a spiffy gold mirror, a piece of art (I bought it at the art gallery - it's a red poppy tile), and all custom shelves!

That's the "Tower of Power" of my shoe collection on the right side, next to the short skirts (on top) and jackets (on bottom). I also have a bunch of hats and more costumey pieces that you can sort of see on the top shelves on both sides (I can't reach those very well, since I'm short).

My purses are on the left, with my sweaters, above the hanging blouses, long skirts and pants. Not a big pant person, partly because I'm only 5'4", and partly because I just like skirts and dresses more. Just beyond that section on the far left is my "long hang": all my dresses and my archived vintage outfits that I've collected over the years.

I do love to shop, but I am a major bargain hunter - I rarely pay full price for anything (well, maybe my Fluevogs, but those are special!) and I love to shop in discount and secondhand stores.

I would post a picture of today's outfit, but I only went to Weight Watchers (I lost 60 pounds last year) and out for lunch and a movie today. It's just not a special enough outfit, in my opinion. I won't post my boring casual outfits (i.e. weekend wear). I do go out a lot, and I dress up a bit for work, so all those outfits will be posted.

A better shot of the shoes:

I'll post more of those as I wear them with actual outfits, so you can have a good look.
Naturally, I have them all properly arranged. They are set as one shoe in, one out, so that I can see the front and heel of each pair. I have about 50 pairs of shoes, including my vintage and super-funky ones that I don't wear very often. I probably buy about 10 new pairs a year, but I try to rotate out shoes that I don't wear anymore and give them to charity or friends.

Since I had the closet built out, I'm much better at actually hanging things up and putting my shoes back where they belong, rather than just tossing things in willy-nilly. See my hangers patiently waiting for me to hang up my pants/skirts?

Hello!

Hi! I'm Sheila and this is my blog.

I'm 40 (may as well just get that out of the way), I'm married (to L) and I have 2 cats (warning: there will be pictures). No kids - not my thing.

The point of this blog is to a) show off some of my fashion stuff and b) show off some of my hobby.

So, I'm a show-off, basically.

I love fashion and being creative in my appearance. I'm a big fan of Kasmira's "What I Wore Today" blog, which inspired me to sign up. I'll post some outfits and you can see what you think.

I also indulge in an odd hobby: I paint fantasy miniatures. They are little metal things, shaped like people, monsters, dragons, that sort of thing. I'm a good painter - it's a finicky hobby (most of the figs are only a couple of centimeters tall), but I'm all about the details. And since L and I have over 4,000 of the damned things, no one sees them unless they come to our place. I'll probably post a couple of his figs too.

Here's the first one:
I am working on an Egyptian theme of figures. Since we randomly choose what we're going to paint next, this is one of the first ones I've done. I like the shading. It's supposed to look like a statue, rather than a real dog.

This particular piece has had some "sand" added to the base - gives it that "just uncovered" archaeological feel, I think.