Reorganising the Workspace

I wanted to post this yesterday but since that was the "Old Stuff Day" and I wanted to give as much publicity to my HeroQuest article I decided that my usual Wednesday WIP should be postponed 1 day.

Last week I had a look at my workspace and noticed that it had became somewhat cluttered with piles of plastic frames, painting pots, tools and all sorts of other hobby related clutter I decided it was time for some early spring cleaning. I took everything away and started reorganising. Here you can see the end result. I have a nice big desk of which half is used for my pc and printer and the other half for my painting hobby. My desk is right in front of the window for nice daylight aside from the two lights I have. 1 light for shining on my model when painting the other light on my palette so I can see if I mix up the right colors but I also use that for additional light on my model.

My paints are stored on the left and i keep them in particular order which I have done so since I started painting so I can blindly find any paint I need. There's nothing more frustrating then not being able to find the color you need. Keeping them in the same order saves a lot of time. This week I went to Ikea(more of that later) and I found some plastic thingy that they use to pack the photo frames with and I asked if I could have some because they just throw them out anyway. As you can see in the picture I use them to store my paint pots. I do that the same way as I had them before but the benefit of this is that they will always be in the same place. Normally they would end up budged and mixed up a bit and I had to take time to order them nicely again after a painting session. This was a great find and I'm really happy with it. (specially since it was free!)

On the right hand side I keep my painting palette since I'm right handed, seems obvious. I use an old bathroom tile and as you can see in this picture this one needs to be replaced. I have a lot of them so I just throw them out when they are done. Also take note of the mandatory cup of coffee. With my palette I also keep some old brushed for mixing up paint and light dry brush work and a paper towel to clean my brushes.

All my tools like clippers, files, scissors,knives, marker pens and a lot of old brushes together with a lot of other crap is stored in a container straight in front of me. You can also see I keep a toothbrush in there, I use that to clean my models after scraping off mold lines. It's hard enough to give them a good scrub and clear all plastic shavings that stick to the model so I can prime them without having to worry that there's still plastic shavings and bits of plastic or glue residue on them.You can also see my 5 euro cents container in the picture. I always glue a coin to the bottom of my bases(they fit perfectly). This keeps the model standing up so you can't knock them over that easily. I have another topic on that for you here.Of course also some glue and my last bit of greenstuff. (note to self: get more GS)

Those of you who had a close look at the top picture might have noticed two cups standing on my desk. I keep two cups of water to rinse my brushes but the one with the big "M" on it is used solely for rinsing after painting with metallics and the other is used for regular paints. When you're painting with metallics there's always some paint that stays in your brush and when you rinse your brushes all in one cup you will see that some metallics will float on top of your rinsing water so if you dip your brush in again it will stick to your brush. Metallics are a pain so i use 2 brushes, 1 for metallics and 1 for regular paints. So therefor it's good to also get two rinsing cups. I put a big M on it so i don't accidentally rinse my brush in the wrong cup.

So, I already told you I went to Ikea. I picked up another nice display cabinet. I could really use about 4 of these to display all my painted miniatures. Maybe I will go back again soon to pick up another one but for now it will do. These are really nice cabinets, easy to put together and dirt cheap compared with other cabinets out there. The only thing is that my hobby room is on the third floor and these things weigh a ton and are made of glass so you have to be careful getting them home.

So this was something different then the normal "Wednesday WIP"but I hope you enjoyed your peek at my workspace.I better not show you my hobby closet as it's cram packed with sprues,boxes and old unfinished projects.

 I did get some painting done last week but i didn't take any pictures so I'll just move that to next week's edition.



Seb