Game of Thrones Bronn (WIP - Facial Skin Tone and Eyes) aka 54 mm Nocturna Models The Crusader

It has been quite a long time since I missed a posting at least once a week. Last week was that kind of week. But I had a real good reason. With the washing machine still down almost all available free time were spent washing family clothes by hand - something I haven't done in a long time. So then something else had to give and of course it had to be my hobby time. So I had to sneak in a precious few minutes there, a half-hour here, and at least get some painting done over a space of two weeks. Unfortunately, this stop-start nature had affected my painting of Bronn's face to a certain extent.    

Game of Thrones Bronn: work-in-progress on his facial skin tone and eyes

First though, a bit of good news in weeks (and boy could I use some). My Tamron lens has been fixed thus allowing me to take closeups of Bronn's facial skin tones. And at the extreme closeups afforded by a dedicated macro lens, any painting error I make gets magnified exponentially. While that's hard on the ego, the magnifications more than make up for it by helping me spot errors to fix later. In this case, Bronn's forehead creases are too prominent and transitions between the shadowed creases and lighter areas of the forehead will need to be reworked with additional half-tone blending.

From the closeups, it became painfully obvious that I was too heavy-handed with the forehead lines

On the flip-side, I'm generally happy with the facial skin tones so far

Apart from his forehead, Bronn has other issues that need to be dealt with. Among them are his less than adequately defined ears; an uncertainty as to where the boundary between his mustache and upper lips may lie; and a rather monotonous skin tone surrounding the forehead creases. As for his hair, beard and mustache - I haven't really got started on them yet with only the basecoat and first midtones done up. More contrast is needed to give Bronn's facial and head of hair sufficient depth. 

Viewed from further out, any issues plaguing Bronn's face became less noticeable

Alternating time spent between work on scale model kits and miniature figurines has been a key factor in keeping things fresh for me in this hobby. Both hobby sub-groups require the miniature painter/scale modeller to bring a slightly different skill set to table. I strongly recommend trying your hands at both as you can't help learning stuff from one that you can use on the other, and vice versa. 

Bronn's skin tone was painted to resemble a weather-beaten Anglo-Saxon 

In profile, the 54 mm Nocturna Models Crusader figurine looks positively aquiline

At the time of writing my washer is still busted. I certainly wouldn't have spend a severely limited budget on fixing my camera lens if I knew the washer was going kaput a week later. Truth be told, things are actually worse than I let on previously i.e. the sole family car had more problems than just the clutch assembly - suspension, brakes and tyres all need to be replaced asap. An Evo! An Evo! My kingdom for a Mitsubishi Lancer Evolution X. Okay, that's enough paraphrasing passages of Shakespeare for today. Okay maybe just one more straight from the bard's mouth ... I wasted time, and now doth time waste me. There are lots of project to do so it's time I get cracking.