I almost croaked...

Look who I found, puttering about in the back yard:

And now, for something completely different...

Well, so far you've seen mainly fantasy and sci-fi miniatures from me. Oh, and zombies*. All in 28mm.
Not this time...
Yesterday, the third day of Christmas (a.k.a. the Thank-Cthulhu-it's-finally-over-Day) I painted a batch of 20mm Deutsches Afrika Korps. They're a project I haven't worked on for nearly a decade, but my recent introduction to the PC game War Thunder has rekindled my interest. Plus they form a nice breather for my (currently main project) fantasy stuff, as they paint up quickly. This whole batch was done in a single day (including drying time for washes and sleeping in a bit), where I take at least two days, or more, for a batch of fantasy figures a quarter this number.

Here they are:

In case you're wondering, the minis without bases, and the one on the big, untextured base are parts of LMG teams. I've kept them apart to acces all the nooks and crannies while painting. Once all members of a team are done, I'll glue them to their base and texture + paint it. The metal on the guns is left flat grey for now, once the whole platoon is done, I'll rub them with some graphite (in other words, pencil) to give them a metallic sheen.
They're on the piece of paper to keep them organised, as I'm painting the basic infantry of the platoon and its command group combined over several batches. Each figure needs to go back to it's own squad after painting!
The reason I'm doing mixed batches like this, instead of a whole squad at a time, is because I custom mix several colours and highlights each time. As a result I get a natural variance in the exact tone of colour in each batch. By spreading the batches among all infantry, I use what would otherwise be a hindrance to replicate the effect of all uniforms bleaching at different rates and in different manners, making the units as a whole seem more realistic. :)

Here's a close up of one of the command group members checking either his tactical map, or the assembly guide for his Ikea flat-pack summoning circle:

(The mini is based on a 20mm washer, for size reference. So the above picture is several times life-sized, depending on your monitor size and resolution.)

What are my plans for this? Well, I have this platoon of infantry to paint, plus assemble and paint their Protze transports. And there is the rest of the box I've collected nearly a decade ago, which includes the remaining vehicles of a small recce group (consisting of a Sd.Kfz. 232 (8rad) Funkenwagen, two Sd.Kfz. 222s and a looted Humber), some PaKs and 8.8s plus tows and some Blitzes to haul supplies. A leichte and mittlere Panzerzug (I already have the Panzer I to function as the command vehicle for the leichte Panzerzug) are on the wishlist to add sometime, as well as a Diane or two.
And I want to add some Weird War war eventually as well ([Edit: Some text here has been removed, due to reasons. ] I have a 1/72 Maus that I can add a turret or two to, making it a "Panzerlandschiff".) But that is still far away, I'll need to get the basics done first. Hopefully it'll take less than 10 years....

See you next time!

*: Which could be classed as modern, post-modern, sci-fi or post-apocalyptic/peri-apocalyptic. ;P

They dwell beneath...

Over the last couple of days, as a counterpoint to the ever increasing Christmas Frenzy and Enforced Cheer, I've been taking little breaks to paint a bunch of goblins from GW's the Hobbit range.
I won't be using them as goblins, though, but rather as degenerate deep-cave dwellers, á la Morlocks or the creatures in the Descent movie. They'll also double as degenerate navite mutants in games of Inquisimunda or similar.
To reflect the role I have chosen for them, they've been painted in a sickly, greyish skintone:

As I needed to get 18 done before Christmas, and they're meant to use in hordes anyway, they got a quick, serviceable paintjob.

As a test, I've photographed them against my Frostgrave wall markers, but it ended up a bit monochrome as a result. In a way, they're a bit too well adapted to their surroundings...

A few mates have also tempted me into giving the PC game War Thunder a shot, and I've been enjoying myself plonking around in wee little tankies (and generally getting shot to bits). Which, in turn, has reminded me of my small(ish) collection of 20mm Afrika Korps that have languished in Mons Plumbum for near to a decade. When I originally worked on them, I stalled out on the painting the platoon of infantry I had, after having painted only one tank, two armoured recce cars and maybe 6 infantry (and a converted Weird War walker)... Not the most auspicious start.
Rooting round the stash, I found I also had an M3 Grant for some reason. So I quickly assembled that one, with an eye on maybe playing some quick tank duels with the Panzer IV I had already finished. So that one is now on the pile of minis ready for primer.

Anyway, that's all for today, have to go do seasonal stuff.
Merry Christmas everyone!

Something good from Sweden, part 2.

Remember back in March when I told you about a Kickstarter by Järnringen to get their RPG Symbaroum translated into English.
Well, today my book arrived! And it is a thing of beauty. The book is well made, feels nice and solid, pleasantly thick pages. The art is beautiful  and evocative (It's part of what pushed me over the edge into pledging on this one), the lay out is pleasant to look at without being overbearing.
I especially like the rounded spine and the fact they thought to include a woven bookmark. Good stuff.
I had a quick leaf through, but I can't wait to read the entire thing cover to cover.
Have a look:

I'll be doing lots of reading this weekend!

Wallpainting

I painted the first half of my walls (made another two in the evening last night, so I now have 6 total).
Here they are:

Painting was quite simple: I took basic black and white craft paint and mixed a dark grey colour. This I drybrushed on with a cheapo 2" round housebrush. After each pass I added some more white to the mixture and drybrushed again, until I reached the desired colour and contrast. That's it.
Before painting I undercoated the walls with a ever so slightly thinned 50/50 PVA and black paint mixture (the same black hobby paint) to primer and toughen the surface of the foam.
 Hopefully, tomorrow I can crank out the next three.

Until next time!

Shire Defense Force

I've known this Kickstarter was coming for a while now, and was really looking forward to it, and now it is finally here!
The Westfalia Miniatures Halfmen Army Kickstarter

 It's a project to fund and start a range of Halflings in a more professional military vein, rather than the quite pastoral and merry style usually seen.
Their armour and equipment of the pint-sized belligerents is styled after late 14th/early 15th century gear, which I really like the look of and coincides perfectly with the era I'm most interested in. It's the era which my setting/headcanon for the fantasy games I play is derived from. So you can see how I could not resist pledging! My collection of heroes and "good guy" warbands has been rather humanocentric so far (with the odd elf and dwarf thrown in), this Kickstarter will go a long way towards correcting that!
The sculpts are very good, nice and clean and the test sculpts sent out to some select wargamers for review have gotten very positive feedback concerning the resin chosen and casting quality.

 So, if you like Halflings and/or fantasy with a strong medieval flavour, go and have a look!
They're already well past funded and burning through stretch goals rapidly.

Walled in.

We, Gunbird and I, started playing Frostgrave sometime after Crisis 2015, and are now building up a local group of players (started at the two of us, now at 5, maybe 6) and getting the hang of the rules before hopefully launching into a campaign.

The "Wall" spell has turned out to be quite popular, but so far we've been making due with folded paper walls as placeholders. High time to do something about that! I didn't feel like painting today, after finishing the Maggot Family, so grabbed some tools, mdf and foam and started building.
Heres what I got done in an afternoon:

 The mdf bases are somewhat conspicuous, partly on purpose, so these can be identified as walls created by spells. Maybe I'll paint the edge of the base with some kind of runes or script to really drive the point home.
If they were to be regular scenery, I'd have carved the bases back into stones, or hidden them in another way, or simply used a significantly thinner material for the base.
They're each 6" wide, 3" tall and about 2/3 of an inch thick.
I know the walls generated by the "Wall" spell have no appreciable thickness, but I made my walls a bit beefier. For stability, but also so I can use them as regular walls in other games. I've got four finished so far, which should about be enough for a single game of Frostgrave, unless both players really go crazy with the spell. Maybe I'll make some more so we can use them when playing several games at the same time. Perhaps even try a different style of wall altogether?

These four still need sealing with (thinned) PVA-glue before I can paint them.


See you next time!

Move, you Maggots!

More Heresy Miniatures this time. His "lovely" range of maggots this time.
Here's the whole happy family:

 The paintjob was fairly easy, just a mix of washes and drybrushes over a fleshtone basecoat, leaving me to focus on choosing the right colours for maximum ickyness. : )
After that it was a matter of painting them all in satin varnish to offset the matness from the drybrushings, giving them the ever so slightest sheen and hitting the hard bits, like teeth and spines, with gloss varnish. A little dab of Tamiya Transparent Red over the bits of gore in one of the Maggotmen's hands and Bob's your mothers brother!
Because they are resin casts and the bottoms of the minis have plenty of contact surface for a secure glue bond, I painted the bases and minis separately and glued them together at the very last.
These will join the 5 giant maggots/grubs I already had, giving me a gross little herd to swamp heroes with!

Here are a few more closeups of the lot:

"Mother", the God-Grub:

(To give an idea of size, she's on a 50mm base.)

"The Keepers", servants of Mother and herders of the giant maggots and grubs:

(These are on 25mm bases)

"The Children", giant maggots and grubs:

(On 20mm round bases)

These nasty gribblies were all so much fun to paint!

See you next time!

That's a load of bull!

Highland bull, that is!
So, a double feature today, two posts within 24 hours! I managed to finish a second figure yesterday. After all, I had a whole day of nothing else to do but wait for the cable guy. I lost no time faffing about on the PC as I'd lose the internet connection the moment the guy started working, so I didn't bother switching it on in the first place and just kept painting.

Which means now I can present to you; the Highland Minotaur.
Like with the chicken-keeper from last post, it was to dark to photograph them by the time they were finished so I took pics today.
Here's the beast:

He's a conversion of Heresy Miniatures Snow Troll. I simply added horns, lopped off it's toes and replaced them with hooves. I hid any seams or connections by sculpting fur over them, to blend into the existing shaggy coat. Paint was a series of washes and drybrushes for the fur.

(P.S. the gritty texture on his left hand isn't a casting or sculpting defect. It's just me being a klutz and not noticing there was still some sand stuck on his hand until well after primering... Being on the underside/inside of the hand, and so not noticeable from tabletop angle, I opted to just keep it there instead of trying to scrape it of and potentially messing up the WIP paintjob or surface of the mini. Just so there is no confusion, Heresy's Andy his casting is impeccable!)

Poultry in motion...

Yesterday I had to stay at home, to wait for the cable guy to replace our connection (apparently the hardware in the wall was out of date, leading to connection problems), so I made good use of available daylight. The peasant maid that goes with the chickens got finished, so here they are:

As with the previous villager the lady and the chickens got a fairly basic paintjob, as these models are to be halfway between miniatures and scenery items in use, they aren't expected to take centre stage.

Like with pigs and pigherd, the animals are from War-bases and the villager is from Foundry.
Hopefully, over the Christmas holidays, I can build them a place to live in.

See you next time!