Sunday 15 December 2019

Rest in peace with the rest of the pieces


Hot on the heels of the previous post, here are the very last miniatures for my current Undead collection. I can hardly believe I'm this close to finishing a whole project. It's such a rare occurrence for me. In fact I'm not sure any of my other collections have ever got this far.

Apart from the Vampire Lord and the skeleton cow, these final models are basically just made up of all the bits 'n' pieces I had left over from the earlier builds, simply glued together as best as I could.




The cow is an ancient model coming from what I believe may have been the very first Undead wagon (or war machine) of any sort to be released by Citadel Miniatures – the Plague Cart, from 1987. If it's not the first, then it's certainly one of the earliest. I've decorated the base a bit, and added a beaten up bell hanging from its neck, but otherwise it's pretty much as it was back at the end of the eighties.

Most of the other miniatures are from the Zombie Regiment (with a few Chaos Warrior parts thrown into the mix), but there's also a straggler from the original Skeleton Horde (with swapped weapon and shield), a Ghoul from Mantic (with new arms), and the remainders of three Ghouls from Rackham (all with head swaps, and the odd new limb).

My goal is to get them painted before the year is out, so the challenge is on. Watch this space.


Wednesday 11 December 2019

Elephants and memories


Inside I'm smiling. In fact, outside I'm smiling too. Because I've finished the other skeleton war mammoth that I started way back here, about a year and a half ago. Even though I started it a long time ago, I couldn't just forget about it. I feel a commitment to all the projects I start, and the guilt of not completing them means I will keep revisiting them until they are done. Even if it takes years – which it often does. This is mainly down to my lack of hobby time and skittish tastes, but also because I tend to paint at a lumbering speed, probably not dissimilar to the one an undead elephant travels at. An undead elephant stripped of all muscle, and carrying a small house on its back.



This newly completed model only mildly affects my Addiction Challenge score, but every little helps.

ADDICTION CHALLENGE
REMAINING: 38


My Undead project is nearing its conclusion now, with both mammoths finished, the cavalry from last week, and all the troops from last year. There's just a handful of stragglers left to build and paint (mainly to use up some of the left over bits 'n' pieces from the previous models). It's kind of exciting to see a project nearing the finish line, so hopefully this will keep my momentum going till I cross it.

But let's not celebrate too early. 


Thursday 5 December 2019

Rattling back into action


It's been a long time. A very long time. Nearly five months since this blog has been updated. Some may have thought Torva Tenebris abandoned. Terminated. Dead. Buried six feet below the ground, never to be seen again, but that's not the case. It simply had a bit of a break over the summer, and it's taken a while for me to get it up and running again.

But now that I've reanimated it – breathed new life into its old dead bones – I'd like to share a completed unit. It's the Undead horsemen that I put together about this time last year.

If you read the earlier posts about their construction (here, here and here), then you may be aware that most of these models are from the 1980s, but have all been chopped about a bit. In fact, some have undergone a considerable amount of jiggery-pokery to make their size more consistent with their companions. Hopefully the paint and 'dirt' hides most of the crimes I committed during that process.



And these six newly finished miniatures mean my Addiction Challenge score is finally taking a dent.

ADDICTION CHALLENGE
REMAINING: 39


Hopefully there'll be some more dents soon.


Monday 15 July 2019

The start of something big (but small)

Since my last post I've been furiously prepping my horde of Grots: cleaning, gluing, filling, basing, and undercoating my way to a force of Gobbos that are ready to start taking paint. 

Contrary to what I said in my previous post, I've decided to try an entirely new method of painting them that will involve green washes on the skin and maybe some yellow Contrast paint on the fabric. This means one of the preparation stages is slightly different to normal, so I've outlined the first few steps below.


Stage 1. I started by roughly trimming all the individual parts and gluing them together on the base. Some bits were plastic, some were metal, and some were resin, so I used liquid poly for plastic to plastic joins, and superglue for anything else. If a join looked weak, I drilled out both bits using a pin vice, and pinned them together using superglue and a paperclip cut to fit.

