Don’t change it , I love it. <3. It will be such a great model in a collection just the way it is.

I love your sculpts and the paint jobs as well, they are wonderful. Don't change a thing. By all means keep going and keep trying, but each and every thing you have made has been better and stronger and you are coming to life bud. That flesh golem is truly fantastic.

 Camkierhi wrote:
By all means keep going and keep trying, but each and every thing you have made has been better and stronger and you are coming to life bud. That flesh golem is truly fantastic.

Signed for truth. Please, go on. Most things can be improved, but many more can be made anew better with experience earned. Keep up!

Thank you for the wonderful kind words you three.

@Theophony: Thanks, and alright, I'll keep it as is. Also thanks for the page turn.
@Camlierhi: Thanks so much Cam. That means a lot, especially coming from someone of your skill. I'm glad you think I'm improving.
@Wirecat: Thanks Wirecat, I will move on, and leave the mini as is. Thanks for the encouragement. I defiantly have plenty of plans to get to without obsessing over a single mini.

Speaking of moving on, I'm still having fun making mini golem tutorials for Vik's thread about sharing scratch building advice for RPG minis. It might be looking a bit more like a robot than a golem, but I'm really liking how the iron golem I am making out of nothing but broken markers/mechanical pencils, apple sauce twist lids, and other junk.


Here's a starting materials shot


I noticed in the past, that if one of the apple sauce twists isn't cut straight when cutting off one of the fins it looks kind of like a helmet with a visor, that that will be my golem's head. The "spikey bracelets" are from old contact lens cleaning stuff. The rest is marker cases and the innards of mechanical pencils.


Here I've begun attaching the body parts, and used a screw top to a contact lens case cut in half for shoulders.


The legs and feet are more pieces of marker and apple sauce twists. I cut the fins into small sections and stacked them for the feet.


I made a sword from an apple sauce twist fin, a piece of the back of a marker, and some foam core


This is as far as I have gotten today. The fingers are also from a contact lens cleaning thing. I've also cut up some milk pulls for an armored skirt


I've also finished the easiest golem, the stone golem.
I started with an over sized elf from Mythical Heroes bucket, cut and reposed.



Then I based it, followed by a quick prime, base coat of light grey with a black wash, and I was done.



Thanks

That iron golem is off to a great start. I'm impressed by your use of found objects for this project.

Love the robot thing . That is grade A+ creativity and craftsmanship .

Thanks so much Josh and Theo
Unfortunately after that big push for two days of crafting, I haven't really done anything since.

After posting about it on Josh's blog, I'm tempted to do some group photos of all my fantasy minis based on D&D class archetype, like all the wizards in one, all the warriors in another, all the cleric type guys, etc. It would also be fun to see others do the same.

Oh man, that Golem is going to be awesome. I think some simple stuff like weathering him and painting him in an "armour" style, and maybe a simple heraldic device put on him somewhere (using a spare shield from a bitz box or something) would give enough visual difference to make him firmly Golem rather than Robot.
But hey, Robots are part of Dungeons and Dragons since the old days too!

Thanks Da Boss, and thanks for the advice. I've been working on attaching the armor plates now, let me know what you think.




Another 8 or so apple sauce tops have been consumed by this project now

Looks great! Amazing what you have done with materials that others would probably have chucked in the bin.

Thanks so much Da Boss, and I agree with what you said, I think it will all come down to how well I paint and weather him to make him more believable as iron golem than robot.

There's of course more I can do, but I'm going to call this guy done now that his hand and arm are attached, just need to prime and paint now.


And a scale shot of this imposing fellow

at first i thought your sword/knife thing was taken from a playmobil mini...but then it dawned on me you scratch built it too!

you´re in a building frenzy and in a good one! that last creature is right up my alley...to the very base, as it has that magic/steampunky vibe in full steam going on!!! i like how you avoided the icky issue of joints, simply by hinting them in the next section! somehow this never is an option for my own builds! :facpelam: i always stumble due to the then too lanky looking minis i make... i can imagine this golem to look all brass or copper...with a really nasty glowing one eye in his "face" ....this one is really full of win!
one small suggestion for a next build...there are these small conductor tongs...

https://www.bueromarkt-ag.de/lochzange_rayher_8932300,p-8932300,l-google-prd,pd-b2c.html?gclid=CjwKCAjwtYXmBRAOEiwAYsyl3P8WSMeH864F-7HGyogQ4g7z_mZ9xJ6Pw159ddK2UPflWvSR7dIO-hoCLGgQAvD_BwE

that can be used to add rivets to your used materials by embossing the rivets right into the material...(just a hint...as this stuff seldom will later on take rivets glued on very well...)


the stone golem took some convincing...but once you added paint...i was sold^^

anyway...my hat´s off to you...also...sadly my oh so precious arena wont win ..if the public voting is any foreshadowing^^

Learned a new trick, today, to do cool hair/tendrils:

Take a piece of plastic, preferably thick. Grab your drill, and put a small bit into it.

Slowly drill through the plastic, as if you were making a mounting hole.

Collect the spiral threads from drilling.

Use these as tendrils, snakes, wild hair, etc.

Go wild!

--Brian

Impressive golem, really creative !

