My client and I decided to tone down the blue on the current thousand sons order. It was my mistake and I "mis remembered" the colour I sed on the last lot (this isn't the same client). Regardless I like this blue, it's stark and clean and suits the smooth space marine aesthetic. More to come soon. Closing in on the end of this order now. 

I also had this really fun (but brittle) arachnid order for a loyal client that's come back for more! I loved the starship troopers movie as a child and these where really fun to paint. Though I will say to people who 3d print...invest in ABS like resin! Yes it's a bit more expensive but the brittleness of this resin was a fustration. It was almost as brittle as games workshop finecast. 

I finished the Middara miniatures. I really enjoyed painting the bright colours (the green shorts especially) and I feel like I nailed the look of each miniature compared to their character cards. 

Both of these commissions are new clients and I love these smaller commissions that allow me to flex my creative skills and paint a mix of things. I will likely have finished, if not close to finished updates of the board game miniatures soon. 

I have just launched on Fiverr with the new prices. I will be bringing these prices to the website soon so remember to get your credit with the current prices before the end of November. I also made a little landing video for Fiverr and I'll stick it on my site today! 

During a recent conversation at a gaming club, I picked up a miniature on the table, and I asked the fellow "how did you get this nice contrasty look on the cape" and he remarked, "Oh I paid a guy to paint for me". 
I smiled and I remarked in kind "I paint commissions, that's cool, how much did you pay if you don't mind me asking..." and he responded…

THIRTY QUID A MODEL! 

My jaw hit the floor. It stayed there for a while. I went home and did some research. I won't mention the painter, and their painting is perfectly adequate, but I believe my painting is vastly undercharged compared to many other painters. If this fellow was charging £30.00 per infantry model, I can only imagine how much I could be getting paid per model. 
For context, I am charging the same amount I've charged since about 2017 and in comparison to the quality I was painting then, I am now achieving a high standard consistently.

I must clarify up front, I will never charge £30.00 per model for an infantry model. 
​

A Valhallan from 2017 More or less just two layers on everything, thick paint, rush drubrushes and highlights. The overall look was great and suited the size of orders I was doing then but since covid those kinds of orders have stopped. I think I charged about £6.00 for this. 

Nightswatch painted this year. Stronger brush control, better color choices, tighter highlights and edge highlighting in particular all signify my growth as a painter. Not to mention blending and care with basing. Generally, they're just vastly better in all ways. Ironically I think this was the same client! I think I charged about £15.00 each for these. 

I have been hesitant to do this for a long time but this year I figured it's time just to do it. As of November I will be increasing prices. I will also launch on Fiverr (a service website where people offer work). God do I hate capitalism...but therapy is expensive, and the longer I hold out on this...the more I'm gonna need. ​
​​

I have fourteen years of experience, thousands of models under my belt, and dozens of happy customers who prove that I am worth the increase. I won't change anything else, I will provide the same quality, speed, and reliability of EZPainter but I will be increasing prices to allow myself a better quality of life, higher self-respect as an artist, and a more honest outlook on my value to the people I work for. 

I know this is a sudden and drastic change for my existing and long-term clients and as such I am offering a deal for October. 
Some people may want to benefit from the current prices but will only have money in the future or may not even know what they want painted. Clients have previously placed credit with me, and this is something that I am able to offer again to both old and new clients up to a value of £500.00 under the current pricing system.
I've had people pay for credit before, so I am willing to offer up to £500.00 credit under the current pricing system for any current or new client that wishes to "book" my work at these rates (pictured below). 
This credit will be good for one year and I will honour it respectfully and stretch it as far as it can go for you. (Paint as many minis as possible with it). 

My business has always been categorized by a few things. 
1. Fast turn arounds. This won't change. I still won't let you wait a year for your order. Just get it in, I'll get it painted and return it. 
2. High quality and durable tabletop paint jobs for as affordable a price as possible. 
3. High levels of friendly communication with my clientelle. (I've made life long friends I like to think) 

These things will not change, only I will now be charging a "affordable rate" in line with inflation and the growth of my skills. 

