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 youwashock wrote:
I look forward to seeing how "Shadowsun" turns out. She does look a little light on armor, but is a great figure. Cool models over rules any day.

It’s a well established fantasy trope that a chainmail bikini offers the same protection as full plate. A little cheesecake Tau should be up to battlesuit levels, depending on her cup size.

Nice work on the suppressors. I keep thinking I need to kitbash a squad of those guys. With the UM super tac doctrine, they become a lot less confused in their role..

@York: Thanks!

@YWS: Yeah, I'm really looking forward to painting that model!

@Nev: Shadowsun's rules give her -1 to be hit, so I'm saying that the enemy is too distracted by her "assets" to shoot straight. As for the Suppressors, you really should find someone to split the Shadowspear box with so you can add all those Marine models to your Ultramarines army. Or find just the loyalist half of it on eBay or something. The models in there are awesome!

Finally got the Suppressors done. Here is the photographic evidence of this:



I'm pretty happy with how they turned out. I freehanded the devastator symbol on their right shoulders since the purity seals on two of them would have gotten in the way of transfers. I feel like they turned out okay, so maybe I'm finally figuring out how to do freehand. Also, the assembly painting handle was no help at all for attaching these guys to their flight stems. I struggled mightily to get them on there, hence why they are kind of at odd angles. I decided to quit while I was ahead instead of trying to adjust them.

Next month's painting challenge will most likely be the usual "spooky" theme for October, so I'll probably be returning to my Blackstone Fortress set and doing the Chaos Beastmen. I've already got a few models from that set started, namely the Chaos Marines and their Lord, and the Navigator (yes, he's still WIP months after I started him ). My next blog update will probably have the finished Navigator and the start of my Beastmen.

Yeah. Those are pretty cool. Shoot. Now I want some for myself.

Returning to the hobby and Dakka after a long time away. Good to see that some of the old blogs are still going. You mentioned a few pages back about maybe dropping the blog. I'd echo what others said at the time and say persevere as not only does your blog inspire you to keep painting but also people like me. Great work as ever and looking forward to when you do decide to paint a few of those DG.

It's nifty to see you plugging away at the Dark Angels. Possibly due to my advanced age, I imagine DA as being darker and shinier, but your flat military green really makes the models seem like they'd seen action.

@YWS: Thanks!

@Lenny: I appreciate your kind words. I do sometimes hit a hobby wall where I feel like I'm not accomplishing anything and nobody cares what I'm doing, but then I remember that I care, and so I keep going. Not sure how soon I'll get around to doing more Death Guard though.

@Josh: Thanks! I don't particularly like the glossy look I've seen on some Space Marines, although obviously people should do whatever floats their particular boat painting wise. I've also seen plenty of Dark Angels that had a somewhat lighter shade of green, which while it does look okay, also doesn't really do it for me. Dark Angels should be, well, dark!

As I promised last time I posted, I've finished the Navigator, so here are a couple of decent (ish) photos:

My feelings about how I did on this guy are kind of a mixed bag. I'm very happy with how the purple robes ended up looking, but the helmet details could have been much better if I had wanted to spend a bit more time. I just got tired of looking at the model though. Glad it's off my desk and ready to go explore the Blackstone Fortress. That's half the Explorers knocked out (if you count the Ratlings as one, that is).

I've also had a bit of a change in plans for that tournament next month. There's no way I'm going to have my Guard and Knights ready in time, so I've decided to go with Dark Angels (because my Tau, although much more competitively viable, are boring as hell to play). I'm planning to run a list similar to what Chase Garber ran at the Iron Halo GT recently, with a bunch of the Phobos units. I even picked up a Leviathan Dreadnought from an acquaintance (no photos yet, the model isn't even primed). To that end, I've been doing a lot of work over the past week on my Phobos characters and I even got started on the Eliminators from the Shadowspear set. Here's some WIP shots:

How did I get so much done so fast? Contrast paints. They really do speed up painting, although the dark colors don't look as uniform as I'd like. Skeleton Horde works great for the camo cloaks to give them a desert look (which matches my overall Dark Angels basing scheme reasonably well). I'm not using only Contrast though; some of the smaller color areas and the metallics are done with regular paints.
Here's a WIP of those Eliminators:

Again, Contrast paints are making my life easier. I've got more Eliminators coming in the mail (two of the actual kits), and I'll probably do Contrast on them too.

