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Howdy Dakka,

This blog is to document my attempt to paint my collection of minis. I am not a very good painter, so those wanting to see some pro tier paintjobs please look to one of the other wonderful articles on this site , but if you want to join me on my journey of climbing plastic mountain, feel free to continue reading. Also, as a general disclaimer, I am not the greatest photographer, nor have I had any kind of experience in doing a blog and uploading photos and such, so this is going to be a learning experience in this aspect for me haha.

First a bit about me.

I have always enjoyed 40k, the lore, the tinkering that surrounds the models (painting, converting and such), and of course the game. Over the years of playing on and off, I have managed to compile a large collection of unpainted minis. The crazyness of life had put 40k in the backseat for a long time, but now that things have settled a bit, I am rolling up my sleeves and getting back into my paint pots.

Like everyone, when I first started my paintjobs were terrible, but pushing threw the pain of being terrible at something allows us to improve on our skills and consequently, we improve ourselves.

With that, lets get into the minis

My two armies are Orks and CSM, so this blog will mostly contain them, but I do have a bunch of models that my friends have asked me to assemble/fix/paint for them, so from time to time, there will be some other things of the tyranid/necron/tau flavours.

Here are some of my earliest ever (poorly) painted minis. These boyz are well over 10 years old, and have served me good in many battles







I have thought about going over them again and fixing them up, but id rather spend the time tackling this pile of plastic crack xD

My first goal is to deal with the rank and file troops. I plan on getting them to a decent tabletop standard, then after everything is complete, I can go over them again at my leisure, highlighting and doing the other time consuming details. I have lots of vehicles and heroes, and I plan on leaving them until the end. My hope is that by the time I get near the top of the mountain, I will have improved enough to give my heroes the paintjobs they deserve! The big thing for me is getting practice doing those gosh darn edge highlights


Here is the colour scheme that my ork horde is going to have





As of starting this blog I have almost completed the majority of the slugga/choppa boyz to a decent table top standard, save the bases. Here are a couple of crappy photos just to give you an idea of scale




That only leaves the other half of the greenskin horde, mostly being the special troops like tankbustas and lootas, as well as the walkers, bikes, copters. mek gunz and other things of that nature.. By gork I swear this pile gets bigger (and my wallet gets lighter) every time I look at it Here are some pictures of (mostly) the rest of the horde.. xD







Although I have spent a bit writing about/showing the orks, the next couple of days I will be spending on my CSM. I have painted so much of the green skins in the last couple days I need to change it up haha. Here is the colour scheme I have settled on.




I still need to go over these guys, cleaning up details, basing, and doing highlights to really bring them out. But as with the orks, I am going to get as much of the base coats done before I go back over them and do highlights. If you made it this far, thanks for reading, and as always with these kinds of things C&C and questions are welcome. Ill do my best to blog a couple times a week, so feel free to drop in from time to time to check on my progress. Thanks!! <3





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First thing on the plan for today are these 4 missile launcher guys



Like the majority of my dudes, they were primed a long time ago and left to sit. This means my first step is to (go have a smoke and make a tea ) give them an even base coat while trying to preserve whats left of the detail. Then I am gonna apply the base of screamer pink. More photos to follow!


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Here is post and pre shade.





While I wait for the shade to dry, I am going to start the rest of my bolter marines, starting with these 3.



I think this guy would make a great cypher. All I need to do is give him a proper hood




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Now that the shade has settled on the missile launcher dudes, I went over it again to try and bring out the colour of the pink. The effect worked nicely on the shoulders but I was pretty sloppy on the legs haha



Next step for those guys is the gold. Once this is on it really livens them I think!

As for the rest of the bolter marines, the shade has settled and its time for picking out the pink. Gotta be careful around the legs



This guy was primed white instead of black. Im trying to see which one looks cooler in the end product. So far, so good. I think anyways

Good start mate, paintings always difficult to get going, got models from yeras ago that ive still not painted.

Time to start adding some gold. I really like the way the gold and pink go together




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 stonned_astartes wrote:
Good start mate, paintings always difficult to get going, got models from yeras ago that ive still not painted.

Haha thanks!!

I am trying to be as vigilant as possible and finish what I have before I assemble more minis. Must... resist.. the.. temptation

Haha yeah, i've tried that, cant stay focused, have a pile of models in a painting pile and just keep switching from modelling to that, seems to work.

 stonned_astartes wrote:
Haha yeah, i've tried that, cant stay focused, have a pile of models in a painting pile and just keep switching from modelling to that, seems to work.

Haha whatever works

After a nap and a smoke, time to finish off the gold.




Next step is to finish the base colours on the rest of the models, silvers for the guns, purple for the ropes/bags. The finished backpacks should look something like this..






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Phew.. now that the rest of the base colours (save the backpacks and feet) are pretty much done, its time to give a nice shade to the bags, scabbards and the purity seals. Then the plan is to go over the shaded areas again with a lighter colour to bring them out a bit.

First thing though, I need a new tea. Note to self, do not leave the tea next to the brush water

It has occoured to me that I have never painted a "normal flesh" tone. I am used to painted green skins not pinkies hehe. I gave it a base in bugmans glow, gonna follow it up with cadian fleshtone, hit it with reikland fleshade, and then go over it again with the cadian. Crossing my fingers On a side note, I really should of went over and taken out the mold lines.
The majority of these troops were second hand from Assualt on Black Reach. These little chunks of plastic really mess up the look of the dudes.






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With the shades and some minor highlighting done, next step shall be to finish the boots and the backpacks. I need to be neater when doing the armor plates. Lots of the pink on the leggings is particularly sloppy, but hey, just gotta keep practicing



I am pretty happy with how the "aspiring champion" is turning out. I am still kicking myself for not cleaning up these mold lines
The hole in his pauldroun seems like a great spot to paint in some plasma burns.






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With the backpacks and boots done, there are 3 things left. Cleaning up the sloppiness, highlighting, and basing.




I am comfortable leaving these guys for now, even though they are not perfect, I think they are a decent tabletop standard . There is a general plan to come back to the majority of the guys after the bulk have been painted up. I just want to keep climbing plastic mountain haha

Here is a shot of the "finished" CSM so far.. Thanks for reading, more to come in the future

Really clean lines mate well done.

 stonned_astartes wrote:
Really clean lines mate well done.

Thanks man . The encouragement means a lot

I definitely found that taking breaks between painting sprees with assembling has helped keep me calm during this process

Slowly chipping away here, I have recently "completed" a squad of CC CSM, as well as an extra Aspiring Champion. I am slowly improving, as I still have lots to learn!

The extra champion


The Aspiring champion for the Squad.

Couple of the other men, ready to rip and tear

The group shot.


With these men ready to a decent standard (save basing, highlights etc..), this almost raps it up for the basic CSM troops choice. I still have lots to do, but together, we will get everybody painted up
Next step will probably be 5 renegade assault marines, that I use as raptors, but I will leave that desicion in the hands of the ruinous powers

Thanks for reading!!

Could with tidying up the washes/ink. and some variations of the same colours to create shading.