A miscellany of miniatures - 29/5 - Finished Grim Ironjaw, BB Star Player

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**Dysartes**

I'd say it is about time for a third attempt at a painting logo on here - my first two have lain fallow for long enough.

I've not picked up a brush in anger this year, as far as I can remember, so I need to get myself back in gear. I plan to join in with the second stage of Azazelx's "Tale of Many Gamers" piece once we get to July, so want to get myself back in the game before then.

Rather than starting with some of the large pile of WIP I have kicking around the place, I figure I'll start with some clean slates. I picked up the following models, amongst others, when I attended my local show last month:

Going clockwise from the top we have:
- Reaper Bones Mocking Beast (a Mimic by any other name would smell as sweet)
- Black Scorpion Miniatures Ogre Star Player
- Black Scorpion Miniatures Dwarf Noble
- Lead Adventure Fargrim Dragonaxe, The King of the Grey Mountains
- West Wind Queen Victoria with Gatling Gun for Empire of the Dead

The two Dwarves are in there to be painted up and reviewed for an article on my blog, while the others just interested me.

My first step back will be clean-up and basing, but before I can do the latter, I need to track down my spare bases. I plan to put the two Dwarves on 20mm square bases, in case I decide to play WFHB at some point; my Blood Bowl team is on WM-style bases, so I need to dig out a 40mm round for the Ogre; and I'm sure I have a suitable resin base for Her Majesty kicking around somewhere. Guess what I'm up to this evening...

**Dysartes**

Well, I'd say last night counted as a partial success. I found a bag of 20mm square bases without slots in them, which will do for the two Dwarf models. I found multiple bags with 40mm lipped bases in, so the Ogre is sorted.

Unfortunately, I had less luck with the resin base I was looking for for Queen Victoria - I was sure that I had a set of 30mm Cobblestone bases from Dragon Forge Design kicking around somewhere. This WIP image of Maulgrun Boldridge from 2012 shows him on one, so they're somewhere - but somewhere out of my reach for now.

Fortunately, I've been able to find an alternative in one of my many boxes of tricks - a set of dockside bases from Model Display Products, which features a curved brick/tile/slab design which I think should look effective under Her Majesty if I can't find the Dragon Forge bases I'm looking for.

I'll have another look through various bags, boxes and shelves today, but if I can't find the resin bases I'm looking for, I'll go with this one. I may even use one from the same set for the Mocking Beast, to represent the slabs of stone making up a dungeon floor.

No pictures this time, but hopefully I'll have some progress to show for my next update, rather than just talking about it.

**Azazelx**

A bit of planning before hitting the paint never hurt. I await the next update!

**Dysartes**

Thanks for that, Azazelx - always motivational to know that someone is going to be checking up on you.

As I mentioned in my last update, I'd creatively mis-placed some resin bases from Dragon Forge Design that I was planning to use on Queen Vic - I've spent a number of evenings lookign through parts of my storage room, to no avail.

I have managed to pretty much fill a container with bases of various shapes, sizes and materials, but not the ones I've been looking for. I've also kept finding random purchases in there, such as a box of Hasslefree models that I swear I don't recall ordering. Methinks the next couple of months have a larger project in the works, and that I may be ordering a couple of cases from KR Multicase to sort my storage of painted models out.

Bases, sah! Fah-sands of 'em!

In terms of preparation, some of these guys were easier than others. Fargrim Dragonaxe just needed his axe straightening out and a small burr removing from the back of it, and he could be glued into a square base from my stash. Having listened to some reviews of figures made in Reaper Bones, I was expecting to have to could mould lines of every side of the Mocking Beast - but there was just the one small one to trim off, before I pinned him to a resin base. I am going to need to come back with some Liquid Green Stuff for a spot of gap-filling, as either the base of the bottom of the Beast isn't flat. With a bit of work, I may even be able to get it to look like it is emerging from the stone floor.

