Painting Workshop Review – Pirates, Ham & BBQ with Fernando Ruiz

Posted on by Thomas Stoesser
Last weekend I had the pleasure of attending my second painting workshop with Fernando Ruiz. Fernando is not only a fantastic painter, but he runs his own miniature company FeR Miniatures which produces some of the coolest busts and miniatures that I have seen on the market. If you have not seen his range yet, you should take a look.

Fernando doing one of his demonstrations

Nananananananananana…

Fernando’s painting technique is a little different from most painters that I know and it is very, very cool. Of course, he uses glazes and washes and stuff like that, but there are two main aspects where his approach is different:

1) He uses acrylic retarder from the brand “Amsterdam”
2) He teaches you to start with a rough sketch on any given part of the miniature (i.e., the face) instead of going straight into smooth and detailed work on highlights and shadows.

Both aspects are really cool and useful tools which have helped me to produce really good results in a very short time. I don’t want to go into more details here, but I can only strongly recommend to attend one of his workshops if you get the chance – especially if you are already an experienced painter.

So, besides the painting bit, what else was cool during that weekend?

  • The bust that Fernando brought with him as the workshop miniature – fricking awesome!
  • The mental picture that Fernando planted in our heads of a fetish version of the Muppets Show.
  • The Gin (Monkey 47!!)  & Tonic that Jens brought to celebrate his birthday with us 
Vlado, Fernando and Jens. There was a lot of love in the air, trust me. 🙂
  • The BBQ on Saturday night with grilled Chorizo (Yum!), steaks, salads, home-made herb butter and tons of other tasty stuff
  • The Spanish Ham, salami & cheese that we had throughout the weekend for continuous snacking
Oh, almost forgot to share pictures of some of the workshop results:
From left to right the WIPs from Philip, mine, Peter
Lastly, I would like to thank Vlado once again for organizing this and keeping us all well fed and happy!

Alright, so this is it for now. If you have any questions about the workshop, put them in the comments section below.

Comments (3)
bust Historical Pirates showcase Workshop

3 Replies to “Painting Workshop Review – Pirates, Ham & BBQ with Fernando Ruiz”

  1. Jens aka Didgman says: Reply
    23. July 2015 at 10:51

    Once again an awesome weekend I am with Thomas to reccomend this Workshop .Had been a lot of fun . Looking foward to see you next time .

  2. Manfred Knoll says: Reply
    23. July 2015 at 20:03

    I´ll say also thank you to Fernando and the other mates how joining the workshop.
    For the next event i´ll bring some Oropax or drunk more beer for a nice sleep.
    The rest of the workshop was awesome for me so many input for a mate like me there
    never paint abusts or figure befor. Thanks a lot.
    Greetings from Man;o)fred

  3. kirby says: Reply
    24. July 2015 at 10:40

    What an amazing weekend. I totally agree with your review.
    For me too, it was also my second workshop with Fernando, I still could learn many new things. It was really awsome.
    Regards, Cornel

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