Scenic Routes

As a side project, (one of many) I've recently been revisiting my scenery collection and sprucing it up a little as over the past few years it's begun to look a little tired. I've always had a soft spot for creating scenery and over the past decade Games Workshop have put out some great pieces of pre-made buildings that really invoke the ridiculously grim-dark architecture of the 41st millennium. Before the advent of Necromunda bulkheads, the only terrain that was available to buy was purely card based and the majority of the scenery used was either found objects such as lumps of cork or crudely made buildings. Last year, I posted a few photos of some Ork buildings I made with my Grandad over 20 years ago last year (christ where has that time gone?) and having some time off work, finally based them up and finished them off this week.

Definately not Ork church.

25 SQUIGS IN THE ROOM NEXT DOOR.

Was tempted to make this into an Ork toilet because I'm 12.

Reasonably happy with the way they've turned out! I tried to reflect as much detail as possible from the old paint job whilst making them look a little more like the amazing 90's Ork terrain the GW studio put out. 

The Squigster's of Mercy gig was good, but the crowd agreed that their earlier material was stronger.

However, I've fallen out of love with the majority of the kit terrain out there because it is all so similar. Even the new Necromunda-esque scenery that came with the new Armageddon Shadow Wars set is a bit suspect. Whilst it is festooned with detail, it leaves little to the imagination like the scratch built model buildings that graced White Dwarf in the 80s and 90s. However, the new shipping containers are incredible! Proper amazing kits to put together and paint. I don't mind each of these looking exactly the same because they're supposed to have that imperialist uniformity. I just can't get on board with the idea that every hive city looks the same. I'm not sure I'll be making much more scenery in the future as I simply don't have much space left to store new pieces. However, I hope to keep going back and adding more detail to the stuff I already have.

Amazon deliveries in the future are even less dependable.

In other hobby news, I'm almost done with my Dark Eldar Armageddon kill team (photos soon) so I'm hoping to get a couple of games in with them. I've also finished off the High Elf Repeater Bolt Thrower, which was fun to do, although the rest of that project will be taking a backseat for a little while so I can concentrate on finishing a few other things off. I'm also glad to say that the very last element of the Emperor's Children has been finished; another Contemptor joins the ranks of the loyalist few of Istvaan III. I've also recently picked up a Fulgrim model too and plan to do a little conversion work to create a pre-fallen version of the Primarch. 

Love these kits so much. That claw is proper threatening

I found it so hard not to festoon this guy in etched brass. However, I couldn't have him out-blunging Rylanor!

All them primary colours.

Lastly, I recently fancied painting a dragon and came across this awesome old Nick Bibby sculpt on eBay for less than £4.00. Couldn't resist the thing and had a blast painting him up. I also got to try using some of the new edge paints on him which are fantastic. Really impressed on how they make features pop. Plus, if the effect is too sharp, you can tone them down really easily with a wash or two. This fella will be joining the High Elves for all those games of Warhammer Fantasy 4th Edition I'll never be playing.

Look at his majesty. 

Love the expression on this guy! Well snaggletooth.

Hopefully going to get back into a fairly regularly pattern of painting now that we've finished some work on the house.  Really looking forward to getting some things ticked off the list! I'm not sure I'll be doing Armies on Parade in October this year as I don't have the space to store a new tile, but may try and doing something for fun for it with stuff I already have because I'm lazy and rubbish.

Quarterly Plod

How is it April already? I've been a little distracted of late and haven't had as much time to paint as usual, but I have managed to make a start on the little High Elf project and finish off a few outstanding single models that have been on the list. I've also been inspired by some of the Dark AOS  stuff that's been doing the rounds and started putting together a random Chaotic centaur dude. I'll hopefully have him finished by the end of the month once I'm happy with the conversion. He's inspired by both the older more canine Khorne features as well as one of my favourite artists - should be a fun project!

GOBLIN GREEN FOREVER.

Firstly, here's the start of the High Elf army. I'm planning on adding an additional regiment of 15 archers and then maybe painting up mage mounted on a griffon, but we'll see. Really looking forward to starting the old repeater bolt-thrower! The Warhammer Quest Ranger was a joy to paint, although I did manage to somehow make him look like a fabulous drag-queen facially. The rest of the army will follow this colour scheme pretty closely.

Gagging on Elven eleganza.

Lastly, I was lucky enough to snag a limited edition Canoness Veridyan model when they were released in January. I remember being enthralled by John Blanche's artwork that this figure is based on and even now it's an incredibly evocative image. The model itself was a bit of a pain to paint as the face had next to no detail to the right of the nose, so the eye and all the facial contouring on that side had to be painted in. 

-2 movement modifier for hobble heels.

I promise you there is an eye painted underneath that fringe!

Close up, it is a little clumsy, but overall I'm happy. It's so nice to see models based on original artwork. I'd be stoked to see more of this kind of thing from GW, particularly if they revisited more of John Blanche or maybe Mark Gibbons's old work!

Fucking nails. Those stabby pointe moves are kill. GW, I dare you to make this.

Paint Flashback

There seems to have been a recent trend in the Oldhammer camp for tracking down and making good old, out of production paint. I must admit to having thought about purchasing some of the old sets, having a fondness for the artwork on the boxes and a reoccurring desire to paint something in Moody Blue or Worm Purple (OG Genestealers I'm looking at you). However, it wasn't until recently I managed to luck out on purchasing one of the later, hex-bottle styled Citadel Colour paint sets that I started to think that there may be some reason other than nostalgia for collecting old paint. 

