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Nice work on the DS batch. You got away with making use of the warped posing on those zombies! The OSL really works well on the ghosts as well.

Nice OSL on the ghosts. I think that was the right call. They'd've been too blah without it.

Valete,

JohnS

Thanks for the kind words. The ghosts are nifty little models, but they were really boring before I decided to do the lighting effect inside the robes.

Next up: armored zombies and dwarf revenants.

I'm still plugging away at the Dungeon Saga base game. This time, I have some armored zombies to share:



They are all identical, so I set them up as a sort of low-tech 360 view. They are obviously supposed to be Basilean men-at-arms, so I painted them in the studio scheme, minus the blue triangle accents, followed by my homebrew brown and/or Payne's Grey glazes. One thing I like about Mantic is that they aim for internal consistency. The helmets on these guys and on the MaA models can also be found on Mantic's plastic skeletons, which makes them feel like they're from the same world a way that you don't get with, say GW skeletons and Empire troops.



Here are some dwarf revenants. I was thinking of doing them in green and gold, but figured that iron worked better for them. I painted their shields according the the studio scheme, but forgot to do any sort of weathering before I took this photo. Also, the green turned out a lot more vivid than I thought it would.

Here is this batch all together:


I'm nearly at the end of the models-- only the Dwarf revenant king and the zombie trolls left. Then all the furniture and doors. Then the expansions. So, not really near the end at all.

Coming along nicely, Josh. They look great. I've finished 7 barrels and 2 wells so far, so you're a hell of a long way ahead of me!

 Azazelx wrote:
Coming along nicely, Josh. They look great. I've finished 7 barrels and 2 wells so far, so you're a hell of a long way ahead of me!

That's probably because I didn't start with the barrels and wells. Expect a big slowdown when I get to those.

I did not especially enjoy the banding on the four barrels I've done. It wasn't bad, and I used a simple scheme, but some of the other stuff was less obnoxious to paint.

Nice zombies and revenants

Love the Revenants, the green cloaks are going to make them stand out really nicely on the tabletop.

I've been interspersing the furniture and doors amongst my troopers to stop it getting too soul destroying. Seems to be working okay so far - gonna spray the last of the furniture today, and hopefully the doors tomorrow.

As I close in on the final stages of the Dungeon Saga project, I am finding these final models to require more time and attention that the other bad guys. Here's Grund, the dwarf revenant king:


I wanted this guy to look a little more regal than the other dwarfs from this set. Who could be more regal than Thorin, the King Under the Mountain? I opened up The Hobbit, but the only description Tolkien gave us is his cloak (sky blue with a silver tassel). Since no one has ever made a lave action Hobbit movie, I went to the only true visual source-- the 1977 animated version by Rankin-Bass. All of the dwarfs were pretty drab, but I figured that if it was good enough for Thorin, it was good enough for Grund-- thus the olive drab/dark blue-grey combination. I kept the metallics pretty dark, more like tarnished iron rather than gold. And since he has eyes (as opposed to empty eye sockets), I did them in glowy green to match the rest of this set. Overall, I'm pretty pleased with how he turned out.

The only remaining models (not counting doors and such) are the zombie trolls, which look like they'll take a long time. Lots of skin tears and exposed guts to pick out, on top of remarkably fine detailing for board game plastic. These will, I think, be the standout models from this set.

In between all the more army-focussed stuff I've been working on for the last few months, I've been chipping away at this guy:






The monster is, of course, Nyarlathotep the Crawling Chaos, photos of which I posted last summer (I think). At the time, he was on a plain, black base, waiting for inspiration to strike me. Then, it hit me: the model appears to be made of guts all strung out, which means they had to come from inside someone. I did a quick google search, and found this page (scroll down for the specific set). I ordered one, despite the painful exchange rate at the time, and settled back to wait. In the meantime, I had to figure out what to do with the base. I settled on a cracked earth scheme, and set about looking for an appropriate medium. LIquitex makes a crackle gel, and I even tried to order it, but for whatever reason Amazon wouldn't ship it from the US to Japan. When I went back in December, I found some crackle paste at an art supply store. The stuff ended up crackling radially from the center, and required some work by hand to widen the cracks a bit more. I'm not entirely sold on the material, but it was $16 and I have a whole bunch left to use before I think about finding something else.

When the Mayan sacrifice set arrived, I knew that I had made the right choice. The whole set is fantastic, if somewhat dated in style (note the guys oven mitt hands). I added some kneadatite tentacles coming from the cut in his belly--inspired by John Carpenter's The Thing, painted him up, and assembled everything. I'm glad to say that this model is finally finished.

Whoa! That is one awesomely freaky figure! Awesome, but freaky as hell. Is that from Cthulhu Wars, or elsewhere?

It's from RAFM's Call of Cthulhu line. I picked it up from their Indiegogo campaign a couple of years back, along with the Cthulhu cultists and Great Race model I posted a while back. The remainder of my rewards are slated to show up in the Tale of Many Gamer's probably around springtime.

Here are the final items in my January painting challenge:

Zombie trolls:


There are two more of these guys, but as they are all identical I decided to keep the photo less cluttered.

Doors:


These were less soul-crushing than I thought that they would be, but even so I won't mind not painting filigree for a while.

Furniture:


Have you noticed that all the browns are the same? If/when I do another set, I think I will add some variation. In preparation for the alchemist's cabinet, I read a few tutorials on painting liquids in bottles. Then I remembered that this is just set dressing for a board game, and opted to just do glazes over Mithril silver instead.