@Viktor von Domm: Thanks Vik, I finally have a vacation so I've been having a lot of fun crafting. Thanls for mentioning the joints, I'm glad you think they work well as is, but it reminded me that I forgot to do them, which I had planned from the very start. Thanks about the stone golem too, the paint really does make all the difference from out of scale toy to statue
Also thanks for the pointer about that punch, despite being a member of the league, I never rivet stuff because I find it too frustrating. I'll check that punch out.
Don't be too hard on yourself about your very nice arena, once Cam joins in it's hard to win these comps You've still won twice, which is more than most people.

@Briancj: Thanks for the tip Brian, sounds useful and fun.

@KernelTerror: Thanks! These have been a fun diversion.

I haven't done anymore crafting since my last post, but the present I bought myself arrived today:

14 kobolds, 3 dwarves, a female Elven blacksmith, a sylph, a halfling ranger, and 3 classic wizards.
Also a fun side note, this pic is exactly my 700th uploaded pic to my gallery.

I've been having fun making monsters during my vacation, but today I remembered that my D&D players finished the dungeon we were on and will be going to a new dungeon. A dungeon that beyond making a few pieces of furniture, I hadn't even started to make yet. So I spent the majority of today making almost the entire dungeon out of cardboard. All I have left is a few staircases, and a few pieces of furniture to finish, and then painting it. At least one of my players visits my blog from time to time, so I'm not going to share the dungeon yet. One of the benefits of this rush is that I finally got around to making the mold of the dungeon door master I made some time ago.


Thanks for stopping by.

I can't believe how well the mold material took the fine lines from your door master- really impressive. Your players are lucky to have you!

Thanks so much, Meer_Cat

Hi everyone, sorry for the lack of updates. I've been so exhausted lately that I haven't been doing any crafting. Two updates though, one is I'm observing a school that is a meer mile and a half away from my closest FLGS, rather than the usual 45 minutes through heavy and unpredictable traffic, so I swung by and picked up a few D&D minis to support the store and also a second copy of the starter set. The other adult in the D&D group I run was talking about continuing the group when I have to leave for the summer again. I bought the starter set as a gift for him, in case he wants to continue the starter campaign with the group.


Also, the next round of the League of Extraordinary Riveters is up. If anyone doesn't alreayd know about it, check it out, they're a lot of fun.

 Syro_ wrote:
I've been having fun making monsters during my vacation, but today I remembered that my D&D players finished the dungeon we were on and will be going to a new dungeon. A dungeon that beyond making a few pieces of furniture, I hadn't even started to make yet. So I spent the majority of today making almost the entire dungeon out of cardboard. All I have left is a few staircases, and a few pieces of furniture to finish, and then painting it. At least one of my players visits my blog from time to time, so I'm not going to share the dungeon yet. One of the benefits of this rush is that I finally got around to making the mold of the dungeon door master I made some time ago.


Thanks for stopping by.

Looks really good! Hope casting will go as smoothly as mold making. Making matching pins and holes for two part mold is the right thing to do. Lots of us forget them... Do You plan on using mold release or just hoping for the best?

I keep looking at these DnD miniatures ever since our shop started carrying the line, but they look so out of scale with majority of my collection that I can't fathom getting them even just to paint, except some monsters. Monsters - they look on par with Reaper, that's true. Maybe one day...

Thanks Wirecat. Luckily, the casting went pretty smoothly, just using hot glue. There were a few little air bubbles, but turned out surprisingly well. I'll have to snap a pic sometime soon and post it. I cast 6 doors a few weeks ago, and primed them. And have been so busy ever since that's where I stopped. Also luckily with these silicon molds, I've never used mold release and never had problems. The only thing that give a little problem is Apoxie Sculpt curing in the mold, sometimes sticks a little. Nothing else seems to at all, and even the apoxie sculpt doesn't cause too much mold degradation.

The scale, is a little odd at times, but I have such a mix of miniatures (plus the ones I sculpt are probably off in scale too), that it doesn't bother me too much. Also you have the benefit of such superior sculpting skills that you never have to buy any minis if you only had enough time to sculpt them all yourself So yeah, I totally understand if any feel off, to not get them. But if you find a few you like, go for it.

That door is fantastic. I can never get gs molds to work quite right. I probably don't 'oil' them enough or something to that effect.

Thanks Maniac_nmt. I like the rubbery give of silicone molds, I doubt I could accomplish much with GS molds.

I haven't played a game of 40k in about 2 years, but I was really in the mood to go back to working on my helbrutes for some reason. I'm not a big fan of all the little tubes, and tenticles, but over all I like the helbrute sculpt for the 6th/7th Edition starter set Dark Vengeance. (I get the impression, I'm one of the only ones, heh). I bought two extras many years ago when I first started collecting which I'm kit bashing, cutting apart, etc. The last time I worked on and talked about these guys was back in August 2018 on page 9 of this blog.

The one I was focusing on last time, is even closer to done. I just need to make the one leg, sculpt some stuff on the wire arm, and reinforce the right shoulder.


This second one is mainly kit bashed, and is almost ready to go, but I want to sculpt/build a different back for him. More chaos armor, less weird fleshy.


I decided to make a weird morphing eyeball covered Tzeentch, chaos dread/helbrute that is still in the very early stages. I plane to make it mostly from hot glue and styrofoam BBs, on part of one of my scratch built dreadnoughts.


I still have all these parts left from the helbrute butchery, with some new additions. I'm thinking of making a fleshy Slaanesh style helbrute copying the fleshy style of some parts of the original helbrute and using all the weird tubes and tentacles I have.