I am so grateful for my clients and the people who have gotten me here but don't get me wrong, I am also grateful to myself for sticking it out, working hard at learning more about painting, and painting fast, well, and with a continuity of style that I didn't have many years ago...when I was charging the same prices. 

A special thanks to Dave, you always send me little bits and bobs when I need a boost to pay my bills or similar. Bram and lukas for being the power houses of commission clients that you are. Ivor for being a legend and sending me roughly 500 minis in one year, Martyn for being along for the ride since day one and so many more people. I can't even begin to thank everyone who's got me to this place. I am eternally grateful. 

I hope people understand and to many new clients...it won't seem weird at all. 

​Peace and love, Arty.
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Pricing as it stands currently (until the end of October). If you wish to book £500.00 credit with my services before then (valid for one year) please let me know asap and I can mark it down and we can chat about what work you may want doing in the future. 

As above, the burglary in my home in July has left me with substantial costs to cover and as a fairly low income person It's been a bit difficult. If anyone has a commission they've been sitting on for the right moment I can happilly negotiate discounts on orders for the rest of August and maybe even september. Get in touch via [email protected] for more discussion on the matter. 
Kind Regards
​EZPainter 

It's been a weird few weeks and it all started with a burglary at my home! My electric bike was stolen from right inside the living room and I chose to cover costs of the new one almost immediately.  Luckilly a client happened to message me the next day asking me to paint these awesome Roleplaying models for his DnD campaign and so I got that done and love the results. 

I do wonder what kind of campaign he is running with this mix of models. I bet it's something tropical jungle themed with some pyramid treasure hunting thrown in. 

I've been painting some more models for my personal western collection. These are from Perry miniatures and are techinically 19th Century rioters. I get a strong gangs of new york vibe from them. 

Last week I went to firestorm to play with my Orc army I showed on the blog earlier this year. I Lost two games, which I expected, but I had a ton of fun. On the way in, though I had promised my self I wouldn't buy any new toys, I saw this new pack from Dead Man's Hand and I picked it up for painting practice and also because I adore the movie. It's maybe one of my favorite westerns. 

Due to my pre-existing love of the characters they pretty much painted themselves. I've recently been feeling in a bit of a rut with my skin tones so I tried two distinct and different tones here. I felt this also went nicely with the way that their outfits are so dichotomously contrasting. 

I cut off their base tabs, as I wanted them to really seem like they where running on the ground and not elevated. 

I've been running this business for 14 years and I decided to set up a review page. I investigated a few option but I ended up using google as it seems like a good place for people to "land" when searching the business in search engines and also I couldn't seem to get some of the other working very well. So far, being that I gave notice to some clients, they've been repeating their wonderful compliments but now in an official capacity, whereas before I had all this lovely stuff to go on but only in my emails. 
I look forward to more reviews with time and I'm really chuffed I decided to sort this out finally. 

Found an awesome free STL of "Da red gobbo" and I printed it out for painting practice. I had to replace the flag because it printed to flimsily on my printer and kept breaking. This was a really fun model, I learned a lot and I'm going hunting for more. 

I've been working my butt off re-imagining the portfolio. Mostly minor changes but even minor ones take a very long time to insitute across the entire portfolio. I've been doing a lot of thinking about re-adding the small scale 15mm armies I've painted. Due to the way my photography got better over the years some of my photography isn't great but I think I can dig out a few more orders that got a good enough photo shoot to put them back in. Keep your eyes peeled for more to come in the portfolio and have a look at the new gallery page with a clean and concise layout for easier navigation. 

I finished the Witch King this morning for my Orcs. I will be playing with them for the first time ever today at firestorm games. I'm excited and nervous but I can't wait to get going! 

Also since I started using adobe express I've become obsessed with experimenting with content and I found this cool background feature. Yes, I know i'm about 20 years late to the game but it doesn't change how much fun I'm having and I'm also hoping it'll boost any ebay sales I am hoping to put up. I put the Witch King on a cool background. 

Long standing customer Dave hit me up at short notice to get some more samurai done for his groups samurai campaign they're running this month so I popped out a few more. This time in blue and purple. Again these resin sculpts are extremely pleasurable to paint and I think the finished look is really attractive and pleasing to the eye. 

