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Great updates, love the adventurers although I'm more partial to the eye-patch face than the Robocop-wannabe

Captains look great and nicely contrasting with the orange and the light blue.

Feel a bit like a broken record, but once again, I’m very impressed with your natural palette. You’ve really captured a great realistic fantasy look for them.

Not quite sure about the Dreadball models. Not a slight on the paint jobs, just not quite able to wrap my head around the models. Still, the colors are quite striking and look good.

And I’m still just completely impressed (floored?) by the Golem. The more I look at the pix, the more impressive it is. That model just looks great!

Vale,

JohnS

Oooh you're clearing out your mantic pile, something I definitely haven't even approached. Kudos!

I especially like your knight and treasure hunter, really selling me on the FG knights kit which, to this point, I had been sleeping on.

Viterbi wrote:Great updates, love the adventurers although I'm more partial to the eye-patch face than the Robocop-wannabe

Captains look great and nicely contrasting with the orange and the light blue.

Well, I find the Robocop helmet endlessly delightful. Robocop is the greatest movie ever made, after all.

cygnnus wrote:Feel a bit like a broken record, but once again, I’m very impressed with your natural palette. You’ve really captured a great realistic fantasy look for them.

Not quite sure about the Dreadball models. Not a slight on the paint jobs, just not quite able to wrap my head around the models. Still, the colors are quite striking and look good.

And I’m still just completely impressed (floored?) by the Golem. The more I look at the pix, the more impressive it is. That model just looks great!

Vale,

JohnS

Well, yeah, I kind of agree with you. Most of the DW line are Mantic models of a certain vintage, cast in their older restic formula. That said, they look fine on the pitch, and the game is enough fun to make up the difference.

GrimDork wrote:Oooh you're clearing out your mantic pile, something I definitely haven't even approached. Kudos!

I especially like your knight and treasure hunter, really selling me on the FG knights kit which, to this point, I had been sleeping on.

My Mantic pile, like all my other piles, will never be completely cleaned out. That said, it's been fun going back and revisiting this game. I highly recommend the FG knights. I'm thinking of getting a couple of sprues of their demons-- there are some bodies with regular human legs and full armor that would work well with some of the helmeted heads on the knights sprue.

Anne-Marie Helder is finished, along with four Jacks:





Anne-Marie here was fairly easy to clean, but the Chinese factory workers who packaged her opted not to use clippers, so there are some ugly gouges here and there. She's apparently not available, and doesn't have rules in Dreadball v2. The fluff (still available via Google search), comes dangerously close to fat shaming. In addition, she shares a name with a British singer/songwriter, so that may have been problematic as well.



The mold lines on the Jacks (which are the backbone of the Void Sirens team) were much more difficult the clean, but too obvious to just ignore, which is my normal method of dealing with restic. I like the black and fuscia team colors, even if it makes them look like Emperor's Children.

I finished the strikers a couple of days ago, but haven't based or photographed them yet. I hope to have the core team finished this weekend. After that, a few more FG knights, and then back to Dreadball to finish out the month.

They look ace! Like really angry liquorice all-sorts.
Her stats are in the Xtreme 2.0 update which is semi-official, it's on the FB group, or pm me and I'll email you - she's now an MVP called The Black Widow. The original model is based on a roller derby blocker I believe. Are you getting Magnetar Circuit? Very excited for it.

 inmygravenimage wrote:
They look ace! Like really angry liquorice all-sorts.
Her stats are in the Xtreme 2.0 update which is semi-official, it's on the FB group, or pm me and I'll email you - she's now an MVP called The Black Widow. The original model is based on a roller derby blocker I believe. Are you getting Magnetar Circuit? Very excited for it.

PM sent. I had forgotten about Magnetar Circuit until you mentioned it. I put it in my cart, waffled over what to add to get free shipping, and then forgot all about it.

