Tuesday, August 12, 2014

Strange Aeons: Swimming Fishman


Ok, first attempt at the swimming fishman for Strange Aeons is passable but really shows what rendering water in resin does for you when you try and fool the eye. By cutting up the Bones Tiik warrior and gluing it to blister plastic the size of an average base, I thought the illusion would be made with clear latex caulk... and it does look cool. The problem is all of my water features are deep tinted resin so the illusion of a swimming Deep One is sorta ruined as the eye sees below the surface and there isn't anything there. The effect will look fine on darkly painted water features that have no depth to them, like paint and polyurethane covered board.



That said, I was happy with the improv of putting caulk into a small medical syringe to aid laying down small ropes. It took more than a day to dry but overall it is an effect I'll develop more.

The real issue in this was the water based polyurethane I used on the painted fishman itself. I wanted a deep wet look on him and when I applied the polyurethane, ANY backbrushing tore the paintlayers right from the figure, leaving just the spray primer. So I imperfectly re-covered a few layers of paint and just moved on.

I'll be heading back to this idea of sculpting waves and swimming, as I add some more fishmen to the mix.

7 comments:

styx said...

Very nice! Makes me want to invest in a few of these.

Unknown said...

Very cool! Maybe if you shade the plastic base darker near him it will give the illusion of his body under the water. Really like the caulk for water movement.

Mathyoo said...

Fantastic! Great idea.

Yeti's Yell said...

Thanks guys. Gotta add, $6 bucks total for both a swimming and on-the-land Deep One is a bargain.

Paul O'G said...

Really cool mare!

Barks said...

Looks great!

Joe Kopena said...

I don't think the lack of underbody is particularly a problem. Most people aren't even going to notice unless they really stop to think about it. In game terms? no problem. But, maybe an inky cloud around the figure on its base would alleviate that? I.e., you can't see what's underneath because of the murk surrounding it in the water?