Queen Vic involved a bit more work - while there was a little flash on the gatling gun, the main work was removing the tab from underneath her so she could be mounted onto the resin base. Previously, I've been OK using clippers to remove these, but wasn't getting much traction. Fortunately, I remembered a GF9 razor saw I'd picked up to do an arm switch between a Cygnar Hunter & Grenadier (if I switch the melee weapons, I can have a bit of variety) which I'd never gotten to. Once I found the flaming thing, it only took a couple of minutes to remove the tab carefully with the saw. A spot of filing later, and she was ready for a pin - again, despite sitting flat on my laptop, QV wasn't sitting flat on the base, so I suspect the issue is with the bases, not my models. As a result, there's a gap at the back between her dress and the ground - not sure what I'm going to do about that yet.

Having had a look at the two Black Scorpion figures, I started off by giving them a wash in some warm water, with a bit of a scrub from an old toothbrush I keep for when stripping paint from metal figures. This had two benefits - it removed any release agent that may have been lurking with intent, and the brush was a fairly gentle way of removing any thin flash that was attached. Once they'd dried, I went back with a modelling knife (with the new blade I'd fitted ready to work with Bones), and tidied up any remaining flash and mould lines.

While the prep for them was going on, I cut a strip from the blsiter backing sheet from Queen Vic, and used it to cover the slot in a 40mm lipped round, ready for the Ogre. Unfortunately, when test-fitting the Ogre to the base, I realised that his stance was ever-so-slightly too wide to get both feet on the flat part of the base. Some swearing later, I decided to file down the rim on one side, until he was stood roughly level. I had been planning on putting the BS Dwarf on a 20mm square base as well, but he comes with a section of resin cast around his feet, like a really old-school metal figure. As a result, I put that idea on hold, and glued him to the 30mm lipped round he came with.

The Ogre's spiked fist was pinned into place once cleaned up.

With all the prep done, I based the Ogre and the two Dwarf models with my usual sand mix and PVA, adding a second layer of sand for the BS Noble to try to offset the resin chunk he is stood on. I'm letting stuff dry at the minute, but intend to seal the sand on the three with watered-down PVA either tonight or tomorrow morning, and then undercoat them either tomorrow morning of evening (depending on when the PVA has dried by. I'm working from home on Tuesday, so hope to be able to start some brushwork then.

Progress update picture:

One point as a counter to my progress - I caved in and picked up Star Wars: Imperial Assault with some earned store credit last week. As a result, the stack of miniatures-based board games I'll be looking to work at come the second half of the year looks a little like this:
- Star Wars: Imperial Assault
- Iron Kingdoms: Unleashed [The starter set for the RPG - not technically a boardgame, but close enough]
- Iron Kingdoms: Undercity
- SDE v1.0
- SDE Forgotten King
- Dungeon Saga KS pack (with the expansions)

I suspect I'll be a bit busy when we kick off...

**Dysartes**

Paint has happened! Honest!

As I mentioned in my last update, I undercoated the Infamous Five when I got back from work and my RPG session on Monday evening - then remembered to glue the Dwarf Noble's shield to a cocktail stick and undercoat that on Tuesday morning. Once dry, I went back over everyone with thinned P3 Thamar Black to cover any spots the Chaos Black spray missed.

Starting with the bases, with temporary coats for now - these should end up being the "core" of whatever I fish with on the bases. The stone ones got a thinned coat of P3 Bastion Grey, while the earth ones got a coat of P3 Battlefield Brown.

I followed up with starting on the flesh of three of the figures - I'm leaving the Ogre's flesh for now. While I've been working from home, I've been watching (or listening to) a lot of videos from Doctor Faust's Painting Clinic, including several talking through how he does flesh tones. Given the amount of skin on the Ogre, this seems a good time to experiment. The two Dwarfs and Queen Vic got two thinned coats of P3 Midlund Flesh, followed by a wash of Reikland Fleshshade. Once the wash dried, I went back and applied some small highlights with P3 Ryn Flesh.

Which was a mistake, as it was far too light after the wash - and we'll ignore the fact that I'm not very good at painting skin or faces. I think I'll try to tone down the highlights, probably with a Midlund/Ryn mix, possibly followed by a second wash.

Obligatory WIP group shot:

Having said that about the flesh, it doesn't look as bad in this picture...

**Theophony**

I wasn't going to post in here cause i don't have a cat avatar

, but those faces are great, will be interested in seeing what else you have coming.

**Azazelx**

I can supply you with any number of cat pictures for your avater, Theo. Just let me know what you're after!

