Our First Custom Order and Happy Little Accidents (Part 2)

We were working on our first custom order. The client requested a Fractal Familiar in three sizes, originally asking for a metallic pearl color.

To get there, we started experimenting and produced five test pieces: two with an airbrushed base and three primed with Citadel Chaos Black from a rattle can.

Look — if you want deep, clean black that just works, you pay Citadel their tribute. Nothing else really compares.

That left us with three final paint tests:

• The first was exactly what the client had requested: steel, followed by pearl.

• The second was a 50/50 mix.

• For the third, I did a bit of research on fractals themselves and found that they’re typically depicted in light blue tones. I mixed white and blue Speedpaints until I landed on a color I liked and hand-painted it onto the model.

My wife followed that up by spraying on the pearl layer and painting all the bases black. I sealed everything with a satin coat.

The client loved the blue version — and that’s the one we went with.

One happy client, a payment, and a five-star review later, we arrived at the happy little accident.

The original request didn’t actually read all that well on the sculpt. But one of the unused test pieces had this incredible shiny, silvery steel finish left over.

And you know what tends to look like amazing shiny silvery steel?

Mithril.

Not only did we happy-little-accident our way into an Adamantine Golem paint scheme, but we also stumbled directly into Mithril at the same time.

I genuinely believe Bob Ross would have been proud.

The takeaway is simple: just because something doesn’t succeed at its original intended purpose doesn’t mean it was a failure.

Either you learned from it — or you discovered a new application for it.

Both are successes in their own way.