2 versions of red and gold

Howdy. Over the last week or so I have been working on a number of things. One if my Vostroyaans Imperial Guard and the other is my Epic scale Space Marines, the Crimson Guard. Both are using red and gold, although in the case of the epic scale it is more of a yellow gold color thana true metallic as on the vostroyaans.

On my vostroyaans I used a base color of vallejo brass and then washed with GW brown ink. Actually a couple of washes to add depth and definition to the metallic. Once dry I painted with Vallejo Glorious gold and then washed again with GW chestnut ink and picked out the highlights with more Glorious gold and finally highlighted with Vallejo Model Gold. Overall I am pleased with the results as the golds have a rich deep color and a bit of a warm reddish hue.





The epic scale guys are based with GW Vomit brown, washed with a light wash of GW brown ink and then ther details picked out with GW Golden Yellow. They are nice and bright and should look really good on a nice green flocked base once complete.







Next thing I am working on is my Mortal Chaos army and I should have a few pictures up in a few days.

The beginings of the Hochland Highlanders

Howdy. Through the weird twist of fate I have wound up with a another WHFB Empire army. With a new fantasy league forming I initially decided to do Empire for the league.I wanted something different for them so I elected to create the Hochland Highlanders. With a little bit of work I have added kilts and other Scottish type gear to them so they take on a new look but yet are still distinctly Empire.

Ultimately I discovered this is going to take a lot more work than I initially planned so I changed the army I was going to play to Mortal Nurgle, with another article on them later. But I am going to continue modeling this army, but I won't be rushed so I can do it justice and make a really cool looking army.

Me and my Silver Demon

Howdy. Ok so this is not my best picture, but this a dream for me. Me with a demon of my very own. I can't tell ya'll how excited and thrilled I was at this moment. Something I had been dreaming of for close to 18 years since I first discovered GW and the Golden Demons. I can hardly explain because what I had always hoped for was the chance to go and see, and yet here I am with one of my very owm.

Things have been a little busy since I got back from Chicago, but at least they are moving along. Gotta finish the bloodthirster for my friend and I have started an Empire Army for WHFB.

I also need to get my Warmaster skaven painted up and last but not least, I need to finish up a bunch of figures for the Miniatures page. SO FAR BEHIND AND SO LITTLE TIME.

In any event, I am slowly getting caught up and getting things done. Also, school and family events are reving up again and my garage is in dire need a major cleaning.

I will post pictures of my initial highlander theme empire army soon.

Tahnks and take care

Back from gamesday

Howdy. I returned from GamesDay Chicago and what a show it was. I played in the Grand tournament with an overall record of 1 win, 2 draws and 2 loses. There were some very tough lists there and some very good players as well. Lots of really nice looking armies, only problem is I am such dork I forgot my camera.

I also entered four figures in the Golden Demon, a dream of mine for many years now and I placed with a silver in the LotR category!! I also had my Court of the young king make first cut in a very difficult 40k squad category. The competition there was unbeliveable and I amreally glad to have done as well as I did.

Anyhoo, there were lots of things to do and I had a really good time and piked up some very good tips and ideas on how to approach things so I will be more competitive in the future. Now all I have to do is get cracking and make these things happen while they are still fresh in my mind.

The picture is of my court of the young king some one was kind enough to take. It still needs a lot more work, but I think I am going to take a break from it for a while and or sell it and start another one. I am not sure yet, but we shall see.

The Bug Guy!!

Here is the guy have been working on for a long while now. He is completely done, but the picture is probably a little dark so I will take better pictures later. These pictures were for a friend of mine so he could review and comment. He has good insights and I am fortunate to get his help!!

Anyhoo enjoy!

2 Days and counting!!!

Howdy all, I have been quietly working hard to get all my entries done in time, but as one should expect there are the inevitable delays.

I have one more figure to get painting on and it is the avatar for my Court of the Young King.

Overall, I am very happy with the way all of my entries have turned out. With each exarch I am trying to keep and elemental feel to each one without blatantly showing it is an elemental theme. I want for the viewer to look at each one and say, wow, that gives me the impression of heat or water or air or earth, depending on which figure you are viewing. That is my goal, I won't know for sure until somebody actually looks at them. Chicago will be the big debute. Yippee!!!

Tommorrow I will post my bug guy because I figure it is safe to show you guys what I have worked on for the last month and a half.

I would appreciate any comments you guys have on what you think, so feel free to fire away. Thanks!!

Working on More entries for GamesDay Chicago

Howdy. I have been steadily working on my figures and conversions for Gamesday. In this I have learned a lot about conversions and sculpting. One of my figures is the most ambitious project I have ever attempted and he is complete. But you will have to wait until before Gamesday to see him. Sorry, don't need someone borrowing my idea for their own use. I'm selfish like that. But once it get closer to the actual competiton I will be ore than happy to post him for ya'll to look over.

But in the mean time I have a picture of my Howling banshee Exarch conversion. I always hated the sculpt for this figure so I borrowed some bits and body parts and improved upon it greatly in my own honest opinion. To me it seems to have a much improved dynamic to it instead of the lame big girl with a pointy stick that is in the current line.

On another note. my youngest Daughter turned 1 yr old a week ago and we are all very happy about that. Now if would just stop kicking our co-depenant anxiety ridden dog life would be perfect. Ahh, well perfect is boring, nothing unexpected ever happens.

And off to Games Day Chicago I go

Howdy. Well in case anyone missed me, clearly I have been away for a long long while. Work has had me very busy and I have pretty much dropped off the face of the earth on anything not related to work, but fortunately these things don't last forever and I am happy to have a little breathing room again.

I have had a wonderful year so far though. Life is good, marriage is good, kids are good. its all good. I also finally after all these years of dreaming, I have finally gotten my ticket to a Games Workshop Gamesday. The one I will be going to is in Chicago end of July. I am really excited about this. I have a few figures already stared for the Golden Demon painting contest and I am also working on my army for the Grand Tournament.

I hope to post some more of my ideas and maybe, just maybe a few pictures of my entries shortly before the actual contest.

I don't know exactly how to go about painting and/or converting some of my figures, but I do have some in mind and if all goes well, I will have them all done in time.

In the meantime, here is a finished figure I did. I think she turned out rather well.

Been Slow going

WOW, it has been a while and so little has been done. I have been busy with work and family and as a result I have not done much painting. Ok well I have been playing a lot of Final fantasy online, but I need to cut back on that. I can get right addictiative if you are not careful.

Anyhoo, I am going to be out of town for a while and as a result I will be getting very little painted. Honestly, I won't be painting anything.

BUT..... I have started a project for a friend of mine. I have been commission to assemble and paint a Forge World Bloodthirster. I have all the parts and have begun the clean up work.

My intial thoughts are that this figure is way to expensive for the quality they provide. it has huge seam lines where the molds did not line up properly. This requires some extensive work to remove the mold line and then resculpt the details. It would be one thing if the parts were smooth and could be done with a simple sanding, but the parts are very detailed and will require a lot of hours to make it presentable. I supposse I could have let them in and just painted it, but that does'nt seem right. I figure if you are going to do something, then at least do it right.

Lastly, I submitted my Roman Signifier to TMP for the Alpha painting contest. I like the figure. it may not be the latest vogue with regard to painting styles today, but I am very pleased with the results. It is a simple but effective figure that has some real depth and character to it. I pretty much decided I am going to paint him up how I wanted to and not with what I thought would win the contest, cause at this point I honestly have nothing to prove and don't care how the contest goes. Painting this figure was a delight and I consider myself lucky to have the opporunity to be a part of this contest and share how and why I did what I did on him. I hope you like him.

Boy, have I been busy

So Howdy. Man, what a long holiday season it was for me. I started playing Final Fantasy Online again and have been having a blast doing it. Also, I have been trying to get a lot of paintig done and out of the way. Little progress has been done on my Brits, but I have finisged up my Russian Arty.

I also got my Alpha Paintig Contest Mini finished. I am in the final round and hopefully I can make a good showing.

Been playing around with the forum as well.Got a nifty header/banner logo or whatever it is called and I think it is rather spiffy.

I loaded my "desk top shot of the week". It is a concept got from Mr. Jacob Rune Nielson. I don't know if he knows I borrowed his idea, but I like it. I hope, or I should say it is my intent, to post a desk top shot of the week here every week. It will help me keep track of what I have been working and doing.

So I like elves

Howdy all. It's been a crazy week with work and pulling a lot of long hours. That really is one of the major downsides to working a salary job. I like my work and it pays well and most of the time I have a pretty good time figuring things out. Of course there is the usualy stress when things don't go the way I would like, but it is what it is.

Anyhoo, I have done very little this last week, but what I did do is finish I think my Woodelf Noble in Traveling clothes. I am not sure she is done, I look at her a lot to see if something is missing. Usually when I do that I think it needs something more, but I am not sure what it needs. I was thinking a tree of some sort, but that would be really akward to pull off.

So here is the initial figure for you to review before much of anything has been done.

I know I haven't really done a good job of sticking to my projects, but I do get easily distracted when people wave painting contests in front of me, and we have had a few of late around here. I promise to get back to what I had planned, but for now ya'll will have to settle for my rambling method. However, I do fully admit this is why I have a lot of projects half way done and almost none finished. Oh well, at least I am happy with what I am working on. :)

Arwen from Lord of the Rings

So here she is. I am rather fond of this figure and it took best overall in a local painting contest this past weekend. I was really quite pleased with the way she turned out. This Arwen figure is one of those that just screams to be painted, so when I saw it last Wednseday, I bought it and went home and got it ready for the contest. After two days of hard effort, this is what I have to show for it. I mst admit this figure, despite the amount of time I out into it, was really a joy to work on.

I feel that the latest batch of LOTR figures GW is producing is among the best they have done in a long time. Some of the early figures I felt were a bit lacking, but this is one is really something special.

What a weekend!!

Howdy all. I hope everyone had a wonderful turkey day. I spent the day with my family and had a spectacular day eating, watching tv and just being around the family with nothing better to do than to watch my daughter try to crawl, play a game or two with my sons and just be a dad. Its kinda nice to take all the worries away for a day. It was time well spent.

Saturday, we went down to one of the GW stores here in town and played a game of epic. It wa lots of fun with my Tyranids trying to eat some tau. Came out in a draw, but what a fun game. In the evening I entered in a paintig contest and took first in 2 categories and best overall as well with the new LOTR Arwen figure. I was going to paint my woodelf standard, but when I saw this figure it just screamed to be painted. So I dropped the woodelf and did Arwen instead and she took best overall. I am rather proud of this as the competition was very good.

I'll post picture when I take one, right now I am still trying to recover from long hours spent on the figure and a day long game-a thon. But I will post of the Warhammer single I entered. It is an Empire Engineer.
I did him early this year and thought it would good to enter and see how it does. Turns out he won me best Warhammer single and for my trouble I won a limited Gimli on Uruk Hai. Its really a cool figure with Gimli the elf from LOTR sitting on a dead Uruk Hai with his axe stuck in its head and smoking on his pipe. Very cool.

For Thanksgiving Weekend Painting Contest

Howdy. I am getting my Wood elf ready for a Thanksgiving weekend painting contest. I have started with the limited Edition Standard included in the Wood Elf Army Box. I was lucky to even get the box a while back, but one of the fellows who preordered it backed out at the last minute and I was fortunate enough to be in the right place at the right time. So now I have Wood Elf army. Actually it is a pretty nice looking army. Figures are well sculpted and overall I like the look of it. The previous models were about butt ugly and even the treeman looked lame. Course, I think the new treeman is not much better, and the treekin look like somethin' even my dog would'nt wee on, but hey, some people like 'em. I'm just not one of them.

Anyway back to my original point. I have been working on my standard and have done a decent job of taking some pictures of the Work in Progress. I will post more of the WIP pics over in the forum where you can more easily ask questions about it if you have any. But for now, here is the start up picture. It's really not much to look at, but I am going for a late summer-early fall theme. To be honest I really can't decide which is a better way to go, so I am just going to paint the figure as it tells me to paint it. It's kind of hard to explain, but sometimes you see a figure and it just says to buy it and paint it. Even though you have no idea how to it should be painted, I find that if you look at it long enough, it just kind of comes to me and so off I go with no rhyme or reason, just doing what seems to work and then when it is all said and done, more often than not I have a really nice looking figure for my shelves.
I hope to have him done this week and begin my next figure for the contest. I'll keep updating over on the forum as I think weekly updates are better done here.
Oh and one more thing, I think tommorrow my report on a 54mm Gladiatorial figure I did will be up on The Miniatures Page. It is a decent article on how I painted up a figure provided by Alpha Miniatures for the reader of TMP. I think he is pretty good. Maybe not the best of all the entries, but at least good enough to feel good about. Be sure to go check it out. My write up on a Barbarian Warlord is already there and can be found here :

http://theminiaturespage.com/workbench/73597/

Lots of good articles hear for you all to read. Thanks!!

Something for the New Week

With a new week should come a new picture. This is a Syntha Biomech I did for a online contest last year. I was sorely disappointed that he did'nt even place, but what can ya do??? I think he turned out rather nicely and I like him. My main purpose for doing this figure was to try to develope techniques for unusual patterns. I elected to try a snakeskin type pattern and I think it turned out pretty good for a first time try. I could certainly do one much better now, but that really is'nt the point.

I was also experimenting with doing NMM on the arms. I wanted to do a metallic look, but not the highly reflective Sky-Earth NMM that I think has become a bit of a plague on the painting hobby. I think it came out alright, but it could be better. As I think about what I could have done to improve it, I am at a bit of a loss. It does look like steel ( I work with it on a daily basis) but it lacks something artisticly to really get it across. I plan to but a few more of the Void Syntha minis to do a little bit more experimenting later in the year or next year, but for now this will have to do.


Feel free to tell me what you think and offer any comments here or on the forum. Thanks!!

Howdy. This has been a busy weekend for me with lots of things happening. Saturday was the neighborhood garage sale so I helped my better half move things around for the big day. All in all it was pretty good,. We sold a lot of things we were going to throw out and it was nice to have someone else pay for our junk.

I got some of my Brits on popsicle stick ready to be primed. I also exchanged a lot of odds and ends and got my self a full FOW British rifel company. I am very excited to get these guys on the table, but I really want to do a nice job on them. There are so few figures that it should not be an issue with time spent per figure. If I am enjoying what I am doing, it can't be that much of a chore.

I also am working on my Wood Elves and Skaven for Warhammer Fantasy. I have a grand total of 1 dryad assembled and I am not sure I like one of the arms so I may remove it and get another one in its place. There is a painting contest coming up in a couple of weeks so I think I will do up my Wood Elf Standard Bearer for the contest. It is a nice looking figure and cool standards are always impressive.

Fall is for all things Brown, Green and Gold

Howdy! For the Month of November I plan to start and complete my FOW british infantry army. It will consist of a couple of units of commandos, some armor and one great big unit of artillery. Currently I have 2 units of commandos, a boxed set of Biritsh rifes, a boxed set of Sherman IIIs. Today I will be going over to my local retailer, Little Wars, and pick up a couple of the Royal Artillery batterys consisting of (4 ) 25lb guns.

I hope to have a good infantry assault force supported by lots of powerful arty and armor. On my little forum I will post pictures and articles on how I did what I did until I figure out how to get a couple of pages here or else where to link to. But I think a forum is not a bad place as you can ask question there about my progress and I can respond.

I also plan to work on a couple of figures for an upcoming painting contest end of the month. Not sure what I am going to do yet, but I am leaning towards a Wood Elf noble and some kind of chaos figure for the single mini category. if I have time I want to do some dryads, but we shall see.

Pics of the figures coming later on today when I get home to post them.

Something for halloween

HOWDY

Well, here is my little corner of the net. I hope to soon publish my thoughts, projects and ideas here soon. Thanks!