This charming little dragon and his hoard of presents is one of several seasonally available figures. This is the first of the holiday dragons that I had the opportunity to paint for Reaper Miniatures a few years back, and I just adore him. I think gifts are a perfect thing to hoard, as they represent love and possibility.
Unfortunately I did not take any work-in-progress shots while painting this figure, so I don’t have a lot to offer in the vein of how-to. I will say that I think snowflakes are an accessible pattern if you want to try your hand at some freehand wrapping paper, since they’re mostly straight lines. Use a brush with as fine a point as you can find. You are unlikely to be able to paint this sort of thing with a standard synthetic brush. You will need a Kolinsky sable watercolour brush to paint these kinds of details. You may find that one on the smaller side or with a shorter bristle head is a bit easier to control, but experiment with the brushes you have to see what you can draw the finest, most controlled lines with. I always recommend practicing on a base or an old miniature or something similar before painting freehand on your intended figure.
The snowflakes I painted are six pointed. Start by painting a center line, then paint two lines over it in an X shape, trying to make the end points of the lines roughly equidistant apart. (Or you could experiment with painting a wide X and then a center line through the middle of it. Experiment and find what works for you!) Then you can use straight lines or dots to customize the flakes. Cross the end or mid-point of each line with a small dash mark, or put two dots to either side of the end points, or put dots in between the lines. There are all kinds of options.
The dragon comes on a small base of holly. I used the forest floor mould from Basius to create more foliage, and then placed him on top. There weren’t really any berries in the press base, but some rounded spots I painted in a similar way to the berries to make it look like he was resting on a larger base of holly.
In 2023, Reaper Miniatures is running their 12 Days of Reaper promotion from December 4 through December 15. During the promo period you can choose one of 12 special holiday figures, including the Christmas Hoard Dragon, every purchase of $40 or more from the online US or UK Reaper sites. The 12 Days promotion stacks with the promotion that gives you a free figure of the month with each $40+ worth of order.
Bird with a Brush 