Need some diversity in my mini's.

[cynthialee]

-And so you see my heroes it is much better to be white... Now go hang those cottonpicking black orcs!

-Yeah... We are not gonna work for you anymore Mentor.

That is funny stuff.

Well I figure the NPC is psychologically twisted due to being treated with harsh bigotry his entire life. Then he attains the power to turn the worm so to speak. Being raised in a constant state of persecution has its consequences for societies in the long run. In the case of this NPC it is a comeuppance issued immediately.
I am picturing the landscape he leaves in his wake down right Jurassic and deadly. His passing changes the very land itself, twisting it into a place of primordial beasts and plants that results in small enclaves of wretched survivors just scratching out a living. Ork, Human, Elf are no longer concerned about the wars of competing wizards and ideologies. No one has time for politics when just finding food and shelter are the constant order of the day.
Perhaps in the ruins of the old world there are clues and relics that can bring an end to the suffering...?

[sorcerersapprentice]

When I got my box of HQ figures and saw they were red, grey, and green I asked myself a similar question. How to get diversity in my miniatures? When I got a second box cheap at a grage sale I ended up dividing the beasts into clans - orcs, goblins and Fimirs. I changed the skin colour on each and gave about 10 members a different coloured skin, from violet to green to black to white to red and changed their armour skull and clothing to match like a regiment. It worked really well as it allowed me to give backstories to each tribe, the white ones were underground outcasts, the violet ones, elite, the red ones more violent and warlike, so too the colour of the creature could change the stats and resistance adventurers encountered.

My skeletons I mostly painted boring yellow or white, though I did single out 5, and made a Silver-boned witchking for whom I made a small material cloak, and one skeleton in sickly green yellow, one in red and brown meat, one in black with grey spotches, and one with gleaming white - all had red eyes and served as my Four Horseman of the Apocalypse. I also kept my broken minis (usually stepped on) and painted bandages on their missing parts for the poorer, trodden down class among each creature - which only helped elevate the Elite.

Giving different colours not only to the skin but the clothing, i.e. use a blue paint-tipped pin for tattoos, the armour, weapon blades, chainmail, even the bases around their feet all help distinguish difference. My characters had mint coloured bases, while the enemies had all sorts of other colours, just not mint which was exclusive. Broken figures can also be great, paint them bloody and use them as corpses, or hapless lepers or outcasts, dungeon victims, or seers. You can also glue stuff onto HQ figures, some of the plastic flashing that you would twist off the figures as you took them out of the plastic sheets was great to use as bones on the floor of the HQ board, but could also be glued to figures to make metal crosses, and other variations.

[Anderas]

Now of course we need photos.
But you knew that.

[sorcerersapprentice]

I will do what I can - I have long given them to my son, who may or may not have painted over them - I will investigate.

[cynthialee]

well the day I was posting this thread mainly I was thinking about how all my human miniatures looked like Northern Europeans and there were no other ethnicities represented
I do have a few that are not white folk. My favorite is a Samurai who looks like a Hindi. I call him Sanjay Lee the Hindu Samurai. His back story being he is a man from Bangalore who is well traveled. He made it to Japan in his travels and was well loved by the locals. He was instructed in the ways of the samurai by his master and he served his master with honor. One day he happened onto a foul warlock and there resulted a quarrel. The warlock cast a spell on him banishing the samurai to a different dimension. That dimension of course is the world of Daroka. {my game world setting}
~Yes... I tell myself stories about my miniatures likely lives and exploits in the land of High Fantasy as I paint them.~

[Baylor_OgreBane]

There are some good thread and resources in this thread! Good job guys.
Don't forget about Ral Partha minis and possibly Heresy.
They do tend to go for a very stereo typical way of sculpting in general for other races, thats because it is an easy way to achieve a look/style.
But as there is such a huge diversity amongst us as humans with some clever painting you can make most minis into various different races.
The only thing that I can say about darker skin tones, is that many of the minis I see painted by others are far to dark, they start from black and don't move up very high there.
I would rather start off slightly lighter than the colour I wanted and wash/ink down.
I have to admit I haven't tried it, but I will try with a few spare heads from my bits box and if I find a good method then post it up for you.

[cynthialee]

I have found that using light browns do well for some ethnicities. I still haven't been able to get my hands on any African styled warriors. But when I do I am going to do what I can to not make them black as onyx. I have seen real people that look like that and maybe a few mini's like that may be in order.

[sorcerersapprentice]

Added some pics to the Miniatures Gallery.

[Daedalus]

As I look at my collection of heroes and villains I see a sea of white faces with a few a couple shades darker into Latin range... Now I tried to correct this but I am having the most difficult time finding a way to paint black skin. But then I am against the issue of Caucasian faces with black skin....

I do not want some stereotype jungle warriors that look cliché and out of central casting for a Tarzan movie. What I need is an adventurer or 10 that have obvious black features, but then I also need a way to paint them that looks somewhat realistic....

Any ideas?

One Hero comes to mind, the spittin' image of the legendary Snorri Whitebeard:

[Anderas]

Amy the latin Amazon.
Model: Pinup of death "Twilight Knight"

I think this time i got the skin color right.
Base: black spray
Base II "Schmincke" Supra-white (28-101) white from above
Skin 1 Games Workshop Scrag brown (it's a kind of dark fiery orange/brown)
Skin 2 Games Workshop Bestigor Flesh (its yellowish ocre)

... until now, it is airbrush only. Pen-work comes now.





Hmm the photos seem not to be the best ever... the cape in original it is dark turqoise not blue...