I actually quite like that flesh tone, Dysartes. Well, it looks good against the black primer, at least. Once you start adding more colours it'll (probably) seem less bright, so maybe that would be a better time to modify it?

Oh, and Dysartes. Just remember:

**Dysartes**

@Theophony - I assure you that a cat avatar is not a requirement for posting in here. Heck, I normally browse with avatars and signatures turned off, so I have no idea what other people are using.

@Azazelx - If Leonard is watching me, what's he doing about his day job? Thar darned mouse'll be in the cheese again!

I've decided to leave the flesh tone alone for now, but I may come back to it later - it is growing on me.

After doing a spot of tidying up around the flesh where I'd gotten a little messy (mainly on the Dwarf heads) with some Thamar Black, as well as around the bottom of Queen Vic's robe, I decided to do something that'd get the Mocking Beast moving, and decided to paint some wood.

Fairly simple process, aided by the fact that he - and both Dwarf weapons - have woodgrain as part of the sculpt. Process was pretty simple:

- Basecoat P3 Battlefield Brown
- Dry(ish)brush P3 Gun Corps Brown with the edge of the brush along the grain where possible
- Repeat with P3 Rucksack Tan
- Wash with Devlan Mud (yes, I still have some, and no, yuo can't have it...) - not slathering it on, but a careful layer.

At this point, I'm really quite happy with the wood - I may need to come back later for some additional highlights, especially on the Beast, but it'll do for now:

Got wood?

Looking at Victoria next, I decided to do a little research online - surprisingly, I didn't find that many painted images of this figure. There was the concept art on the West Wind site (which seems to be mirror compared to the final sculpt), while the only painted one I was able to find was in a blog post where the chap was using her in a diorama. Fortunately, those images were enough to correct me on a couple of points - I'd originally thought the apron at the front would be white, for example, but it looks like the intention is for just her veil to make it that light.

Amusingly, I find myself in a similar situation with Fargrim Dragonaxe, the Lead Adventure model - it is a little strange to be painting without references. Someone has removed my safety net...

Given I've having problems getting the Vallejo metallics I'm after locally, I think I'll go with my usual metal techniques, assuming my Citadel metallics haven't dried up since I last used them, anyway.

**Dysartes**

Interesting - say there's something you're not happy with, and people respond. Say you're happy with something you've done, and get radio silence...

Anyway, I've made some progress in the last few days, mainly on the Mocking Beast and Queen Victoria.

As I noted in my last post, I abandoned the "new metal" idea, as my LGSs seem to b running low on the Vallejo colours I was after. While I did manage a raid on one of them yesterday, and picked up a couple of golds and the VMA Chrome, there was no sign of Gun Metal or Steel. Did manage to grab some of the colours I needed for the Beast, though - more on that later.

Following the success of the wood (in my mind, at least), I decided to get some of the metalwork done, starting with silver metals. For Queen Vic and the Beast, that was fairly straightforward - gun barrels for QV, metal framing for the MB. The two Dwarf figures and the Ogre were a little less simple, as I'm still deciding which bits of metal I want in which colour - and in the case of the Ogre, whether some bits are metal or stone.

For the areas I knew would be steel(ish), I basecoated with GW Boltgun Metal, followed by a wash of Nuln Oil (on QV and the Beast only - I'll wash the steel on the Dwarves and Ogre when I'm happy I've painted it all). No highlight at this stage, though I may come back and add some later.

"He ain't heavy, he's an Ogre..."
"No, Alfred, he is both an Ogre and rather heavy."

At this point I turned my attention fully to Vic and the Beast, and I'll return to t'other three once these two are done.

With the steel out of the way, I moved onto the gold. When I came back to painting in 2010, I tried out a few new techniques, and one of these was to use the new (at the time) washes to tint a silver metallic into a different colour. As I recall, I picked this technique up from an article on The Painting Corps, and it has been my main technique for gold(ish) metallics since. I may try returning to using actual gold on a couple of models now, though, given I picked up a couple of the VGC golds from one LGS yesterday.

Anyway, the gold was pretty simple. Basecoat with GW Chainmail, then apply two mid-to-heavy washes of GW Seraphim Sepia wash over the top. Again, I'm considering a highlight, but leaving it for now.

