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This thread will detail WIP on this model as I work through it.








Pros -
VERY COOL - Crisp detail. Soft mould material lets fine surface detail get cast nicely.
VERY COOL - Easy carve material. Very much similar to set greenstuff in consistency. Similar behaviour from first tests.

I've categorised the flaws I see as red or green - red being tricky to fix (and best taken as impossible / best not attempted for a young'un), and green being easy enough in my opinion.

Cons -
UNBELIEVABLY, SHOCKINGLY DOUBLEPLUSVERY BAD - Disgusting QA. It took 6 packs to get this model, which was the least affected of the bunch. Several of the rejected models actually had mould material stuck to them. - You'll notice it as it's bright pink. And this is from Warhammer World.
VERY BAD - Price. £14.50. NOT WORTH IT! For damn near 15 quid, I'd expect a much better production. I reckon this miniature is actually worth about £7.50, tops.
BAD - Vent points obscure detail in places. Again, requiring careful knife work to fix. Green 1 - The reliquary on the chest will need trimming neatly. This sort of flaw is less apparent on the old metal GK termies / Stern. Presumably due to the soft mould material.
BAD - Air trapped in the mould leads to filling work that shouldn't need to be done. Green 2 - The bottom of the foot will need greenstuffing to produce the sole of the foot.
BAD - Warping is present, in some areas that are impossible to fix without (relatively easy) sanding/filing. Green 3 - The bolter casing is warped and not square. Needs filing down and a bit of carving to correct. Careful work, but not too hard.
MEH - Some parts snapped off the sprue - No damage in this case, but easy to see where it could have happened. A simple piece of sponge in the pack would probably help that.

VERY BAD - Mould warping / air trapping is present in areas that are impossible to fix without resculpting part of the model. Red 1 - The face here is warped (not as badly as the rejected ones, but still I think the left side of his face will need reworking around the mouth and nose.
BAD - Some detail didn't come out in the cast - Red 2 - the usually ribbed areas on the back of the heels aren't. They'll need carving down, which is difficult for newbies.


Overall score: 4/10. Potentially a nice change, but the QA really needs to be stepped up a LOT for the price to be worthwhile. For the time being I'll advise clients against mail / internet ordering (as I do for Forgeworld stuff), and instead offer to go pick it up in store for them so the quality can be checked. By someone who cares.

My first Finecast model was... disappointing.

Interesting.

Thanks for the rundown.

Thanks for the detailed review. Its great to see the model up close. I gotta admit, the detail is really really sharp. Drybrushing and highlighting are going to take on a whole new meaning with finecast models.

But to be honest its FAILCAST. If they can't do good Quality Assessment and charge more money for it its a complete fail. At least the metal miscasts could be melted down and re-cast. And to have to clean up mouldlines and fill in bubbles and do all this on a model that was in the best state of the ones on offer....it doesn't fill me with hope.

Very nice evaluation of the new casting material and figure. This is my first time seeing the new resin models and I have to agree with you for the price and the hype, these things should be flawless. That is disappointing to learn that there is so many corrections to be fixed on a single model.

s.j.mccartney wrote:Thanks for the detailed review. Its great to see the model up close. I gotta admit, the detail is really really sharp. Drybrushing and highlighting are going to take on a whole new meaning with finecast models.

But to be honest its FAILCAST. If they can't do good Quality Assessment and charge more money for it its a complete fail. At least the metal miscasts could be melted down and re-cast. And to have to clean up mouldlines and fill in bubbles and do all this on a model that was in the best state of the ones on offer....it doesn't fill me with hope.

No - drybrushing will be NASTY on a lot of these. Some of the mould alignment issues (oh yeah they're happening) I've seen will simply be er, highlighted, by using an indiscriminate highlighting method (drybrushing). To get the models to look good in those circumstances you'll either need to resculpt, or put in false highlights to drag the eye away from the flaw.

For £15 have ordered a Limited Edition resin Studio McVey model.
Note limited to 750 units

The price includes the cost of postage.
How GW can justify the cost for a mass produced item is beyond my ken

His boots are as badly in need of repair as mine


Well reviewed Winterdyne, thanks.
Is a real pity about the faults as the material hold the detail very well.

Oh my god. That is the most disgusting thing I have sen out of GW. They need to fix Finecast, and fix it fast.

I'm planning on getting a Finecast Ghazzghull Thraka, and will probably (Thanks to winterdyne) wait until the whole resin gak is sorted out.

Very good review. If I weren't already keeping away from Finecast (because IG got no good stuff), I would now thanks to this.

Glad I got a Metal Astorath if this is what the quality is like.

Especially as the price has gone up. I know its a new product but its not like GW is a small company that doesnt have the resources to do proper product testing.

£15 for one model.

Even if its isn't flawed - that's a steep price to pay.

Actually, I saw an extremely nice Astorath cast today. If I get the go ahead from a client I'll be buying one to convert, and I can see the job working out cheaper if the cast is good as the material is very easy to work with.

BUT - that one good cast was one of several (I didn't count) that were not good. Some not good at all...

So they are casting in resin and they bumped up the prices, because resin is cheaper to manufacture.

But they still have <NFI about pressure casting it.

Epictacular Failcost, guys!

With product like this, they won't be keeping their "best evah" miniatures company tag (even if it was a self-labelled description).

>

The fixes I've done so far. Probably will be more surfacing to do once it's primed.