Still plugging away at the BlackPinks:

Three identical Strikers:


And one oddly-posed (thanks to warping) Guard:


And finally, two alternate poses (L: striker R: Jack)


I didn't notice the debris on their bases until I posted these photos. They have since been cleaned off. I only have two more-- another oddly-posed Jack and the Keeper (who no longer has rules, from what I can tell). THere is also a prone model in the set, but she's pretty low priority.

Finally, the raw materials for an entry in the latest LoER Competition:


My wife frequently has to attend conferences, and recieves bento lunches when she does. Usually, bentos come in disposable plastic containers, but for the last three, the disposable plastic containers were further contained in these sweet compressed foam "boxes." They are all 5mm thick and the "walls" are 55mm tall. I'm going to turn them into a two-level abandoned building/haunted mansion, with internal walls and some kind of flooring. It will be quite an ambitious project, and one that I'm not sure I can pull off, but I relish the challenge. Wish me luck!

Good luck, indeed! That sounds like a great project

Keepers are used in league or casual play only. It's an advancement for Guards. The Guard pose is indeed truly bizarre - another reason for using Anne-Marie! Looking very snazzy regardless.

Excited to see what you do for your building!

Good luck with the building, looks like a challenge

I like the black-pink colour scheme, they look great!

Lovely work on the pink team, very smooth colors. And also excited to see your LoER project develop.

GrimDork wrote:Good luck, indeed! That sounds like a great project

Thanks. I'm gathering materials and planning in my head. I hope to start work on the house in earnest this week.

inmygravenimage wrote:Keepers are used in league or casual play only. It's an advancement for Guards. The Guard pose is indeed truly bizarre - another reason for using Anne-Marie! Looking very snazzy regardless.

I think the guard is supposed to be punching someone. I'll have to straighten out her leg and see if I can't make her work.

Da Boss wrote:Excited to see what you do for your building!

Thanks. I'll try not to disappoint.

Slinky wrote:Good luck with the building, looks like a challenge

I like the black-pink colour scheme, they look great!

Thanks. It's based on the official white-and-pink colors, with black instead of white. I think it works better.

Viterbi wrote:Lovely work on the pink team, very smooth colors. And also excited to see your LoER project develop.

Thanks. I hope I can make the building work.

Here are the final models from the Dreadball team:



The one on the right dancing the twist is a Jack, the one on the left is a Keeper. I probably should have repositioned the Jack to look like she is running.

Here are the three alternate poses in one photo:


And the basic poses+ MVP*


And finally, a couple of poorly-focussed shots of the whole team:



Reflections:

1) Working with restic remains challenging. It doesn't help that Mantic models of this vintage have mold lines in terrible places, and in many cases have been twisted off their sprues by the underpaid factory workers. That said, restic is no better or worse than metal or HIPS, just different.
　
2) Both the black and pink that I used on these models are from Warcolors. I got them on a whim when the company first started out, but haven't used them much before this project. They both have a gel-like consistency, and the pink is a lot more translucent than I'm used to, requiring 5-6 coats over a white basecoat. That's probably a plus when using their system, but kind of frustrating when you're used to Army Painter and Vallejo (like me).

3) Working on these reminded my of why I prefer building Frostgrave warbands over, say, Space Marines or Eldar. Painting what amounts to the same model a dozen times got really, really boring by the end of the year.

4) That said, I spent a lot of time looking at the Dreadball rules while working on these models, and I am itching to play again. I can't wait to give this team a go!

As always, I have some Frostgrave models in the works, specifically some more dudes from the Knights sprue. I've also done a little work on the haunted house as well, but not enough to share. Thanks, as always, to everyone who looks and comments.

Oof, yeah, 6 coats would drive me nuts!

They look good.

This is a fantastic blog! I really enjoy your painting and the variety of miniatures and styles.

I have one quick belated question: I just browsed through the last several pages of your blog and I saw your (awesome) KOW Vanguard miniatures were based on circular bases. Have you played Vanguard with those models and did the base shape matter? I would like to try Vanguard sometime this year, but I would rather get double use out of the models and based them on circles to match my other fantasy models.