And finally the promised pictures of the doors I cast. There was more air bubbles than I thought, but they're ok. Not painted yet

Holy cow- hellbrutes is a very different direction than you've taken for awhile, for sure! Very interesting builds and my penurious nature heartily approves of your plans to use up all the extra bits in the third build. The Eye-thing sounds interesting too- mostly because I want to see how hot glue and styro-BB's work together.

_Love_ the doors (I'm hearing Jim Morrison screeching Hello, I love you even as I type this). The casts came out amazingly well, I think.

Too much fun!

Thanks very much Meer_Cat. I've been so tired that there has been a serious drop off in progress of any of my projects for weeks. I can't seem to concentrate on sculpting, but I did work some more on the weird hot glue and styrofoam BB dread.

Tired due to job, stress, or health?

Wow, that BB dread and the bottle gollumn/robot are both really cool. They remind me of 70s sci fi novel covers. There's nothing quite like making things yourself. What do you use for glue on projects like that? Adhesion is my achilles heel for that kind of build. The "this to that" site helps though.

Hope ya feel better!

Thank you both.
@Briancj: Luckily only the first two. Too many of the great people here on dakka are suffering with health problems, thankfully I'm not one of them. Thanks for your concern.
@kestral: Thanks kestral. Both for the kind words and the interest in the stuff I'm making. Adhesion is a pain for me too sometimes, I was lucky that Brian introduced me to "this to that". The entire golem figure made from mostly the green plastic is all held together by hot glue. I find quality of the glue gun and ammo make a surprising difference. When I use my Surebonder high heat glue gun and Surebonder glue sticks, it holds most things well. When I use the cheapo glue sticks from the dollar store, not so much (I still sue them for a lot of stuff tho). I can totally see the 70s sci fi aesthetic you're talking about, thanks.

After an energy drink that didn't help enough, and a mid-day nap (which feels weird how often I'm doing that when I'm only in my early 30s), and going jogging, not to mention the support Brian and kestral showed, I was feeling better and got a little of my groove back with crafting. I kept working on my chaos dreads, even tho I should really be crafting for D&D.

The Tzeenth dread is basically done. Would anyone like to suggest his weapon arm? I'm looking forward to painting this guy, to see if it ties in half as well as it looked in my imagination.


I started building another of the dreads, but have to take it slow, the pieces down want to stay how I positioned them. I also sculpted a exposed muscle across the cabling on my most complete altered dread.


I finally started the very beginnings of the mind flayer for the LoER contest, but nothing worth showing yet. Thanks for stopping by.

(which feels weird how often I'm doing that when I'm only in my early 30s),

erm...coming from a man working as a kindergarden ward/nursery nurse... you might consider to think about burn out a bit? just to be on the safe side...it is a thing for people working with people that happens eventually...(it´s almost impossible not to occur in my opinion...been there done that, fell down the stairs and tried to get up...)

the doors looks very good...i´ve seen sets of these for sale on ebay...from pathfinder, MTG and so on... you´re very close to perfection here...and in my opinion what you´re still not done in perfection gives character...which then sums up to the 100% count!!!

also...the dreads are developing really cool...as for the weapon arm...plasma?...plenty of room this way for scratch building...

The Tzeentch dread/hot glue and balls dread looks great , very creative.

I keep forgetting how efficient You are with that hot glue stuff... I like silicone moulds too, but with a lot of available resin mixes they either do not last long enough or require a lot of care and lubricant. Doors look very solid!

And these brutes/dread thingies - I really like that weirdness! But I do wonder if sprue, pulled and twisted over the candle light, would make a better "veiny" kind of detail than a greenstuff on a wire. May try that on some future beastie.

Loving the Tzeentch dread, he’s a real freak of the warp so far. The clawed foot is a particularly nice touch.

Viktor von Domm wrote:

(which feels weird how often I'm doing that when I'm only in my early 30s),

erm...coming from a man working as a kindergarden ward/nursery nurse... you might consider to think about burn out a bit? just to be on the safe side...it is a thing for people working with people that happens eventually...(it´s almost impossible not to occur in my opinion...been there done that, fell down the stairs and tried to get up...)
the doors looks very good...i´ve seen sets of these for sale on ebay...from pathfinder, MTG and so on... you´re very close to perfection here...and in my opinion what you´re still not done in perfection gives character...which then sums up to the 100% count!!!

also...the dreads are developing really cool...as for the weapon arm...plasma?...plenty of room this way for scratch building...

Unfortunately, I think you're 100% right on that. I don't really know what I can do about it though, I'm just trying to hold on for the last few weeks of school. I'm still spending every summer in intense training, but I'm at least expecting an easier less stressful class next school year. Also thanks for the kind words on the doors and the dreads. I hope to get around to finishing the paint jobs on the doors soon, and get them posted. I like your idea of the plasma weapon for the Tzeentch dread, I'll go with that, thanks.

The Tzeentch dread/hot glue and balls dread looks great , very creative.

@Theophony: Thanks Theo! It's mostly done, so I've moved it to my painting station to finish. Unfortunately moving to the painting station is usually the death of regular progress on my projects

@Wirecat: Thanks Wirecat, I do think messing with hot glue is what I'm best at over other crafting forms . I didn't realize resin tends to beat up the silicone molds. And I'll have to keep the melting sprue in mind for the future. Thanks for all the advice.

@gobert: Thanks gobert, and welcome to my blog. I'm glad you like the clawed foot, being Tzeentch I wanted to make one of the legs look bird-like.

