El Greco Laconian Hoplite - Completed

 

Well, he is done. After more tweaking of the helmet details, crest, beard, cloth and chest hair he is complete. I may well tweak some more before the Long Island Show comes along in a few weeks but for the most part I am happy with the outcome. I have to say that the pics don't translate my reds quite the way they look in real life and I am probably going to shoot him in front of a few other different backdrops as an experiment tomorrow.

El Greco Laconian Hoplite - Helmet and Cloth

 

Progress on the helmet, crest, cloth and hair can be seen in the pictures above and below. I have put together a small step by step series of photos (see below) showing the process over the past few days to get to this point. As for the hair on his head and chest, I basically filled out his beard and hair with a coat of Mars Brown and Burnt Umber. The chest hair was created by repeatedly touching the effected area with a worn W&N "Series 7" 000 brush with thinned Burnt Umber in the hairs.

 

The first step was to block in the color panels using Mars Yellow, Raw Umber and Mars Black.

These areas of solid color were then stippled and blended with an old soft brush to develop transitions in the tonal values.

 

Orange reflected color was worked into the wet paint as a "reflected" color tone on the helmet (both sides front and right side back).Additionally, a base wash of Cadmium Red Deep, Mars Black and Orange was applied to the crest.

 

Mars Yellow and Titanium White were used to begin highlighting and unifying the finish.

 

Titanium White with a touch of Mars Yellow begins the process of reflective highlighting. The helmet still looks to soft but additional highlighting once the helmet is dry will begin to pull it all together. Cadmium Red Light is used to begin to get the red dyed crest to begin going towards a dyed and faded crest from the period.

 

The tunic cloth was highlighted with Cadmium Red Deep mixed with Titanium White. At this point the chest hair had not been started.

El Greco Laconian Hoplite - Flesh and Cloth

 

Further progress on the flesh, hair, eyes and a basecoat of color for the cloth.

 

The face received shadow tones of Brown Madder. This has a slightly redder tone than my usual Burnt Umber. This worked well with the cooler flesh tone I had started with. The highlights are Titanium White with a touch of Cadmium Yellow Deep. The eyes started with a pinkish white base color for the whites with the corneas and pupils picked out in blacks and browns. The hair was started with Burnt Umber and Mars Black. Two layers of color have been applied at this point. A further dark shadow tone will be applied prior to my beginning to highlight and age the hair a bit.

 

The cloth was started with a coat of Deep Cadmium Red (Extra Deep from the old Liquitex line). areas of dead shadow tones were worked in while still wet with a touch of Mars Black here and there. This is far from the finished color as I will be working more towards a faded earthy red. This will not be a brick red nor a crimson/scarlet, but somewhere in between.

El Greco Laconian Hoplite - Starting the Flesh

As I said before, I have a lot of projects on the fire these days. This great bust from El Greco was on my want list for quite awhile and after recently purchasing it I put it high on my "to do" list. It has been sitting primed, on my bench for a month so last Sunday night I decided to start on the flesh.

 

I decided to try broadening my pallet for the basic flesh mid-tones, adding some tonal value changes in the basic mix rather than my standard technique. The flesh started with straight Burnt Sienna but I used, Green, Indigo, Alizarin Crimson and Brownish Madder to modify the warmth and hue of the colors prior to doing my first wet-on-wet blending. So what you see here is the outcome of these mid tones. Next I will tackle shadows and hair base tones as well as the eyes. A friday night project if ever there was one.

 

 

 

Pegaso Greek Hoplite - Completed

So here it is, nearly complete. I say that although my policy has always been that a figure should sit on the shelf for two weeks and then be revisited for mistakes or details that need that one last touch. I just didn't want to wait that time to post photos. The shield looks a bit lifeless in the pics but there are highlights and shadows on both the shield face and the cloth hanger that just don't show up in photos. I will be putting a few highlights on the shield design once dry. I will most likely have to touch a few spots with dullcoat and I will definitely need to give the metal areas some sparkle with a bit of gloss. This last bit adds just that final sparkle to non metallic technique on figures. Anyway, I hope you like it.

Pegaso Greek Warrior - Part 4

Ok I know I said I was moving on but although I have worked on other things all week I keep coming back to this figure because I am on a roll and near completion. As you can see the sword was taken to the point where I need it in place and surrounded by all the other colors before I apply final highlights. The shield has a ways to go as I continue to paint the metallic bits and the design has yet to be started. There are details all over this piece that need to be done. The next post will be it's finished appearance.

Pegaso Greek Warrior - Part 3

As a change of pace and to give the Navarca an opportunity to dry a bit I spent the other night working on this Pegaso Greek Warrior a bit more. I decided to focus on refining the non-metallic painted bronze armor, padded armor and a few other details. Various mixes of Yellow Ochre, and Titanium White were used to add reflected highlights to the greaves, helmet and chest armor. The crest was completed as seen in the photos and the sword has been primed to begin painting. Once the sword is complete I will glue it and the shield to the figure so I can begin to paint the face of the shield. I will also re-attach the spear points to the shaft. I have broken them off twice and have them safely hidden away so as not to damage or lose them.

Now on to the gladiator vignette for a little work tomorrow and hopefully back to the Mayan bust sometime during the week. Full circle and soon a few things will get completed.

Pegaso Greek Warrior - In Progress Part 2

As promised here is the shield in progress. I have painted the inside of the shield completely in order to attach it to the arm once the figure is ready. The shadow work is a bit washed out in this picture (I am still working on my digital photography skills). Once I see how the shield looks on the figure I will darken the shadows of the bronze work and lighten the highlights. One of the tricks of painting metallics this way is to actually look at the figure complete and at proper angles to ambient room light. This helps me see better what will be required to trick the eye. I also need to work on more details of the shield banner. The front of the shield has had the base color for bronze and the painted field completed. This gives you a good idea of what I start with for bronze compared to the bronze at 80% completion. The checker pattern will also be on the front of the banner and I am going to use a bull motif on the shield. My next posting will probably be pics of the completed bust I am working on. See ya next time.

Pegaso Greek Warrior - In Progress

I've never been able to work on one figure at a time. That being the case, along with a bust I'm working on, I started this little gem from Pegaso. The sculpting is excellant and the figure lends itself well to some nice detail painting on the shield. I had just purchased the three Periscopio Publications books on Marathon, Thermopylae and Salamis so I was feeling a bit inspired. The figure is probably about half finished at this point, needing a lot of detail work. The groundwork is A+B Putty that has been worked with a Dremel tool. It has gone through about five washes of color, each slowly building the color tone I desire. The shaft of the spear was replaced with actual wood, something I like to do for effect. The armor is in-progress as well. The bronze work lends itself well to the non-metallic techniques described previously. I will show the shield in progress in my next post.