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Welcome all to the 94th round of the Dakka Painting challenge. For the unfamiliar, this is a friendly painting competition open to members of all skill levels and experience, whether your entry is your first or you thousand-and-first time painting miniatures. Each month, finished entries are collected into a thread where the community can vote on their favorite pieces, and those votes go towards an annual overall League that runs for 12 rounds.

This month, the annual Open Round returns, so you can paint whatever takes your fancy, whether that's some last-minute gifts, prep for holiday gaming, starting the new shiny army waiting under the tree or just squeezing in time to paint a mini or two amid a busy time of year. The usual rules still apply in terms of model count and such, but beyond that, this is the chance to paint whatever it is that you want or need to get done before the year's end!

How To Enter

- You may enter up to 5 MODELS as a SINGLE ENTRY, and are permitted one entry per member per month. If you enter multiple models, they should ideally be related in some way, such as part of the same squad, unit or scene if you are doing a diorama
- You MUST post a 'proof' picture of your entry in the thread of the state it was in before you started working on it; this must be either unassembled, unpainted, primed or coated a single colour. Entries that do not submit a valid Proof Picture will not be eligible for voting.
- After this, you may post WIP pictures in this thread and your own if you wish, and on completing the entry, you may post up to 6 final pictures IN THIS THREAD that will then be used for voting. Please note that pictures in a montage or collage picture will be considered individual images for this purpose, so while these types of presentation are certainly acceptable, please keep the image limit in mind when compiling them. For example, a collage of 5 images and one separate image would count as your 6 picture allowance.


So What Do I Win?
- Points... and points mean... bragging rights for the next month! Following the vote, points will be awarded to every entrant. This year, the Points you receive will be equal to the Percentage of Votes your entry receives in the final Voting thread; if you get 10%, you get 10 points, if you get 6% you get 6 points, so on and so forth.

These points will be used to form a league table, which will be updated month on month as the results come in.


How Long Do I Have?
This challenge begins 1st of December and will end at midnight GMT on 31st December. After this, I shall compile the finished entries into a new thread, and voting will run for 5 days.


List of entrants

inmygravenimage: Core Space Auxiliaries


Giefer: Shoretrooper Captain and Civillian


Mr Nobody: Word Bearers Dark Apostles


JoshInJapan: Dragon


FrozenDwarf: Dwarven Battleships


Daia T'Nara: Doomrider


KidCthulhu: Chaos Knight and Imperial Soldier


Lovejoy: Stormcast Archer


Nevelon : Parasite of Mortrex


theCrowe: Ninja Weasel and Highland Viking Dog


Flinty: Stargrave Alien Lizards


Pariah Press: 8th Necromunda Regiment, the "Spiders," Company F, 2nd Platoon.


CancelledApocalypse: Raven Guard Librarian, Battle Sister and Inquisitor Greyfax


Snail22: Torgillius The Chamberlain


Vejut: Giant pikachu sloth,


Jadenim: Ultramarine Lieutenant:
Jadenim: Ultramarine Lieutenant:


Boringstuff: Cartoon Thief


Captain Brown: Escher Gangers


Gulgog TufToof: Ork Kommando


Maharg: Blue Horror and Tzeentch Acolytes


ZergSmasher: Exorcist


Turaxa: Chibi Commisar


Midget Gems: Santork's Little Helpers

I think I'll do leader for my Stormcast Eternals army. Well, I say army... 5 painted models so far! At least this will add 3 more.



cheers,
Michael

It's the merry season so I'm going to paint this happy couple:

Geifer, that is AMAZING! Do you take sculpting commissions?

I'm still trying to decide what to enter. I have one idea, but I don't know if I'll run out of steam (again) once I put brush to model

^seconded, and, exalted! I'll be doing something for my primaris Stormcast I reckon.

Still need to pick something. Probably more nids.

I'm gonna get very ambitious and try to finish this in a month:

Blocking in the main colors should be pretty easy; it's all the little details all over this thing that have intimidated me. But, if I painted a Daemon Primarch in just a month (five years ago!), and I've grown as a painter since, this should work out okay, so I'm gonna give it a go.

 KidCthulhu wrote:
Geifer, that is AMAZING! Do you take sculpting commissions?

Thank you. No, I don't take commissions. I suffer from considerable health issues these days and I don't feel comfortable making promises I can't keep. It's unfortunately not viable anymore for me.

 KidCthulhu wrote:
I'm still trying to decide what to enter. I have one idea, but I don't know if I'll run out of steam (again) once I put brush to model

Well. there are another twenty nine days of December to figure out what kind of mood you're in.

Who knew ideas for the open round could be so sparse?

In the spirit of the open round, I'm keeping my options open... which is to say, I don't really know what I'm going to do, so to be on the safe side I just took a photo of everything that hasn't gotten further than the spray primer yet. The bikes are the ambitious goal, I've been wanting to make a Doomrider for a while, but I don't know if I'll come up with a conversion I'm happy with inside of a month; guess we'll see.

Well, then, some early thoughts.

Core Space Bounty Hunters and drones (got excited, started painting the wee tracked one before taking a pic).

Or possibly the crew of the Cygnus (again, Core Space, and again, got a bit excited)


Or then again, maybe a few more Snazzy Storm Marines (not that the ones I started for last month are done yet - vid chappy at left edge of pic!)


Decisions, decisions

As promised, this month’s open round entry will include my ninja weasel and possibly some others depending how much painting I get done.

Back to Oldhammer stuff for this round: Imperial Guard soldiers!

If nobody minds, I’ll have another go at painting this commissar, since I didn’t actually apply any paint to him last month,

Mantic`s Armada; Dwarf Starter box.