I've finally started building the last leg of my one chaos dread. The leg still needs to bulking up. But I noticed in the pic I took, that it really looks like the leg is growing out of his armpit , it's really not, I promise.


I can't post most of the D&D stuff I've been making to not spoil it for my players, but once the school year ends, I'll have a big post of the stuff I've been holding back. For now, here's some really simple stuff that's not in the starter campaign, so I can show it.
Beginning of a simple throne/chair out of craft sticks


It's probably not even worth showing the super simple ladder made out of skewers.

I've also finally started the sculpt of a Mind Flayer for the LoER terrain contest. The first time I'm doing a diorama. The Contest is titled "Food for thought", and I couldn't resist going with a pun. So my contest entry is a monster that eats brains, running a little food stand selling brains to eat. (Sorry you have to hear this twice Vik).


Thanks for stopping by

D&D club was yesterday, and my group discovered one of the things I prepared, so now I can post it. The groups ranger is both very clever and very stubborn. He thought of some very smart things to ask me which allowed him to find and follow goblin tracks toward a goblin hideout, and so far seem to be skipping at least one part of the module, maybe more. They were ambushed by 4 goblins in scrub land, and battled them for quite a while. They handled the combat well, taking little damage, but it took a long time as the goblins continually fired one them, fell back, and used their bonus action to hide. After two goblins were killed, they rest disappeared into the scrub with extremely high stealth scores, ending combat. Following these new tracks, the party came upon the "Impregnable Fortress of Dib" from "Prepared" a D&D one shot suppliment.



Here is them finding it and my build.








And finished






Thanks for stopping by

Oh, that is highly recognizable!

Also....makes me very envious to read about your successful d&d meeting. I wish i could find some players for me too...games with the family have a very sober nature...i miss my younger times, during university. That was an active gaming time, where hearty games happened. Unfortunately we all lost contact to one another and lives moved on...

Ahahah gorgeous fortress, well done !

@Viktor von Domm: Thanks Vik. I'm sorry to hear about your difficulty getting a D&D group together. I miss my youth where friends were close by and had more free time too, it's a lot harder hanging out as adults. Maybe try getting your kids' friends to join to make the group bigger, and try to get some of the other parents to come along and hopefully end up joining also? Either way, good luck.
@KernelTerror: Thanks

I've been slowly making progress

Here is the Iron golem's paint job so far. I still need to add white to the middle of the cylon eye. I'm also thinking I should weather this piece all over with a reddish orange powder. Thoughts? Also I've never done weathering before, so advice would be welcome and appreciated.


I've been painting the Tzeentch dread, but still WIP. I feel like the Navy blue and purple washes over the regular blue paint job isn't showing that clearly. I'm thinking of highlighting with a lighter blue or purple, and then finally painting all the eyes. I still need to make the plasma cannon arm too.

syro...good ideas on how to start/recruit group members... i think i will go down that route!

the iron golem turned out very good indeed, all that it promised and then some. i am with you on the weathering issue, i´d start with a light brownish/ orangeish drybrush or sponging it on on certain areas...

the tzeentch dread looks highly promising too... the bubbled area is really good looking. i would add some more purple and pink here and there...


Automatically Appended Next Post:
also...the mind flayer looks really cute!!!

Vik, I hope you are able to get a group. Thanks for the advice on weathering. As for the dread, do you really think pink would be a good addition? I feel like pink is reserved for Slaanesh, blue for Tzeentch, and they both seem to share purple. What do you think?

The rest of the figures were garbage in the Halloween 5 pack from Dollar Tree, but I like the gargoyle that came in it. I've cut off some pieces and cleaned up a lot of mess and flash. sculpted back on an ear that I broke off while cleaning it. Made it a tail, and now am making it much better wings than it had. I'm planning in immortalizing this gargoyle as a mold for D&D gargoyles.


I've gotten a little further on the mind flayer for the LoER terrain contest. Gap filled, sculpted details on the head, and started on the hands.


I haven't gotten back to painting the iron golem, but I have gotten started on crafting two more golems. Not far enough to take pics yet. One is a gravestone golem, like Reaper miniatures makes. The other is original and unusual.

I had my reservations when I saw the WIP photos, but I'll be darned if that golem doesn't look infinitely better with a coat of paint on it.

Syro, please do not take this wrong, you have always inspired me with your ingenuity and brilliant models, but you really have stepped up a notch or two bud, these figures and terrain pieces are amazing, really great stuff.

@JoshInJapan: That's good to hear, I'm not super happy with the paint job in the iron golem and kind of miss the crazy plastic colors from when I started. I'm glad it looks good to you.
@Camkierhi: No offense taken at all, and thank you, Cam. I haven't really felt like I'm getting better, so I'm glad to hear that you think I am. thanks Cam

It was really nice having Memorial Day off, and I spent a decent chunk of it crafting, and writing. I might need to add more water, but I added bodies of water to the planet I've been creating. I'll be adding the equator and major lines of latitude next.





I'm also excited to say that my 7 year old nephew has recently become very interested in Dungeons & Dragons. So I've started giving him a mini or two each time I see him, to start his collection. I whipped out my molds and cast everything I've given to my D&D group to also give to him. I'm also going to be giving him a few pre-painted minis from my collection that I have spares of (but not enough for my whole D&D group). Here's what I have prepared to give him.