All sealed, still with original brush!

At the most basic level, this stuff still works. When you seal one of these pots, they remain sealed. The most recent selection of GW paints are terrible when it comes to both tightness of seal and longevity of use. I've thrown away over a dozen pots in the past year because the paint has solidified despite being fully closed. The new pot design is also more susceptible to rim clogging (hurhurhur), which wastes paint and further prevents the lids from closing. You're also getting more paint in these older pots too. Whilst the coverage isn't as good as the new base paints (which are fantastic) the majority of the older paints still lay down a solid cover over a coat or two. Also, the old paints can be picked up for the same price, if not cheaper if you're lucky. Whilst the 1993 range may lack the breadth and technical optionality of the modern collection, it more than makes up for in Goblin Green, Blood Red and Snakebite Leather. Plus they smell nicer too. I've tentative plans to create a small fourth edition High Elf army using these paints as I've recently had a real urge to visit them as a  (another!!) distraction project. 

Because I'm an obsessive dick, I bought a working copy too.

On the subject of paint, I finished off my Colourblind Demon entry for the local shop competition last week. The idea behind the event is that you randomly pick four different paints from sealed containers and choose another two from the rack. If you're lucky you'll then have six colours that work together on any model of your choosing. Thankfully I picked out a few greens and one of the new Thousand Son blue and had the perfect figure waiting for it! Meet Bogbrush, a 1988 Bob Olley Black Orc.

Minty fresh Orc.

I must admit, I'm looking forward to actually finishing this fella off as without being able to add any other colours to highlight or shade with, he feels only around 70% done. Still, I did manage to play about with using some of the Silver Birch leaves I collected during the Autumn on the base, pretty stoked on how they came out!

New Year Times!

Ack! Two weeks deep into 2017 without a predictable 'plans for the year' post. Thankfully, I'm not planning to tie myself into any vain-glorious hobby resolutions other than to paint up stuff on the pile of shame, learn to paint better and to play a few more games than last year. I've already made good progress on finishing up the Emperor's Children and I've a tub of cleaned, based and undercoated figures to crack on with over the next few weeks. I've also tentatively made plans to get involved with a painting group in Liverpool in February as I've been wanting to push my painting in a more crafted direction. I'm hoping to make it down to paint with people down at the local store order pro-painted models from Romania more often this year too so we'll see how that goes. 2017 ahoy!

Purple people eater mincer.

I was lucky enough to receive this wonderful kit as a birthday present from my long-suffering partner in October last year. Initial impressions when it arrived went from excitement to panic when I realised how different large lumps of resin feel in comparison to plastic. This kit has so much more weight to it and demanded much more clean-up work that I expected. I doubt I'll ever get involved with a resin kit as big as this again as the material weirds me out so much, but it was really fun to paint once I got going. It was based up for the local stores 'Armies on a Plate' competition (I know, it was pushing it as an entry, but it was a good incentive to get it finished!) I had a lot of fun messing around with heat-bloom washes on the lascannons and finally got around to having a proper muck about with some FW weathering powders on the tracks.

Did I mention how much I love Forgeworld's etched brass?

The large etched legion markings have been great to work with and I personally think work better than their resin counterparts. Overall, I'm pleased with how it came out, even if the paint job is a little basic in comparison to many other examples online. My narrative excuse is that it's a work-horse Land Raider that never made it to the artificer's gilding workshop. Fulgrim won't be pleased!

Don't you know they're gonna kill your suns?

Fancy resin lascannons!

The last squad I wanted to add for reasons of both and fluff and symmetry were the 'Sunkiller' heavy lascannon support. I've been keen to avoid using the usual Emperor's Children tropes and I thought that these guys were never properly represented in the way the Phoenix Terminators, Palatine Blades or Kakophoni were. Plus, the resin underslung lascannons look amazing and although fiddly to assemble, were great to paint. I was lucky enough to be hooked up with some additional studded pads and helmet by one of the Corehammer dudes with these - thanks so much to Stephen for helping me out!

N O N E   M O R E   H E A V Y 

Out of everything I've painted recently, this set of Cataphractii terminators were the most rewarding. I've painted an awful lot of terminators in my life and these were by far the most fun. The kit itself is clean, simple to put together and creates an overall silhouette and tabletop presence that is awesome. They positively hum leaden menace and I'm half tempted at times to do another squad of these as a Sons of Horus Justarians because they're that nice.

Shredded nails for breakfast

Mole-manned into oblivion

The Emperor's Children project is more or less complete now, with only some final varnishing and a single Contemptor pattern dreadnought to paint now. I doubt I'll be adding any further units to this army as it'll mean buying considerably more and I really want to concentrate on unfinished projects and odd, single figures I've had lurking in the pile this year. Speaking of which, with the recent return of Blood Bowl, I finally got around to painting the only remaining team member from my 12th Birthday present.

Go long!

So yeah, loads to be getting on with. In the next few months I hope to finish off the Beastman contingent to my AOS Chaos army and get some games in with them. I also plan to finish off my Frostgrave band which is slowly coming together with loads of sick LOTR figures that have been gathering dust over the years. Then theres still the 2nd Edition Tyranids, Wild in the Streets goffs, Skitarrii, Space Hulk remnants, Pob's Epic Eldar, Colour Blind Demon.....

Sod it, I should just go skating instead.