Jul 14, 2011
After spending the last month or so sweating away in my studio, painting full-steam for next month’s NOVA event, I have been reminded of a hobby challenge that can exist for even the most focused of painters: actual, physical strain.
Due to the stationary nature of our hobby, gamers in general do not exactly have the reputation for being incredibly fit. With that in mind, I am sure you would think of the physical activity of painting models to be far from strenuous. Personally, I paint in a small air-conditioned room, while listening to podcasts or movies. While this does not sound like the setting for a torn ACL, hear me out…
After several weeks of painting full time, I woke the other night with a severe pain in each of my fore-arms. I experienced this kind of pain once before, when I was in the midst of painting my last army. I obviously should have learned from these experiences to intersperse my 8 hour painting sessions with far more breaks. Maybe some fore-arm stretches or exercises. I also find that the more concentration the current task requires of me, the more tired my arms, wrists and hands are at the end of the day. Full days of detail-work often result in “painting dreams” in addition to the muscle strain…
Why bother sharing this? Well, I think it is worth noting that while you may be able to plan out your hobby projects across a calendar, unforeseen factors can intervene. I am sure that the discontinuation of GW’s “Tentacle Pink” put more than one Emperor’s Children project on hold. Hell, the dissolution of the Squats probably drove a few 2nd edition 40k players away from the hobby. Granted, neither of the previous issues would be preventable, but with all of these possible external factors, it can be easy to pass over an obstacle that lurks closer to home. In plotting out my own hobby schedule, I viewed my summer vacation as a time where limitless painting could occur. While the motivation and free-time are certainly present, I have been fighting to get through the physical strain of week-long painting binges. The point is, if a tree gets blown over by a storm, and lands on your army, well that is just unforeseeable bad luck. However, KNOWING that the tree could have fallen, puts you in a position to prevent such an issue. Perhaps we should keep the possibility of physical infirmity in the back of our minds as we plan out our work.
Ok, so this might be the most absurd “hobby” article ever. In fact, it may not even be a universal issue, but more of a personal statement about fitness. Regardless, I just thought I would share this experience of running into a challenge while in the midst of a hobby frenzy. With El Pee and the Man in mind as I say this, I know that it is not uncommon for gamers to attempt to burn through painting a new collection in a few short hours. I just wanted to point out that where the mind is strong, sometimes, the body is just too weak.
Keep those brushes moving, but maybe wear a helmet.
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While the Shake Weight is nice, I prefer http://www.bodyrock.tv/ for my YouTube workouts.
But seriously, hand and arm injuries are probably pretty common for people on our hobby. I get hand pain when I’ve done extended painted sessions over several days. My wife is a Physical Therapist and she’ll often recommend some stretches and exercises, but you can find exercise examples all over the web, like http://www.noc.nhs.uk/oxparc/information/treatments/occupational-therapy/hand-exercises.aspx
The key is to take frequent stretch breaks while you work. My policy is to do a little hand stretch or exercise each time I rinse my brush.
I’ve also found that if I focus on relaxing the muscles I’m not using I have less aching afterwards. Sometimes I’m so focused on my brush work I find that I’m tensing a lot of muscles. Taking a deep breath and a pause is sometimes all I need.
I have a friend with carpal tunnel syndrome. He’s a guitar player. He can’t type, paint or play guitar for more than about an hour or two a day, so take care of your body while you can!
It’s exactly right that you need to relax the muscles you don’t use, because they cause antagonistic tension and strain the opposing muscles, which I can imagine would also cause much shakiness.
RealGenius: Thanks for the advice! I think you are really on to something when you mention tension in muscles not used in painting. When I am painting detail, I find that I get physically tired pretty quickly, and I blame that on subconscious tension in my back and legs.
It’s funny, when I wrote this article it made me feel like and old codger complaining about a sedentary hobby. However, I have since mentioned this physical strain to some o my friends in the hobby, and my experience was not unique. Thanks for supporting a crotchety gamer, RealGenius!
I’d suggest regularly going to the gym or running. This works out the muscles that are all scrunched up when you’re sitting and painting and is a great relief, I find. Forearm exercises and stretches are probably a good idea too.
My big physical problem is eye strain–I use enough light, and I supposedly have good vision, but if I’m painting a lot for a stretch of weeks then I develop very annoying twitches in my left eye that don’t go away until I take a good long break from painting. *Not* good when I’m on a relatively rare I’m-so-into-painting-right-now kick!
Copious amounts of sex work great for exercise. As for forearm exercises, self pleasure works wonders.
Review how you position yourself while painting. It sounds like you may be gripping things too hard for too long, rather than an RSI type thing.
Like the others say, try practicing relaxing the muscles not used to avoid antagonistic tension – If you don’t already do so, you may want to invest in something to hold your 25mm friends for you as you paint, like a magic arm or something.
But yes, it sounds like you’re gripping too hard.
smoke cannibis, that will solve your relaxation problem.
All good suggestions. Thanks!