As for my Beastmen for the monthly challenge, not too much progress on them yet. I hope to have some soon, though.

Contrast paints are very interesting, for sure.

Now, about that Navigator. He rocks. Love the purple and gold, but those eyes are the star. Super good.

Phobos Librarian looks good, too.

I think you did great on the navigator, makes him more realistic in my mind.

I have to agree with the others the navigator turned out great!
Keep up the good work I almost want to add some more DA to my old 6th edition list.

@YWS: Thanks! It's funny you mention the Navigator's eyes, as I was originally going for a slightly different effect. Kind of a "happy accident" as it were.

@Theo: Thanks!

@York: Thanks! If you do happen to paint up some of your own DA and post pictures, I'd be happy to have a look.

Finally have a little bit to show on my Chaos Beastmen. The skin is basically done, and I've basecoated and shaded the hair:

Lots more work to do, but it's hard considering my Dark Angels are kind of the priority at the moment. Speaking of which, I've made good progress on my Leviathan Dreadnought:

This model has been a lot easier to paint than I feared it would be. I'll probably to be able to completely knock it out in no time.

I've also been making progress on my Phobos-armored guys. Here's a second WIP shot of the Eliminators:

Still some work to be done, but they are definitely getting there. The Master and Librarian have gotten a little more work as well, but it's mostly small stuff that doesn't really rate another photo. They are very nearly done, so maybe I'll have some finished shots of them soon. The Libby has been cut from my tournament list though. I'm also still waiting on the other Eliminators in the mail. I ended up having to order some from a different seller, as the first seller has either lost my order or never sent it or something. I've asked for a refund, so hopefully that situation will be resolved soon.

That dread looks like he means business! Nice chunk of mean right there.

Phobos stuff is coming along nicely. Contrast pains look to be working well for you. I do think a mix of them and classic techniques are the best way to go. They are a great tool to have available, but not all encompassing.

Yup, the Dread is great. Big boy, big guns.

Hey Zerg is a pic of my DA and allies army. These were painted back when 6th edition dropped.

@Nev: Thanks! I totally agree about contrast paints. I don't see myself switching to them exclusively, but they are very handy for some things. Gives a basecoat and shade in one coat of paint, basically.

@YWS: Thanks!

@York: Those are some nice looking Dark Angels there! Thanks for showing them to me.

Well, I'm back. I've been painting and stuff, but I just haven't been taking any pics or anything until this evening. I ended up not finishing the monthly challenge for October (doh!) because I had too much to do to get ready for Mid-Mo Maelstrom (a GT that I played in). I ended up going 2-3 in that tournament and was the only Dark Angels player, but I did get some compliments on my army, so I guess I'm doing something right, eh? Anywho, one thing I did manage to completely finish was my Leviathan Dreadnought, so here it is:


This is my first painted Forge World model, and I'm pretty happy with how it turned out. It's pretty powerful on the tabletop too, so it'll likely get plenty of play time unless GW decides to nerf it or something.

Now, my entry for the November painting challenge. The theme is Heroes and Villains, so with plastic Sisters coming soon I decided to enter Saint Celestine and her Geminae Superia. Here is where I've gotten to on them:

I'm more than halfway done already. Nothing like a big Warhammer tournament to get my painting juices flowing, as I did see plenty of inspirational stuff and got to talk to some friends of mine who also like to paint.

Coming soon, I'll probably start working on some non-GW stuff, namely the Bolt Action models of the cast of the TV show M*A*S*H. I'll be painting those as a Christmas gift for my brother, who really likes the show. I'll probably get a bit further on Celestine before I start on those, though.

That is one beefy Dread! He looks great Zerg, are those 4 autocannons?
I really like how Celeste and the sisters are turning out too, any plans to add some Sisters to your army?

That’s one mean green washing machine

I agree, the dready is looking fearsome! Sisters looking of top quality as well Zergsmasher!

Awesome Dread followed by Celestine and M*A*S*H to follow? What's not to like? Good stuff, man.

