Critical Hit Creations

Penny Arcade's Cardboard Tube Samurai, acrylics on canvas. I started painting this many years ago, my first attempt at painting on canvas, based on Mike Krahulik’s artwork. I never finished it but always planned on returning to it. After really enjoying the recent traditional painting I did, I decided to dig it out and complete it.

The original intention was just to finish it off from where I had left it all those years ago, but I quickly realised that it needed a lot of rework. In the end I painted over and re-did pretty much everything, with just the orange wrist wrap remaining (mostly) intact.

I’m really happy with how it turned out, and really pleased to see it side-by-side with my original work. It’s a great illustration of the progress I have made in my creative journey over the years.

Paint Brands:

Unreal Unearth, acrylics on board. Despite never being more than a few metres from a large selection of paints and brushes, I rarely do “traditional” paintings. I got my sister tickets to Hozier for her birthday, but they’re e-tickets and I wanted to give her something on the day. So I set aside my miniatures and prop replicas, and painted his latest album cover. Gifts are a great excuse to try a new hobby project!

Nightbells, by Mindwork Studios. I found this piece difficult to finish, mostly because I started it before a long break from painting, so lost all my momentum on it. I’m happy to have finished it, and the sculpt’s distinctive silhouette stands out on my shelf.

I wanted to paint this figure black, but not a cold grey-black, so I drew inspiration from Paul Kidby's illustrations of Discworld’s Death. The black is highlighted with purples and blues, and lit from below with browns and oranges. Since his whole outfit is the same colour, I stippled the highlights on his trousers to differentiate the materials. The orange source lights are reflected in the metal accents around his neck, the sword and dagger hilt, and the all-important bells hanging from the weathervane.

I’m really pleased with the copper of the weathervane, I think it’s the best non-metallic metal I’ve painted so far. The non-metallic of the sword has an extra pop of magical blue light added to it.

I’m also really happy with the skin, it’s quite different in tones to the recent figures I’ve painted, using khakis and desert yellows and creams. His arms have translucent blue veins to give the skin extra detail (though this may be difficult to see in the pictures).

Paint Brands:

K0-Hana from Robot Rocket Miniatures. The cyberpunk aesthetic of this piece allowed me to play with colours I don’t usually work with, and try out some interesting techniques. I’m happy with the final result, though there were a few parts that I really struggled through!

I’m really pleased with the skin, the cyber panels broke up the surfaces and allowed me treat each piece separately. The glowing pink between the panels is matched by her iris colour, while her pupils are purple to complement her lips, hair and flower. The flower is painted with a white core and fades out to purple to achieve a slight glow effect.

The purple for the armour uses more muted tones, while the green is blended from a dark green to nearly a yellow to make it punchy and neon.

The carbon fibre texture on her arm took forever. It didn’t help that I went on holidays halfway through, and it took a while to get back into the flow of painting countless tiny grey squares when I came back.

I based the t-shirt design on a glitch effect line art style I like. The symbol is the kanji for “katana” to match her samurai stylings.

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Ar-Fienel, the last Studio McVey miniature in my collection. She has lived unpainted on my shelf for years; she’s so small and delicate I’ve always been sort of afraid to paint her.

I based the colour scheme on a cherry blossom, painting and shading the dress first with white tones, then glazing over it with pink to capture the translucency of a flower petal.

I’m particularly pleased with the detail I was able to give to her face, including glowing green eyes and freckles.

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Zensh-Iku is a fantastic miniature from Abyssoul. I had a lot of fun painting this piece!

I’m really happy with how the skin turned out, particularly on her leg. The skin and the robes had a lot of glazing to get the transitions super smooth, while I used different textures on the leather around her waist and the copper armour.

Other areas of note are the glowing Cthulhu eyes and mystical pipe, as well as the non-metallic metal of the sword blade. The blade has some purple reflections suggesting that there are other glowing items nearby, and I included the wave-patterned hamon and nicks and surface imperfections catching the light.

Paint Brands:

Madame Whiskey from Oda Models. This is the first 3D printed mini I’ve painted, really high quality print.

I spent a lot of time on the skin of this piece, with lots of glazing to get it just right, and playing with opacity so it looks like the skin is showing through the colour of the stockings.

I also worked a lot with textures, giving the dress the impression of sequins catching light, and strands of hair for the fur wrap.

I painted the cobblestones of the floor onto the whiskey spill on the base, then tinted it with inks so it looks like the floor is visible through the translucent pool of whiskey.

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