Armies on Parade 2015

So I did eventually manage to just about finish off the Eldar Alaitoc army off, but only just! It was a 2am painting session the evening before that finally saw the last of the work completed. Overall I'm really happy with how they came out and it's been a really good learning experience. Here's the very last units that were completed before the force was displayed at the local GW in the annual Armies on Parade competition.

Insert zooming noises here.

I mentioned in an earlier post about the possibility of adding some of the old jet bikes to the force but didn't actually come across any at a reasonable price until a month before the deadline.  These were good fun to paint and really add some mid-level height to the army as well as the opportunity to whizz around the house like a dick with them. They're really simple four-part figures (not including rider) and have a proper weight to them. The castings were a little off in parts, but nothing a little greenstuff and filing couldn't fix.

Proper flying bases! I always preferred the old hex style base.

Bonus shrieker cannon.

I would have preferred to spend a little more time on them and come up for a slightly more exciting design for the carapace, but they look okay and fit with the rest of the army. I really feel as if I've (finally) cracked using yellow with this project too and I've started adding glazes into the painting process so that should be something fun to play around with in the future. I can't describe how much of an epiphany it was when I realised how much more vivid they made certain colours pop, which is especially useful when painting 1990's inspired armies!

Last of the boy Scouts

The very last thing to finish was the last group of five Scouts. These were okay to paint, but nothing particularly special and felt like a bit of a chore (as the last of any project is want to be). I also had to do quite a bit of modelling work to clean them up as some of the casting was iffy. Still great figures though and it's nice to have had the chance to paint up all nine of the Jes Goodwin Scout models! Anyway, here are some of the entries from the event.,..

Chaos Iron Warriors with Thunderhawk.

Amazing Khemri Undead Army.

Fantasy Ogres on an amazing display board.

Fantasy Goblins on another great board - love those Squigs and Trolls.

Chaos Thousand Sons force that won - some rad airbrush stuff going on with these guys!

My Eldar on the day - stoked to have finally finished them!

The guys at the local shop really do go out of their way to hype up the event and it really paid off, with 18 entrants this year which turned out to be a record for the country! There were loads of other great boards that I didn't get to photograph, including a rad Werewolf-themed Fantasy display and an Undead graveyard scene.  I was really impressed at some of the scratch-built boards and the amount of narrative that was happening in some of them (something which my board had none of). In the end I didn't place in the top three, but wasn't really fussed as the event is always used as a deadline rather than a competition for me - seems to be the only way I manage to finish stuff off! In true hobby style, I've already started working on the next army and will be posting an entry on that in the next few days as there's some really exciting stuff to start working on! If you've never done an Armies on Parade project before I'd defiantly recommend it -nothing better than seeing other people's work and chatting about little men.