I’ve finally started on my chariot unit. The weather lately has been completely horrible for priming with either rain or massive humidity. Yesterday I took a chance and decided to prime them even though it was humid as hell. I broke my own rule, NEVER PRIME ON HUMID DAYS! Some sections of a few chariots look like they’ve been sprayed in fine black sand. I was SO pissed at myself as that stuff murders any chance at detail work.
Here are the first two. The crew will be done when this weather clears up.
It’s been a busy few days but I’ve gotten some work done. First up are two completed characters for my army.
Now to be honest these are my least favorite characters that I’ve built and it appears that that fact showed up in my painting. Especially for the Priest. But they are done and all they need is a coat of varnish I can move on.
Next up are some WiP’s that I’ve been picking at. I’ve started to paint the tower. This bugger will take a few hours to get done but it will be a pretty addition to my scheme. Second is an Obelisk I bought from Armorcast YEARS ago. I think I bought this back in ’04 I believe when I was first painting this army. It’s been sitting around taking up space so I dug her up and now she’ll get some love. Cant wait to get started on it.
Last but not least I think I’ve got my Arkhan model pinned down. I like the look a lot but he needs some green stuff touch up. He will look really intimidating when complete.
That’s all I have for now. The weather here has been horrible. We’ve had 1 rain free day out of the last 9 and we have more rain predicted for most of this week. I may get a free day on Wednesday to get some priming done. We’ll see.
I’d like to take a short detour from my TK project to write about what motivates me to build/paint and to display the work of two good friends of mine.
I started this hobby back in ‘98 while I was still in the Army. I remember coming up to DC from Ft. Bragg to visit my girlfriend (now wife) and for some reason or another we found ourselves at a GW shop in the mall. I remember being blown away by the incredible armies they had on display in the glass cases so I bought a box of those crappy Saurus and some paint and vowed to return one day. 13 years later, I still play at that store and the then manager James is a damn good friend of mine and one of the most unforgiving opponents I know.
James is a brilliant painter and most of my technique was developed from trying to replicate his style and he still astounds me to this day with his talent. Here’s some of his work:
My favorite part of this model is the boar. The skin is brilliant and the attention to detail by glossing the eyes and the tongue makes this little bastard spring to life. The Orc is also amazing. James paints like the old school Heavy Metal painters and it pisses me off at how easy it is for him. He now has a full unit of these sexy beasts by the way…
This Dark Elf Lord was painted for some tourney where everything had to be represented on the model. The Blood Armor is again brilliant. The saddest part of these models is that about 10 minutes after I took pictures someone knocked James’ case down and both got broken. The Boar Boy was easily repaired being plastic but the elf lord took all kinds of scratch damage. ☹
Last but certainly not least is this amazing terrain piece from my friend Michael (Chewie). Chewie is to terrain as James is to painting. It never ceases to amaze me what he does with board terrain. Here’s his “Rock of Aegis” (that name kills me! LOL!):
This beauty is for sale if anyone is interested. It does include the mounted guns by the way but we tend to take them off when he brings them into the store so they are not stolen/broken. Drop me a line if you have any interest and I’ll get you in contact with Chewie.
My hobby is driven by viewing the work of other hobbyists. Seeing someone crank out a badass model/unit or some inspired piece of terrain makes me want to paint/hobby myself. Find out what motivates you and use that inspiration to take your work to the next level.
Well my molds arrived on Sat and I was really happy to get started with them. I used up all the black resin I had lying about and burned through quite a bit of my slower casting resin making enough to make this new version of my Dais and a watchtower.
I think they came out pretty nicely. Sadly the weather has not been cooperative so I think the coat of varnish dulled my gold a little too much but that’s fine. It looks good with the crew.
The tower was a blast to build. It was like playing with Lego’s that I cast myself. Can’t wait to paint it up.
I started school this week so I’ll be slowing down somewhat with my painting. I’ll likely only get one unit done a week. Still nice progress though.
These guys were fun to do though a little annoying. Since they came glued together and on their bases I had to prime them in ivory and that was a pain to cover up. I would have done the base separately and primed the stalkers black and saved myself a great deal of cover-up time.
I’ll likely pick up another box to fill out a unit of 6. Don’t know when though. I have a unit of chariots on the horizon.
This thing was a real joy to paint again. I didn’t go all out as I did before but the end results were very satisfactory. I’ll complete the crew tomorrow.
Now I had designed this model to pose as both a Warspinx and Necrosphinx but it didn’t work out as I had hoped. Installing the howdah on it’s back scratched the paint pretty badly. So no wings for this bad boy…
Crap!
Double Crap!
I do however like the winged kitty look of this kit and may use it in the future.
Next on the chopping block will be the stalkers and crew for the Warsphinx.
I got to put in some real time with the sphinx kit yesterday and with some time I was able to modulate it. It’s not as easy as say a dreadnought but it can be done if you take your time and are careful. I love you Dremel.
I also was able to use the torso for a new design for my Heirotitan. The Conduit concept works well for my army scheme but does not scream monster enough. This is closer to the idea I originally had.
Getting three models out of one box is pretty cool.
It’s been a hectic last few days! First of all I got my TK book in on Thursday and as soon as I cracked the cover I noticed something I didn’t see before that gave ideas! (more on this in a sec).
First up is I finished that unit of Skeletal Archers. I hate to admit it, but they look pretty good with a decent paintjob. I would prefer newer models, but these can suffice. Hell, knowing me I’ll end up loving them in the end…
Now about that idea I had. There is a little hieroglyph on the bottom middle of the first illustration in the TK book that spawned a slew of ideas for me. It has been pointed out that I like floating stuff (And I do! Big whoop, wanna fight about it?), here is a prototype of the ideas that took root: The Conduit.
My idea was this was made of stone cut from the black stone of Nagash’s Pyramid like the casket conversion I made. Floating over the battlefield it acts as a focus for Liche Priest magic as well as throwing curses of it’s own. While I like it this concept and it fits in nicely with my army scheme, it needs work on several levels. First it does not give off the “AHHH! Monster!” vibe it needs to. Second being that it has no real facing (I marked the base to show the front). It function till I get the elements I need. I’ll be picking up 3 Warsphinx kits today.
It was built using blocks from my pyramid and another Hirst Mold (#56). The top is held aloft via rare earth magnets (REM). Unfortunately I had a resin mishap and the mold got ruined. I have it soaking in degreaser at the moment and will upgrade to mineral spirits if this fails.
Now for some weird stuff. I’m a tad compulsive. So when I do something I feel driven to go all the way. So this is my dice cup. XD
The Necrosphinx planted a serious painting seed and when I gave into it the first thing I needed was an appropriate dice cup. My first idea was for a large canopic jar and I found a few really nice ones the problem is they were all either too large or too narrow to hold the sea of dice I intended to pour into my foes’ units. Then I found this beauty on Amazon. It’s called a ‘Bronze Scrab Box’ encase you want one for yourselves.
With some slight modification using some REMs I have the lid significantly secured. I love this thing so much I had to get matching dice. Did I mention I was compulsive?
Yesterday we had a 1000pt vet night tourney at the hobby shop and I decided to use my new TK. I had a BLAST and won Best Army and these were my prize! I can’t wait to paint these bad boys up!
Lastly, he’s home. And mine. I was given him last night along with the Stalkers. I was so happy I almost squee’d
Squee
Intransitive verb
1. A noise primarily made by an over-excited fangirl, however it has spread rapidly and is now widely spread among the web community.
2. A random ecstatic exclamation
Retrieved from Urban Dictionary.
My Casket of Souls conversion is now complete! I’m calling it a Black Dais until I can come up with a better title. I like this conversion a lot but I see room for improvement and will likely revisit this model in the future (The rear pillars are not working for me…)
The priest came out ok. Not tops for a character but definitely tabletop quality.
I finished the Necrotect last night. He painted up really quickly and I like this version better then the one they currently have in the rulebook.
Since it’s raining again I’ll have to wait a day or so for the humidity to clear up so I can varnish my completed units and get some more stuff primed. In the meantime I guess I have to start on these pieces of crap…