This last week i've been working hard on a new pricing pdf. It's come in at 500mb! So I've uploaded a compressed version of about 60mb to small pdf and you can find it here: 
https://smallpdf.com/file#s=ae8c3afb-f608-4406-a821-b936c0834234

It's a concise but descriptive look at the offerings of my services, some historical examples of work and details about things like basing and conversions. I really hope you like it and that it helps you understand the business a little more. 

I've been painting away quietly and thought i'd share some updates. Recently I have been working on my orcs and some smaller commissions. One of those commissions is a small selection of sci-fi models. One of those was a warmachine mech (I've always loved these janky / improbable models) and I really enjoyed the rusty gnarliness of it. 

In the same order I had these space wolf looking resin dudes. I don't know where they're from but I had a lot of fun painting them and enjoyed getting those gawdy nineties yellow skin tones down. 

My little orc force is climbing up to 500 points slowly. I added a few more mornanon orcs and also a 3d printed proxy troll. After my colorful first bunch of orcs I decided to make these a bit more monotone with greys, beiges and browns. Note "simpson orc" with yellow skin. He is cool. 

Despite being a long time commissions painter for wargames I haven't gamed since 2010 or so (that is - excluding some of the games I've designed myself.) 
In 2010 roughly Games workshop introduced the laser pointer and I had a guy table flip because I "got him" on a technicality, that wasn't one, it was that his weapon, despite having line of sight, just could'nt reach. He went fucking nuts. Ever since then I've avoided games workshop games like the plague. However there is one that has really been calling me, my favorite, my own, my preeeeccciiiiooous. 

Yes, the lord of the rings, middle earth strategy battle game. There is something unique about the way they just "got it right" on the first try (or third, but more or less the first). Who knows, maybe they didn't go back again because of licensing or some other agreement. Maybe they did, somehow, despite their negative and greedy capitolistic sticky fingers, decide, "nah, we're done" with core rules. Either way I always loved it. It's so simple that even years after I stopped playing, I can still easilly follow along with youtube battle reports. 

After much consideration I decided on a Mordor army. My gaming style is way to chaotic for a good army, even though I adore so many of them and with the Evil one my OCD side will allow me to Mish Mash my force way more easily. I bought the starter battehost because I wanted the very radical Gothmog and plastic witch king (who appears to almost be a statistically broken unit) and I also bought some units online including a sprue or two or Oathmark goblins, as I've heard they're great proxies for Orcs, which was absolutely correct. 

Pictured above: Gw, GW, Oathmark, Oathmark, GW. They fit almost perfectly. They faces match and the scale is great, the legs are almost identical in style and the arm "seams" from their multi part nature is covered up really easily with a little paint or where it was really obvious, some green stuff and a little "copper shoulder pad". Note, I converted every model even a tiny bit, so these orc archers are all modified slightly. Though saying that, the guy on the left might not be. 

Some other basic conversions. Left, a simple arms twist took a "look at me i'm open, hit me and i'll die" model to a "eff off mate, i'm gonna crack your skull in" model. Middle, an arm twist removed another "hit me and i'll die" pose (what is it with GW single poses and this open arms pose, it's very silly) to a more menacing approaching enemy. I also slit the helmet and put an axe head in it but it's not to visible in this picture. The guy on the right was an arm twist and weapon replacement, my models probably aren't anywhere near tourney legal (and I couldn't care less, I really have zero aspiration to play in tournements). I love the idea that he's just picked up another weapon to lob at the enemy. 

I don't rightly remember eveything I did here but I really enjoy the "multi spear" on the right, I feel like he's a particularly twisted orc who enjoys mayhem and mashing up "hoomans". 

Talking of mashups, this guy is a big old mix of parts. He has GW legs, green stuff straps and shoulders with a very old warmachine left arm (i think), an Oathmark right arm, an "amazon" head on his right arm as a shoulder piece (from god knows what set), a GW shield on his back, a GW head from some sigmar ghost set (it had a particular gnarly mouth and I like the idea that he can't see, it's kind of stupid and orcish). On top of that his Banner is a mix of the Amazon set (spear), Skaven detailing and a copplestone dagger from his cavemen. Like I set this Orc is a real mutant of parts but damn if he doesn't look all of the sum of his parts and more. A real badass. 

