Kingdom Death White Speaker [sans cloak and spear]

One of the reasons why Kingdom Death easily makes it to my Top 5 favourite miniature range is because their figures allow me to do a lot of something I have come to love in this hobby ... painting skin tones. Personally for me, a miniature truly comes alive only when skin tones form a large percentage of the surface area ... caveat being they are painted well, a skillset that I am always striving to improve each time I tackle a project. This then serves as the perfect introduction to my latest work on a Kingdom Death miniature i.e. the White Speaker without her cloak and spear. 

Kingdom Death White Speaker, sans cloak and spear

Although I am fully aware I have a long way to go before I can achieve my two main aims when painting skin tones of female figurines - porcelain-like smoothness and realistic looking skin - this highly detailed 35-mm scale Kingdom Death miniature represents my best effort to date on skin. That's hardly saying much when my baseline effort is so low but I'm happy with any progress I make.

Lovely sky blue to complement the White Speaker's blond hair

After some thought, I felt it best to go with blond hair coupled with white/grey/sky blue clothing. It's a colour scheme which soothes me, and likely the White Speaker's enemies too before she sticks that dagger deep into their gut. But at least they will all die with a relaxed smile on their face. 

The White Speaker [sic] Wears Prada

I was also pleased with how her toes and high heels turned out. I managed to clearly define separate toes on her feet, paint the nails of individual toes and paint a little blue dot into the high heels thus adding depth to her shoes. Some of this came about due to a better understanding of how important it is to paint some lining in between two not-so-contrasting colours. I am still susceptible to lapses in which I forget to paint the lining (e.g. parts of the strap in her clothing) but I am getting better at it. As minor as this may seem, it can be the difference between 'meh' and 'not too bad'.   

Base was kept simple with some sand, stones and grass

Slightly more work was done on the White Speaker's skin but not too much as my original skin tone mix had gone dry despite being in a wet palette. I concentrated mainly on her chest area to improve contrast as well as repositioning her navel lower towards the crotch area. Some minor work was done to bring out her collar bone by adding darker shadows and brighter highlights.

White Speaker's cloak had to go as it would have covered up her beautifully sculpted back

Two things about the miniature that I did not like was her spear and cloak. The former because it seemed out of place. After all, why carry a spear if you already have a dagger in hand. Stylistic I must admit but it looked off-putting to me. Meanwhile, the Kingdom Death White Speaker's cloak was not as well sculpted as her back so I left the former out so as not to block the latter.

Two of her fingers had snapped off turning it into a victory sign gesture

Now if you ask me to choose between resin and plastic miniatures, I would pick resin anyday. The details that a resin miniature can provide a painter cannot, in my honest opinion, be as well replicated in a plastic miniature. Unfortunately, one main drawback of resin is the brittleness of some parts which can result it being snapped in two if not prepped with care and gentleness. Having prepped the White Speaker during my early days in this hobby - when I approached prep work without care and with an impatience bordering on devil may care heavy-handed brush strokes when cleaning the minaitures - there were consequences. This White Speaker had two fingers broken off  so now it's because she was careless during a battle and got them cut off. I am sticking with that story.    

Kingdom Death White Speaker (side view from right)

In line with my Achilles Heel with bases, I didn't put much work on the White Speaker's base other than to glue some sand on it, drybrush the sand with brown/yellow hues, add stones and grasses, and finally drybrush the stone block upon which her right leg rests. All very unexciting stuff. One day I hope to create the very dioramas which made me go 'ooohhhhh' and 'ahhhhh' as a very young kid in a Tamiya model shop (I couldn't afford this hobby till I was well into my late 30's so I am painting with a zealot like single-mindedness to make up for lost time) but for now simple bases will have to do.

I just love this dynamic pose struck by the White Speaker

 

360 view of Kingdom Death's White Speaker
For a 360 degree view of the Kingdfom Death White Speaker 35-mm scale miniature, please check out the YouTube video below. For other videos, please visit my YouTube channel FourEyedMonster Miniatures. Also be sure to choose the high definition (HD) option when viewing the videos.