More furniture:


I kept with the same greys as the bases and doorframes (Ceramcoat dark charcoal and bridgeport grey). I mounted the lectern on a ￥1 coin for stability, then painted the coin like a little carpet. I may go back and pick out the exposed writing to make it more mystical, or I may just ignore it. Probably the latter.

Everything together:


Well, not quite everything, because one room doesn't really need that many doors. Not to bad for under 30 days work, I think. I plan to revisit Dungeon Saga in a couple of months after clearing out some other items that have been sitting around unpainted for years. The orcs and demons look pretty nifty. And finally, drawing inspiration from Grimdork, here are some action shots, hidden behind spoiler tags.

The heroes confront the Dwarf Revenant and his bodyguard:


Then, they confront the banshee Elshara and her spectral minions:


Next, it's time to take out Hoggar and his zombie trolls:


Finally, it's time to eliminate the necromancer, Mortibris. Assuming the heroes can get past his horde of undead servants!


Starting in February, I will be finishing off the Sedition Wars models that have been taking up space for all these years.


Finally

Great work on the dungeon saga stuff. Really like that 'crawling chaos ' beastie.

EDC

Great (and fast!) work on the DS

@drcheese: RAFM's Call of Cthulhu line, although old, has some pretty nifty models.

@slinky: fast but simple, which is perfectly adequate for a board game.

Love the tentacle headed dude "Go Chaos!"

Your dungeon saga guys look excellent as well, especially with that dungeon terrain.

Looking forward to seeing you tackle the Sedition wars figs.

Great stuff as always! You continue to amaze me with your impressive productivity. But keeping up that level of quality with that volume is outstanding.

Valete,

JohnS

Great stuff! Gonna be me back and ogle these on my pc so I can see all the fancy detail. I plan to use one color of wood per patch of furniture too.

John: quality is an illusion generated here by inks and drybrushing. But thanks for the compliments nonetheless.

See that's even better in my book. You can make stuff look good without breaking a sweat. Witchcraft!

 JoshInJapan wrote:
John: quality is an illusion generated here by inks and drybrushing. But thanks for the compliments nonetheless.

Painting is nothing but the art of creating an illusion with paint, inks, and technique...

Valete,

JohnS

They really do look great, Josh. The dungeon base works really well with them as well.

Although I have started on my SW models for February, I still have a couple of things left over from Dungeon Saga. First up, bone piles:

Like most of the models from this game, these acrylic pieces would have benefited from some touch-up on the sculpts before painting, but by this point "good enough" is, well, good enough. I only did seven out of twelve because I only had that many empty paint bottles to stick them to. Next up, resin traps:


These are all the fingerprinted traps. I used some [url＝http://www.amazon.co.jp/%E3%83%92%E3%83%8E%E3%83%87%E3%83%AF%E3%82%B7-%E3%83%97%E3%83%A9%E3%82%B9%E3%83%81%E3%83%83%E3%82%AF%E3%81%AD%E3%82%93%E3%81%A9-%E3%81%8A%E3%82%86%E3%81%BE%E3%82%8B1000-OO-1000-24%E5%80%8B%E5%85%A5/dp/B002P6PWMS]plastic clay[/url], which is InstaMold but much cheaper, to make a press mold of a dungeon base, then used the last of my kneadatite to add detail to the flat sides. When I get some more putty, I will probably patch up the edges a little bit.

The bone piles, while nothing to write home about, are perfectly acceptable game pieces. These traps, however, are pretty dismal. The trap sides aren't too badly done, but these flat faces are inexcusably bad. At least they'll be easy to paint...

Those bone piles came out looking great, and it's awesome to see your core set coming together too!

Have you got the expansions as well? I'd love to see your take on the abyssals.

I went pretty much all in on DS. I have a couple of project up ahead in the queue for Azazelx's paining challenge, but I'll get back to DS sometime in spring.

Sedition Wars: Battle for Alabaster was the second Kickstarter I ever backed (the first was KoW1). I was as excited as anyone for the project, and have never really been disappointed with the results. It appears that I was the only one who felt that way, however, and the game died a quite if undignified death. I still like the models a generic SF infantry, though, so the 2016 Painting Challenge makes for a good excuse to finally finish them off. First up, heroes.





This is Captain Kara Black. I painted her uniform in Army Painter army green, with a Tamiya NATO green wash. The armored bits are NATO green with a Strong Tone glaze. The box art shows here with a scar on her face, but I couldn't get it to look right. In space, no one asks if you've had plastic surgery.

Speaking of surgery:




Morgan Vade is a medic, as you can tell by all the pouches and stuff. I painted him in the same colors as Kara Black, as is appropriate for space army men. The browns are AP Oak Brown-> Leather Brown->Desert Yellow, with a Strong Tone wash. As a medic in a battle against space zombies, he would naturally follow universal precautions, which is why he has blue latex gloves. He should probably have rolled his sleeves down, as well.





Finally, we have Akosha Nama, a sniper. Her paint job was inspired by Scarlett Johansson's Black Widow, which is why everything is black and/or grey. All three of these models have shallow pits for eyes, which is why they look so terrible. On the troopers I just left the eye sockets dark from the wash, and it might have been best to do the same with these models.

Next, I have a dozen Vanguard troopers in the works. They have been cleaned (as much as I am willing to clean restic models), glued, and in some cases bent into place. A few need some gap filling, and I have one extra body with no arms that I need to figure out what to do with. I hope to have photos up by this time next week.

Nice work on the Sedition Wars stuff. I've got a few that need painting up as well. Really like your doctor figure.

Thanks. He is easily the most interesting of the three, as well as my favorite. He'll make a nice Rebs medic in Deadzone, if I ever play that game.

Great stuff! I like the blue gloves the most.