I've gathered from my youtube binging that Captains are super important for Orcs...because the general rabble mostly sucks. This guy is a Oathmark goblin with a Dark elf head (I think) and a big amazonian shield that has been brutalized to look something akin to a Uruk shield with those big spikes. He is pinned onto some Airfix stairs. I enjoy the gore but i'm indecided as to whether i'm going to gore them all up yet. 

Gothmogs gitz wouldn't be anything without the man himself. I chose the mace as it appears really horrid to me, and I think I gave his sword to another orc. He's a surprisingly simple model, more or less dry brush, ink, highlight and then paint the red and skin. I think he came out really well. 

​Right! Some more pics below but keep your eyes peeled for more, I'll be adding a troll as soon as I can find a Proxie I actually like! 

One of the commissions I've just finished is this really cool looking, and cohesively painted, unit of Thousand Suns space marines. The client wanted them painted in a slightly less gaudy blue and so we went with Kantor highlighted up to some edge highlighting here and there. 

Another minor creative choice was to highlight the gems and red eyes with a little gloss varnish at the end of the process which really made them pop and helped them from getting lost in the final product, being that these are very colorful and exciting models. Below are all of the pictures I took but I didn't photgraph all 25 as my photography studio isn't huge and many of them are almost literal repeats of each other. 
​Oh and the title of this post? Well - there was 25 of them.  Hehe. 

Hey everyone! I'm back painting again after a long break. In fact I've been painting since november but I was consistently working on just one big order for Dom (A DnD order that was huge!) so I will post pics of that soon. 

Currently I'm working on some 40 Emporers children for Jody and some Nightswatch for Lukas to go with his collection I painted before the big break. I'll post some photo of the 40K stuff later tody or tomorrow but for now enjoy these first two models from the Nightswatch top up. 

Heading out today is this beautiful and small german motorized devision. A great little collection of models with a lot of character. I particularly enjoyed applying the mud effects to the wheels here, which i achieved by mixing up some of my snow paste and dying it brown with paint, usually i mix gravel right into the wheels but it can look a little large so this new effect is much nicer. 

I've been working on this commission slowly and intermittently since last winter as i have had a big house move and some other bits to sort out in life. The commission is large and exciting and i have really enjoyed painting a unified and individual force. As with anything uniform (in this case rather asymetrically, being that not *everyone* is wearing a greay cloak) i had a good time working out the color scheme and the unifying elements. 

I had the most fun working on the deer rider, on this model i took my time to work some soft and gentle blends of brown to light brown/grey and i love the final effect, it's very naturalistic. 

Some of the troop choices featured a fair amount of colour variation, so i went with a "three-four colours rotation" and the final look is fantastic but most of the troops feature a grey and black pallete. There where so many troops i had the chance to experiment with different types of black, different ways of painting it and different ways of finishing it. As a final choice, once basing was complete i went through the whole collection and added a tiny bit of mud and dust kick up on every single cloak (and many of the shoes). This really ties them to the winter look and every one of the my housemates that i've shown have specifically noted "they love the snow on the capes". 

The heroes took a little longer and i really took my time to make sure each one stands out from the other. I also added a little more detailing on their bases so that they pop on the battlefield for the player. During the end of this commission i feel like i really mastered the snow effect of the bases that i've been devloping since the first valhallan order a few years ago. These days i've got the "mottled/ stepped in" snow down to a T. 

I will be posting high res images later today. I hope everyone enjoys them. 

​Arthur 

I've been working on some little orders in this new year period as i've recently moved and have set up a new studio. One of these was a fun and unique little order of "not" blackadder miniatures from Scarab miniatures. I really enjoyed this order and it bought back lot's of good memories of the show which i grew up watching and i always loved it. In british schools (at least when i was there) they often use the show to educate people gently on the horrors of ww1 such as the food shortages and the command structures. I am looking forward to sending these back to my client (dave, a long time loyal client and friend) and finishing the next thing on the desk. Check back for more soon. 

