[Commission] Will's Yeti army

During the fall, Will asked me the following seemingly innocuous question: "Hey would you mind painting and getting paid in product?" My answer was a tentative yes, not sure what he meant. In effect, he offered me a pile of L5R/ Clan War miniatures to paint his Yeti army by Crocodile Games.

I stated many times how much I love painting Crocodile Games (makers of Wargods of Aegyptus, Olympus, and Hyperborea) because paint jobs come together quickly and just look good.

"Yep," I ended up answering. A quick trip to a Waffle House (another blogpost of an adventure if there ever was one) and I returned home with a case of mini and a huge bag of models for me. YAY! Of course, that meant painting. Which was a good thing since I was in a painting funk for a while. But no more.

One thing Will asked was to have bases as though they were on ice or a glacier, not the easier "just snow." An interesting challenge. I would have to make a test or two.

So, now to the bases... this elusive glacier...

I watched a few tutorials and how-to on youtube, but I did not like what they ended up with. The ones I saw were overly complex and I had one big issue: unlike them, the minis were already glued to their base, and well-glued too... However, these videos gave me many different ideas on how to accomplish what I could do.

Now, there is nothing like experience, doing it, and trying things to see how they play out. So I made a large base using a zombie and some stone/sand and a lot of open area to paint. I had a fun time with this one. The body was done quickly to focus on the ice. Despite this, I was able to find something that would work on the smaller bases.

The final result works nicely, the area is perhaps a tad overly blue for "real" ice, but the effect works. I gave this to Will as an objective marker.

Looking at the models, they are fairly basic: fur and abs. So I wanted to add some highlights, something that would be interesting. So the leather straps were simple, as were the wood on their weapons. No, I settled on the stones of their weapon. My first thought was to go black or red but after a quick test, it just didn't do it for me. The black just vanished and had no pop while the red was just the opposite: it popped too much and drew the eye from the rest of the model.

So I thought about about an effect I did earlier on my Hordes Trollbloods: a green with yellowy highlights. But again, a test proved this was not right.Close but not what I wanted.

So I simplified the work and focused on more basic elements: the dark green base with only minor highlights of bright green for the rock. I loved the outcome. It was subdued but enough to draw the eye without drawing too much attention from the rest of the model.