Stage 2. Using a scalpel and a Citadel Mouldline Remover tool, I then cleaned up any obvious flash and excess material left over from the casting process. I also filled any holes and/or joins with green stuff.

Stage 3. I then textured the base, by covering it in white PVA glue and dipping it into a small container of thick, coarse sand and tiny stones.

Stage 4. Although this picture looks almost identical to the one before, it is nevertheless an extremely important stage. You have to paint watered-down PVA glue over the top of the sand to give it any chance of staying in place. I think I probably use a roughly 1:1 mix of PVA to water. Maybe a little more PVA, as the water is simply there to help it flow.

Stage 5. This is the undercoat stage, and is the bit that is slightly different to my normal process. I usually just prime everything in plain black, but with these guys I wanted a pre-shaded, much lighter finish to take the washes and Contrast paints. Therefore I started by lying the miniature down, with the bottom of the base facing me, and lightly spraying black from underneath. At this point I don't want to cover the model, but just to get a little darkness into the deepest down-facing recesses – like armpits and groin regions. I then stand it up and spray grey from all around, at a roughly horizontal 90º. And then finally white from above and about 45º off. It's a bit of a faff, but I'm hoping it will prove an effective shortcut for adding a little extra shade and highlight.

And that's that. But before I could start painting, I just had the small matter of repeating the entire process another 43 times.



Friday 28 June 2019

Lads, lads, lads


These seven diminutive bad guys (six if you only count the bases) were originally meant to be test models for a larger force. They were a small precursor squad to get the colours and tones right for the main bulk of the Grots, Gobbos or Gretchin that were to be found scattered throughout my Ork Armoured Brigade. Some as armed combatants, others as mechanics, medics and helpers for their larger, even more unpleasant, Ork overlords.

I painted them several years ago, hoping to quickly iron out the method and go on to do the rest of their mates. But alas, as is often the case, that plan never came to fruition and these guys remained alone, holding their own, surrounded by their bigger, brutal cousins, for way longer than I ever anticipated. 

So recently I've been cleaning up the remaining miniatures in the hope I'll be able to continue with them en masse. I've got 40 or 50 more of the nasty little blighters, so they could be just what I need to finally put my Addiction Challenge to bed.

Or, as might be the case when relying on horrible little goblins for anything, this whole project could end up completely running amok, cluttering up my desk, sowing chaos and confusion across other, more worthy, pursuits and generally taking up way too much of my already depleted time.

Let's see, shall we?



Thursday 20 June 2019

What's on the desk, then?

In the absence of any real progress on either my small squad of Judge Enforcers or my little cluster of Undead, I thought it would be a good idea to share a few photos of some of the other projects currently cluttering up my desk. Not just to keep this blog up to date, but also for my own mental well-being – a visual list of the outstanding things on my plate, that I've mentioned here before, but still haven't finished. Starting with those aforementioned skellies.


These guys have got a bit of colour on them, and are slowly making their way towards completion, but there's still a way to go.


Scrap-built, modular, industrial terrain (and Games Workshop shipping container) for the city of Kruenta Karoliina Arx Rotunda, or Kru for short. The larger pieces are primed, with the odd spot of colour, but I'm having a bit of a rethink about doing them all grey.


Kit-bashed Sisters of Silence (Or Psilence, as I prefer) and Thunder Warrior. I'm not sure I've ever mentioned the big fella on here before, but he's very much part of my six-strong band of 30K style warriors (my kit-bashed Custodes being the other three).


Mercenaries, henchmen and adventurers. A bunch of converted characters, likely to be found in the city of Kru, undercoated black, with a grey zenithal highlight spray, but otherwise currently going nowhere fast.


Rag-tag Ork vehicles in various stages of completion. It's always a joy to glue random bits of plastic together until you see something you like.


Plague Marines. At some point this little skirmish force will be joining their two Spider-Dreads, but for now they haven't got much further than a base coat in an appropriate shade of green.


And finally here are the civilian vehicles that are siting on my desk. The articulated (and satisfyingly modular) lorry is from Puppets War, and the two cars are from Antenociti's Workshop.