This last month i've been working in silence, tying up loose ends and sorting out my order queue. I have had some old clients get back in contact about Flames of war orders which i am super excited to get started on in the coming week or two. I finished some of daves mixed stuff and the infinity bits for lukas, i can't wait for Lukas to get all his work back, due to Covid we went with a "send it all back together" approach (also better because of shitty brexit) and he is going to get a christmas size box of painted miniatures! 

I had fun painting these infinity bits but i think i may not paint infinity in the future. I've spoke to lukas, maybe i could just charge a little more but i prefer not to charge to much. In my eyes this hobby and job isn't about rinsing people capitolistically, i try my best to keep costs down but with some painting styles (e.g. the "infinity" style) it's just impossible. I give every client i work with some kind of discount, which is ok as most orders vary in style, size and length, meaning i can recoup the "cost" in one way or another with style and technique choices. When you've painted professionally for this long you don't worry about how you're going to paint something, you just do. Sadly infinity takes so long to paint due to the fine edges, this is the reason i don't paint much 40k any more. I was charging £10.00-£15.00 a miniature and it made me feel sick, i didn't want the cost for the client to be that high. Don't get me wrong they look awesome (literally i'm so proud) but due to the cleanliness of the paint job i shall think long before painting more Infinity in the future. As i become a better painter my time and effort input becomes more congruent with my costs and output so i could in fact be pondering a very simple problem that in essence doesn't exist. Most artists undervalue their work (except usualy for the famous ones...) and i think maybe it's time to do another re jig of the costs, being more specific for each range i like to paint. The irony being with these infinity is that they bring me such joy to look at, especially the magnet pinned spider robots, which where a realy adventure and the results look fantastic. 
​

I also had the oppertunity to paint some Uruks from lord of the rings this month, i adore lotr models. I would paint LOTR all day if i had a choice, sadly a large chunk of the LOTR collecting community are hobbyists themselves so i shall simply keep wishing and hoping. It would be my dream to just paint an entire collection. I shall pop Lukas's orc bow on here to, just in case i didn't share it yet. 

I also finished Daves covenanters (i hope i'm writing that correctly) and i am as always having fun painting in a vaguely "dallimore" style that Dave always enjoys. Dave to is waiting on the return of this lot as i have some other bits i'm just started yesterday for him (after someone broke into a parcel of his on the way here and nicked some bits! But don't worry i like to take care of my clients so i re purchased the pieces and we're back on track, no cost to Dave of course.) 

Pete's SS where a good laugh. I worked on these to provide a style and color pallete that matched his current collection, in fact we spoke a lot about paint styles and colors, and i had a really good oppertunity to think about how i structure the paint costs of the business. I think i may begin to offer a "flat coat" rate, for gamers who fancy the "no bells and whistles" style over high detail. It pleases me so that the high detail obsession of the early 21st century is already wearing off, i personally think gaming should be about gaming, and the super duper high detail paint style of some painters and some companies can get me down a bit as i feel the pressure to match. 

I knocked up this little base marker for Pete but i forgot to send it so i've popped it in the post this morning and it should be with him soon. I hope he likes it, i had time to kill while i awaited instruction, so it was time to kit bash with those lovely spares. 

Next up i'm going to whip through some otherworld stuff as mentioned above. The otherworld miniature line is fantastic and just the right amount of character. Taking what i jsut said about detail i want to note, detail DOES NOT MEAN CHARACTER. Take many miniatures from the gamesworkshop lines. They're often repeated soul less high detail mechanical constructs with absolutely no character inside. Then compare them to low detail lines like the 90's warzone. Yes they look gimicky and at times completely nuts but the character pours out. Some sculptors hit this happy medium and the sculpttors for Otherworld manage that in spades. One of the beautiful things about characterful miniatures is that they take paint very well. The more Characterful a miniature the easier it is to decide what type of paint what area. Ultimately this means that the miniature is much quicker to paint and much more fun.

Pic below - some FOW i did for this returning client many years ago. I always loved seeing those horses lined up.

Finally pictured below is the two rather comprehensive Flames Of War orders i have on the go. Luckilly these are (i think but i am not sure) collections of two friends, which is awesome as it means i can color match their armies and they will look great on the table together. So check back for more on the Otherworld stuff and the Flames of war soon. I shall also aim to get some good portfolio pics up of the Infinity bits. 