Finishing the Kingdom Death White Speaker has wet my appetite for yet more skin tone experimentations. With that in mind, I am sorely tempted to get some of Kingdom Death's new hard plastic miniatures to practice on while I keep the few resin miniatures that I have left for future days when my skills have gone up a notch. For now, I feel like I am in 2nd gear and halfway up the RPMs while driving a five gear manual transmission car. Just hope I don't blow up my transmission while moving up the gears. Achh! Why am I talking about cars? Must be the constant bombardment by sexist magazines that equate scantily clad models with cars. Power of the media indeed! 

Kingdom Death White Speaker [WIP - Skin tones, so far]

For some time now I have been pretty unhappy with the skin tones of miniatures I have painted. I am aware that, on occasion, they lack contrast that make skin pop. To get over this mental block that seems to be hindering my progress as a miniature painter, I decided to paint up a miniature with the main objective of achieving deeper shadows and brighter highlights for the skin tone. 

Kingdom Death White Speaker [WIP - skin tones]

To try and make further progress on the painting realistic skin tones, I had a look at some miniatures in my collection to find one that showed a lot of skin. What I found was a 35-mm scale Kingdom Death resin miniature namely the White Speaker, which I thought would be suitable for my purpose. I had primed this miniature way back when I was still fairly new to the hobby and kinda botched up the prepping stage in my impatience thus resulting in rough looking skin on her arms.  

She was a perfect specimen for more painting time on skin tones, for obvious reasons

For a white Caucasian skin tone, I used mainly Reaper Master Series Paints (MSP) and it was based on a paint recipe formulated by one of my favourite miniature painters i.e. Jennifer Haley (the other favourite being Marike Reimer). I find that my style of painting is rather similar to both painters. But of course, on a scale of 1 to 10 with the latter being the best, both are a perfect 10 while I am at 1, that is I feel about nine whole levels away from these two wonderful painters on a scale of 10.   

Kingdom Death White Speaker - [WIP skin tones, side view from left]

At this stage, I don't necessarily feel that I have completed the skin tones of the Kingdom Death White Speaker. I am still contemplating a further increase in the contrast of her skin tone. Other possible touch ups might include trying to clear up an unfortunate wash ring and perhaps smoothening out the transitions between shadows and mid-tones in certain parts of the skin. As for chalkiness in the highlights, I am afraid that is most likely beyond my skills at the moment.

With armour like that, no male warrior stood a chance against the White Speaker

Light skin tones continues to be a challenge to me as chalkiness is still apparent at very up close - especially the highlights. Lighter colours are often more susceptible to chalky results than darker colours. Based on what I understand, the light skin tones can become chalkier for a number of reasons such as being thinned too much or having paint dry slightly on the brush before application. But on the bright side, the level of chalkiness I get is reducing although I have yet to hit the sweet spot of a perfect smooth porcelain-like skin tone without the benefit of a wash. 

"Is my butt too big?" ... a question many warriors dare not reply

Missing from the photos are the White Speaker's spear and her cloak. Personally, I don't really think the cloak goes well with the miniature. However, I will paint it up later and stick it to the miniature using blue tack to see how it looks before making the final decision on whether to keep the cloak.

Her hair is also nicely sculpted ... question is, will she be a blonde or red head?

Other than painting the Kingdom Death White Speaker's skin tone, I also blocked in the leather (or is it cloth) straps that serve as armour with a Reaper MSP Brown Liner diluted with water. Officially her armour ... and I used that term lightly ... is white in colour though I am toying with the idea of using light blue. Specifically, sky blue would look good if I make her a blonde.

Kingdom Death White Speaker - [WIP skin tones, side view from right]

A very dynamic pose ... and in high heels too

This Kingdom Death miniature saw me taking a short break from a much bigger miniature I am also currently working on, namely Nocturna Models's Le Petit Chaperon. To give you an idea how small the White Speaker is, I took a shot of her next to a paper clip and a Malaysian five sen (cent) coin.

In the grand scheme of things, she does look rather petite

To get myself out of a rut (I have not been improving as well as I hoped), I needed to remind myself of the level to which I aspire to - for example the miniatures that placed first and second in the Best of Show Crystal Brush 2014. To paraphrase a recent battle cry by the captain of a football team I have supported since before my teens - the completion of every miniature I paint is followed by an attitude that it's done and finished. Then it's time to move on to the next miniature and start again. There is a lot of improving I need to do but the fun lies in the journey which I hope will be a long one.