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Special Project: “Shadeglass Scenery”

Special Project: “Shadeglass Scenery”

“The Mirrored City of Shadespire is a nightmare plane of illusions and madness, an ever-changing labyrinth of endless stairs, cramped streets and soaring archways. The original city is drained of all color and life, and for thousands of years, it has rested as a foreboding ruin. Those unfortunate, brave, or foolhardy adventurers that set foot within its walls are drawn through the veil between realms and trapped within the Mirrored City. For such wayward souls, all hope seems lost. Yet there are those who will not accept their fate without a fight.”

Concept:

Whenever I pick a new title I always crave to have an ultimate gaming set – the same happened with Warhammer Underworlds: Shadespire. It started when I’ve finished working on a small Shadespire commission and  was instantly drawn into the game. Two days later I was already painting my first warband – the Sepulchral Guard, but it wasn’t enough to quench my hobbystic thirst. I moved to another warband, being Garrek’s Reavers, all the while my hype was kept strong by Shadespire facebook group – full of awesome inspiration. Somewhere in the middle of Garrek’s Reavers paint job I let myself be overwhelmed by hype and decided to go for a Shadespire scenery set. The idea was to keep it as crazy cool as I am capable of. Concept was there – inside my head – all along, fueled by Shadespire’s background story and insanely sweet art from the rulebook. So, the scenery was to fit the board with a ‘ruined city of sorcery and mysticism’ theme in mind. Most important part: ‘Shadeglass’ – broken, ghostly lit mirrors incorporated to a variety of trinkets, statues, pools, wells etc.


City of Wanders:

The way I see scenery making is this:

  • Prep all necessary resources.
  • Create a baseline shape and base it firmly.
  • Apply basic texture.
  • Add major features.
  • Add detail.
  • Polish.
  • Paint.

I faced “Shadeglass Scenery” Project following these key points. Started by preparing all the stuff that seemed usable and/or necessary. I like my scenery to be light, durable and painting friendly, so I picked 3mm plasticard to become both bases and baseline shape. Used hot water to bend some pieces, then cut ‘walls’ and hex bases out of the stuff…

Plasticard is very easy to work with. Adding texture all over newly created ‘pieces’ was a matter of using a right tool, rather than sophisticated and time consuming techniques…

With texturized walls and bases I was ready to move to major features – Shadeglass vessels of all sorts and sizes. For this purpose I used perfume cups plundered from my wife’s collection. (At the point when I’m writing this article she already noticed all the missing cups – fortunately the scenery is done and we played with it so she’s more like – ‘for the greater good’)…

Throughout about twenty years in the hobby I accumulated a vast collection of bitz, although until recently skulls where a rare commodity in the collection – Praise Nagash, Games Workshop released a set of skulls thus rendering them near to unlimited. Skulls backstory aside – I used some bitz to add detail and points of focus to the scenery…

I then used self prepared Hobby Gravel to add more detail and make the scenery pieces look ‘ruined’. Once I was sure that each piece is telling it’s own story – final polish followed and all was ready to get painted…


Nagash’s Curse:

Painting a ruined city of sorcery and ghosts was an interesting transition between a color recipe I use for Shadespire warband’s bases and working on a much more bigger scale. I decided to follow my guts – start as usual and then see where it would take me. Somewhere along the way I started adding blends of purple to compliment incoming ghostly green’ish-turquoise hum. This turned out to be a bullseye hit, creating an illusion of morbid, colorful lights dancing across the ruins…

The ghostly hum of Shadeglass was a real challenge. I feel very comfortable with toxic green light, but going turquoise is moving away from warm color spectrum – my sphere of comfort. Still a hobbyist gotta do what a hobbyist gotta do – I braved the unknown with a mix of Vallejo’s Jade Green and White.


Broken Mirrors:

Broken Shadeglass mirrors – a special feature and main theme of the scenery. Decided to approach this in two different ways. First are the hand painted broken mirrors, adorning walls. I simply airbrushed hard angles with a mix of Jade Green and White using a Scarhandpaing’s business card like a stencil. I then adjusted transitions of particular ‘pieces’ of glass and made them more distinct with sharp white lining. Other vessels were a different story. I cut translucent plastic into shards and tossed them into resin-filled vessels. Some sunk instantly, while others stayed afloat – creating a really nice effect – which unfortunately looks much more badass in real life, than in the pictures.


The City Awaits:

The “Shadeglass Scenery” set is done and it have already seen some Shadespire action. Who knows what will come next if the hype continues? Either way – if you plan to venture into the Mirrored City – be sure to head there through  “SHADEGLASS SCENERY” SPECIAL PROJECT gallery

If you like the article, consider sharing it with someone who likes hobbying around with miniatures. Find me on Facebook and Instagram. Most importantly have a great hobby time!

Scarhandpainting

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