A Quick Test

Despite the recent flurry of Malifaux activity I have been painting some other stuff. This has mainly been miniatures for SAGA. As I said in my last post I really wanted to get my Viking band together. Well I have painted a test model or I should say finished a test model as this guy has been on the desk for a long while. I have no idea if I have enough models but I think I should have. The box I contained them all in is getting light but I should get by. I can just add loads of Huscarls into the band. What I am eager to get a hold of is some Berserkers that fit scale wise with the rest of the models. There are some terrible old gripping beast sculpts but I really would like something better. These guys don't have a fancy shield to hide behind so the quality of the model needs to be fairly decent.

I copied the shield design from Old Fogey's Saxon Warlord. Aalthough looking now his is much better. I will be doing higher quality shields across the band and so I have been looking everywhere for some inspiration. I have had a lot of problems with the quality of the Little Big Men studio shield transfers over time so I definitely don't want to use them. They may look fine now but give them a few years and they won't. It seems the only way to go is to freehand the designs. I wonder how long it will take before the enthusiasim for that will wear off.

Arise my thralls...

I finally got a Master finished. I had Nicodem put together and half done for a while. I sat down last night and fnished him off. He isn't the recipient of the most awesome paint job ever but he came out fine and I am glad to be able to put him into the cabinet alongside the other Malifaux miniatures. The sculpt is actually different from th one show on the package I bought. That shows a stiched together coat while this one was plain. Maybe the artist managed a convincing paintjob on the stiches. I kept it plain and experimented with a few brown colours. As my favourite Scorched Brown is down to a single pot in my collection and it can't be replaced I need to keep that for one or two future projects to maintain some consistency. I drybrushed the vulture as when it came to painting him I really wasn't up for the careful highlighting of the feathers. Carefully applied drybrushing can be just as good as painstaking blending, especially when viewed from across the table.

I wanted to add something to the base for ach of the Master models I will have. It took a while to come up exactly with what though. I think I shall add some tiny playing cards just like these in the picture. They are an absolute pain to paint and I guess nobody but I will ever notice them. Still for me, it differentiates the masters from the already characterful other miniatures. I will do it for the others I paint. I have picked up Seamus and Molly so I have a decent amount to get through. I seem to always do the same. Once I get enthusiastic about a project I dig into the backlog and make a decent amount of progress. Just as I am clearing them out I always end up ordering a few bits more. As soon as they arrive I end up moving onto something else...

I will be painting some more Dark Ages stuff over the Christmas break. There seems to be another few players for Saga and I want to get the last band I have here together. I have enough still from the Gripping Beast WAB deal I bought nearly ten years ago to make one more Viking Band and to bulk out the Saxons and Anglo Danes. The only thing I am a little short on is archer levy. I will have to pick up a pack or two of them. I have so much stuff painted that I am considering trying out a few games of WAB in the new year. I should have sufficent models painted to field a 2000 point army.

Another Mindless Zombie

Despite being incredibly busy I have managed to get another model finished. Work, mainly self created, has been hectic for the last few months and as a result my painting has suffered. I have plans to get back into it a bit more in the New Year but I won't be as prolific as before. There are only so many hours in the day and I definitely have too many projects running at once. At least I will soon have enough finished at least to play with a fully painted crew. These mindless zombies are fun to paint. The models are quite characterful despite the fact they are zombies and I am eager to see what the future ones might be like. I stuck with an autumnal scheme for this lady and it came out fine. The camera washes everything out but you can get some appreciation of what I was going for I hope. I have been painting the whole crew in a deliberately mixed colours. The models just feel too unique to really give them anything more than a token uniformity. The bases do decently well enough in my opinion.

Necrotic Machine

I picked up the Necrotic Machine from e-bay a few days ago and I was eager to get it painted. I had seen a really awesome example of sponged metal and I knew instantly I had to try it. I don't really get to paint many all metal models or at least predominantly metal models so I had to settle for experimenting with this guy. Basically the technique layers the metal and weathering coats alternatively on top of each other with a sponge giving a very strongly mottled effect. It was fairly simple to do though I think it would look better on a larger model with flatter surfaces. I think it could be great for me on something like metal rooves I do for some of my Warmachine, and possible upcoming Malifaux, terrain. It gives a really different effect when compared with the pigment based weathering.

I used Mithril Silver (GW) and Chainmail (GW). For the rust I used a Vajello paint whose name has worn off the bottle. I guess it is something akin to Vermin Fur. These were just repeatedly sponged randomly over each other with some torn blister package sponge. After that I washed them down a little to darken the effect. This is the result. I kept the skin really pale to contrast the dark metals. It really stands out now. Also I painted the syringe vials a yellow colour. I hate painting these sort of things. I can never get it to look right. These came out fine.

I have been using Molly Squidpidge recently on Vassal and I really like her. I am still a complete beginner with regard to Malifaux but I think I picked the right faction. The summoning mechanics are well balanced allowing me now to feel like I can achieve some summoning. Before I always felt like it was a bit of a hit and miss as you basically had to have the right card in your hand. It is a lot more difficult to summon the bigger models now but that feels right for the game. I am hoping to get another game in on Tuesday. I am looking forward to it.

Mindless Zombie

I have been playing a lot of Malifaux recently and I decided it was about time to get my paintbrushes out and get some models painted again. Here is a quickly painted mindless zombie. I picked these up as they were 20% at the local game store and as I use Nicodem these are probably useful. I am hopeful that when the plastic versions come out they will be different and so I will have six variations on the model. I painted the skin up with some washes, mainly grey, green and red. I may have used purple also but I forget. The base colour was Elf Flesh (GW). On the hands I wanted to try the blood wash that Old Fogey has used on his ghouls recently. However his comes out a lot better than mine. I also tried to make a blood trail behind the model and on the bottom of the boots. That came out okay at least. I have never really gotten that realistic blood correct. Eventually I will. I am considering upgrading my camera. The quality of shots are fairly poor and even a half decent smart phone seems to take better photographs nowadays.