Miniature Showcase

Grick and Grick Alpha

For this Miniature Showcase, I chose to paint this Grick Alpha and baby with my Speed Paint set. They are fairly simple creatures and I wanted to see if I could replicate the color scheme on the packaging with the speed paints. They are, essentially, the same creature, one is just much bigger. I started out with the pre-primed unpainted Wizkids versions.

Since they come pre-primed, all I had to do was get started with the paint job. I chose a dark green to start with and painted the entire back portion of the skin. The paint was applied liberally and created very nice pockets of shadow and highlight. The dark green lends them the look of snakes. I love how the speed paint also creates shade variations not just shadows and highlights. The base green color varies where it’s applied even when it doesn’t pool in large quantities.

After painting the back of the gricks I moved on to their bellies. I used a light yellow green which furthers the snake like look of the creatures. Since these creatures live underground it makes sense that some of their skin, especially the belly, would be pale from lack of contact with the sun. As you can see, the paint bled into other areas in some places. The only drawback I can see for the speed paints is this. Overall though, the paints achieved a great look for the Gricks. I was a bit more careful with the smaller Grick and managed to keep the paint from bleeding too much into the other areas.

Once the skin was done, I went to work on the “face”. I love these creatures for the fact that they have no eyes. Eyes are the biggest issue when painting miniatures so I was glad not to have to paint some on this project. I painted the beak with the speed paint Bone color that was provided. It gave the Grick beaks a worn, aged look that would normally take me two or three layers to achieve. I would also have had to add a wash to get the aged look on the beaks. I also used a deep red for the mouth. The speed paints gave the mouths a really nice, wet look as well, that I can usually only achieve by adding a wash to a paint job.

When the beak was completed I moved on to the tentacles and suckers. I used a light gray for the main tentacle portion and a bright blue for the suckers. I tried to be careful in the application of the paint but the speed paints are really meant for large sections to paint not really for small detail work. Still, this was a learning moment so I took what I learned and plan to use it on my next project. For a simple paint job, the speed paints definitely did the trick.

The final step was to paint the base that the Gricks are on top of. In the packaging, it looks as if the Gricks are poised on top of some dirt so I used a dark brown for the base color. I made sure to apply the paint liberally to give a lot of shadow and texture to the base. The base really looks like dirt now. The paint created a really nice variation of highlight to shadow, making the base look like real dirt. I was careful not to let the dark color run onto the Grick’s belly because it would overpower the light color of it.

The end result was better than I expected it to be for the small amount of effort it took to paint the creatures. I love the vibrancy of the colors. The colors make these two creatures look both beautiful and terrifying to behold. Imagine running into a few of these in the dark caverns of a mine. These two are now ready for use in a game or for display on my shelves.

Have any questions or comments? Message below or find me on Twitter @DnDWifeStories and on Instagram @dndwife. I would love to hear from you!