Caution - Wet Paint

Interview

The following is an interview with Kevin Holland about judging painting contests.  He judges contest with David Violago

1) What are you looking for when judging a painted miniature?

Ideally, I'd like to see figures painted "FOR COMPETITION." It often seems (locally anyway) many of the people entering the competition, are simply entering their regularly painted miniatures. Occasionally, we will see some outstanding effort put into an entry, and it's pretty obvious that figure was painted as a competition entry.  Even if you are going to enter your wargaming figures (for us three judges generally, our "entry" figures and "gaming" figures are interchangeable), at least put some extra effort into your work beyond what might be your normal "wargames" level of painting.

Consistency in an entry is another good thing. I recall seeing a Space Marine figure several competitions back; the entrant had done a really fabulous "stained glass window" treatment on one of the shoulder pads - the rest of the figure was nothing special... I don't recall what this entry got, but it might have been a Bronze - had the rest of the figure been done with a similar level of skill and creativity, the entry could easily have made "Silver" or possibly even "Gold."

Some basic criteria we look for:
PRE-PREP:
--has the figure been properly cleaned up before painting?
--no mould lines
--no "vent" tails (those little bits of stringy lead/pewter that stick out off a fig)
--separate bits are well joined, seams filled, no glue "globs" all over
--"slottas" filled in the bases

GROUNDWORK:
--is there any? (some entries fail to have groundwork!)
--is it done well enough to cover up the "slotta" in the base?

COVERAGE:
--is there any primer showing through the paint?
--IS the figure primed? - bare metal showing through paint is a definite "thumbs down"
--are the different areas of paint well applied, not streaky?

PAINT CONTROL:
--do the different areas of colour stay where they're intended to stay?
--are there any "brush flips," accidents, bleed-overs, fingerprints, etc.?

STABILITY: make sure all the pieces of your entry are stable and secure! Judges
will "shy away" from entries with loose, or extremely fragile bits and pieces. If you're
entering a gaming piece with interchangeable parts, try to pin the pieces so they are secure
yet "swop-able" (sometimes magnets can work well for this, too!)

In order to get down to the business of judging, we will go through the different categories one by one, and do a "triage" (pron: TREE-awje) of the particular entries in a category. If an entry fails to meet these basic criteria, it's "booted out" as far as the competition is concerned. We are, of course, far more lenient when it comes to the Novice category - often, one (or more!) of these criteria will not be met, but you don't want to discourage a "newbie" painter the first time they enter!

2) How do you choose between entries that might otherwise be a tie?

Any entries that get through the initial "triage" stage, will generally have a lot going for them and "ties" are pretty uncommon. However, "above and beyond the call" is always a great way to get our attention. Conversion work is one way to get noticed - if you are just going to paint a "stock" figure, it had better be a pretty good paint job if you hope to keep the judges' attention; interesting ideas for groundwork (ie: Necromunda figs with "tech" bits, leaky piping, etc. as an example rather than just sand or flock); dioramas that ACTUALLY tell a story - anything that will catch the judge's eye or make YOUR figure stand out above the crowd can only help.

For our local contest, the hosting store has allowed us to designate multiple Gold, Silver, Bronze, and Honourable Mention for each category. It's been highly unusual of late to have more than one Gold, but multiple Silvers or Bronzes are not unusual.

3) What are some common mistakes or things people neglect to do when painting miniatures for competition?

Look back to Question 1 for starters. These are all things we look for as part of our "triage" process and if "Open" or "Advanced" category entries don't hit at least all these points, they will get "the boot" in favour of other entries.

Material for your groundwork: if you're using sand, pebbles, small stones, bits of twig, etc. - be sure to paint it/them along with the rest of your painting. Having "real" items mixed in with a painted figure, is a sure way to distract the eye from your painting, and throw off the "illusion" you are trying to create! And don't overload a "single figure" entry with an excess of "tricky" groundwork - this will also distract from your painting.

As general info, if you're using decals on your painted miniature, apply a coat of gloss sealer spray (I generally always use Krylon Matte spray; works out to be semi-gloss) to the figure before you apply the decals. The decals will adhere better to the gloss surface. Then overcoat as you would normally. The final overcoating also helps to seal down the edges of the decals and make them a bit more invisible. However... if the base colour under the decals isn't too complex (shading, multi-tonal, etc), you SHOULD paint the edges of the decals to get them to blend into the background colour!

Rather than enter several "OK" figures, try and outdo yourself, and enter one exceptional figure! (this gets back to the painting "For Competition" issue, though). We often see people entering several of their "OK" figures, rather than trying to do one REALLY GOOD figure. All the "OK" figures wind up being of more or less the same quality (and if the quality isn't good enough, that's several entries that aren't going anywhere...)

4) Do you have any specific advice for painting contestants.?

While creativity is always important, never forget the "technical" aspects of you work. (See Question 1 above) You might just turn out THE most Amazing paint jobs know to mankind; but, if you haven't pre-cleaned the fig, filed off all the mould lines, at least puttied up the "slotta" in the base, these sorts of things will all detract from your fabulous painting!

5) How long have you been painting and how long have you been judging contests?

I've been painting miniatures since about 17 or 18; I'm turning 40 in 2001. I've been judging in our local contest since about 1991, I believe.

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If you can't be a good example, at least
act as a horrible warning!
Anonymous
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My Website:
http://homepages.about.com/kevinjrh/index.htm

5/14/2001