Thank you!

GrimDork wrote:Oof, yeah, 6 coats would drive me nuts!

They look good.

Thanks. Six coats was a lot, but as the team is finished, I will never have to do that again.

Abdyel wrote:This is a fantastic blog! I really enjoy your painting and the variety of miniatures and styles.

I have one quick belated question: I just browsed through the last several pages of your blog and I saw your (awesome) KOW Vanguard miniatures were based on circular bases. Have you played Vanguard with those models and did the base shape matter? I would like to try Vanguard sometime this year, but I would rather get double use out of the models and based them on circles to match my other fantasy models.

Thank you!

Thanks, and welcome! Thanks to the pandemic, I only really play at home with my son, so we can relax the rules at will. Base size and rear arcs are both part of the Vanguard rules, but as long as you keep track of how many models can gang up, and mark the rear arc, I don't think round bases would be a problem with most gamers.

After painting all that black and pink, I decided to get back to basics:



Ah, glorious browns, greens, and greys! How I missed you! I built these two from the FG Knights sprue. I painted their eyes, but you can't see them because of my terrible lighting. The shield design came from the endpapers of one of my son's King Arthur storybooks.

I'm also slowly (very, very slowly) working on my entry for the latest LoER competition:



It's going to be a dilapidated, two-storey wooden house. In my head, I'm calling it the "cannibal house," having been inspired by "The Picture in the House." I still need to add a door, some windows, porch, staircase, inner walls and a second floor-- pretty much everything, really.

One of the reasons I'm going so slowly on the house is the Dakka Painting Challenge. It's "Space Marine" month, but as I don't enjoy painting Space Marines, I'm revisiting Deadzone Enforcers instead. Rather than the military green I've used in the past, I decided to make them shiny and (non-metallic) metal. My first Proof of Concept:


This guy turned out a lot more blue than I'd planned. I'll probably use this for the forward observer/sniper. My second try was this sheme:




The guy on the left is plastic, the guy on the right is metal (he doesn't appear to be available any longer). A while back, during a discussion on the relative merits of these models, someone said that they were weirdly proportioned. Specifically, their helmets looked to small to fit a human head. I argued that they were cyborgs rather than dudes in armor, and another person chimed in "like Robocop." That idea has stuck with me ever since, so that's the direction I'm taking with this strike team. I'm still trying to figure out exactly where to put the highlights and how deep to make the shadows, but overall I think it's working.

I think they are excellent, I like the slightly more brown tones in the shading of the plastic (to be fair I like the scheme on the plastic guy better generally).

Nice progress JoshInJapan.

CB

I love the colour palette on your frostgrave stuff as always. It's kinda what I aim for, but only hit on my good days.

Frostgrave minis look really cool, I need to get some sprues, they don't look so good in the rulebook, love your way of painting them. NMM on those Enforcers looks great!

I really like what you are doing with the Enforcers! The pink and black really suits that Dreadball team, looks great.

inmygravenimage wrote:I think they are excellent, I like the slightly more brown tones in the shading of the plastic (to be fair I like the scheme on the plastic guy better generally).

Thanks. As a rule, the metal enforcers, as well as the mono-pose restic ones, come in more interesting poses than can be built with the multipart plastics. That said, the plastics are easier to clean up and to paint. These two have the same color palette, but it was easier to get into the recesses of the plastic guy. I agree, he turned out better.

Captain Brown wrote:Nice progress JoshInJapan.

CB

Thanks. These NMM experiments are proving to be very, very time consuming.

Da Boss wrote:I love the colour palette on your frostgrave stuff as always. It's kinda what I aim for, but only hit on my good days.

The secret to my FG (and pretty much all fantasy models) these days is just paint everything brown.

Viterbi wrote:Frostgrave minis look really cool, I need to get some sprues, they don't look so good in the rulebook, love your way of painting them. NMM on those Enforcers looks great!