The colors are hard to see in the photo, but I've finished a quick paint job on all the rat swarms that I'll be giving my D&D group. Sadly this Thursday is the last session of the school year. I'll try to have the gargoyles ready to give them by then, also.

 Syro_ wrote:


Thanks for stopping by

This fortress reminds me of a blindaged gunboats of American Civil War. Which is not even near being a bad thing! Very cool, very stylish, if such thing (stylish wooden pillbox) exists... Drat! Now I am thinking of a cross between a humidor and a doctors necessary..

Wow, you have been busy. Have missed a handful of updates since I've not had the time to browse dakka properly.
I' now caught up and you never seem to disappoint with your crafting.

Especially loved the Tzeentch dread. Really good work with the hot glue. It looks like a proper creation of the warp.
It kind of reminded me of one of the monsters in the video game SOMA.

Awesome job on the Golem and rat swarms.

Loving the wooden fort too, you really make a lot of custom stuff for your players!

@Wirecat: Thanks Wirecat, I like that comparison. I also like the idea and term "stylish wooden pillboxes"
@Ezki: Thanks Ezki, it's good to see you back online. Your comments give me a lot of confidence and enthusiasm to push to get more stuff done. I've never heard of SOMA, but I definitely see the similarity between my dread and the pic.
@Da Boss: Thanks Da Boss. It's nice how well the press mold turned out for the rat swarms. I don't know how sustainable it is, but I've been trying to craft everything they come across to have visual representations.

Just a small update. I've been making some more minis as going away gifts for my school D&D group (which I'll post later). I went with the plans to do some sculpting with apoxie putties for my mind flayer, but ended up making the plasma cannon arm for my Tzeentch dread instead. I hope to get it painted to match the rest soon. And finish the dread in general.




Thanks for stopping by.

that needs a lick of paint ....currently its a bit lacking in contrast...

the wings are really promising...
and you´re imo the master of press moulding...holy moly!!!

also...would be interested how you start gaming d&d with kids of that young age...how they envision the path that "might" lay before them...do you help your nephew with the phase space of choices available?...

That dread is really promising, I may have missed is, but did you take a scale shot of it ?
The glue+balls mix is definitely something I might steal....

@Viktor von Domm: Thanks Vik, yeah the new arm does clash a bit with the color scheme . Thank you also about your kind words about making molds. I really love make molds and go overboard with it. I just happened to have a plasma cannon terminator arm mold from years ago, so I put together the dreads arm super fast. Are you talking about the gargoyle's wing? I've make a bunch of them (with a new mold ), and i think they turned out well, but I forgot to photograph them, I should try to before I give them away. it would be best if I gave them a simple paint job so people can actually see them.

As for starting D&D, it can be hard. I made plans with my nephew's family to play D&D with the whole family, but they're even busier than me, so 6 months later and we still haven't done anything. My nephew has watched a few minutes of the D&D games at school, which got him interested in the first place. His mom hoped he'd want to ready about stuff from D&D, but he declined when I offered to lend him my Monster Manual (all kids' favorite of the D&D books to look at). So mostly, I'm just giving him little toys to get him excited even though he probably won't get to play a real game with them any time soon, but hopefully it will help keep the interest alive.
Starting D&D with kids can be a challenge, but also very rewarding if it happens. One of my student's dad has been playing D&D pretty much from the very beginning, he and his dad talk about it a lot at home. He's really interested in it, so I decided to start the school D&D group for him. We found a day that works for his closest friends, his brother, and Dad to all meet at the end of the school day, and it's been a lot of fun ever since. This made a lot of the other students jealous, and there were plans to start 3-4 more D&D groups, pretty much the entire class wanted to join. My only requirements were that they get an adult volunteer meaning a parent to join us and find a day of the week that works for enough of them to forma group. They were all stoked, but never got their act together enough for more than the one group to form. They would still ask me about starting a D&D group about once a month, but didn't manage to form any more groups.
Playing D&D with kids, is pretty straight forward. I started pretty easy since many had never played before, I have no intention of killing any characters if I can help it. The father with a lot of experience played a character to act as a mentor to the other characters, he gives them advice every game, and I've been watching them mature as they explore and get advice. Kids can get side tracked easily, but are also super creative. My group last year spent 30 minutes debating how to remove the chains of some guard wolves making more and more mild plans until the quite player suggested to just take their collars off. This year one of my players skipped a large section of the campaign, jumping far ahead with some really insightful planning and some good rolls. So a mixed bag like any group.

@KernelTerror: I'm glad you like the glue and balls mix. It would be an honor if my technique ended up in your amazing chaos army. I don't think I ever took a proper scale shot of the Tzeentch dread, only scaled against other homemade stuff, so here's a scale shot with the Dark vengeance helbrute and a space marine:


Also combining to cast pieces from my cape mold, I've started on the body/robe of the mind flayer for the LoER contest. I'll be sculpting on some more refined details where I've just done gap filling so far, before moving up the body and adding the arms.

Thanks for the scale shot ! that will be properly tzeentchian indeed !

That mindflayer is coming along brilliantly. I love the glue and balls technique for the Tzeentch Hellbrute as well, looks awesome and very fitting.

How excactly did i miss this tzeentchian dred?

Well done.

Thanks guys I hope to get more done soon.

Hi All,

I was really in the mood to get something done quickly today, I don't always have the patience to work slowly step by step with apoxie putties. That was when I noticed that the bag of Halloween skulls that I got from Dollar Tree are very similar in size to the beholder I made. You know what that means, time to make a Death Tyrant. I wasn't able to finish the painting with constantly waiting for stuff to dry, but the build itself is very easy and took less than an hour if anyone else wants to try it.


I started by sawing the skull into anterior and posterior halves to be able to insert clear plastic for the floating glowing eyes.


Next, using an Xacto, I cut out an area for the main eye socket


I glued in a sturdy wire for it to "float" with, and glued cheap expanded polystyrene over the eye socket.


Using the hot tip of the glue gun I hollowed out a cavity in the EPS for a socket shape.


I glue the two halves of the skull to a clear piece of plastic (this is from an egg carton) and glue the wire to a base.


I painted with a mixture of cheap craft paint (combo of tan, yellow, and white) and then made 10 dots of white glue that I sprinkled red glitter on. That's where I had to leave it to dry for the night.


I've also added the main lines of latitude to my fantasy planet that I've building from the ground up. Equator, 30, and 60 degrees.


Thanks for stopping by

I've stippled on some rust to my iron golem, first brown then orange. It's helped. It may need more, but I'm tired of working on it and calling it done. I'm still overall happy with it. Thanks to Vik for the suggestion about stippling on the rust, time to post this on his thread collecting "how to scratch build D&D minis.
https://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/773264.page





Along with working on the Death Tyrant, I've also gotten back to making tombstone and grave markers for a tombstone golem

 Syro_ wrote:
I've stippled on some rust to my iron golem, first brown then orange. It's helped. It may need more, but I'm tired of working on it and calling it done. I'm still overall happy with it. Thanks to Vik for the suggestion about stippling on the rust, time to post this on his thread collecting "how to scratch build D&D minis.
https://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/773264.page

Excuse me while I recompose myself and roll a good morale - amazing Rusty General! Looked good from the start, but the paint brought it to a real completion. Congratulations!

Golem looks friggen sweet!

The eye tyrant is genius as well. Loving the world, though that is a proper bottom up approach to world creation!

Just noticed your posts about tiredness and burnout. Fellow teacher here, and definitely feel ya. We are down a bunch of staff in my school and the load is redistributed to the rest of us and really wears us down. Take care of yourself!

@Wirecat: Thanks so much, I'm glad you like it
@Da Boss: As a fellow teacher, you definately do know where I'm coming from, thanks. I'm glad you like the golem and undead beholder. If you're planning to make any of these monsters for your own games, I'd be happy to talk with you about them and see them on your blog when you're done.

Speaking of the Death tyrant, I've finished it (After redoing the paint job):



I've also gotten started on another golem that can be called a tombstone, gravestone, or graveyard golem. I decided to model it with similar proportions to a 40k dread in my mind. It's honestly too big for its 2 inch base.
Some starting stuff, I ended up making twice the starting amount of foamcore graves in the end.





Here he is finished, but very hard to see without paint




Thanks for stopping by

Here I thought I was a nut with repurposing odd parts , your robot guy is awesome

Good work on the tombstones as well.

hey Syro...

the Iron Golem is everything the constriction promised and then some!

the death tyrant (i had to check this via google to know what it is all about for starters...) is a really cool thing too...the clea plastic surface idea is a nice twist...me i probably would have used gems on a clear rod...but since i´ve done some research now i´ve seen that idea gets some use too...(i think i need to build so many cool monsters eventually that i will come to a death tyrant sooner than later too^^)

as for the tombstone golem...brilliant! i recently marveld about these animated "household" items golems for quite some time... i want to build a skull golem for sure...also...what do you think about a knife golem? build from knifes around a substructure of hot glue...
come to that... i have these clear plastic gems...all shaped alike but once glued together could make a cool crystal ...whatever^^

i recently ,made an homage work on pacman...i really need to take and upload some pics of my recent works...

@Theophony: Thanks Theo! Luckily we can all hold each other up as examples of why we hold onto massive amounts of junk
@Viktor von Domm: Thanks Vik, I hope you do post more of your recent stuff and have more time for crafting. For the skull golem, do you want only skulls? or do you want more of a golem made from human skeletons? If you look up "Critical Crafting bone golem" on Youtube there's a really cool, huge bone golem made from Dollar store skeletons. I really want to try making one in the future. As for the knife golem, I think that sounds like a really sweet idea, and also a heck of a lot of work. Will you be making a mold and casting some knives or buying/building them in bulk? I imagine the knife golem being the ultimate weakness of hand-to-hand fighters
I think someone has actually made homebrew rules for a gem golem, and probably crystal golems too. I'm no expert on lore, but I could see them going around the Underdark, maybe made by deep gnomes?

just looked up the vid...thanks...another new channel to watch
that bone golem is pure evil....(btw do you see a scale issue with these dollar store skellies?)

as for the knife golem...i have a massive truckload of knifes and blades due to my bitzbox...especially the leftover ogre stuff you can haul in on ebay really cheap...(and which i did years ago)

and yep...i will set the date for a nice update on Thursday... then i will show off

I'm looking forward to your update
As for scale issues with dollar store skeletons, yes there definitely is. Critical crafting seems to embrace that they're not to scale, but I try to stick with ones that I close personally. I find it helps to use only parts of the skeletons at a time, all cut up, as it makes me feel like the wrong scale isn't as obvious. Do you find the same?

scale issue is something that is turning out to have some kind of OCP on me...it grows on me more and more... to the effect that i have problems using frostgrave minis together with warhammer minis...or heavens forbid D&D minis... the differences are subtil to be honest... but hands, heads and so on are items of minis that are of great importance for the character of said mini...

but to be honest... when i was a kid...many kids never had a problem mixing playmobil, action figures and legos... me, i was twitching around and feeling nervous ... i am in these matters a bit more purist than maybe necessary....