@York: Thanks! The weapons are the Stormcannon Arrays. Each one fires 10 shots per turn (so the dread gets 20 autocannon shots per turn basically, except with better penetration). As for adding more Sisters, I'm starting a whole army of them!

@Theo: Thanks!

@shaso: Long time no see, and thank you very much!

@YWS: Thanks!

Well, I was having so much fun working on Saint Celestine and her gal pals that I went ahead and finished on them:



I'm overall pretty happy with how they turned out. Not my best work ever, but I definitely feel like I'm getting there, as it didn't seem as difficult to get these models painted as I thought it would be. I'm not sure what I did wrong that ended up with Celestine leaning at an angle, but honestly it doesn't look bad so I'm not complaining. Here in a couple of weeks I'll be picking up the Sisters army box to give her the start of an army to lead into battle. My FLGS put in their preorders so I made sure to snag one.

In other news, I just brush primed the M*A*S*H models so I'll probably get started painting them pretty soon. Getting the colors right for their clothing will probably be a major challenge, as I do want them to match what was seen on the show as much as possible. I'll have to do some research and look up clips from the series and stuff.

Gals are looking sharp. We are getting a lot of pics of what’s in store for the sisters; going to be a TON of awesome stuff. Looking forward to seeing you paint it up. Going to do the whole army in gold? Or just save that for Celestine?

Saint C and her backup singers came out great. Glad to hear there will be plenty more Sisters in the works.

 ZergSmasher wrote:

I'm overall pretty happy with how they turned out. Not my best work ever, but I definitely feel like I'm getting there, as it didn't seem as difficult to get these models painted as I thought it would be. I'm not sure what I did wrong that ended up with Celestine leaning at an angle, but honestly it doesn't look bad so I'm not complaining. Here in a couple of weeks I'll be picking up the Sisters army box to give her the start of an army to lead into battle. My FLGS put in their preorders so I made sure to snag one.

In other news, I just brush primed the M*A*S*H models so I'll probably get started painting them pretty soon. Getting the colors right for their clothing will probably be a major challenge, as I do want them to match what was seen on the show as much as possible. I'll have to do some research and look up clips from the series and stuff.

ZergSmasher,

Nice Celestine, while she is leaning a bit, the burst of doves is level so I do not think anyone would think that out of place.

I see you did not paint her with the scrolls attached, smart move as a gaming buddy of mine who used to be a professional painter did and discovered she basically bounced as he painted her.

Good luck in the painting competition, there is a bit of a Sister's theme this month.

Cheers,

CB

I really like how they turned out! The flesh tones and gold is very good plus the blue gem on Celestine really pops.

@Nev: Thanks! I'm probably going to go with white armor and purple cloth for my main Sisters army. I did Celestine and her gal pals in gold because I wanted them to stand out.

@YWS: Thank you very much!

@CB: Thanks! You're right about how wobbly the model is. I just hope it doesn't break at some point...

@York: Thank you!

I've gotten a fair bit of work done on my MASH figures, so here's a quick WIP of them:

Ultimately the injured patient and Major Hoolihan will be on the same large base, but I've left them separate to make it easier to paint them. The models are actually pretty nicely detailed. I'm looking forward to doing the skin and faces as that is where the personality will really appear and bring the characters from the TV show to life.

Mostly just for fun, I'm also working on a Techmarine for my Dark Angels:

He's actually pretty far along. I left the servo harness off until I finish painting because trying to paint the model with that attached would be a nightmare.

Hopefully I can make some more progress soon. Real life's going to get fairly busy with the holidays coming up.

White/purple for the Sisters will be sweet. MASH is looking like a lot of fun. Techmarine is also good. That's one of those models that has a whole lot going on.

@YWS: Thanks!

Been a while since I posted, but that is because unfortunately I have been fighting hobby burnout once again, plus the holidays have kept me fairly drained (Retail work will do that to you during the Christmas season). I have made a little progress on the MASH unit, so here's a WIP:

Mostly it's just been adding some highlights and stuff to the characters' clothing, nothing major. The good news is that the clothing is basically done. The bad news is that I have 11 days to get them completely finished so I can present them to my brother on Christmas day. Next up will be the skin, which I'm starting on as soon as I post this blog entry.