The knighs offer a lot of variation, and are compatible with the rest of the FG line, so even one sprue comes with a lot of opportunities, assuming that, like me, you buy everything FG related that comes out.

I'm not completely happy with my NMM yet, but it's getting there.

RobertsMinis wrote:I really like what you are doing with the Enforcers! The pink and black really suits that Dreadball team, looks great.

Thanks. I'm pretty pleased with how they turned out.

Spring vacation has begun, and I've managed to find some more hobby time, allowing me to finish the Enforcers:





These two are basic enforcer troopers with special weapons (thermal rifle ont he left, fusion gun on the right). I added a little muzzle burn, but it didn't turn out so well-- I guess you really have to use inks for that.






This medic has a lot of interesting details, but being restic, he also has a lot of terribly-placed, difficult to clean mold lines. He looks good enough at arm's length, though.








This is Lt. Roca (I think), a special character. Since he is a sniper, I decided against the shiny silver-grey of the other models in this update. Like the special weapon guys, he's metal, so the paint on his left heel keeps rubbing off. Also, the runner for his right arm was right in the middle of his shoulder pad, so I had to file away all the detail to get it flat. Who approved that design?






Finally, Sgt. Howlett, Mantic's Wolverine tribute. After all that bule and grey, I wanted to try something different with this guy. I used a NMM bronze recipe that I found online, but left out the verdigris step. I'm actually pretty pleased with how he turned out-- facing my fears head on and highlighting to white payed off, I think. Finally, a group shot:

There's so much to love here but your howlett is superb. Now for some iron man enforcers!

NMM is improving. Each model looks better than the last. Wolv . . . I mean Howlett looks awesome.
The contrast seems to be the thing. I've been practising my NMM as well. I'll continue to look at yours for inspiration.

Lovely stuff there, Josh, and Howlett is particularly great!

Well done for persevering with the restic models, they are a bit of a bugger to work with...

inmygravenimage wrote:There's so much to love here but your howlett is superb. Now for some iron man enforcers!

I've been avoiding that, but who knows? It's not like I don't have enough to spare.

DJJazzyJeff wrote:NMM is improving. Each model looks better than the last. Wolv . . . I mean Howlett looks awesome.
The contrast seems to be the thing. I've been practising my NMM as well. I'll continue to look at yours for inspiration.

I agree, conrast is the key. Black-to-white is still outside my comfort zone, and I'm scared of screwing up all the work I do on a model, but I guess we all have to face our fears someday.

Slinky wrote:Lovely stuff there, Josh, and Howlett is particularly great!

Well done for persevering with the restic models, they are a bit of a bugger to work with...

Agreed. Normally, I just do a token pass with the needle file and then ignore the mold lines, but these are for the Dakka Painting Comp, so I had to do a little more work.

At the end of last week, the rest of the family took a trip to visit the grandparents, leaving me at home to look after our aged dog-- returning readers should recognize this as an ongoing pattern. Normally, I use this time to catch up on movies and to tackle a larger-than-normal hobby project. I achieved the first, but agonizing over the Enforcers left my hobby batteries a little drained. That said, I did finish all the obstacles and the goals for Dreadball Xtreme:



I started the larger obstacles on the left full of enthusiasm, as you can see with the highlights and carefully-placed sponge weathering. I began to lose steam working on the smaller trapped obstacles on the right, but still found the energy to add some depth to the trap markers. The goalposts I just phoned in, as I was ready to be done. Overall, I'm rather pleased with how everything turned out, especially the pin wash I did for the black lines.

Unrelated to the above, I have narrowed down my entry for this month's Dakka Painting Challenge(theme: Travelling In Style) to either this Mech:



Or this Goblin King:



I'm going to paint them both, and enter whichever I'm more pleased with.

Obstacles came out nice, and rather understandable you ran down the batteries after that much weathering.

Looking forward to the mech and gobbo

Obstacles look great, I love what they add to the game