I figure I should start getting some 30k stuff done. My word bearers need some proper orators.

Thanks that puts in in some perspective (quite literally )

Finally got around to this the League table and HOF have been updated, its close at the top
https://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/732117.page#9481149

Need to work out my entry for this one, I always try to do something Christmas themed, I have the starting's of an idea but need to work it through

I'll be painting this OOP Gold Dragon from Grenadier. At least, I think it's OOP.



I've had this model since I was in high school, which was a long, long time ago. It had been sitting in a box back in the US for years, and my dad sent it to me for Xmas last year, along with some other random stuff he's been keeping for me ever since I came over here. I guess this makes this a Christmas-themed entry.

Geifer wrote:It's the merry season so I'm going to paint this happy couple:

Lovely bit of putty work there!

theCrowe wrote:As promised, this month’s open round entry will include my ninja weasel and possibly some others depending how much painting I get done.

...and more cool putty work! I love seeing all this greenstuff getting used.

JoshInJapan wrote:I'll be painting this OOP Gold Dragon from Grenadier.

I love those old Grenadier dragons, great models. And a much more realistic size than the enormous dragon models you get nowadays... (yes, I am old.)

Anyway, I've got my entry built. I have a few doubts though, as some bits look like they'll be very hard to reach, even to undercoat, never mind paint. I'm wondering if this is why I see so many people painting minis as sub-assemblies...




I didn't like either of the helmets this model comes with, and I wanted a bare head with a hood. I picture him as having been a scout / ranger type before Sigmar took him. So I've jumped on the greenstuff bandwagon too, and made a head. First human head I've sculpted in a very, very long time (been doing too many mice and badgers and stuff...), but it all came back to me pretty quickly, and I like it!
Just have to paint it without spoiling it now...



cheers,
Michael

So I already painted some really cool stuff in December, but neglected to take "before" pictures. My painting schedule is often up in the air and inspiration is often feast or famine. But since I started painting this guy already, I might as well drop him in here as a "before" pic.



With any luck, I'll get him finished on time. If anything else comes up, I'll just have to try to remember to tale pictures before painting.

Here's a quick WIP shot of the Exorcist:

Still looks pretty rough, but it's a start. It'll look better once I get the wood railing/panels basecoated, plus some more of the metallics.

 Lovejoy wrote:

Geifer wrote:It's the merry season so I'm going to paint this happy couple:

Lovely bit of putty work there!

Thanks. You did a pretty neat job on your ranger, too.

 Lovejoy wrote:
Anyway, I've got my entry built. I have a few doubts though, as some bits look like they'll be very hard to reach, even to undercoat, never mind paint. I'm wondering if this is why I see so many people painting minis as sub-assemblies...

Presumably it's easier if you're unsure whether you can reach every part to just paint sub-assemblies by default. In my experience most GW models are pretty friendly to people like me who don't usually bother with sub-assemblies. I don't remember a GW model with cape or robes or similar where I had to leave a visible blank spot. The tricky part isn't to get the brush or paint in, but to not mess up the surrounding areas. It doesn't hurt to get your painting order sorted out ahead of time.

Not that I always remember to follow my own advice, mind you...

I have so many different things I want to paint for this round I can't decide which to do!

Definitely want to paint up an inquisitor greyfax, but I've also got a sororitas kill team I want to get at least some models painted for. Then I've got all my aspect wraithlords still to paint, a ton of various eldar, with some really nice character models to do, lots of exodite conversions and a whole corsair army to follow my recently painted corsair prince. Not to mention my 1995 Warhammer Quest set - plus extras!

When it comes down to it, though, I might just paint a primaris librarian...

OK, I’m going to phone it in a bit this month. Not a lot of energy/motivation. Took me a week to get together enough umph to pick something. Primary goal is to get the parasite done. One model, should be doable. Secondary is as many ripper swarms as I can. Just finished cleaning 3 more, but would need to prime them.

Keep at it Nev; the competition is working if it gets you to paint even one thing

I think I’ll try to finish off these Plague Marines that have been sitting in my painting area for a while.

Okay, inspiration is a fickle and ephemeral thing. I'm working on this too, so I thought I should put it in here in case it gets finished.



Some of you may be familiar with my sci-fi miniature webcomic, 28mm; I'm planning on a fantasy counterpart sometime in 2023.
This is three different models of one of the potential protagonists.

Ooh, nice. Looking forward to seeing them done 👍
Remarkably, my entry is done! "Spacer's Little Helpers": Auxiliaries from the Core Space: Wanted - Dead or Alive expansion

An assault hound (PUH-ppy!), a cargo drone, utility drone, a Gurnrit (a little pack animal) and a gun drone - for all that it's quite a grubby, lived-in universe, I wanted that in particular to feel sleek, as they're very expensive bits of kit in game, often used by scary-as$ bounty hunters.

Really enjoyed these wee dudes.

I figure that at this time of year have a group of Little Helpers is fitting

I particularly love the Utility Drone. Inspired by Xero from Star Trek Prodigy.

And the Beasties! Auxiliaries are pretty much essential in game as your crew size is limited - and require pay! So they're a fitting Xmas gift to all my trader scum and Villainous scrappers.

I spent some time making a scenic base for the dragon:



The bark, sand, and stones all came from the side of the house. Once the mod podge is fully dry, I'll hit it with the gesso and start the painting process for real.

Well he's in enough of one piece that I guess I'll see him through this month - a proper proof photo (I mean, the last photo most of these parts were still in different boxes, by that logic you could just photograph the shelves at a GW store and call it a universal proof pic) of Doomrider, who I like enough to want in my warband, but not enough to bother getting the actual mini off ebay.

I am pretty much finished with the base: