Lessons Learned – The Gnome Who Didn’t Survive the Paint Job

Peter Demos
May 18
3 min read

After finishing the wizard from Reaper Bones’ Learn to Paint Kit: Layer Up!, I moved on to the second figure — the female gnome. This little caster had some personality, and I was excited to dive in.

Right out of the box, I noticed the knife arm was broken. I thought about fixing it, but honestly? I didn’t feel like gluing it back on. This was more of a practice piece for layering anyway, so I just rolled with it. No primer needed — these Reaper Bones minis are supposed to be good to go from the start.

The guide recommended a pretty detailed paint order: cloak, skin, lining, chainmail, hair, leather coat and sword hilt, coat studs, hair clips, cloak pin, belt buckle, boots, gloves, belt, stone base, sword blade, hilt, and pommel. Spoiler alert: I didn’t make it all the way through.

Cloak Basecoat

I started with the basecoat on the cloak. That went on nice and smooth.

basecoat on cloak of Reaper Bones miniature — Basecoat on cloak

Shadow Layers

Then came the shadow layers — I did two. The first was a general shade layer, and the second was a darker tone I worked into the deeper creases of the cape. This part was going great.

Highlight Layers

Next came the highlights on the cloak. I put down two layers here too and was happy with how they turned out — smooth blends, good contrast, and a nice pop to the folds for my abilities.

Highlights added to cloak of Reaper Bones miniature — Highlights added to cloak

Glaze Layer

Before jumping into the skin basecoat, I added a glaze layer to smooth out the transitions between the warm tones I was planning to use. This helped knock down any roughness and acted like a subtle filter that tied everything together. It made the skin feel more unified from the start.

Skin Tones

I then moved on to painting the skin. I laid down two layers of skin tone because some of the grey was still showing through after the first coat.

Base layer of skin tone on Reaper Bones Gnome mini — Base layer of skin tone on

Then came the shadows and highlights for the skin, and honestly, I felt like I was hitting a groove.

shadow and highlights added to skin on Reaper Bones Gnome Mini — Shadows and highlights added

Lining and Trouble

After that, I started working on the lining — especially around the skin, gloves, and shoes.

Lining added to Reaper Bones Gnome miniature — Lining added around the boots and gloves

And then, while working on the chainmail, I pressed a little too hard while trying to get the underside — and snap. The figure broke clean off just above the feet.

Applied too much pressure to the miniature and broke it around the feet. — Applied too much pressure while trying to paint bottom of chainmail and broke the miniature

I had officially joined the ranks of mini painters who’ve had a model fall apart mid-project.

I could’ve glued it back and kept going, but at that point, I decided it wasn’t worth it. The whole point of this kit is to practice techniques and build comfort with layering — and I’d already gotten some good reps in.

Final Thoughts

Lesson learned: sometimes minis break — and that’s okay. Not every figure needs to make it to completion. Sometimes, the progress is the win.

On to the next one!