If I were my girlfriend, I would hate my hobby too.

By the power of Greyskull, it has been far too darn long since I have had a chance to slap some plastic together and even longer since i last painted anything.

SO I DID BOTH!!!

After crying myself to sleep for several hours after seeing the work coming out of Beneath The Mires very own Drone, I have finally gotten my butt into something that almost looked like a gear and made up a Feral Ork buddy for old Captain Dakka!

 So there is a bunch left to do on him, the layering and highlights for example, but hes a good start for me.

I'm not a very motivated painter, but when i get in a mood like I am now, I can churn out a model a day to a tournament standard.
I got this guy done in a few hours, but I have to do his base still, its sitting on my warzone like desk at the moment, as I am using it to balance a rather delicate warshrine for my Warriors Of Chaos army.

I'm tempted to give him Warpaint and the like, I'm thinking a crude snake and dagger motif, those Snakebite tattoos from the old school Rogue Trader books really excite me.

So that's it from me for the night, it's 2:32 am and I have a feeling that I'm supposed to do something in the morning with my poor girlfriend who has had to put up with me muttering to myself about how the hell I paint bone. I know it has something to do with earthshade and Deneb stone. 

Endings And Beginnings

This is Klein's whole warband poised and ready for action.

This may be the only time any dice are rolled around these models! :-)

This marks a bit of an end for this blog. Klein's warband is done and although I have plans for a couple more models and plenty more ideas, I think I'm done with Klein and his boys for now. So, I'm going to start posting more of my general hobby here.

I am very happy with how the warband turned out. They have that dark future feel and I'd like to think that thay are an ok emulation of the few John Blanche miniatures that I've been luck enough to see in real life. And I've learned how to make my stuff more grim-dark. 

This is not to say there won't be more Inq28 stuff. For example this the last miniature that I finished.

I'll just not be focusing on it as much. Expect to see stuff for my armies, stuff that I've been meaning to paint for years, some terrain, some sculpting and maybe some non-GW stuff. I hope this is ok.

Commissar Skulthorpe

An expert in inter-tribal and ritual warfare Commissar Skulthorpe has had a long association with the Holy Ordos Xenos in matters involving the orks and other primitive alien races. His reputation was made with a series postings to newly recruited feral guard regiments where his methods of assimilation with the tribal structures and traditions before introducing the Imperial Creed proved very effective. He is however dogged by rumours of ritual cannibalism and involvement in blood sacrifices.

So he is all pained, varnished and sitting on the shelf with the rest of the band. Sorry about the poor photos: I'll try to get some better ones with the rest of Klein's retinue soon.

I can't say I'm all that pleased with him. I'd hoped that once he was painted that would help like it did with Sir K. Perhaps I've stretched the commissar archetype too far. Maybe a storm coat would have helped.

Fallen Knight Paragon

Know now only as "Sir Ketamine" Odo de Gatton was once a full member of the Inner House Knights on the feudal world of Esperence who worshiped the "sky warriors" as the perfect chivalric ideal. He was recruted into an off world mercenary army and eventually saw the "sky warriors" in the form of the Flesh Tearers space marines on Gideon IV. However, far from being inspired by the them he was driven into a spiral of depression and substance abuse by their brutal actions.

De Gatton has recently been seen in the retinue of Inquisitor Klein. What the inquisitor wants with a drug addict is anyone's guess.

The knight only took a few nights to paint and I'm much happier with him now that he's got some colour. I particularly pleased with the armour and the patina that I was able to get on it by using Windsor & Newton Nut Brown ink. It's just the right kind of grimy. I feel like I'm starting to get a handle on this "grim dark" thing. :-)

Nostalgia pt. 1

I'm not dead. Just distracted and sometimes busy. I never said that there would be regular up dates. Did I?

I've been doing a few different things over the last few weeks. I little work on the Govenor that I'm not real happy with. Some more Necromunda stuff (I picked up one of the last three eschers I need for the "full set" of twenty on eBay) And I've painted a 1000pt force of UMC for Dropzone Commander (because they are cool and I miss Epic. Not sure that I'll ever play a game of DZC but who cares really)

I've also been painting a bit of pure hobby nostalgia over the last week or so. I remember standing in a store in 1994 with my pocket money burning a hole in my pocket tossing up whether to get a blister of these Guardians or some Howling Banshees. I got the Banshees.
 

I think I did a better job than I could have in '94 ;-)

 It's a great old model but it makes you appreciate the stuff that is released now days. The detail on it is soft and sometimes muddled or confused. And look at those hands! 

I have half an idea of doing a full 2nd ed army like this but I don't want to be seen as one of those old farts telling kids how good it was back in the "old days", before GW became evil/ greedy/ sold out etc. While I love looking at all the "oldhammer" blogs there is a part of me that is wary of the "old stuff is better than the new stuff" way of thinking. The new eldar stuff is light years better than this. No question in my mind.

I still have all my old models and there is always eBay to fill any gaps in the collection. Maybe I'll just do a few now and again for kicks. As I said pure hobby nostalgia.

Salutamus WIP1

More pictures of progress on Governor Salutamus. He's looking alot more 40k with the purity seals, that gnarly face and Tommy-Lee Jones bags under his eyes.

The big skull hat is the next thing. The Blanche picture makes it look like a giant skull but I was wondering if it should be a skull-faced mite instead. But I also like the idea of making as just the skull that is some kind of machine from the dark age of technology that no longer works but has become a symbol of power on Salutamus' world. Opinions?

WIP Up-date 1

A WIP up-date. Since the last post the paragon knight has been undercoated and based, I’ve started on my next project and committed a bit of nostalgia. Sorry about the lack of posts I've had real life take over toy soldier life.

  
Sir Junkie looks much better now. I think that he just needed some bulking up around the shoulders and 40king up some. The eye lens and the ubiquitous 40k tubing has helped a lot on that score. I tried the epic marine commander on the helmet but he seemed too flat. The laurels with the tactical marine seem to do the job though. Next I need to work out some colours for him. At first I was planning a blue/green palette to show up rust and brown grime on his once pure “white” (silver) armour but I’m not so sure now.

The next project is a planetary governor based on the great John Blanche picture of a high lord of terra in the old 2^nd edition Codex Imperialis. He’s part of my fallen paragons so is not a heroic figure; he’s a confused old man wrenched from his palace and caught in a battle he doesn’t understand. To begin with I was converting one of the Empire battle wizards but found the weird pose too restrictive. After a couple of days struggling with it I abandoned what I’d done and pulled out the sculpting tools. I know that this may be a faux pas in the world of =I=28 to sculpt a whole model but it was the only way that I could get something that I was happy with. Please forgive me.

As a side note the original picture makes the high lord look like a hard arse. It’s not something that I imagine that they would be; in my mind they would be standing by a brass-bound cogitator attached to the Golden Throne endlessly waiting for a message from Him that will never come as the scribe whose job it was to stock the machine with punch-cards died 5,000 years ago and, because of a administrative error, was never replaced, or sitting in a dark, gothic board room reading endless centuries old casualty reports and trying not to let the state of the Imperium crush them.

Finally, I’ve also been working a few other bits and pieces: an astropath that I saw on eBay and could not resist; Lt. Varras for my Imperial Fists; and some old eldar. This October marks 20 years of toy soldiering for me, and the eldar were some of the first miniatures that I got. My plan is just to paint ‘em up nice. Better that I could in ’93 at least :-)