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The statues are great. They have a real "presence". Would love to see what the ivy would add.

As said elsewhere, love the statues!

The lotr scenery is very nice, good work Another vote for ivy here

It's amazing how satisfying it is to paint scenery isn't it? Your's look superb, you've really made them look "real".

I second the satisfaction gained in turning out some good scenery. I find it as rewarding as painting models and when they are all together on a tabletop it looks simply awesome.

Recently I showed the Bones Skeletal Swordsmen that I finished for Marouda's Mythical Greek force. These six are the other half of the group. Originally the twelve of them were to make up a single unit of more generic undead troops, whether spear or blade worked out simply by swapping the front rank as appropriate. Since the Mythical Greeks are now becoming a thing with the addition of a big load of stuff from Wargames Foundry, they got split into the Blade regiment and these guys, who I finished last Friday and will be the back half of the Spear regiment.



You may well have noticed that the spears appear to be made of rubber. Well, that's Bones PVC for you! While I could have replaced the spear shafts with wire by cutting them off, drilling out the hands, and reattaching the spearheads, just look at the sculpts! They're hardly worth that kind of effort! I did what I think is a nice enough job on the actual bones, but that's because I enjoy painting bone most of the time. I've painted the shields with a kind of pseudo-Verginia Sun to give a Greek-Macedonian vibe to go with the preudo-Dipylon style shields. I left the shield bosses bronze rather than painting them the colours of the rays, or carving them off as I did on the swordsmen.



The unit will be completed soon, hopefully. I've got the four Foundry skeletons with spear completed, though I still have to do a shield for one of them and I'm unsure about shields for the other three, due to their poses. I've used a Wargames Factory Model for a fifth, but I'm still struggling to find an appropriate sixth to complete the unit. Any ideas? I'm looking for an unarmoured skeleton armed with a spear, sturdy one piece casting, nice enough sculpt, and preferring metal or at least sturdy HIPS. (The Wargames Factory ones seem a little fragile).

This!

Sometimes scenery is more fun because it's bigger and chunkier, you can be rougher with it and it'll still come out surprisingly well at times. Plus, it's the backdrop for your fancily painted armies. One of my fellow local gamers uses a lot of felt. It's fine... but making something really nice can set a game off so much better.

What's that saying... terrain is the third faction? I think it works aesthetically as well as tactically

Hey thanks guys, I didn't see the new posts about scenery while I was out in the shed taking some photos, cropping and uploading.

You're right about the Bones skeletons. Individually, they might lack a little something, three ranks of them behind something a little nicer will work out just fine. I look forward to a group shot of the completed unit.

Just a simple one today. Some of these models were finished last year, but I've finally finished off the last few of these last weekend, so now the unit is finished (for now). I've got them stuck to a Renedra 100x80mm movement tray for Kings of War, but since I use these guys for the Lord of the Rings Strategy Battle Game I keep them based on 25mm rounds (also for aesthetics, and for consistency with most of my other models). These figures, as reasonably simple and uniform as they are have become a real bane to my painting queue. Originally, I only had the 24 models that came with the RotK starter box, and so with 8 of each type (Archers/Spear/Blade) I afforded them each a reasonable paint job, which involved blending their skirts, leggings and the edges of their shields with wolf grey over black rather than doing something simpler and faster like a black wash over dark grey. Because of this, and the fact that they're just not that interesting to paint - particularly en masse, they tend to take me forever to get done. The tree device on the shields, as many people will know is reeeeeeeally shallow as well, making it way trickier than it should be to give a quick once-over, which is a bit annoying.



When finished - and especially in a unit either on a tray or in a bunch - they look pretty good. They're effective at looking like what they're supposed to be. On the other hand, individually, they're really not very exciting at all. This is why despite painting quite a few of these guys last year and haven't shown any of them off to date aside from a single character model - Beregond. These guys are only on show today since I'm wanting to photograph everything I finish this year, and because people on Dakka's LotR forum have shown some interest.



In the rear view here you can see the blending on their skirts. It's come out a little more stark in the photos than in real life, but that's ok. The 75mm of the three ranks of figures also doesn't quite fill the 80mm of the movement tray, but again that's ok - especially as Kings of War is an element based game, and people often use fewer models and/or unit fillers - this unit "should" be 20 men strong, rather than 12 - but that's okay since it means I actually get a lot more units completed by using models and their bases in this way.

They look great

When you base them like that they really look like they're meant to be done that way, and i wouldn't expect 20 models to fit on such a tray if I hadn't seen it before.

Those guys look awesome, aesthetically I think they are some of the best in the range! I know what you mean about the tree detailng being soft/shallow, I found that on mine on the chest as well (although the fact they've all been repainted twice might have a slight effect on that... )

Really liking the Gondor soldiers- the White Tree of Gondor looks awesome if a bit fiddly.

You may lament the level of detail that you decided to go into for these guys, but they really do look spectacular and you should be proud of your efforts.

Even if you feel they are a little dull I think the finished product is an excellent result.

Thanks for the positivity on these. I certainly didn't expect that much of it. I'll get some more photographed soon, and reveal the army a bit at a time. Also, a whole bunch of units just need their command to be finished - so it'll definitely be a bit at a time...


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 JoshInJapan wrote:
You're right about the Bones skeletons. Individually, they might lack a little something, three ranks of them behind something a little nicer will work out just fine. I look forward to a group shot of the completed unit.

Probably a couple of weeks still - I need to find a last figure to complete the unit, and I'm waiting on some Macedonian transfers from Warlord to then completely finish the unit.

As requested the other day - my Dark Angels Scouts. These figures are part of the fourth wave of Space Marine Scouts, released in 1998. The first were the initial two models, followed a year or two later by the second wave - an expanded range in the same style. With Advanced Space Crusade came the Scouts who dressed like a weird combination of Landsknechts and the previous designs (with clown colours to top things off). Then these guys were released, with the first Space Wolf Wolf Scouts being released shortly before, and acting in many ways as the prototype/sketch book pages for these.

If you browse the Stuff of Legends page for these figures, you'll notice that no actual bolter-armed model exists in the line. This is why I've got a squad armed with shotguns. With no bolter-armed models available, these guys could be (and were) alternately armed with Bolters or Shotguns, as appropriate to the game being played. The "Sergeant" model came later. I think he was released alongside the bolter-armed model a few years later from the initial models. I believe I acquired him later on, but painted the whole gang at once anyway.



Eagle-eyed viewers might notice that these guys aren't actually painted much like the typical Space Marine or Dark Angels Scouts. Space Marine Scouts' of whichever chapter tend to have their armoured bits painted like their Chapter's armour, and the soft "cloth" bits painted in a beige/off-white. All the better to scout with, obviously.



I made two choices about scouts and my 40k armies, long long ago. One is that Scouts should be dressed to scout. While it's fine for the fully-armoured Marine brothers to charge forward in their bright, heraldic powered armour, I thought the guys with the job of doing actual reconnaissance, ambushes, infiltration, and general sneaking around should be dressed a bit more appropriately. I chose the 1991 Desert Storm 6-colour "choc chip" camouflage pattern for the Dark Angels because it was fun to paint, still pretty much in common memory, and because I didn't want to paint them in a predominantly green camouflage. With this in mind (and reference pictures from Iraq in my folder), I painted both the "hard" armour and fatigue clothing in the camo pattern and their webbing and pouches with a nice "webbing" green. Boots were brown/black, and the weapons were given a dull green (plastic/plasteel/etc) for the furniture.



I used white Dark Angels transfers for the shoulders as low-visibility army identification. The white doesn't particularly stand out on their camouflaged armour, just like real armies. The Sergeant has a slightly different transfer to make him stand out to me and other players (aside from the model's pose), but not so much as is usual for Marine NCOs.

The other painting variation from the traditional theme? Several of the scouts aren't painted with Caucasian skin tones. It comes up from time to time when people question why pretty much all Warhammer/40k models are painted as though they come from Coventry, and without getting into a whole discussion on the origins of GW, Warammer and 40k, it always bothered me a bit that there was never any growth or movement in that aspect (and still isn't). It's nothing to do with Political Correctness and everything to do with realism in modern armies - particularly in large armies and forces that recruit from entire worlds or a wide variety of locales. Why am I bothering to mention it here? Because reasons.

Well, they look pretty sweet! Good work.

Aye, they look great. I'm very much in the school of 'Scouts will wear Chapter Colours and be damn glad of it', but then the only Scouts I have are Raven Guard, and brown and black are pretty subtle anyway!

They have camo cloaks anyways so I'll paint em chapter colours

Fair enough - though Camo cloaks weren't a thing until recently (5th Ed codex), and these guys were painted early on in 3rd, so I'll stick to camouflage armour for my various marines.


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Day 59. Finished 12 figures (that had been on the desk for months). Total now is 71 for the year.

Just as, or maybe even more importantly - I'm getting the half and part-painted crap cleared off my desk and shelf that's been clogging it up for months and in too many cases - years.

Well, I managed to get that Stone Thrower that I was asking about at the start of last week finished today. It's a good feeling, especially since it was started and kinda-finished so long ago. I should be able to get some pics up on Wednesday night, or more likely Thursday/Friday.

Another of the figures that I've just finished this week after initially being started years ago, restarted a couple of years ago, and re-restarted several months ago - the C32 Chaos Ogre from the mid 1980s. He nicely provided the final figure in another unit of three - my Berserkers. I think I may have originally been planning to use him as one of my two single-Ogre units - since he looks like the kind of complete nutjob that Ogres might allow to fight alongside them, but, you know, don't get too close to me - but since they'll be removed as an option in the new edition of Kings of War, I've just dropped him onto the Base with the other two C23 Ogres that I'm using as Berserkers for now.