That's it for now. I'm hoping to have some progress on the Judges soon, so I'll hold off showing them here for the time being. Also, there are quite a few as-yet-unseen other projects lying around on my desk, but I'll probably introduce those on a one-by-one basis, as, when and if, they ever show any signs of significant development.


Monday 27 May 2019

Whether to weather?

If you follow me on Twitter, or you caught my previous post, you may have noticed that I've started dabbling with my Warhammer 40,000 Enforcers again. My Adeptus Arbites sanctioned, Judge Dredd inspired Enforcers who police the mean streets of the hive city, Kruenta Karoliina Arx Rotunda.

I've started painting them, and have found myself tweaking the colour scheme in ways I didn't expect.

In the Judge Dredd comic, along with their red-rimmed helmets and gold shoulder pads, the Judges of Mega-City One sport several green items on their uniform – boots, gloves, knee pads, elbow pads and pouches. In the 2012 Carl Urban film they clearly felt this approach wasn't going to be gritty enough, so although they kept some of the green details, the colour was made so much darker that it was hardly noticeable in the final grade of the movie.

When I started on my troopers, I wanted them to look like the darker, almost entirely black-uniformed movie version, but decided to switch out the dark green altogether in favour of a dark tan leather colour that would probably make for a more easily identifiable texture in miniature form.




And with that I eventually got to the above stage where the test model is just about complete.

Or is he?

Originally, several years ago, when I first envisioned this project, my plan was to make my Enforcers look more worn. A little beaten up. Dusty, battered and generally in-use.


Like these guys

But now I've got this far, I'm not sure the model will really benefit from a lot of weathering. The dust might blur the already difficult to detect line between the harder body armour and the slightly softer black leather jacket and trousers. So I'm faced with a bit of a dilemma. Do I push ahead, sticking to the original plan, and run the risk of making an irreversible mistake, or just stick with what I've got, and let the weathering go the way of the green boots?

The answer is I'm just not sure yet.

ADDICTION CHALLENGE
REMAINING: 44 or 45?



Friday 10 May 2019

Wheels of judgement

One hundred years ago, I pledged, on this blog, to build a couple of unique models. Ones that would combine a character from a film, with a vehicle from a comic, and infuse them both with a hint of WH40K flavour.

But only a mere few days into the project, I got to a stage that had me stumped. I put the fledgling models to one side, promising myself that I'd return to them soon, once I'd mulled over how to go about finishing them.


Fast forward those hundred years, and I was finally struck by the urge to complete them. In reality I was less driven by the desire to finish them that I was by the guilt of having abandoned them.


And today I think I'm finally at a place where I can share them.


Perps, jimps, futsies and stookie runners*, may I present to you the LexDominum urban patrol bike.



Although they don't look all that complicated, these bikes were a real headache to construct. I worked on them, on and off, for about two and half years, doing tiny, incremental stages every few weeks, then abandoning them for months on end. But I took a few photos along the way, so I can share some of the major leaps forward. 

Before I do that, I'll just share a quick reminder of my original brief. You can see it in full here, but quite simply it was as follows.


Start with this bike as the major ingredient...

... but add the lights from this design...

... to create something a little like this...

... then sprinkle in a hint of the armoured feel of these bikes...

... but base the whole thing on this model

This meant I was starting with two of the Space Marine Scout Bikes, which I cut at the join between the front forks and the main body of the bike.


I started by rearranging the angle and length of the front forks, using plasticard and putty...

... before smoothing off the putty and adding more plasticard to create the basic shape of the front fairing

I then added some simple detail to the reverse of the front section

The guns, rims, rivets, baggage and lights, came next, while I also brought the rider in line with the earlier troops

I bought the lights from Zinge Industries, who have an incredible range of tiny detailed parts for exactly this kind of conversion work (I think it was these ones). However, even though they seem to come in sets of five, and from looking at the photo below I clearly had at least six, I somehow didn't end up with enough to complete the job. So rather than risk interrupting my flow while I waited for a new order to arrive, I decided to cast the missing two with Instant Mold and green stuff. (I talked a bit more about that process when I created the Judges' shoulderpads here.)

