Monday 3 March 2008

Opinions Sought

Bit of a dilemma with the drummer. I've basically finished the figure, however I'm not sure about how much of the lace I want to add to the sculpt, as opposed to just painting this on the final figures. At present I've added the shoulder "swallows nests" or whatever you like to call them, but not the lace running down the sleeves. I'm a bit concerned that if I do this it will make the figure a bit clunky. After all in "real life" this would not have been raised up, which it will be, at least to some extent if I add it to the sculpt. Doing this however would make it a lot easier and more consistent to paint. The nub of this dilemma is the old school vs new style figure debate, and this is a good illustration of this point in action. New style would have all this sort of thing in high relief making it easy to pick out, but it would be an artificial look and the figure could potentially look like a gorilla, though hopefully not! Old style figures either wouldn't have it, or it would be very lightly "etched" on. Not sure how to go on this one, interested in people's views, do you think I should add or not, some photos attached to get an idea of how he looks presently.

10 comments:

Andy Mitchell said...

Paint it on, exactly how thick is lace?

Snickering Corpses said...

If I might suggest, why not make a couple of spare arms with green stuff, and try some different things....adding it on, doing a light engraving as you mentioned in the old school, and then just painting the arm. See what it looks like "in the flesh" so to speak, as I think you'll regret it at this stage if you make a choice without a clear satisfaction.

Fitz-Badger said...

I think SC has the right idea. This is probably one of those things you actually have to try to see which way works best for you.
My own SYW era collection consists of Foundry minis, the chunky style with raised bits. But for the slimmer style you are doing I would think painting it on or slightly "etching" it would be best. Another advantage to painting it on is if you decide some drummers in some units don't have the lace you can elect to not paint the lace. On the other hand, if it's etched on or raised yo have clear guidelines for consistently painting the lace in the correct spots on multiple minis (this has me thinking, if I can get around to it and sculpted some Highlanders I might try etching in some guidelines for the plaid ...).

Bluebear Jeff said...

Count me solidly with the "old schoolers" . . . leave it as is.

That way you (or whoever) can paint lace as they wish. Certainly not all regiments had the same lace patterns for their drummers.

Leave it alone.


-- Jeff

Steve-the-Wargamer said...

Not! I say go with the paint... :o)

WSTKS-FM Worldwide said...

Hi John,

Yes, paint on the sleeve lace. Then, the arms won't look like your drummer has been pumping lots of iron and drinking protein shakes.

Best Regards,

Stokes

MurdocK said...

'if' you are feeling up to the task of etching in the most minor of lines, then follow that course.

I suggest it only as a 'guideline' for consistently painting in the lace in the future.

Otherwise you can probably comfortably skip the process entirely and just "suggest" the lacing in the painting process and not worry about the consistent location of the lacing.

tim said...

PAINT IT ON!

Bloggerator said...

Paint it on, say I rather redundantly!

Greg

John D said...

Thanks to everyone for the response, I think there is a clear concensus not to scuplt the lace on the figure.

Regards

John