The final bit I worked on yesterday was the Beast's tongue and Vic's sash. Both got a basecoat of VGC Royal Purple, and then I worked the tongue up with two highlights, adding some VMC Ivory to the mix to lighten the purple. I would've done the same to Vic's sash at the same time, but I noticed a bit of flash on her shoulder I missed, so had to remove it and rebasecoat. The sash was then highlighted with the same method this afternoon.

If there is one thing the Mocking Beast should be noticable for, it is its teeth, so I worked on them next, along with the skull in its mouth. A layer of P3 Gun Corps Brown served as the basecoat, followed by P3 Jack Bone and the realisation that there was a fething mould line across the teeth - were this plastic or metal, I'd deal with it, but as it is Bones I'm going to avoid the hassle and leave it. Final step for today was to try to use some Army Painter Dark Tone Ink to help increase the definition between the teeth - first time I've used it, and I'm not sure I'd shaken it enough. I'll see how it looks after it has had time to dry overnight.

Next steps? Tidy up the Beast's teeth, then work on the gums, the area where it is arising from the ground, and the floor itself. I have blocked the eyes in with P3 Jack Bone, but I might just go back and re-wood those, as I dislike painting eyes. That should finish the Beast off. Vic needs the area just above her sash touching up with black, then her black clothing highlighting, the small area of hair painting (probably light grey) and the veil working on.

I'll keep thinking about where I want which metals on the other three before I so any more on them.

@Theophony - You said you'd be interested in what I'm going to work on next. I think I have an answer for you, though I'm not sure how interesting it is - a wall section from the Garden of Morr to go with the statue from the set I painted in... 2013? Really? Wow...

The other model I've unearthed to work on is a metal character model from Mantic for the Corporation faction of their Warpath game - though I can't now see him anywhere on their site, which is odd. For those of you who may remember the range, he's in some sort of trenchcoat over armour, no helmet, with a pistol in one hand and his sword over his shoulder. I need to attach the arms and sort his basing out, then he can get primed at the same time as the wall section.

**Azazelx**

Dysartes wrote:

@Azazelx - If Leonard is watching me, what's he doing about his day job? Thar darned mouse'll be in the cheese again!

Interlopers aren't suffered to live. Leonard's pretty strict about that, and he runs a tight ship in that regard.

I really like the tones you've achieved with that wood. I'm going to steal the recipe, and then see if I have the correct P3 paints. And if not, I'll have to buy them. I usually just mail order my paints. Have you considered a small order to firestorm or one of the others who have fast turnaround and live stock updates? For metals and highlights, I find that doing a highlight before washing with black works well. Sometimes I still do a final highlight, but even when I don't, there's a highlight "in there" which is obviously much more subtle under the wash, but sometimes that's what the model needs.

QV and the Mimic are looking good as well so far.

**Dysartes**

@Azazelx - I shall take care to stay on Leonard's good side.

Well, I think I've polished off the Mocking Beast...

I'm still unsure about the teeth, particularly in MegaZoomVision (TM), but I'm happy with the gums.

So, what needed doing after my last picture?
- Sepia wash on the roots of the teeth
- Highlighted the teeth and eyes with VGC Ivory
- Basecoated the top of the "root" of the Beast with VGC Royal Purple
- Basecoated the gums (and the lower half of the "root") in a couple of layers of VGC Warlord Purple
- Attempted a wet blend in the "root" between the last two steps
- Highlighted the gums and root with a mix of the Purple and Panzer Aces Flesh Base
- Highlighted the gums and root again with a mix of the Purple and Panzer Aces Flesh Highlight
- Added pupils to the eyes with VMC German Grey

I may need to tidy the base (and teeth) up a touch, but for now, I think I can call him done.

Got a little work done on Queen Victoria when the right colours were on my pallette.
- Highlighted Victoria's hair and dress with VMC German Grey

OK, not a lot, but a little. I think I need to work on my cloth highlighting, though I think they look better in person than in this picture *shrug*

I've also added a third figure to my second group - the Goblin Shaman from Heresy Miniatures. He's currently glued into his base, but he does need basing (as does the Corporation Officer).

