New Tutorials

I've got several new tutorials up on FigureMentors.  Here's a list in case you're interested in checking them out:

Painting a Shiny Black (with Matte Paints)
The most recent work looking at how I did the black sections on the Dragoon and the hair on the Fallen Angel

Step by Step Painting of a 54mm Saxon Warrior
This is an older project, but I only recently got around to writing it up.

Knight of the Holy Sepulchre
A summary of my work on this.  Not a true step by step, but still an in-depth look at the project.

A Reference on Crusading Knights
Not a true tutorial, but a good summary reference for anyone interested in painting crusaders.

Travels and references

For the past two weeks my wife and I were traveling in Italy, which was a ton of fun.  While I was there, another modeler, Davide Rainone, showed me around a few of the model stores in Rome.  Both had some great models on display, so I took a few pictures to share.  The first place we visited was the Roma General Store.  They had a real nice selection of figures and I picked up the Origen Art's Boudicca bust.

I unfortunately forget the name of the second store, but it had a couple display cases worth of models.  I also grabbed a figure while I was here.  This time is was the Cavalry Office of the Companions from Alexandros Models.

The trip wasn't all about figures of course, but I also took some nice reference photos while touring the ruins.  We had a few days down in Naples and I took a tour of Herculaneum.  People are much more familiar with Pompeii, but Herculaneum was on the other side of Mt Vesuvius and buried at the same time.  However, the difference in location caused it to be buried in a slightly different way which lead to some of the wood and furniture in the city being petrified instead of burned like in Pompeii.  It also seemed like more of the art on the walls survived.  I don't know about you, but since most of the ruins we see are plain rock, we get the impression that these ancient cities were very plain.  However, the reality is that almost all the surfaces would have been covered in decoration.  Here are a few examples from Herculaneum...

First, a nice mural

And here are some wall paintings...

 

 

We also stopped by the archaeological museum in Naples, where many of the artifacts from Pompeii and Herculaneum are stored.  They took a lot of the murals and wall paintings including this amazing mural of Alexander the great.  I'd seen pictures, but it was so neat to see it in real life.  I was not prepared for the shear size of this thing!

If you're working on historical figures from the Greek and Roman eras, don't be afraid to add lots of color and detail to the scenery.  Their world was a much more colorful place than most of us think.