My Next KDM Miniature - Intimacy Female (painted mid Dec, 18)

One thing about Kingdom Death that I've always loved is the duality of hopelessness and hope represented within the game. Do not develop an attachment on your people, because they will die, often, and usually by unexpected, gruesome means. Still, even in this bleak existence, the game offers sparks of light in the form of hope. An excellent example of this is the Intimacy Couple, a miniature duo offered in Kingdom Death: Monster 1.5. Along other additional miniatures (such as Till Death Do We Part), this group gives a window into how the survivors can develop true loving ties that ultimately provide redemption and strength to the survivors. It's an aspect that I really admire and as such, I wanted to start painting the miniatures that represent this touching facet of the game.

Presenting the Intimacy Couple: art design inspired after my better half and myself

Normally this is when I say, I've tried to honor the artistic design of the creators of the miniature by using the color scheme of the artwork representing the character. However, this time, I went a new direction.

My better half has been an encouraging force during my painting and often we've discussed different topics relating to painting and KDM. One topic that we once conversed about was how many of the artist renditions are somewhat similar regarding certain aspects. One of these is that most of the artist renditions are of buxom white women. While this doesn't really bother either of us (in fact I've got some fan theories why this may be the case, more on that later) I had been getting a bit tired of always working with the same pigments. So I wanted to switch up this character, and the way I thought would be best was instead to honor the woman I love by mirroring the character off of her. She loves blue, has jet black hair, and is not white.

First, a brief comment about the skin tone. I was originally a bit hesitant to try a darker tone since I hadn't before. I tried out the layering technique that I had seen on a YouTube video before, and since this miniature had more skin showing, I had a better experience than the previous miniature. While the pictures aren't perfect, I was pretty happy with how the subtle layering was apparent in the various curves of the belly, arms, and legs. I also began to see how beneficial this technique is when accenting or bringing out additional detail, such as the golden band around the right thigh.

Attention to detail is my overwhelming focus now-a-days with much of what I paint, but I'm always trying to do something new. I wanted to go vibrant blue with the cloth draped around the Intimacy Female, and at the same time I wanted it to seem natural and not too bold. I used the classic ultramarine as the base hue, then created a slightly darker wash and lightly coated all of the base painted areas, allowing for more healthy deposits of the wash in the folds of the cloth. Afterwards, I created a lighter version of the base color, watered it down, then applied several layers of dry-brush coats to accent the highlights. While I've read a lot of tutorials saying that one should over accent to really have the color variation pop out (especially on camera) I've always followed a "less is more" mentality. While the end result doesn't quite (I suspect) show as well on camera, I'm really happy with how it looks in real life.

You may have noticed that the miniature's sword looks pretty good. To that I would say, "Thank you for the kind observations." I did try to focus a bit more on it, and I like the end result more. The jewelry, the strings, the golden rope belt - all the detailed elements are better than what I've done in the past. All in all, I was happy with these outcomes. I also took a stab again at the eyes and they came out better than before. Watch this YouTube clip if you find yourself having a hard time.

However, the miniature wasn't perfect. Once again, I was having a bit of trouble with the hair. My better half has jet black hair, but before we first started dating ages ago, she would sometimes get varied vibrant highlights. I tried to go this route with this miniature, so I I did a dark blue wash to provide some depth and also did some very minimal light blue highlights. It didn't show well. Ehh, I got tired trying after a while and just moved on.

Lastly, as you may have noticed in the other pictures, I did something a bit different with the base. I've wanted to try my hand at free-hand painting in the past, but didn't feel confident enough not to completely screw it up. The standard KDM bases are round and flat and thus are easy to experiment on, so I tried with the Intimacy Female. I wanted to do a picture design that has some relevance to the theme of intimacy so I started with a heart and then went from there. The end result looks OK - could be worse - and I should note that while I was painting that, the miniature was already attached to the base and fully painted, so there was that extra challenge. You may be thinking, "well that was a stupid thing to do. Everyone knows that you paint the base first to make things easier." And to you I'd say, "shut up - I forgot!" Actually, I'd say that the free-hand work was a spur of the moment thing. If anything, this has taught me to have a strategy in mind before I glue anything to a base, or really even begin painting.



So December is already half over and I've gotten another miniature proudly painted. As you may have guessed from the first picture in this blog, I've done the Intimacy Male and I'll focus on his white, pasty ass in the next post (he's supposed to represent me, so I can call his ass white and pasty, because my ass is white and pasty). I did a pretty good job with his eyes, even if they look a bit cross-eyed.

This was an enjoyable experience. I was very satisfied with the level of detail achieved, especially given my own skill level in painting. To think that only about 5 months before, this kind of work would have been impossible for me. I also glad that I branched out and tried to do my own color scheme instead of just following what the artist did. Mind you, I like mimicking the artist rendition, but it's nice to reaffirm that I have enough creativity to do my own thing.

So as always, I hope that this showcase is enjoyed by all whom read it. Please, please feel free share any comments or critiques. If you find my blog enjoyable, be sure to follow and subscribe. Not sure what either do but should be fun either way.

Thanks much!