Iron golem sure is looking sweet! Great use of materials.

Looking forward to see more progress on the tombstone golem.

@Viktor von Domm: Everyone has different things that bother them, so worries. But yeah, I definitely wouldn't get any dollar store skeletons then.
@Ezki: Thanks Ezki! I've got enough paint on to make it visible, but will be a while before it's fully painted.

Just like last summer because of my continuing education, I'll be leaving home again for a few months. That means this will be a last update on this blog for a while, although I will still be on Dakka and visiting everyone else's blogs. I ordered green stuff and sculpting tools while I was out there last year, but was so busy that I never even opened them.

I'm planning on painting the tombstone golem to look like there are several different kinds of stone making it up, along with dirt, algae stains, etc. For now I just have it a flat gray with a black wash for you can see the details.

Love that tombstone golumn - by strange coincidence, my first 40K scratch build used that same hero quest piece to make a dreadnaught - with pen caps and lots of hot glue! I wish I'd known how to mold the part though.

It reminds me of "Rock" from Galaxy quest. Brilliant!

The death tyrant and the bubbly hell brute are lovely too.

Thanks kestral, that Hero Quest tomb is so useful, I use it constantly, and think it would be really great for a Dark Angels dread. And the tombstone golem defiantly has the same esthetic as "Rock" from Galaxy Quest.

Indeed, the “Rock” from galaxy quest .

Looking forward to some paint on him. Will they be more marble or limestone colored. Also needs lots of moss on them.

Thanks Theo, and I'm glad you mentioned limestone as that's what I was thinking of when I said marble before. I'm planning on mainly limestone and grey stone for the graves, with a few different ones sprinkled in like marble, maybe dolomite. The moss is a good point too, I'll make sure to include it.

I'm not quite home yet to be able to return to working on any projects, but I found this cool little package of clock and gear buttons in Walmart for $5. The seem like they would be useful for mechanicus stuff in 40k, D&D terrain for the plane "Mechanus" with the modrons. Also just making a clock tower.

Woo! Looks like a jackpot.
I can only imagine what you could achieve with those pieces.

Those could very well be used for some orky machinery. Or a clockwork robot

I may have used some of those in my most recent building builds...

I've a packet of something similar also- elevation gears for artillery, engine components under the hood- Warhammer 40 k meets Steampunk! Great find, Syro!

I will be repetitive here - Earth-Sun-Moon model in astromancers lab.

But selection of parts looks good indeed, lots of possibilities. The scale may be too small for actual clock tower, but they came in all sizes and forms back then, and a lot of things can be adorned with a clock face. Mechanic shoppe, entry gate... steam omnibus stop?

Thanks for all the great ideas guys! I have a lot of fun stuff to try and make sometime. I'll have to take a closer look at Brian's mechanicus table for gears And good point Wirecat, the clock faces definitely aren't big enough for a full clock tower, maybe more of a town clock or something.

Bases for tempus fugite or whatever the clockman from DC goes by, depends on the size of them though.

Cool idea Theo, the clock face buttons are 1 inch and 1/16 of an inch total. So pretty close to a standard base.

I'm finally home again even though it's only for a few days. I haven't been able to find one package that I ordered, arrived, and I think was brought in by my family close to 2 months ago, but I did open the other thing I ordered for myself.
Here are the Agricola expansion miniatures. Paint job is nowhere near how they look in the photos on the box of course, but I still think they are nice


I couldn't find all of them for the group shot, but I'm happy with the number of townsfolk/villager minis I'm collected

There are so many partially finished projects I should be working on, but when I saw this goat toy in the dollar store I couldn't help getting it to try to make a blood thirster for 40k.

GOAT (Greatest Of All Time) bloodthirster . I’m sure you’ll have it living up to it’s name here shortly.

Ooooh, that is very promising !

Hah! That is brilliant. Goat-thirster is going to be a really fun project no matter what.

Brilliant, simply brilliant. Cant wait to see him progress.

 Syro_ wrote:

Intimidating already! Actually, was looking at these things myself, in relation with some Reaper stuff, like a celestial stag, but decided to lay that idea off for a while. And here You are diving into a great conversion! Good luck with it!

@Theophony: Thanks Theo! I'll try my best to have the bloodthirster live up to the cool name you've given it.
@KernelTerror: Thanks
@Da Boss: Thanks Da Boss, it has been fun so far.
@Camkierhi: Thanks Cam. I I'm looking forward to getting back to him as soon as I can.
@Wirecat: Thanks! I hope it goes well. I'd love to see you do a similar conversion

No update photos this time, and I've been so busy and jet lagged that I haven't been updating. I've moved to a new country, and now live in Hong Kong, China. I've been very busy at my new job, but can't wait to get back to my projects and posting here. Sadly & obviously I couldn't bring my over crowded crafting area, so my projects will be changing to be more just sculpting with putties & a few conversions (similar to how Pneumo could only sculpt while he was studying abroad if I recall correctly).