So this is my Njal I just bought. The main things I've noticed are the fangs on the bottom right in the first pic that are coming off of the boot are completely fused together and encased in excess. That chunk on the raven's back. No foot pegs at all. Too much flash everywhere. I'm relatively new to modeling so GS is foreign to me and I'm afraid of damaging this $30 model to excavate those fangs on the cloak. Also there may be that same boot issue where some of the rim of the boot is gone on the back and side. I think I'll have to return him and try again. :(

Dear god! That looks awful

Thanks for the review. Seems consistent with what we've heard. A shame, though.

black-rabbit wrote:Dear god! That looks awful

ph34r wrote:Thanks for the review. Seems consistent with what we've heard. A shame, though.

We can only hope they get better with time right?

I'm looking forward to following this.

Really seems hit and miss. I dropped by my local GW store yesterday to take a look at them and from the 10 or so I looked at very closely, they all looked good. I asked the manager about the problems people here have been discussing and he said, he had already a few returns because of the same kinds of things we have seen in this forum. But only like 2 or 3 of the slew of the ones they have sold.

I have enough to paint for the moment, so I am going to skip the Finecast for a while until GW's QA gets up to speed and they have consistently good models, not consistently hit and miss.

that's far worse than my Termie libby, which only had a miscast hose on his force weapon.

I feel bad for customer service tomorrow morning...

That Stern is mediocre at best. The Njal is absolutely terrible. Shame really, as the parts that do come out well look great, and this could have been a good thing for GW, but seems they goofed it.

Factoring these in with the others Ive seen, Ill be avoiding the finecast stuff. Luckily 99% of what I need from GW is plastic. The few other things I need Ill either track down on ebay in metal, or source a similar mini for another manufacturer.

Sterns face looks so damn ugly. He looks like a 70 year old with brain damage.

And its horrible how much you have to fix up.

Yep. That Njal needs to go back. I'm NOT scared of GS work, and I wouldn't want to do that. Thinking on it there's a very high chance I'll have to put the guide price up for commissions on finecast due to the cleanup / fixes required.

I think GW needs to slow down. They rushed this stuff out. And it is only going to bite them in the ass in the long run in my opinion.

Cool review. I lost out on Astorath before the whole finecast thing and now i can't justify 30 bucks for one model especially if it likely to have a lot of flaws. Ebay here i come!


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Synister_Intent wrote:I think GW needs to slow down. They rushed this stuff out. And it is only going to bite them in the ass in the long run in my opinion.

+100%

Actually, Astorath is one of the few cases where I might consider using a finecast mini in preference. He's mighty top heavy. Do buy in a store where you can check your purchases.

winterdyne wrote:Actually, Astorath is one of the few cases where I might consider using a finecast mini in preference. He's mighty top heavy. Do buy in a store where you can check your purchases.

I wouldn't agree on that. The only one that benefits is the Zoanthrope less chips and won't fall over half as much.

Portaljacker wrote:

Spoiler:

So this is my Njal I just bought. The main things I've noticed are the fangs on the bottom right in the first pic that are coming off of the boot are completely fused together and encased in excess. That chunk on the raven's back. No foot pegs at all. Too much flash everywhere. I'm relatively new to modeling so GS is foreign to me and I'm afraid of damaging this $30 model to excavate those fangs on the cloak. Also there may be that same boot issue where some of the rim of the boot is gone on the back and side. I think I'll have to return him and try again. :(

I was lucky ang got him as a metal a while back..... Im worrying a lot about the 10 incubi that I ordered the other day

hmm it seems that the only way that gw could continue offereing the characters and models currently in metal is to offer them in resin.. yea I know it sucks with the flaws and airbubbles.. but gw didnt resculpt over 100 models to offer in plastic.. so this was there solution.. boy i hope they improve there methods..

Resin normally isnt cheaper than tin casting.. pewter models were cast as they were cheap to offer for years... but with metal prices going up..things have changed.

Forge world casts in resin and they dont give that stuff away and they too have lots of flaws and crap castings.. but everyone just goes gaga for FW.. but they charge too much too in my opinion for what you actually get. For some reason there stuff in the pics looks bigger then when you recieve it.. and there hit and miss shipping sucks too..

perhaps that these early versions of finecast will continue to improve.. FW early stuff sucked alot too.. but they did improve..

now as far as pricing of the finecast models.. they kept the price close to the metal price which they would not have been able to do if they continued in metal.. and they now have full color clamshell packaging which they didnt have before..

I examined a Nurgle Demon Prince and couldnt find anything really wrong with it.. the casting was nice and had very few airbubbles in the hanging chains.. and they were easy to fix with wood putty.. just rubbed it right into the pinholes.. no problem.. but I worked with resin for years and wasnt expecting the models to be perfect casts..

my advice though be sure to look your model over in the store before purchase.. I was already advised by a shop owner to check the cast before buying it.. he is not a gw store and informed us that if we dont check the model that its our fault.. he laughed about it.. and I assume he would make it right but we agreed to inspect the items and inform him if we saw something that needed to be replaced..so he could order a replacement if needed..

good luck and good modeling..

Here's an update - I sent a link to my blog over to the Customer Services guys at GW. Anyway, I'm being sent a new Captain Stern. No argument, just a shipping notification, nice and efficient. Big kudos to Customer Services.

So, it seems that GW Customer Services also agree this level of fixing is not really acceptable for a premium product. Let's see if the replacement is up to par.