Thursday 29 September 2016

Suffer Not The Alien To Live

Eldrad Ulthran - Farseer of Ulthwe
 
It's been a busy busy September but painting has still gone on regardless! With DeathWatch:Overkill & then later on Death Masque - GW has been busy ensuring that I never run out of stuff to paint! Or that I never actually clear my backlog >< On that note - GW of late have really turned around. The 'new', shall we calle it 'attitude' has been fantastic and done much to quieten if not shutup many of the whiners. All the new social media presence and a more open and communicative ethos seems to be serving them well and making things much better for all. Anyways that subject is a topic for another post and has already been done on numerous different boards and forums and blogs across the web.
So, August and September.....some stuff done, lots of stuff yet to be done and new plans beginning to take shape. Forayed into some of the DW:O marines to see how they are and damn but those are some gorgeous figs. I bought a load of resin bases for them and for the 'stealer half of the boxed set to match the setting - underground industrial mining complex. The bases are from Micro Art Studio and after searching a load of different companies for tech styled bases, these are, imho, the absolute cream. They do a ridiculous number of different themed bases not just the tech ones and are worth a look. Anyhow, got a few of the DW done and made wee collages for each one - see what y'think -

Antor Delassio - Blood Angels

Edryc Setorax - Ravenguard

Garran Branatar - Salamanders

Zameon Gydrael - Dark Angels

  Have also continued to press on with trying to get Space Hulk finished as well. The termies are just about all done now barring the Librarian which should follow in short order. Which is just as well as Ben aka TP-DC and I have started playing the 4th ed missions over FaceTime every second weekend or so. Love the technology - from Wales to Korea, the game goes on. Expect a batrep of the first couple of missions up soon :)






The other bit of painting to note, which I'm now quite sorry I didn't do here as an ongoing WiP, was the painting of the new Eldrad Ulthuan sculpt from the Death Masque box. Had a lot of fun with this one and tried out a few new things on him. I like the 'official' paintjob but I wanted to change it a little to my own idea of him. He is old, oh so very old - old enough to have been around during the Horus Heresey old. So I wanted to tone down his colouring a bit and make it less bright and fresh. Not dull per se but just a little less saturated. The spiritstones he wears for example are not as blingy as the ones you usually see on the eldar to give the idea that they have come from eldar now very long since dead. His cloak was the scariest part to paint as a starfield done badly looks like an utter shitmess so that was something I needed to really think about and plan out. I did a couple of runthroughs on plastic primed icecream spoons to make sure I was going in the right direction. Romain from BoW and Ben Komets on painting buddha both have done very good tutorials using slightly different methods to get the effect. I ended up going with a wet-in-wet approach and then several glaze layers and filters to get the effect. Really happy how it came out.
The snow was another thing that I've never attempted before and there are a load of tutorials out there on how to do it. A lot of them, I felt, end up with an effect that looks more like solid hard chirstmas cake icing, so a bit of fiddling and experimentation later and I settled on a mix of baking soda, ceramite white paint and my go to matt varnish as a carrier. Happy how it turned out. Actually I damned well delighted with how Eldrad turned out - lol. Couple more bigger pics for ye -






Well that's a lot of photos and I think quite enough out of me!! C&C always welcome as per usual. Any questions - just drop me a comment and I'll see what I can do

Cheers
Jan



Wednesday 17 August 2016

A Medal for Ireland.........well............ ;)

Damn hell but it's been an age. Lots been going on, lots been happening and the humidity still won't fuck the hell off! Hotter and sweater than the devil's ass cleft here for the last month or two. But some painting still been getting done. Not as much as I'dve liked but hey ho.

In bigger n better news - the Facebook group 'Eavier Metal had their annual 'Eadbanger painting competition. Loadsa different categories and I entered pieces in 4 of them. First time entering a proper painting competition so needed to seriously get my shit together. The level of talent and painting that goes into this comp is phenomenal!! Seriously top class

Anyhow......it's done and judged and the result are in.......


 I entered a squad of Sicarian Rustalkers from my AdMech war convocation. Should really have built a stand or base to house them. Happy getting an honourable mention here. Next year definitely upping my game on this one.


For the Diorama/Vignette category I went with something a little more personal. A while back Buttery Commisar over on Dakka sent me the now OPP Gaunt's Ghosts figs in the old white metal. I love those books and they're what really got me back into 40K so they deserve something extra special when it comes to the paint. The plan is to build a vig for each of them showing a scene from the books. For Larks - it was always going to be the scene from his own short story 'The Angel of Bucephelon' (If you haven't read it already, go pick up a fething book and do so). I had a fairly good idea of how I wanted to do this but the trouble was how to include 'the angel'. In the book the angel is in the form of a statue that talks to Larks but I didnt want to include another fig in the scene to emphasise the lonlieness and solitude that Larks suffers from. So with a little artistic license I decided on an angel in a broken stained glass window behind him. Anyways, I talked about all this before in a previous post here - http://warpbound.blogspot.kr/2016/06/i-saw-angel.html   Larks got me another honourable mention :) I had hope he would do better as it was quite a personal piece but the competition was fierce and the winners rightfully deserved their places at the top.


Got another honourable mention in the Monsters/Armour category with my Thanatar. I think I spent the most amount of time on this guy and his base. Tried out a whole rake of new techniques an stuff on him. I thought he might do a little better but hey ho - tis all good :) Better pics of him in an earlier post here - http://warpbound.blogspot.kr/2016/05/step-forward-big-fella.html




And finally the big one. The Showcase category! I went with 'The Nurse' from Thirdman Studios, sculpted by the amazing Alexandre Aragon Marks. The base is totally scratch built (I have WiP photos somewhere but can't be arsed finding them right now!!) and boy those spiral stairs were an ass to make!! The wall is just several layers of plasticard then painted and distressed a lot!! I carved into the wooden base and then filled it with BFTBG paint. Anyways - was absolutely delighted when I found out that she placed and took 2nd prize in a really hard category. When I first finished painting and based her, she recieved kinda lukewarm reactions. I know that style of boutique figure is not everyone's cup of tea but I was kinda surprised so having her winning in such a high talen leveled competition felt good. Really REALLY good :D

Well, that's about it. I have a whole pile of other stuff I've finished recently but I'll save that for another time. In the meantime, I really rec/mnd you go and check out all the other winners from the 'Eadbanger competition. There are some seriously amazing and beautiful pieces on show. Check 'em all out here  - 'Eadbanger 2016 Winners

Till next time

 Jan


















Thursday 16 June 2016

What have I let myself in for??!!

So my painting area and hobby area has been getting on my wick recently.  It needs a good reorganising, sorting and all that. Have decided to have at it and totally redo the whole thing. Here's how it looks at the mo


Paints are all in those wee drawer units to the right and drives me nuts rooting around trying to find the right one even though they're semi organised by colour. Immediate painting glass shelf at the back and so on.  The monitor never gets used as its not compatible with my laptop. 
Decided first thing needed was some proper paint racks which then led me to ordering these........



100 of them......ordered off eBay......which arrived today. Yup - in for a penny, in for a pound as they say.  On the same day also ordered one rack from Modularterrain in Spain which holds up to 50 bottles of varied sizes which has been dispatched and Is currently winging its way here and 2 dropper bottle racks from Back2Bas-ix, who have so far (acc to my order on their website) done feth all with my order except take the money. 'Processing' my arse.

Anywho - that's what's going on. Hopefully decanting 70+ GW paints into the dropper bottles won't send me too far into the abyss!!

Meanwhile, the hedgehog couldn't care less......



And as usual the dog wonders what the feth I'm up to and if there will be any food for her in the whole deal!!



Tuesday 14 June 2016

"I Saw An Angel"

Hlaine 'Mad Larkin & 'The Angel Of Bucephalon'


Morning All - just a really quick wee update while I try to get my morning coffee into me and vanquish morning stiffness.
Recently finished up a vignette I had been working on for one of the 'Gaunt's Ghosts' OOP figures. A most excellent and really generous painter over on DakkaDakka sent me 5 of the old metal character figures from the range and I figured they each deserved their own little vignette of a scene they played a role in from the books. Previously I did the Aexe Cardinal farmhouse scene (which you can see here - http://warpbound.blogspot.kr/2016/03/commissions-done-back-to-mech.html ) which turned out rather well. So it was time to do another. First up - my favourite of Ghosts - Mad Hlaine Larkin.
In the books, Larkin is one of the saddest of characters. Originally a poacher back on Tanith, he suffers from a few mental disorders and is the 1st's Master Sniper. I'm not going to go into him too much here as you can read all about him in the books, which you should have already done. If you haven't read the GG books yet, then go and get stuck in for feth's sake!
Anyways - there is a short story featuring Larkin called 'The Angel of Bucephalon' where Mad Larks imagines (or does he??) that he is visited by an angel while he is getting ready to assassinate an enemy Chaos Magister, Nokad the Blighted. It's an awesome wee story and shows us a very intimate and sad portrait of Larkin. This was the scene I decided to do for his figure's vignette.

In the story, it's a statue of an angel that comes to life and starts talking to Larks. I didn't have an angel/statue figures to hand and I didn't really want another figure beside Larkin in the vignette as I wanted the scene to also portray the isolation that Larkin suffers due to his condition. So rather than showing the angel as a statue, I decided to try and make a broken stained glass window with the remnants of an angel in it. This was something of a challenge!! And the results......well.......judge for yourselves!!
I give you 'Hlaine 'Mad' Larkin & 'The Angel Of Bucephalon' '











 And there we have it - hope you like him and cheers for stopping by. C&C welcome as always

Cheers folks and catch you for the next one :)

Jan


Saturday 14 May 2016

Step Forward Big Fella!!

The Thanatar is finally done (we knew that already) and I've finally got some proper pictures taken. Lots of pictures. Lots n lots.......you get the idea ;)

Really really happy how he's turned out so here's the man himself. Hope y'like him :)

C&C as always welcome

Cheers
 Jan

Thanatar Siege Automata

Thanatar Siege Automata

Thanatar Siege Automata

Monday 9 May 2016

All in the details....

The Thanatar Siege Automata Delta-7 is finally finished. Didnt take as long as the Imp. Knight but still was no quick job! Really happy with the big fella. Tried out a few new techniques and such with him and everything seems to have paid off. I won't be getting any proper photos taken for a few days yet. So here's a wee teaser of some (badly taken on the iPad) photos of some of his details.
Thanatar Siege Automata Delta-7
C&C always welcome


Cheers
 Jan

Friday 6 May 2016

Where Are We Now?!

Right - that's what was, now what is....kinda. The buying freeze has had some sucess but far from total! Have picked up a few things in the interim. Got some more of the Mortician's Guild from Steamforged as they are simply awesome - got the Starter Box'Obulus, Cosset and Graves and also the big fella Casket and their mascot Dirge. So they're sitting waiting with Ghast and Silence in the cabinet now.

Also totally caved and picked up a copy of this beauty. When I'm actually going to get them all painted (it's like 50 highly detailed stunning figs in there) well......it'll happen.....IT WILL!!

And last of all (apart from backing Rum'N'Bones - Second Tide on Kickstarter that is) I got myself a Solar Auxilia Dracosan Armoured Transport. No, I'm not going to start collecting a SA force (though they are gorgeous) but the Dracosan really has an old AdMech look to it so am going to convert it over to being a reclaimed tank now being used as a transport for my Dust Dogs Skitarii Rangers squad. I've made a start on this one at least. And have converted the top gunner into a skitarii and replaced the multilaser/flamer option with a twinlinked lascannon from the Ironstrider kit.
The cast is for the most part well done but there was a little mould slip and a few other things that need to be filed and fixed. It's pretty much ready for the build now so hopefully get that done over the weekend. Hopefully

Reclaimed Dracosan Skitarii Gunner
 So what have I been painting? 'Eavier Metal over on Facebook is doing another one of their comps and it's a big one - 'Eadbanger II. The amount of figs they've got from sponsors is astounding!! So I fugured I'd give it a bash this year. So far am entering in three categories - Unit/Warband; which I'm putting 'The Ashen' in for. Need to reshoot some photos for them though. Single figure- Showcase; I'll enter 'The Nurse' for that. I've got her prepped, built and primed but really need to get a move on and start painting her soon.
'The Nurse'
 Which leads up to Armour. For this am doing one of Forgeworld's Thanatar Siege Automata. Glorious beast of a model he is. Been trying out a whole pile of new techniques and stuff with him and, touch wood, it's all gone great so far. He has been hogging the paint recently though. He's getting towards final stages now though so should have him finished soon. Am really happy with how it's been going thus far. Few WiPs for you to finish up this post then

Thanatar WiP

Thanatar WiP

Thanatar WiP
Well there we go, all caught up. C&Cs always welcome and paint till ya drop :)

Cheers

Jan


*Edit*   Shit - totally forgot but remembered again. My Harlequin Solitaire was featured on the Games Workshop website. Very very chuffed :D Here's a screenshot


Where were we now?

Yes, I suck at blogging. I keep meaning to update more often but......I suck. There it is.
Anyways - still working on my huge list of unpainted stuff (which after Mymearan put up a thread getting folk to count their unpainted minis over on Dakka, seems to be nowhere near as long as some folk out there) and still trying (and failing) to not buy any new stuff in the interim.
So - quick catchup. What have I actually got done since......crap...March?!!!!
Vox Divina ServoSkull

Tech Priest Enginseer Dendris

'The Ashen'- Sicarian Ruststalkers

'The Ashen'- Sicarian Ruststalkers

'The Ashen'- Sicarian Ruststalkers

'The Ashen'- Sicarian Ruststalkers

Space Hulk - Terminator Brother Goriel


Ok - that's what I got finished. Looks less than I thought......o.O dammit!!