Part of the distraction from getting actual paint down is that I've taken time to assemble the contents of the Sisters of Battle army set:

I left the Seraphim off the flight stands for painting. I'll be making heavy use of Contrast paints for my Sisters army, and while my initial plan was to do white with purple, one of the other local players is already doing that so I decided to do something different. My scheme will now be YELLOW armor with purple cloth. I would never even attempt something like this with traditional paints, but with Contrast it shouldn't be too hard, and my hope is to get a lot of models painted quickly. I'll probably have to wait until next year to paint them, as besides having other stuff I want to finish first the weather has turned really nasty because winter is coming very soon.

No progress to report on the Techmarine I'm afraid, but for the December painting challenge I'm going to try and get a Primaris Master painted. I need to focus on the MASH unit first and consider everything else to be stretch goals right now though.

Everytime I see the MASH figures, I hear the theme song. Looking forward to seeing how they and the Sisters turn out. Yellow for the armor sounds quite striking.

@YWS: The theme from M*A*S*H might be one of the most iconic TV themes ever made, so I'm not surprised you think of it when you see the models.

Nothing like waiting until the last minute to finish a project, but I finally got all the MASH models ready. Here are some final pics, and as the pics are shown I'll include who each character is and who played them on the TV series.
First, a group shot of the whole cast:


Starring:
Alan Alda as Capt. B.F. "Hawkeye" Pierce:


Mike Farrell as Capt. B.J. Hunnicutt:


Harry Morgan as Col. Sherman Potter:


Loretta Swit as Maj. Margaret Houlihan:


Larry Linville as Maj. Frank Burns:


David Ogden Stiers as Maj. Charles E. Winchester III:


Gary Burghoff as Cpl. Walter "Radar" O'Reilly:


Jamie Farr as Cpl. Max Klinger:


William Christopher as Father Francis Mulcahy:


Overall I'm reasonably happy with how they turned out. Not my best work, but they were actually pretty tricky to do, as they are somewhat smaller than most Warhammer 40k figures and have smaller details that are tough to pick out. My brother will be very surprised tomorrow morning as he has no idea these models are even a thing, but he loves M*A*S*H and has a lot of TV and movie memorabilia in his home.

In other news, we've been having some unseasonably warm weather lately so I did manage to get my Sisters of Battle primed with Wraithbone spray, so I am go for painting them any time I'm ready. I'll wait until after the new year before I actually get going. I'm hoping to knock out a couple more models, namely the DA Techmarine and a Primaris Master before the end of the year, but I'm not sure it's going to happen.

Hope everyone on Dakka has a Merry Christmas!

Nice seeing all the M *A*S*H minis painted up, that‘s a helluva christmas present for your brother (if I unterstood it right, that you gift them to him )

Merry christmas to you too!

@Viterbi: Thank you very much! Yes, it was a gift for my brother.

Well, it's that time again, folks. A new year dawns before us, so let's take a little trip down memory lane and see what I accomplished hobbywise in 2019. First, here's a pic of everything I painted in 2019:

Not seen in this image are of course the M*A*S*H models, which are now in my brother's apartment. He loved them and showed pics of them to all of his friends, who were very impressed. Gave me a warm fuzzy feeling for sure. Anyway, my total painted model count for the year was 62 models. I'm going ahead and counting the Phobos Master and Librarian for 2019 even though they are not 100%, because they are so close (only very small finishing touches needed). I've got other models that I did not count for 2019 which if I get back to them and finish them will count for 2020. Here's a list of what I painted in 2019:
Dark Angels:
Primaris Lieutenant Zakariah
Master in Phobos Armor
Librarian in Phobos Armor
Veteran Intercessor Sergeant
5 man Intercessor Squad
3 Ravenwing Bikers
3 Ravenwing Black Knights
Leviathan Dreadnought
Blood Ravens:
6 Space Marine Heroes models (Captain, Sergeant, and 4 Bolter guys)
Tau Empire:
Ethereal
Ghostkeel Battlesuit (with Stealth Drones)
3 Crisis Battlesuits
3 Stealth Battlesuits
Chaos:
Daemon Prince of Khorne
Sisters of Battle:
Saint Celestine
2 Geminae Superia
Blackstone Fortress:
Taddeus the Purifier
Pious Vorne
UR-025
Espern Locarno
4 Spindle Drones
4 Ur-ghuls
Bolt Action:
MASH Unit (9 figures)