Next up: repeat the previous stage on the other bike, but go for a different overall pose

Add the basic shape of a badge in plasticard



Then cut some details from Forge World brass etched eagles...

... to be glued to the front of the badge

Sculpt in the hint of some wings on the eagle badge

Then add final detail to the reverse of the bike

These two bikes finally complete the construction of my entire Judicial Enforcer Squad, a process I started back in the first post of this blog, nearly four years ago. That's slow, but its not my slowest project ever. Not by a long shot**. 

Besides, the real challenge is to see if I can get them painted a little bit quicker. So here's to hoping I can finish them before April 2023.


*For more information see over 40 years of Judge Dredd comics.
**Remind me to tell you about my converted Scout Titan at some point.

Monday 29 April 2019

Mechanicus approved, hard-shell, hazard-zone, close-protection servitors


Occasionally you see a model, and you just have to have it. No matter that it doesn't belong to any of your armies. No matter that there are no rules for it in your games systems. No matter that it has practically zero crossover with anything in your collection. 

And sometimes you see a model, 
like these Grymn Walkers, from Hasslefree Miniatures, and you just have to have two of them.



In situations like this I like to come up with a few ideas as to why these models should be on the same shelf as my other miniatures. In this case I felt they would be perfect for my city project. They would be close-protection gun-servitors, sealed for operations in hazardous environments. And they would probably belong to an individual, or perhaps a faction, rich enough to afford them, but not wanting too many people in their employ. Like a Rogue Trader who wants to keep his crew light, or a gang boss who doesn't want his grunts getting too close.



I liked the models so much that not only did I buy two of them, but I left them largely unconverted. I hardly touched them at all – building them almost entirely as they came. I think my only deviation from the kit was to add some spacers between the guns and their shields. And that was only to offer a little more strength and stability. In fact, if truth be told, I think I did more assembly and conversion work on their bases than I did on the models themselves. For example, on one of the bases, to add a bit more variation, I cut out a small section to create a recess in the ground. I think it could be a trick worth pursuing on other models in the future.

Once everything was constructed I decided it would be cool to try an urban camouflage scheme. I laid the original colours down quite some time ago, so I can't remember exactly how I did this, but the following steps seem to make sense. 

1) Spray the whole of each model with Mechanicus Standard Grey, followed immediately by a heavy zenithal highlight of Corax White. The speed allows the two colours to mix a bit, and the heavy zenithal highlight means the darker colour only remains on the hard to reach undersides that would naturally be in shadow. 

2) Make a cup of tea while both models dry thoroughly. Because we are about to stick things to this surface, it is vitally important that the paint is as tough as it can be. I think I left mine overnight, just to be sure.

3) Cut out tiny geometric shapes of masking tape and cover roughly one third of each model with them. A random third that is. A bit here, a bit there. I only did this to the armour panels where I wanted the camouflage pattern. I didn't stick any tape to the weapons or other areas that weren't getting the camouflage scheme.

4) Spray again. This time with a mid-tone colour. I probably used a directional spay of Chaos Black from beneath, followed quickly by Mechanicus Standard Grey from above.

5) Don't remove any of the masking tape yet. Instead leave everything to get really dry again. Maybe go to sleep for a bit. Or paint a different model.

6) Again, leave the tape on. And then start cutting out more pieces. Use these new bits to cover another third of each model. The new tape can overlap the previous bits of tape, but try to ensure that roughly an additional third of the armour is getting covered.

7) The final spray was a mix of Chaos Black (for the undersides) with Death Guard Green everywhere else, and a final, very light dusting of Chaos Black (everywhere).

8) Again, show some serious restraint by not removing any tape too soon. I don't know what would happen if you did, as I just walked away, but my worry is that it could create a bit of a mess that ruins all that hard-fought progress.

9) Once completely dry spend ages finding and removing every last scrap of tape.

10) Sometime later, once you're halfway through painting the finer details, discover several bits of tape that you missed in stage 9 and remove them too.

Those steps were the bulk of the work, but they only really got me as far as the base colours. To finish these off I painted the weapons, grills, lenses, markings and metallic areas, added a tiny decal to each model, edge highlighted some of the armour, washed some of the recesses and gave each model a smattering of weathering to tie everything together.

