24/08/2009

The Raven Priest....

Hi guys,

New model to show you - The raven priest. This is the first of the new Studio Mcvey range of miniatures, and what a model it is! I haven't enjoyed painting a model this much in quite a while.

My model was number 40 of the limited run of 750, cast in a smooth grey resin. The casting was excellent with no defects and only minimal flash (Forge World could learn a few things here...). The only problem that i found was that the sword was so thin that every-time i used my hairdryer to speed up drying time it would bow slightly and would need reheating and pushing back to being straight! In short, this is the best resin casting I have come across, beating my previous favourite resin caster (SmartMax) by a good margin.

I decided to paint the model in very natural colours, and placed the model in a "woodland" scene. The tree was scratch built to go along with it, with the aim of making the tree look wizened (if its possible for a tree to have human qualities!) . I was aiming to give the character the impression of being some sort of native american shaman (well, a fantasy version of...). And yes, painting all the feather tips was an absolute nightmare!

In summary I would highly advise anyone who loves high quality models to pay a visit to Mike and Ali over at Studio McVey - hopefully there will be many more models of this quality. From what i can see on the site, they still have the Raven priest available, so grab it now before they are all gone.

PS - I have to apologise for the quality of the photo's for this model - I finally got a new camera (Nikon D60) and I'm having real problems getting images with natural colours on them - everything ends up bleached or over "coloured". I'm still learning about the photography side of the hobby, so please bear with me! Hopefully you can still see the model through the awful photos ;)


3 comments:

John Lambshead said...

I use a Nikon D60. It is the best camera I have ever owned.

You need to white balance minaitures. Do this on the computer, not the camera. Nikon provide software that I am just learning to use.
John

sovietspace said...

Thats a lovely diorama, great work :) How were the leaves done by the way?

Paul Chana said...

@sovietspace

The leaves are done in multiple layers - Layer 1 was a basic dark brown scatter material. Layer 2 was a mix of Mint, Parsley, Mixed herbs and Tyme. Final layer was a cut up dried out leaf from the local park