Q and A With Roman Lappat

We are very happy to bring you a Q and A with Roman Lappat Aka "Jarhead"

How long have you been painting and what made you get into the hobby?

I started my interest in miniatures and boardgames with HeroQuest back in the late 90s. I always enjoyed modelling of aircrafts and tanks, together with my granddad back when I was a kid. First I was mainly interested in gaming, not the painting aspect. 

Then life went on, I got more interested in girls and basketball and miniatures dissapeared from my focus. Until 2002, where I found a small store in my hometown, meet friends there and enjoyed learning to play Warhammer 40k, Warhammer Fantasy, Blood Bowl and Mortheim. 

I learned a lot about painting tabletop miniatures back then and in 2006 I started to paint army comissions for local friends. During my studies to become a teacher for art I paid my way through daily life with this "job". Since 2009 I am a self employed miniature artist, painting comissions, teaching classes, doing coachings, judging contests worldwide and looking at my hobby, which is now my daily job.

Have you ever won any competitions? 

Yes, but I do not masturbate on medals or prizes. Taking part in a comp is a good and healthy thing for motivation,

but I have seen other painters going to the dark side of comps. Being angry if they do not win what they expect to win, etc. 

I learned many lessons about this myself and decided to stay on the bright side of the force. I do not care about medals or comps.

A medal does not make a good painter, a painted miniature does.

What brushes do you use?

All. I mean I mainly use Windsor & Series 7. Several sizes. Some Rapheals, some cheap brushes, some big brushes from canvas painting.

Really, I like to paint with what I can find. Sometimes I paint a blending with my fingers.

What are the three things at your workstation, you could not live without?

Supgerlue. Superglue is the solution to most of the worlds problems.

Accelerator. Makes supgerglue bring solutions even faster.

A small garbage under the table to throw away all my sugerglue disasters without getting up.

Is there anything you know now that you wish someone told you at the start?

Use superglue wiht care. That's the only thing. For the rest I enjoy making experiences. My own.

My failures, my happy moments, my moments of success. Over the past years I learned that this is the only way to gain some sort of wisdom and 

natural experience in what you do. It is good to be inspired by others, to get a tip by others or a warning, but in the end everything that you learn happens in you, at your workbench, nowhere else.

What is the last Model you finished painting for your own collection?

As I am self employed artist I mainly sell most of my pieces. I have a small collection of miniatures that I exchanged with friends.

This is my whole pride as I love to see these models and think of a friend.  I got a small collection of Ilyad Games Miniatures, which are rare due they are not produced anymore.

I have a small collection of these for my private joy and paint one up once in while. Over the last three years I painted six of them. Last one was the one called "Vorag Shaman".

Would you choose True Metallics or NMM?

I personally enjoy True Metallics more. 

What is your favorite scale to paint in?

No favourites here, depends on the sculpt. Sometimes I go big, sometimes I go extra small. It doesn't matter to me as long

as the sculpt catches my attention, brings out emotions or the right idea.

Do you use an airbrush and if so, what for?

Yes. I think the airbrush is a great tool for a miniature painter. Just like a brush or a blade. I would not use only one of them. All goes in 

combination with other tools to achieve what you want to see on your miniatures. I use the airbrush for priming sometimes, I use the airbrush for basic colors sometimes, I use the airbrush for in-between-color-filtering, I use the airbrush for 

glazing, for bigger changes that have to be done. But in fact I can do it all with a brush and I do sometimes too, just depends on the mood of the day which tool I use.

Do you suffer paintbrush envy meaning is their a painter out there who you wish you could paint as well as?

No. My goal is not to copy other painters, I enjoy finding myself in my paint.

What do you feel you need to improve and why?

Sometimes I think I should paint as clean as other painters or controlled or whatsoever, but I am getting very unhappy with these thoughts.

I think of changing my way because of outside pressure, what the masses think is great or not, but very fast I throw these thoughts in the garbage and feel great

painting my way again. Improvement comes through painting time spent well and that's what I do eight hours a day, since several years. Improvement and Learning never stops. 

If you meet another painter telling you he knows it all, do not try to learn from him.

Do you or have you ever felt like a Noob with Just his paint brush?

Yeah, once in a while.

What three things would you have stranded on an Island?

Supgerglue. Accelerator. A wonderful, beautiful girl who would laugh on my superglue experiments.

Work By Roman Lappat.

If you have any questions you would like to ask Roman please comment them below and we will send them over to him and with any luck have them answered in part 2.