In Progress back log....

This is an in progress shot of the Ork Nob I have on the bench currently. Despite taking this at the end of October, this is pretty much where he is at the moment. I'm currently getting bogged down with the Orkish skintone....I usually do a brownish green for my orks but I'm not liking it anymore. It works great for Rackham's orcs, but not for my GW ones (don't know why...just the way it is with me). So, I am working on a Reaper fantasy orc to try out some new color ideas for flesh tone (and to add to my fantasy RPG mini collection...it's lonely with just the halfling).

I kinda neglected my blog throughout November and most of December....so a little update on something I started.

December'd

Couple of models I finished recently....one or possibly both of them are Xmas gifts for friends.

Zombie Hitler here is from Reaper's Chronoscape line. I started painting it on a whim and the more I painted on him, the more I liked him. I went for the chancellor uniform color scheme as I wanted something that would:

a. contrast with the flesh as any sort of green just wouldn't do it.

b. be bright enough for any weathering to show up.

I'm sure I am on some sort of FBI watchlist now considering how many times I googled Hitler and Nazi uniforms....

Next up is a Leprechaun I got back in 04. He is one of three from the pack. I went with the obligatory Leprechaun color scheme...although I did paint his clothing with a much more subdued green. Sort of reminds me of the Leprechaun from the movies of the same name.

So this week's projects...

This week's projects are Anwyn, the Female Bard from Reaper and the Female Gael Champion from Brigade Models (or Ikore before Ikore sold off the line... and then became Urban Mammoth).

Excited to work on both of these as Werner Klocke and Kev White are two of my favorite sculptors. I don't know yet if the Celtos minis will find their way into my D&D collection as their scale doesn't jibe with most of my Reaper stuff. Odds are I'll just paint them all as one offs and just do a seperate collection or something. I don't know...

Now I'm off to sleep.

And so the gamer in me has once again come into conflict with the collector in me...

Here's a fun story. About a month ago, I was picking out some minis to buy myself for my birthday. I picked up some Reaper stuff I didn't have (which is saying something as I have or had their entire line) and a little something caught my eye. What was that?

Yep, these fellas. And when I saw them, I heard this little voice screaming out "BUY ME". Now, rational Mike said "You know that these are figures meant for wargaming...they aren't nearly as detailed as I like and are probably totally out of scale to Vikings I already have"...and the little voice said "BUY ME". This argument went on and on my head for two weeks...that is until I saw they were doing a 20% sale on this set. That's when the little voice screamed "IT'S TOO GOOD TO PASS UP...." and logical me was off having a sandwich or something. Long story short, I bought them.

So, fast forward about a week later, they arrive in the mail and I am as giddy as a school girl. I pop the box open and pull them out and view their gloriousness. Honestly, they look really good...much better than the zombies I had purchased from them the year before. So i set about assembling the first 4 guys....and let's just say the set is a versatile as an GW kit but the parts are about half the size. And I start noticing that they are not anywhere similar scale to my Foundry Vikings. First pangs of buyer's regret setting in. But I figure let's at least paint one and see how it goes.

Last night I primered and started on a Huscarl...just one so I can figure out my work flow for knockign through 32 of these guys. Every stroke of the brush, my buyer's regret is getting worse. I stop for the evening and pick them back up the next night. I am some what relieved by the fact the face is turning out well....but the more I paint the rest of it my buyer's regret is building and building..and now here I am.

These are NOT the minis for me. While they are head and shoulders above the vikings I've bought from Old Glory and the like...and if you are talking some real high quality bang for your wargaming buck, these are nigh unbeatable....but still just not right for me.

I just wish there was a charity or something I could donate these to so I don't feel like I wasted 20 bucks.

Thurin continues...although I don't know for how much longer

Yeah...I'm getting burned out on things again. Not a painting burnout, just a creative slump. But anyway here is Thurin the Blackguard at the moment.

The part I'm happiest with at the moment is his cape. The flash sort of messes it up, but the red blended really nicely. Hopefully it will come out when I shoot it with my fancy pro rig...and by pro rig a clamp light from home Depot and two desk lamps...I really need to make me a lighthing cocoon thing to diffuse the light though.

I did go back over all the black parts with Vallejo black rather than Ceramcoat as I wasn't getting the rich deep black that I wanted. I also went back and toned the highlights on the armor down as I didn't want him to look like he was dark blue, but black. And dear god that flash really reflects off the black now...

Feel free to comment or encourage...i could use some right now.

I am so done with Old Glory

...six fingers on a guy....SIX FINGERS ON A GUY.

Yep, what little remains of my Old Glory stuff is going in the trash. And so help me god, if I find a six fingered German in my Berlin or Bust stuff we are gonna have some problems.

This week's progress....

This week, I am focusing my attention on Thurin the Black Guard from Reaper. He's part of my incredibly small D&D/WoW/fantasy RPG collection....as a matter of fact he's the second guy for it. I'm going for a sort of Death Knight look for him...black armor with some glowing bits here and there. I'm using the same colors I used for my Anti Paladin a few years back...Ceramcoat Payne's Grey and Cape Cod Blue. If you happen to be using Reaper's old Pro Paints, the color would be pretty close to using Blue Black along with Nightsky (have to order some the newer versions of those two). I had thought of doing some sort of NMM on him, but then I thought about the fact that I was painting him for me and not for sale...and honestly I hate how cartoony my NMM turns out anyway.

But thus far I am happy with the way he's turning out. You can't really get a good look at it, but I'm really happy with the skull on his shoulders...I got a nice blended look going with about 7 different colors layered in and a ton of washes with browns and dark greens.

And in other news, my coccyx is almost healed back up. So more painting will be getting done soon as I can sit for more than 30 minutes at a time.