Enlightened Atmosphere Part 1/2: OSL-Workshop

Introduction 

Finally in spring 2018 i had the chance to travel to Augsburg and meet Roman from MassiveVoodoo again.

Again? Yes...Again! We have met on several workshops over the past years. Roman kickstarted my painting hobby with one of his famous 'beginner classes' and tought me not to only paint better but to enjoy life a lot more.
(Look forward to an upcoming post in several months (or years?) about my personal history of classes and journey of becoming an miniature artist.)

On Friday the 27th of April I arrived after an relaxing 5h travel with the 'Deutsche Bahn' and a short drive via taxi in the studio. Knowing that I will be here for quite a while I was happy to see Roman and some of the other students of the upcoming class already painting and in a brilliant mood.

This was the moment where i realized that this journey and spending my vacation will be worthwhile and very rewarding both in terms of meeting great people and finding disctraction.

Two great events where waiting for me:

• Enlightment (OSL - Workshop):
  1 day of learning how to paint light sources like lamps or magical artifacts
• Atmosphere (Prive Coaching):
  2 days of improving my personal painting abilities coached by Roman
• 
  

Part 1: OSL - Workshop

I have to admit that since my last workshop i didn´t paint too much either because i was too busy (meaning i used my time for other hobbies) or i was not motivated enough. I was really happy that i got the chance to get into painting again and train my 'painting muscles and memories' for the upcoming coaching.

As you might know OSL stands for 'object source lightning'. Goal of the workshop was to understand  how a source of light near the miniature influances color and saturation. ...and of course on how to paint this on the mini itself.

To get started we were looking at some reference images of different painting and even some photos of romans miniatures (and spotted some small errors in Romans older paintings...we are all humans aye? Good to see everyone progress and learn!). We also discussed different types of light and where it needs to be painted in which intensity before we started getting into the painting....and everything in english (thanks Richard...we all know now who you are...). To be honest i think everyone had a ton fun and we had some great discussions!

In contrast to the beginners class Roman had chosen two miniatures from the board game Massive Darkness which needed to be painted. A small orb glued to the base serves as a generic light: clever idea to keep things simple and easy to follow yet intesting to paint!

The first mini was some sort of goblin warrior where we focused only on painting the OSL itself: no other colors or materials were painted. Roman showed all the details step by step and everyone was listening and watching carefully.

Attention Please: Roman shows the first steps.

Base colors and highlites: roman is blowing us away!

My goblin warrior: primed, painted source, light on miniature (finished)

After about 2-3 hours of concentrated work all of the students achieved a great results!

Getting serious now...moving from small to large...from the sneaky tiny goblin to the mighty dual wielding orc!

Following the same principles we already learned we now included different base colors and materials while still using the OSL. As i don´t want to spoil you the fun of taking part in Romans classes i just present you the results:

Great Results? Richard Approved! 

There is not much left to say beside: we all had a ton of fun! Thanks to all of you and especially Roman for being such a great teacher and host (more on this in Part 2).

Enlightened students!

Be prepared for reading about atmosphere in 'Part 2: Private Coaching' soon!

Review Airbrush Workshop with Raffaele Picca

Hello everyone,

over one year has passed since I wrote the last time in my blog...I wrote about a workshop.
You might guess what I will write about now: well of course another workshop!

Even though my Alice is still not finished I took part in Raffa's Airbrush Workshop as I own my airbrush quite a long time now ... but I was always afraid of using it for more than priming (with zenithal light).

TIME TO CHANGE THIS!

The workshop took place at the Harder&Steenbeck Headquarter in Norderstedt near Hamburg (not too far away from "Wu Dao" where quite a lot of the Massive Voodoo workshops happened). Harder & Steenbeck kindly let us use their luxury equipment consisting of an "Infinity" airbrush with a 0.2mm nozzle and an evolution with a sprinkle cap. Free water and coffee included  (...not as paint)!
I took my own "Evolution" to the course...which was a wise decision as it was quite damaged and I bought some replacement parts to get it back to work.

Christian and Christian...suprise! 

I visited my friend Christian who was kind enough to let me sleep on his couch for this weekend.

After a journey of about 1.5h from Christian to Harder&Steenbeck via train and bus I arrived at the workshop location in the industrial area and I instantly recognized some well known faces. Although the weather was very nice and not too warm, it was pretty hot inside the factory due to the corrugated iron roof.
Leaving the work behind after the first day Christian joined the group and we had a nice dinner at the Panthera Rodizio.

Full of motivation the second day was a blast as all the students improved the previously learned skills.

Some impressions of Raffa and his eight (?) students throughout the course:

The painting table at Harder & Steenbeck

Raffa teaching...

... and intense training everywhere else!

Heiko tries so levitate the color with his awesome Kung-Fu powers...

...and Lutz shows off his true skills!

At the end of day two final photos had been taken...but first a proper background had to be built.

I didn´t shoot a photo at every stage of progession of the Miniature "Romero, the Cat"(sculpted by Raffa, more pictures: FeR Miniatures)...

Artwork of "Romero, the Cat"

...but I want to show you the overall change from "zero to hero" in the following photographs. But before I want to briefly sum up what we did during the workshop (for a more detailed explanation I suggest taking part in one of the following airbrush courses from Raffa):

Day 1:

1. Removing moldlines...wait...there is only small moldline at the back. 2 Minutes later the work is done.
2. Basic usage of an airbrush
3. Discussion of typical problems (which of course happen at the beginning)
4. Airbrush: priming with 2 colors (with respect to zenithal lightning). Due to the more precise nature of an airbrush compared to a priming can we were able to pick up important areas much better.
5. Airbrushing base color for the face (several steps with additional detailing using the traditional brush)
6. Summary

Day 2:

1. Finishing the face (brush)
2. Airbrushing the cape (several steps, detailing using the brush)
3. Starting the chest area (not finished at the end of the workshop)
4. Summary & End

So here are some random pics from my unfinished "Romero":

Airbrush basics and sprinkles ... a lot of sprinkles!

Naked Romero (gnihi!)

Primed Romero (Airbrush)

Basic skin tone (airbrush) + brushwork + airbrush sprinkles

Intended exaggerated highlights after airbrushing... we should call them "ultrahighlites"...

Ultrahighlites (different view)

Skin improved with airbrush and eyes finished

Different view

Group shot at the end of the workshop...all busts turned out really well as you can see.

All the work from day 2...finishing touches (all leather, knives, correction of eye position...) coming soon.

I had a lot of fun at this workshop and I´m really satisfied with the result.

Raffa did a really great job at teaching us both the basics of using an airbrush and the advanced usage of different techniques like using sprinkles and translucency and reminded us that some simple techniques like using washes yield great results too if done properly.

He also tought us which colors and thinners work together and recommended us good brands...good bye "trial and error" :-)

Do I recommend this course to you? Yes (at least if you own or plan to own an airbrush).

Greetings,

Christian

Alice continued...

...nachdem der Workshop in Hamburg hinter mir liegt, liegt noch viel Alice vor mir.

Die Haut wurde noch etwas aufgehellt an den Melonen (der Modellierer gehört gehauen!) und dem Bein.
Die Harre wurden angefangen, Augen etwas korrigiert und der Fliegenpilz hat ein paar Pünkte bekommen :)
Aber nun zu den Bildern: