Places of Power

Well, they're done:

Five stone circles for the mages and mystics of my fantasy games to draw power from.
(Now I just need to get some mages and/or mystics actually painted...)

Until next time!

Just standing around...

As you may have noticed, I haven't been really active recently, hobby-wise.
The creative juices have dried up, it seems. But today I had an idea for a quick, fun project and, having the afternoon off, decided to not let inspiration go to waste!

So, out came the stack of useless old CD's, the foam and foamcutter and there I was, a bit later:

A group of mystical standing stones, somewhat inspired by a fantasy PC-game franchise I'm rather fond of. For those in the know, the sigils on the central stones should give it away. (One internet cookie for whoever guesses it first, I believe is the custom? ;P )

I'll finish and paint these when I have the time and the mood strikes me. Maybe, in the future I'll make some loose standing stones so I can make larger henge formations, or maybe make a few more historical looking standing stones as well.
Until then, these should nicely provide my wizards, sorceresses and various mystics with a useful arcane powerboost, once I paint them, that is! (Yes, I mean both the stone circles and the miniatures....)

See you all next time!

Dungeon Kickstarter

I've totally forgotten to show you this kickstarter by Manorhouse Workshop in collaboration with Maki Games:
Modular Underground Project
Being plastic and based on 10cm squares, it would be perfect for many a dungeon game, the upcoming Privateer Press Corvis Underground boardgame (though you'd need a fair few sets to remake the board with these sections) as far as fantasy goes. You could also use it for pulp games, or even sci-fi games (it reminds me an afwul lot of Hellgate London's sewer levels, for example, or some of the Metro 2033 stuff.
They've demonstrated its compatibility with several major other modular dungeon systems.
Here's what it looks like, once painted:

It currently seems to be flagging a bit, so please, have a look and if you like it spread the word!

The Minoic Beast

Another to tick off the Warhammer Quest completion list: One Bipedal Bovine.

A monster of the labyrinth to really worry the heroes...
(Or from the heroes' perspective: a large pile of loot and beef!)
As usual, I took inspiration from the classic WHQ look, but with a more modern palette.
I may go back and add some smears of less fortunate adventurer to his axe, but I'm letting it rest a bit before I decide.

I struggled with painting him a bit, as my mojo has been at an ebb lately, but I'm still quite happy with how he turned out.  With his brothers I might try to get the skin a bit lighter, though. I underestimated the darkening effect of the washes I used to smooth out the highlighting on him.

Bound...

My lovely wife's birthday has passed, so now I can, at last, unveil the special birthday project.
But a little background first: My wife took up making her own perfumes sometime last year. Until now, she has been noting down her recipes in a simple office notebook.  I decided she needed something more special to keep and treasure her favorite mixtures. So I made her a handbound book for her recipes.
Mind you, I've never done any bookbinding before, nor do I own any of the  (expensive) specialised tools. So I had to improvise and jury rig some things along the way...
Here is the result of my journey into "ghetto bookbinding":

I'm quite pleased with the results, but much, much more importantly, so is my wife!
Some more pictures of the "book in progress" after the break...

Going beyond the threshold.

As the "Birthday Project" has been wrapped up (literally!)  and I don't feel quite up to tackling the rocking chair just yet, I've pulled out the painting gear again. Hopefully I can get up my mojo again by just doing it and going from there.
I decided to start with something simple and fairly quick, to prevent myself getting discouraged by the mid-paint "hump" I often encounter when either unit-painting or going high quality on a single model. This really only left terrain and counters, neither of which I have a lot of ready to go right now. Except for the doors from the Warhammer Quest set. I had painted 4 of the 10 a while back, leaving only six to finish:

As the previous were done in a grey stone colour, I decided to do these in a warmer sandstone scheme.
Now, I hear you thinking; "He said he had already painted 4 out of 10, that should leave 6, but there are only 5 in the picture?"

I'm not dead yet!

As you may have noticed, this blog has been less active lately.