So, what else have I been painting the last week and a half?

Well, there's these lovely fellas:

Giant Slugs* from Heresy Miniatures.
*: The majority of them actually look more like grubs or maggots, but who cares, they're nasty-looking and that's what counts!

I also finished the spearmen for my knight's retinue:

This group is a bit more mixed than the archers, who are all more or less of equal standing.
Among these spearmen is the knight's Sergeant, who is in overall charge of the knight's armed retainers, regardless of their armament. This is the veteran who, in his lord's keep, sets watch rosters, oversees drills and exercises, manages the day to day running and supplies of the garrison, etc. In battle he commands the retainers, so his lord can concentrate on his combat knowing that his men will be where he needs them, when he needs them. He is the man in maille with the pigfaced bascinet and the fancy shaped shield who is enthusiastically waving his sword in the air...
In this group is also the spearman selected to bear his lord's personal banner. It's an honoured, if hazardous, duty...
Here is a better view of the banner:

So, this is where my recent painting leaves the knight and his retinue:

So, where next?
Currently on the painting table is the knight's squire (like the knight I have both a mounted and foot model for him). And once he is done, I still have the knight's wife, children and faithful hound to paint.
Of course there is still the rest of the Warhammer Quest boxed set to finish, several other heroes to paint, my own stable of monsters to paint (and collect more of)...
And let's not forget I've still that diorama display to finish, and dungeon terrain for gaming to consider.
Thankfully I've got several other projects to switch to, whenever this one seems to be getting too much for me... ;-P

Behold!

This miniature is somewhat special to me, as it is a gift from a generous fellow member on the Lead Adventure Forum* who goes by the name Elprez.
So I decided to give it a bit more attention when shooting pics of it.
Here it is, the Beholder:

The miniature is a Black Tree Design "Evil Eye".
I painted the miniature up from a ruddy brown basecoat, highlighted up to a pale, almost tan brown. Initially I simply drybushed, alternating with various purple, brown and red washes and glazes to smooth the colour transitions and tweak the colour to the tone I wanted. For the last few passes I painted the highlights instead. Quite an unusual experience to paint what is essentially not much more than a textured ball. It meant I could spend my time and mess about with texture and tone of colour instead of needing to focus on getting all the details, and making different colours work with each other. It's a nice change of pace to try and make a single-colour model look interesting.
I hit the eyes with a layer or two of gloss varnish, to give them a more natural shine.
Thank you again Elprez, for giving me the opportunity to paint this model!

I painted this model over the Easter weekend, and thoroughly enjoyed myself doing it. I just didn't have the time until now to get a photographic backdrop set up. (Should have taken the time to clean the lens too, but didn't discover it wasn't clean until after I took all my pics... Then again, it adds a slight dreamlike quality to the pics. ;-p)

*: A really great forum, full of lovely folk. If  you don't know of it already, you should really give them a visit!

Scenario Servitor online ... +++Processing+++

So, time to try something new...
Every now and then I get some idea for a scenario that won't let me go. As I may have mentioned before I don't get to game often, either because the few people I game with don't often have time to meet up, or I can't find someone to share/get my particular gaming interest. So the idea stays unused, maybe gets noted down somewhere, and then is forgotten.
Which I think is a shame. So from now on, when I have such an idea, I'll try to note it down properly and post it here. That way, the idea gets retained in a way that I can retrieve them more easily. And maybe someone else may get a use out of them too?
I'll put them under the "Scenario Servitor" label to make them easier to find.
So, let's fire this thing up, shall we?

+Scenario Servitor A5P4R4GU-5 Theta activated...+
+Processing request+

+<Verbalise: "Which file do you wish to retrieve, my lord?"+
+Awaiting response+
...

Tacti-cool

Well, no progress on the Dungeon Diorama, I guess that project needed a breather...

Instead I've been diving a bit deeper into the Adeptus Astartes.
I've finished assembling and personalizing my second Tactical squad (but forgot to snap pictures, silly me!).
I've also finished building and converting another Terminator for the Space Hulk/40K Howling Griffons roster. Of him I did take pictures:

And his rear:

Unlike the previous two Terminators (the already painted Lightning Claw one, and the Cyclone one in the background), there's no custom sculpted detail on him, just some press molds and converted detail. I'm not entirely sure how I feel about that yet. You see, with the Terminators I set out to make each as unique and decorated an individual as the Blood Angels Terminators from 3rd ed. Space Hulk are. I'm not entirely convinced he meets that standard yet. Then again, unlike SH3's 12 Terminators, I have roughly 30 to 35*  to do, so maybe I've set myself a rather high bar...

*: 2 regular 5-man squads, 2 assault squads, 6 extra terminators with alternate weapons for the tactical Terminators, up to 5 Librarians, at least 3 captains in various loadouts, a chaplain,  and I'm thinking about doing a Techmarine and Medic in Terminator armour as well. No kill like overkill, I guess...

I've also continued on a conversion that is a bit of a testcase for an =I=Munda warband. Even though I currently have no-one to play it with, I enjoy collecting and converting miniatures for =I=Munda/Inq28. To me it is just such a nice way to explore the odd and creepy nooks and crannies of the universe that 40K itself seems to neglegt these days.

Naturally I want to include my Howling Griffons in this setting (despite the controversy of Space Marine power levels in Inquisitor/=I=Munda, it's mostly a modelling project for me after all...).
I'd be limited to 2 maybe 3 Marines in a warband at the most anyway, so it's a nice excuse to try and portray them with all the intimidating size and grandeur the Astartes are credited with in the art and background stories. I like the idea of a Marine or two being sent as emissaries or such and getting embroiled in all sort of dubious plots and shenanigans.... Sure you're a combat powerhouse, but just try to be covert when you're 8 feet tall and painted bright red and yellow!
Anyway, here's the aforementioned testcase:

The techniques of the conversions are nothing innovative, and borrow extensively from explorers in the true-scale field like Doghouse, Migsula and Lamenter. The only thing I'm really doing differently from their examples is using the rear torso of a Grey Knight Terminator instead of regular power armour one. This is for ease of fit, but mainly because I can use the front of the Grey Knight torso, and the psychic hood I shaved off, for converting Terminator Librarians...
His pose is fairly pedestrian, just a Tactical Marine firing his bolter. He is mainly intended to try the conversion for myself and see how I like the results I can achieve for myself. Any future true-scale marines will receive a bit more attention to posing and personality. For now I just need to try and manage the basics...

As part of the current focus on the blessed Astartes, I've also cracked open my Rogue Trader stash. I was surprised to find that, over the years I've bit by bit collected more Marines and Orks than I remembered. These were squirreled away bit by bit whenever I encountered a few I could afford and lovingly stashed away. Turns out I have unknowingly collected nearly a half-company of Beaky infantry and a similar number of Orks. No vehicles or other support to speak of though. I really should do something with them someday, it'd be a shame to just hoard them...
But I can't decide what Chapter to make the Marines. I don't want to do more Howling Griffons, but I do want to choose a Chapter that really suits Rogue Trader. Plus some of the Orks are painted, and I am unsure if I want to strip them. Oh, well, no rush.

I seem to be suffering from Hobby-Butterfly-Syndrome again, so who knows what I get to show you next time...
See you then!

Mancave?

Well, I'm a man, and I made this cave, so it must be a man-cave, no?

We've had a couple of days of good weather here. I spent the first few treating myself to some nice solitary bike rides and walks through the newly-awakening woods in the area.
The last day of good weather (seems that way looking out of the window now), yesterday, I resumed work on the Dungeon Display of my wife's Warhammer Quest miniatures. This was something I needed to do outside, as I would be slapping filler all over the place...

Here are the results:

Before the filler went on, I made the cave entrance, and some nice irregular bevels and ridges as a sub-surface for the filler. In hindsight I should have cut the cave entrance a bit larger, as it's a rather tiny hole now. I forgot to account for the thickness of the filler...
As I didn't want the filler layer to be too neat, I just slapped it on randomly at first and then smeared it out with whatever throwaway item or finger that was closest at hand. The outside of the cave was done with the same tree bark I also used for my hills.
It should be nearly set now so I can scribe a "hidden" door into the plaster near the cave's far end later today.
Oh, and scrape away all the spill-over from the backdrop...

To bide my time until I could do the above, I dug out my Space Marines (an army that grew out of my collection of Terminators for the Space Hulk project) and had a sift through them. I have a second tactical squad (from the old AoBR starter set) nearly ready for primer. I just need to make some more of my greenstuff detail stamps to pretty them up and base them.
Typical really, I started with needing Terminators for Space Hulk, but I seem to be making the most progress on the regular power armoured figures. ( Progress is relative though, seeing as how it is only a single Terminator and a tactical squad that are actually finished!)
No pics, as I don't think a line up of bare plastic, snap-fit starterbox marines are all that exciting.

Oh, and I painted up the first batch of bats for my lady's Warhammer Quest set.
I had to pack up my painting stuff almost as soon as the last brushstrokes were dry, so you'll get a pic of them in the glass cabinet instead of my usual "messy workbench"-chique. ;-)
Without Flash:

And with flash:

As is typical of photos taken under artificial light, the truth is somewhere in the middle of these two pics, as far as colours go. So, only 6 snotlings, a Minotaur and a half and two heroes to go, and I'm halfway done! (God, there are a lot of figures in this box!!!)

See you all next time!