Some old Citadel wood elves (and other stuff!)

[Charlie_]

Hello,
Just testing the waters here before I dive head-first into a huge Perry Miniatures project.

I game up the hobby a while ago, but am now coming back to it. I've had a few classic wood elf minis floating around for a while, some of these I painted 2 or 3 years back, whilst the most recent two I did this last week. Knowing that I'm getting back into the hobby has given me a good reason to finish them off and practice my brushwork. I'm definitely a hugely better painter than I was when I was last playing WFB (which must be over 10 years ago). Odd, because I haven't touched a paintbrush in that time!

There are actually three others, but I'm just showing you the best few.

The wardancers is a 90s 4th edition sculpt, whilst the others are from the late 80s I think.

They were a real joy to paint. I find flesh especially fun. I'm most satisfied with the decal on the shield, the colour of the cloth, and the flesh on the archer on the far right (who has an eyepatch!).

The bases are just done very plainly with sand, and I may add to them at a later date, but for now I think they work fine.



However what is entirely new to me is taking proper photos, so this is really a trial run for that. I've bought a lightbox, and am using a cheap digital camera. If anyone could give me tips on how to get better photos, I'm all ears! I could justify buying a better camera if I know it will get better results, but don't want to spend much - I have no interest in photography except for this.
But looking at them now, I'm quite happy with this photo.

[Sir_Theo]

It's funny you mention your painting improving with age. I noticed the same thing when I refound the hobby. I attribute it mainly to the fact that I am a lot more patient as an adult!

Nice elves. I always liked the citadel wood elves. My second favourite wood elves after the Mark Copplestone Grenadier ones in fact!

[Blue in vt]

These look fantastic and I really like your color choices...avoiding the Cliche Green and Browns can be difficult with WEs...but can look spectacular when pulled off properly like this.

Keep up the good work!

Cheers,

Blue

[Charlie_]

Thank you both, yes I'm very pleased with my colours here.

[mweaver]

They look good in those dark colors.  I always did like those Scarloc's archers.

-Michael

[PhilB]

Great stuff! But what has the second guy got growing out of his sword's hilt?

Coming back to this hobby after years of hiatus is a common theme for many of us old grognards. When I was in my 20s and 30s, people around me looked down on miniature painting and wargaming in general, and I was gullible and insecure enough to listen to their disparagement. Coming back to the hobby after a 20+ year break has been a real pleasure, and it's good to see other people sharing some measure of that feeling.

Photographing miniatures does seem to be a real challenge, and a skill to be mastered only by practice. But your pic looks far better than mine, so no worries!

[Charlie_]

Great stuff! But what has the second guy got growing out of his sword's hilt?

You know, I'm not quite sure! Some sort of tassel?

[MartinShamutantis]

These look fantastic and I really like your color choices...avoiding the Cliche Green and Browns can be difficult with WEs.
Blue

I can only secondat this. Great work on these elves!

Martin

[Charlie_]

I found this guy hanging around, and he was just asking for a repaint. What a poser!



I'm very pleased with the face, moustache and sleeve cloth. Perhaps a bit unsure about the armour right now (I'm gonna have to find a good technique for armour, as I will be painting lots of full plate!).

[Charlie_]

Some classic High Elf archers from the early 90s. I've always loved this range, mostly sculpted by Jes Goodwin.

Fiddly, but good practice for painting white clothing!

[Duncan McDane]

Elves look pretty good, much more natural and far less Disney than GW used to do at the time.
About mail, you might want to try experimenting with dark glazes ( brown/black/smoke/rust/purple/blue )  and washes. Makes the metal look much more natural, gives it aging and depth and it breaks the standard mail/silver palette... 

[Argonor]

Absolutely adore these.

I have a fair bit of Goodwin elves recently dug out from a dark corner of my crypt garage attic, was thinking about making a warband for Frostgrave (but the project has stalled, due to my dislike of the FG combat system).

Well, maybe they'll be designated as some God of Battles units....