Now, on to my hobby goals for 2019 and how I fared on them:
1) Get better at playing Warhammer 40k. I want to win a tournament this year if possible. I won't be totally destroyed if it doesn't happen as our local meta is very tough, but I'm hoping to improve my play. I didn't win any events, but I do think I improved somewhat and I had a legit shot at winning one event (I was on the top table at an RTT), but I couldn't pull it out. Gonna be generous and call this one a partial.
2) Reduce the pile of shame, as in paint more than I buy. Due to RL stuff happening, this should be easy, as I won't be buying as much plastic crack (my money is needed elsewhere). Hard fail on this, partially due to the fact that I didn't paint as much as I had hoped. Plus I got a fair number of cheap models like Guardsmen and stuff, which increased the pile of shame faster.
3) Get the bits boxes done. I'm already benefitting from what I've done so far, so now I just need to finish them so I don't have to fish through so many boxes and sprues to find bits I need. Didn't really touch this project, so I'm calling it a fail.
4) Paint everything from Blackstone Fortress. I probably won't play it until I do so. Painted 12 of the 45 models from the set, but then I got distracted and lost the will to finish the rest. Gonna go ahead and call this a fail too.
5) Improve my freehand painting. It's coming along nicely already, but I want to get even better. I'm pretty happy with the freehand stuff I did this year, so this one's a win. Always room for improvement though!
6) Paint some non-GW models. I've got a few around, including Infinity, Star Saga, Guildball, and others, and they need some love. Plus it'll be nice to paint stuff that isn't Warhammer related too. Going to call this one a win too, as I did the MASH unit which is neither Warhammer 40k nor GW.
7) Finish up a bunch of partially painted models. I've got a bunch of Death Guard stuff, some Dark Angels, and even some Tau in this category. I really need to go ahead and finish them. One of the Ravenwing bikers I did was partially painted from before, but that's not really enough to count. Fail.
8) Play some non-Warhammer 40k games. I've got stuff from some other systems as mentioned in goal 6 above, so I want to use it. It'll make a nice refreshing change from battles in the grimdark future. Didn't play any wargame other than 40k, so this one's a fail too.

Not a great showing for 2019. Only 2 of my 8 goals were met, and one partially met. 2019 was kind of a crappy year for me in all aspects of my life though, so here's hoping 2020 is better (it could hardly be worse). That being said, time for some new goals for 2020:
1) Paint more than I buy. Actually reduce the pile of shame instead of watching it grow ever taller.
2) Finish some of the stuff that's partially done. I need to stop leaving projects in the middle and actually get them done.
3) Paint more non-40k models. I've got quite a few, so I should get some done to break up the endless grimdark.
4) Play some non-40k stuff. I really want to get started with Infinity and possibly Guildball (although I'm not sure there's much of a local scene for Guildball).
5) Paint 100 or more models. That's a reasonable goal for me I think. That should definitely help with goal 1 as I don't see myself buying more than 100 models this year (although with my new Plastic Sisters army I suppose it could happen).
6) Get something entered in all of Paradigm's painting challenges here on Dakka. Every year I've fallen short as usually in a couple of different months stuff comes up that prevents me from finishing. I need to quit letting that happen.
7) Work on the bits boxes. It'll reduce clutter and help me find bits for conversions and kitbashes.
8) Update this blog regularly, at least once every single week. I've got to quit slacking so much and this will help me keep myself productive as I'd hate to have nothing to show everyone.
I think these goals are doable, and I'll have to push myself to make them happen, which is a good thing.

Finally, here are what I consider to be my top 5 models (or units) that I painted in 2019:

#5: Spindle Drones


#4: Espern Locarno


#3: Saint Celestine


#2: Dark Angels Leviathan Dreadnought


#1: Daemon Prince of Khorne


HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!