Good Monday Morning Jungle,

it is time to dig again in the past year.
Back in December 2014 Roman and Peter travelled to the second episode of MV Jar's Beginners Class in the Netherlands.The first class in Sprang-Capelle took place exactly one year earlier
- you can find a review of it here.

Well, this class was a blast for both teachers of Massive Voodoo and the students. This class was packed with repeaters of the class and only a handful first timers. Thanks to everybody who was a part on this weekend. Thank you for the cool time we enjoyed together and your will to learn more about miniature painting from us!

Another big thanks goes to the sponsors of the class, those companies who help MV with their support in material to bring a happy painting time to different locations:




First things first.
Peter and Roman had a little trip with the train and arrived in Brussels Thursday evening where they got picked up by Gert via car. After a nice dinner at Gert's place a nice relaxed evening was spent there before sleep took us over.

Brussels by night ...

It is important to say: In 2013 we thought the organisation of the class was close to perfect thanks to Jurgen, Gert and Peter but via this class and the preparation all of them took care of (before, during and after) we can easily say it was even better.

Many thanks to you both, Gert and Jurgen - we really felt so good to be at the well prepared venue again and enjoyed the great organisation of the food and drinks. If there was a question left both, Gert and Jurgen were just there giving you the answer and their help. Thank you for all your hospitality all over again. It is really a pleasure to organise such an event with you guys!

Many thanks to Peter for helping Roman with so many repeaters in this classroom!



Well, before we start into the jungle's review of the class let's have a look on UK Miniature Painter
Peter 'Avicenna"  Bell, who wrote down his expectations before taking the class for the first time:

"ROAD TRIP!
The awesome guys over at Massive Voodoo are doing another of their International Beginners Painting Classes in the Netherlands this coming December…. and this time I’m going!
For any of you who don’t know Massive Voodoo, they are a creative bunch of so-and-so’s based in Germany who have a really great ethos when it comes to the hobby. It is all about enjoying the art of painting miniatures, and the community that is brought about by the hobby.
In their words:

"Massive Voodoo’s aim is to inspire people to have the most fun while enjoying the passion of miniature painting. We also want to reach people who are not yet even knowing about the beauty of this little miniature world and as long as we can hold a brush we will continue to do so. Those small figures and the worlds you can create around them bring so much joy."

And they very much succeed. I read the blog pretty much every week, and really hope to bring some of their enthusiasm and passion for what they do back to the UK with me as well as new techniques and style to add to my repertoire.

What will also make this an awesome trip is that I am going with a good friend of mine who has experienced the might of a Massive Voodoo painting class before, and there are going to be a number of internet friends that I will meet for the first time on this adventure.
I can’t wait!"

Found via jollybodgers.com


Peter B. wrote down some words after the class and we thank Peter B. for his kind words and the cool write up!


Friday
The class itself was really busy. From theory parts about harmony to practical preparations and base building - everybody was busy on Friday night. Beginners and repeaters.



Saturday
The morning arrived with some more practical work on the bases, adding some details here and there, putting some of the colour theory from the night before to the test and getting closer to noon, where we would meet up outside for priming our projects.



After lunch the miniatures waited for us, primed. So it was time to jump into the painting process. While Peter and Roman took both care of the repeaters needs, it was clear sometimes - with such a huge gang of repeaters - that Roman would not be at their side because he was taking care of the beginners painting and experiments with the new techniques shown. Thanks again to Peter for helping out with the repeaters and doing it the "bad cop style".






Sunday 
This morning arrived again rather quick. Time is flying by if you are having fun and learn something new in regular intervalls. Sunday was packed with little tricks to close in into a nore harmonic look on the beginner's projects, pushing those demonettes as far as we could and the repeaters did put their efforts and skills to achieve better and better results. Remember: Every minute spent is worth it!

Discussion about miniatures took place


Wim to Phill: "Put away that smartphone man! 
Paint, before Peter or Roman appear again! Don't you waste so much precious time!"

Well, but Sunday closed in to an end of the class in the late afternoon. Many thanks to Patrick from Scenery Workshop who did photos of mostly all of the models. As you can see in this review Roman and Peter were not able to do many photos as they were busy teaching full time.

Let's have a look on the results of this weekend workshop:

This first timer worked his demonette's skin with some tourquoise and did well in understanding the new painting techniques, theory about zenithal light and colour composition.


This repeater went crazy with a beatiful base and some really cool freehand work.


This student took the class for the first time and even he is a renown painter already learned a lot during the weekend on how to have more fun while painting and achiving cool results in a faster pace.


The green witch on a subtile greenish-ghost-mood base. Cool work from one of the students who took the class for the first time.


This repeater went for little Grimdalf by Hasslefree. Sadly due some headaches he wasn't able to push him as far as he wanted to but we alreay can see on how this little fella will turn out if worked on a little more.

This first timer student had a lot of fun with his demonette and bringing the colour wheel to a test in finding proper colour harmony on his base and model.


The purple lady turned out to be a bit though as she was started a little too dark in her basic skin tone but this student did not give up and brought a nice result home.


A blueish demonette with the evil look in her eyes by a first timer of the class.


Another beginners demonette screaming "harmonic colour choice!!".


This repeater went into the creation of a beautiful love scene. After a bar brawl this guy takes home the girl and leaves the place victorious. Cool Hasslefree models invited this student to create this scene.

This student who took the class as a repeater was all about learning to get better in painting skintone.
Well, he did really well, but the photo does not show anything of it. Sad.


Pushing this repeater of the class further in his overall painting skills on a difficult and fragile model was a real pleasure. Remember, every minute spent is worth it!


This student who took the class for the first time already has some deep background in painting historical miniatures and you can see how much fun he had applying some new ways of thinking and painting to a fantasy model.

Well, this repeater of the class made huge steps too. On his place you really heard many "clicks!" going on in his brain. It was a real joy to see him work on his technical painting skills by try and error himself and the result speaks for itself!


This repeater of the class created this beautiful scene and it was great to see her learning with every
single brushstroke!


A ninja turtle by Kaha-Miniatures turned out to be the star on this cool base. Even without much training during the two classes this repeater of the class took really cool steps on his painting ladder.
Now off for more homework, Sir!


This beauty was the result of another repeater of the class. It was our pleasure to see her grow in that direction.

This repeater went pretty big with his model choice for the weekend and tackled many of his questions he had on this scale. Sure we were not able to finish her, but she was a good training ground ...


... and recieved a nice base too!


Again, we want to thank everybody who was involved in this cool weekend!
Keep your brushes wet, train your skills once in a while, find relaxation in it and continue happy painting!


Roman & Peter