The last few weeks i've been bouncing back and forth between painting aqnd my new gaming company. I started a new company under "wicked wargames" (wickedwargames.weebly.com). The company is a splinter off ezpainter as opposed ot releasing more games "under" ezpainter. It never felt quite right and i think it confused people as well as myself at times. 

On the painting table i have of course been painting a lot of miniatures for the new game but also some commissions. Dave has sent me a nice mixed order of Covenantors and a tribal shaman. 

I really enjoyed painting the horses for these blokes. I took a bit of a Kevin dallimore approach to the horses straps and saddles and i think it really paid off. One day i'll paint everything that way and it'll defniitely be good for business. People seem to like the Dallimore method. Dallimore is the chunky paint method of the foundry miniatures line. 

I also just landed a really fun Waffen SS ordfer. I asembled them all and i got a bit creative with someo of them, this is going to be a fun order and i can't wait to continue building a fun working relationship with this new client. 

The only miniatures i'm paiting for myself right now is these western models, i plan to paint one a day as a warm up excersise and i love western models. It's been many years since i had any of these exciting foundry sculpts on the table (there is two dixon miniatures in there two) and i look forward to getting them on the table with a western gaming system that i plan to develop in the future. 

I'm still working on the infinity bits but i'm taking my time to work on them slowly so that i make sure to give them the attention they need. Infinity is not a style you can rush, it's sharp, clean and it needs time and care. 

Today i finished the War for chicken island starter from Kickstarter. This has been one of the wierdest and most exciting commissions i've had in a long time. With a recent slew of "realistic" commissions and even some that you might consider "hyper naturalistic" i've been slow to the table but with these random and cartoony models i've managed to really flex my painting muscles and get some really fun painting done. 

My fave from above is the guy with the muscles, he really shines as a character and i added a little tattoo on his arm that says "mom" and an anchor. 

Despite howbasic the above paint jobs could have been i decided to use a mix of browns and silvers and painting techniques so as to give thme some individuality. Some of these got flat coats and inks with lighter lifts while others got layered drybrushes and wet brush techniques to simulate gashes and scuffs on the stone, wood and metal. I particularly enjoyed painting the dragon chicken who i painted using a mix of red and silver paint that created a really curious tone across the model, almost colored metal. 

This slide is almost all favorites to, i particularly like the "god of war" kratos and the "not skeletor". I felt like i nailed the purple on that one. 

In this one it's gotta be the terminator chicken...i mean come on...a terminator chicken. 

The big boss models (i presume) came out a lot better than expected. Generally painting 3D printed stuff can be hit and miss, print lines can be very distracting but i personally enjoyed layering on slightly thicker layers of paint on these, adding depth and also covering some of those lines as i went along. 

This week i've finished the basecoats for the rest of the chickens (it was nice to practise some more complicated colors like purple, it's always hard to get a good flat basecoat of purple so that was pleasent.) 

These guys are seriously some of the funniest models i've seen in a while, i particularly like the "god of war" one and the "zen master". 

I've also been working on ctaching up on personal projects. I've had a colleciton of toy dinosaurs i have been building up for a while that have needed a good lick of paint for a while. I am painting them to use with my own published wargame "Cretacea: The game of gargantuan survival". 

I really enjoyed painting this Ankylosaurus (size wise he's probably a large juvenile) and he came out wonderfully with a mix of spray and inking techniques used. He reminds me of "bumpy" from the Juarssic world kids show (which i binged all two series of in it's entirety in a few days recently hehe). 
​

I've been catching up on these infinity models. My personal anxieties rarely encroach on my work but they seem to with infinity but i decided not to make a scene and just wait until the motivaiton came up. I believe it's because infinity has a real distinct style associated to it (the reaosn i don't paint space marines) and i worry about not getting things "clean" enough. But i shouldn't worry as the client i'm painting for this time is not only one of my favorite clients but a friend also. 

These robots are looking awesome, and i do enjoy a chance to practice extreme edge highlighting. 

Some base coats and some black ink stuff. My current black ink mix is a bit mirky, it doesn't matter i repaint almost all of the model but i may re mix my ink.