Warlord’s resident sculptor, Wojtek, kicks off a quick series of articles on sculpting. If you’re looking for new tips or to get started on sculpting you’ll be wanting to follow this series. Take it away, Wojtek…
Welcome to a short series of articles in which I hope to explain some of the processes I use when sculpting Warlord Games miniatures. Before we get stuck into working on Myrmillo and showing you the techniques we’ll take a look at the tools of the trade.
Preparation
In the photo below you can see the laptop paintstation I use as a sculpting area. In addition to the smaller laptop variety there is also a bigger desktop paintstation – which you choose is down to your own preference. I prefer the portable paintstation to a desk as it allows me to sculpt where I like.
In this photo you can see pretty much everything I use to sculpts miniatures…
1. Sculpting tool
2. Fine detail sculpting tool
3. ProCreate 2-part sculpting putty. Also known as Grey Stuff. 3a is the pale grey ingredient whilst 3b is the hardener. More on this below…
4. Green Stuff (also known as Kneadatite). Although for most things I tend to use ProCreate, I do still use Green Stuff occasionally as it is ‘stickier’ which is handy when you are trying to add more medium to a dried model.
5. Blister pack cut down to hold water. Water is used to smooth the finish out and to stop the putty sticking to your sculpting tool. Be careful with how much you use on Procreate though as it can cause it to dissociate!
6. Scalpel
7. Clippers
8. Pliers
9. Pin vice
10. Silver wire. Available from most jewellry stores and online in several thicknesses. I use 1mm thick for dollies and 0.6mm for armatures
11. Superglue
12. Sandpaper (grit size 240)
13. Files
14. Laptop Paintstation
Tool number 1 – This is a standard sculpting tool – you can get it from the Army Painter sculpting tools pack. Tool number 2- This is simply a needle stuck into a paintbrush and filed to be a very tiny knife. You will notice that both tools need some preparation before you can start sculpting. It’s not very difficult – just a case of filing and sanding the edges to give a smoother finish for when you sculpt.
The rest are basic tools you can find around the house/garage. Many of them you can pick up from the Warlord webstore too. Whilst these are the basic tools I use there are others I draft in for specific jobs – I’ll explain more about those in future tutorials.
I’ll be back next week with more thoughts on sculpting miniatures, specifically our gladiator Myrmillo. Until then, best regards!
– Wojtek