ADDICTION CHALLENGE
REMAINING: 45



Wednesday 17 April 2019

Addressing the undead battle mammoth in the room


Let's face it, I am neither a great painter, nor a quick one. I started cleaning and assembling the above model about halfway through last year – probably something like May or June. And although I whizzed through the preparation and construction phases, it's fair to say the painting has taken a little longer than expected. 

This model was one of two skeleton war mammoths, designed by Grenadier, that I've had lying around since probably not long after their release in the 1980s.

I wanted to add them to my Undead skirmish force as twin centrepieces – un-living battle tanks, able to plough through ranks of infantry, tearing the enemy apart with their sheer size and strength.

But there was something about them that immediately threw a spanner in the works. Instead of swiftly completing these and moving on to something new, I lost focus and started fiddling around with other projects. And to make matters worse, because I knew I was meant to be painting the mammoths, none of the other projects got my full attention either. I just kind of dithered. Meandered from one non-committed project to the next. Dilly-dallying. Exactly the kind of hobbying that gets you nowhere, fast.

Or even slow.



The other mammoth is still very much a work in progress, but I painted the crew from both beasts' howdahs at the same time.


Sadly, after all the work I've put into this – or more accurately all the time it's taken me to do that work – it's still only one completed model to knock off the list, so my Addiction Challenge score is looking remarkably un-dented. Hopefully with a little luck, and a little focus, some of that dilly-dallying will pay off later this month.

ADDICTION CHALLENGE
REMAINING: 47




Saturday 30 March 2019

The crow-walk modular wall section

The fantasy genre has occasionally offered us glimpses of strange and incredible cities. Urban environments that seem anchored in reality, but far outstrip anything we may have encountered in life. If you're interested in this kind of thing, you may have some favourite locations that really stand out in your memory. Fictional places where your explorations seemed so vivid, you can almost imagine you were there. For me it's towns like GormenghastKharé, New Crobuzon, Hammerhal and of course Mordheim. Twisting, dangerous municipalities, where the weird and exceptional is often considered entirely normal.

Cities like this may boast cobbled, winding streets that rarely lead where they seem, or endless seas of undulating rooftops, where chimney stacks create forests out of stone, or foreboding, crenellated walls that, as much as keeping intruders out, could equally be holding something darker and more nasty in.

Games Workshop has recently announced the release of its Age of Sigmar skirmish game, Warcry. This looks to be set in what could potentially be another of these exciting, visceral cities, Varanspire, and it seems there will be a new range of fantasy, urban terrain to accompany it.

Following on from last week's model tree, I thought now would be a good time to share another piece of my old, scratch-built Warhammer scenery. A modular wall-section that is very much based on how I imagine one of these cities may look.


All my fantasy terrain was conceived to sit together – or at least to not look totally out of place when next to one another. The idea was that I could use different combinations of pieces to build a variety of locations. I had hoped that one day I'd have enough bits to build anything from a graveyard to a farm, a small village, or the aforementioned, twisted, inner streets of one of those dark and oppressive cities.

Of course, like all my projects, much of this is still a dream, but that's not to say I didn't finish anything at all. This wall section, named the crow-walk by my six year old son, is meant to be part of castle, a citadel or a keep. I wanted it to be able to represent buildings in a variety of different states, so I settled on the idea of damaged roofs. When placed next to buildings in tip top condition, they will hopefully make it appear only slightly more run-down, but, with a little luck, when placed among ruins, the broken roofs should help portray the idea of a sacked or neglected settlement, or even one recently overrun by the forces of Chaos.



The model is based on a polyboard frame, that has been detailed with card and balsa wood, then textured in places with polyfilla mixed with sawdust. I added some barrels and ladders (that I picked up from a third party seller at Salute many years ago), and some tattered and torn posters that I slapped together in Photoshop and printed out for this purpose. The roofs are removable to allow access to the inside.


This is one of my larger models, but there are a few other bits and pieces in my back catalogue – including at least one that was designed as a counterpart to this, and may even be slightly larger. I'll try to share this and some of the other items over the next couple of months.