GOAT Bloodthirster has traveled with me and I'm looking forward to returning to work on him. Unfortunately, I was afraid airport security would stop me if I tried to bring my apoxie putties, sculpting tools, and hobby knives. When I was going to ship them I found out it would cost about $60. I figured I could buy them again once I got here cheaper than that. Turns out, that's not true because of import duties/taxes but it was still pretty close, in price, and because I had a gift card balance it technically was pretty cheap. If all goes well, my art supplies should arrive September 5th.

Thanks to all of you for your interest and support.

Now that is quite a move... Take care, settle well and good luck!

Phew, fair play for taking ANY crafting stuff with you on such a move! Hope you enjoy Hong Kong!

@Wirecat: Thanks Wirecat, It is taking a lot of getting used to, settling here.
@Da Boss: Thanks Da Boss

I'm very happy to say that my art supplies have finally arrived! I can now start some sculpting.


I spent most of the window of time for crafting making stuff for my classroom instead. I'm making a model volcano out of clay, and also a model solar system to hang from my ceiling. I also discovered that I still need to buy some super glue, so I didn't get to far, but I have begun the armatures for two more bloodthirsters that I plan to sculpt. Wish me luck

Good luck!

"Captain Scarlet is indestructible, you are not, remember the difference." Colonel White Thunderbirds Are Go!

Nice supply drop, glad to see you are getting set up allright in Hong Kong.
Yeah lack of superglue is the worst, and blocks everything ! I'm currently trying to make my last tube last the sunday...Won't happen ^^ !

Thanks Meer_Cat, thanks KernelTerror.
@KernelTerror: I hope your super glue lasted, I forgot to buy some again. I did a probably unnecessary price comparison and the store with the best price is a little harder to get to. I don't remember 100% where it is either...

I've done a little work of GOAT bloodthirster and his buddies.

 Syro_ wrote:

Don't remind me about dentistry! But, actually, I need a couple of scalpels-spreaders like that. Making do with pocket knife and bits of hardened wire is possible... yet tiring and frustrating. Now do some bloody bloodthirster! Chaos won't happen by itself, no matter what some people try to pretend. :(

 Syro_ wrote:

@KernelTerror: I hope your super glue lasted, I forgot to buy some again. I did a probably unnecessary price comparison and the store with the best price is a little harder to get to. I don't remember 100% where it is either...

Well now I feel bad, while my tube was empty by 2 in the afternoon, I then remembered I may have had a stash in the garage...And managed to keep on gluing.

Nice to see that the goat is getting friends !

But, actually, I need a couple of scalpels-spreaders like that. Making do with pocket knife and bits of hardened wire is possible... yet tiring and frustrating.

Wirecat, are you seriously sculpting those amazing things that you make without typical sculpting tools?

@KernelTerror: I'm glad you had enough glue, I finally got some. And thanks, hopefully all the bloodthirsters will turn out okay.

You see see some of the slow progress on the bloodthirsters





More art supplies as well. I finally bought some super glue, my girlfriend ordered me some magnets, and I picked up some extra x-acto blades while I was browsing an art store.


I mixed up way too much putty today, so after finishing what I felt could be accomplished on the bloodthirsters I had a lot left. I threw together some not very good brains for my mind flayer, hopefully they will look good enough with a splash of pink paint. I also bulked out a helbrute with the excess.



Thanks for stopping by

It's been a long time since my last post on here. I've been very busy with work and also just plain forgetful. I've been meaning to post this for two days but get distracted reading everyone else's blogs

A little more progress on the bloodthirsters. GOAT is starting to get its whip holding arm (mostly to help it stand up as the cheap plastic of the goat toy keeps bending over time from the weight of the putty and then won't stand up). I also found a Warhammer store here in Hong Kong not far from where I live, I stumbled upon it while shopping. It was really nice looking at the minis on display and the tables. It was also my first time seeing a bloodthirster model in person. They always look so massive in online photos, but aren't. I broke the legs of the least complete bloodthirster to reposition it to more of a crouch, and any future bloodthirsters I will try to sculpt much smaller than I have been.


I also started sculpting some daemon heads. I have trouble sculpting heads, and I'm trying to improve and research techniques. Hopefully this will look more okay as I add detail and layers.


On the left I also sculpted two multimelta barrels

Your bloodthirsters remind me of the old Realms of Chaos days, when daemons were all weird and unique sculpts. Yours really look like they'll be real creatures of Chaos.

Heh heh, thanks Josh, sadly the weirdness of my sculpts aren't intentional
But I am trying to make each one look unique. I'll be building up a lot on top of the "screaming green marbles" that I started with

It's been really nice being able to devote time this weekend to sculpting. I've been trying out making more daemon heads, worked a bit more on a modified helbrute (not fully pictured), and picked up a few more supplies at the Hong Kong equivalent of a dollar store, tht my girlfriend told me about and took me too.






Thanks for stopping by

FYI, Syro, I'm now running an online D&D campaign. Using miniatures!

Congrats Brian! I'm glad you are getting to play. I'm also glad you are getting to use that beautiful collection of miniatures you have, but I admit I'm confused how you are using them in an online game. Could you give some more detail?

I was in the mood to work on the helbrute today, but did a very little bit more on the bloodletters.

I point a camera at the battlemat, and screen-share the cam's output.

--Brian

@Briancj: That's sounds a lot nicer to look at than the usual digital tokens of many online D&D games.

I continue the slow methodical progress of sculpting daemon heads