It took awhile to work out a skintone that would work well with the armour. The ruddy tones for his face and horrid pink and purple for his lower jaw seem to provide enough contrast without looking too garish. Red-browns for his leathergoods, and bronze for the metal trim again provide enough contrast without overwhelming the model or making it too busy.


As you can see, I decided to go with a Nurgle-themed look to him in the end, though not so completely over the top as so many of the current models. A green tinge to his beaten-up and damaged armour, and some glistening, oozing pustules on his shield were enough to match the model's aesthetic. He's much more "Chaos Warrior" than "Chaos Spawn", after all. Unsurprisingly, the rear of the model is the least interesting side. Armour plates are as armour plates do, after all. I used brass/bronze chain to break up the endless green a little.


I really thought I'd shown off the other two, but I can't find them in my archives, so here goes. These guys were both painted a long time ago in the early 1990's. Last year I cleaned them up a little while maintaining as much of the original work as possible. In practice this really just came down to smoothing the blends in their flesh and brightening up things like metal that had become dull, rather than any kind of major repaints.

This guy was (is) actually called "Ogre Berserker", so how appropriate for his current role in my collection. The mono-horn predates the whole Nurgle aspect by several years, but I admit does fit in thematically with his fellow here. I've got some "proper" Forge World Chaos Ogres somewhere, but their time will come later on down the line. I want to finish all of my old-school Ogre models before starting on newer ones like those. You can tell that he was painted in the same general timeframe as the Dark Angels Scouts I posted the other day as his pants are in "choc chip" desert camo and his loincloth in woodland. I think this might have been the figure that inspired me to paint my Marine Scouts in Desert Storm camouflage.


This next Ogre has clearly seen better days. With a peg leg, an eyepatch and a hook-hand, he's got the pirate battle-wound triptych down. All he needs is a parrot and a tricorne hat (or bandanna) to complete the look completely into self-parody. A clear forerunner and inspiration for many of the Maneaters that came decades later (as are many of the Original Ogres). This particular figure is quite special to me, for reasons you're about to see.


There's a nice glimpse of it. When I painted this one, it must have been 1991 or 1992, and I was working in the fringes of the music industry, taking home a lot of CDs each week.


Search and Destroy - Life is Pain - I Want to be Insane


More Than Soul - Death Trip


Creepy Crawl - Wash This Out of Your Life

Yeah, once I finished the skin on this guy, I just started painting Henry Rollins' tattoos onto him. Not planned or anything, it just happened. If I'd planned it, I would have chosen a much more suitable figure to be the canvas for it, with a fully-exposed back, visible forearms, etc. Maybe even exposed legs. I'm planning to do another Ogre in the semi-near future with Rollins' tattoos on him, and do a better job. But for work that's more than 20 years old, this guy still stands the test of time for me and remains one of my special favourites from all of my painted models.


These guys should make an impressively scary unit on the table, each figure an individual you wouldn't want to feth with combined into a very nasty unit. Now to get onto finishing their Shaman...

Yeah those are kind of terrifying, and the tattoo work is pretty sweet!

Bunch of crazies there, all look great!

Unique collection you have there. Loving the skeleton shields.

Those space marine scouts look fantastic. Very much have a 2nd edition feel to them.

The ogres are so full of life and character and I love the subtle Nurgle influence you have running through them.

Thanks guys! Haven't had a chance to work on any more ogres yet, but I've got another guy to work on this weekend - once he's finished I've got another small unit ready for the table.

I haven't been out to the shed to take photos yet for this week, so in lieu of something completely new, here's a blast from the past instead. This guy was done awhile ago (late 2012), painted for a charity auction. Very happy with how well he came out in the end. I still need to paint this model for myself. Well, I guess once Gondor is "finished", Rohan will be next up.







A couple more pics here, but they're just additional angles.

That's an awesome paint job you've made there. Nice work.

I definitely would have bid a pretty penny to own such an outstanding model. Hope he raised some good funds and one day you get to keep him for yourself.

This one goes out especially to Captain Galenus. For the White Tree!

These guys were painted last year, making up a decent chunk of the models I painted. As I've said, I wanted to avoid showing them individually (or at all) until I had more to show. Now that I've shown some of them recently, I figure I may as well start to show them off here on the blog to help motivate myself to get the army finished. I've got two units of swordsmen finished so far for Kings of War - one set up as a Regiment, and one as a Horde. They used to be three units, but I combined two into the larger unit.


Everything I said about painting them previously applied and applies just as much to these guys, as well as the ones I've still got to paint.


For Horde-sized units, I just double the number of models I use for a regiment. In this case 12->20 becomes 24->40. I think it still works, especially on the tabletop.


My two units of Sword-Armed Warriors of Minas Tirith