New Camera!

After many months (years?) of saving and selling off some old miniatures, I finally pulled the trigger and bought myself a new camera.
Canon EOS 6D Mark II.  Standard kit lens for now, and eventually i'm going to get a macro lens.
But in the mean time i wanted to take a couple quick test shots as a comparison.

My old camera was a point-and-shoot Canon Elph PowerShot  It was a great little camera.   As I began taking pictures of miniatures I tried to learn every setting and adjustment on that camera to take better pictures.  I very quickly reached the technical limits of the camera and squeezed every ounce of performance out of it.  In order to get good pictures i had to spend a lot of time setting up perfect conditions. Optimal light, setting the white balance, ISO settings, exposure time, and lots and lots of post-processing.

Here's an example of one of the best pictures I managed to take on that camera.

If you zoom into that picture (download, save pic, zoom), you can see that to my surprise, some of the smallest details of the miniature are in pretty good crisp focus.  I was incredibly pleased with this image, but it took maximum effort on my part (and the camera's part!).

Here's the test image I just took with the new camera.

Not exactly the same angle, but close enough. If you zoom into this new picture (download, save pic, zoom), you can see that some of the smallest details of the miniature are a little out of focus; not as crisp as that other picture.  However this picture was taken with almost little effort.  I set the camera up on the tripod, put the camera in auto-focus, and pressed the button.  As far as post-processing, all I did was adjust the color temperature a bit to get close to the original image.  That's it.  I've owned the camera for 4 days and used it twice.  Basically, I have no idea how to use it yet.  And that picture came out.  I didn't even switch to macro mode.  Not too bad.

I can't wait to spend some quality time over the christmas break learning how to use this thing!

World War 1 Update (and other news)

It's been a while since the last post, and lots of things have changed.  The biggest thing is that we moved to a new house and with it comes my long desired dedicated wargaming room! I'll post more pictures of that later.

Recently I've been focused on finishing the World War 1 10mm gaming project, specifically getting the Germans completed.   Here are a few work-in-progress shots.

All figures are 10mm Pendraken.

Below are the artillery - I was trying to determine which location for the base (front, middle, or rear).  I went with front.

Next two pictures are basic infantry stands ready for their ink wash.  I follow the tried-and-true method from Le Coq Fou.  Paint them lighter colors, with impressionisting highlights, then seal them with a gloss varnish, then apply AP Dark Tone ink. Provides the shading and really looks great.  Especially at the smaller scales.

Two more stands ready for ink.

Most of the German Infantry ready for ink. This includes the stands that represent the stosstruppen (storm troopers)

These two were my test stands for infantry.

Here are two shots of the Germans and French lined up across from each other in the new gaming area.  Once the German artillery and MGs are complete, I think I will finally have enough painted to host a game of Take Action.

Eventually I will create some trenches and craters.  Haven't decided if i'm going to make custom modular boards or purchase pre-made trenches.  We shall see!