**Azazelx**

German Grey? That's not very appropriate for a British Monarch! Oh wait...

The not-Mimic looks good. I wouldn't stress about the teeth - everything looks dodgy when blown up to massive-o-size. The actual model is smaller than most of those individual teeth in the image, after all.

**Dysartes**

Well, this is going well, isn't it? Over a month since an update...

Still, I've signed up to Azazelx's Tale thread, and I think I have a plan in mind.

As I mentioned in that thread, I'm going to be working on board game figures, and I've decided that to prevent myself getting stuck in a rut, I'm going to mix up which game or games I'm working on at a time.

My initial thought is to work on the Iron Kingdoms: Unleashed intro box (which I know is a RPG, not a board game), along with my copy of SDE: Forgotten King. If I can accomplish something from each of them each month, I'll be happy, with the possibility of progressing from Unleashed to Undercity if I get it finished.

My next trick will be digging them both out, taking a look at the figures, and sorting out something suitable for a short month in July, as I'll be away for the last week or so.

Hopefully I'll be back before the end of July with some sort of update...

**Dysartes**

So... planning phase.

I've decided that I'm going to start off working on the figures from the Iron Kingdoms Unleashed Roleplaying Game Adventure Kit and Super Dungeon Explore: Forgotten King as my initial two games. I figure getting one "set" of fogires out of the way for each in a month is a reasonable goal.

For those who aren't aware, here's what is in each box.

Iron Kingdoms Unleashed:

Spoiler:

SDE: Forgotten King:

Spoiler:

July is a bit of a short month for me, as I'm away for a week at the end of the month. As a result, I'm not looking to be too ambitious in the first month of this Tale. As a result, I think my initial goals will be:

IK: Unleashed - 2 Razor Boars
SDE: Forgotten King - Either the Old-Growth Hollow Spawning Points or the Trasure Chests, once I've had a better look at the Spawning Points. If I do the Treasure Chests, I'll also bundle in the one I have from a metal SDE Dwarf, and possibly the ones from my SDE 1.0 set. Pretty repetitive work in that case, but it'll bulk them out a bit.

This is the first time I've worked with the IK board game plastic, and I can see it is going to be more of a pain than the plastic kits. There are clear injection sites on the back of the bases for the Razor Boars, but attempts at cleaning them up with clippers (for the big bits) and a file don't seem to have worked. Time to break out the modelling knife, methinks...

The IK:U figures are also fairly shiny, making me suspect the presence of release agent, so they'll be getting a warm water bath before basing/undercoating. The polearms for the Slaughterhouses will need straightening out as well, and I may need to break out the Liquid Green Stuff for a couple of gaps on some of the figures.

Anyway - why am I doing the Razor Boars first? Well, this won't be the first time I've painted Razor Boars, though obviously these won't be metal. In fact, I'm now wondering if I got the heads on my metal ones the wrong way round. Fortunately, it means I've got a pretty good idea what I need to do to get these painted up - I figure I have a reasonable shot at getting the pair done in a week, once the prep work is done...

**Dysartes**

MOAR PREP WORK!!11!!1!

I gave the IK:U figures a bath in warm water and a bit of a scrub with a toothbrush to try to remove any release agent I was surprised how quickly elements gained flexibility - maybe straightening out some of these parts won't be so bad after all.

Once everything had dried overnight, I went back and used liquid green stuff to roughly fill in the area on the back of the base rim where the injection point had been. Once it had cured for a few hours, I went back with a file and got it roughly back into shape. Some PVA and sand was used to add texture to the base, with a layer of watered-down PVA applied to seal the basing material.

I decided to go with the treasure chests for SDE in the end. There were five in each set, plus the one I had from the metal Dwarf, for a total of eleven. I also got the five Boo Booty markers (which look a bit like Mimics) out at the same time, as I figure I'll be using a similar colour palette - they can be a stretch goal for the month.

The chests are in a different plastic to the Booty markers (which seem to be in the same plastic as the monsters from each game), and needed some clean up to get rid of injection sites and mould lines. They're not perfect now, but they should be good enough. There was an airbubble on the rear bottom corner of one of them that I'll be leaving alone, while I did use some liquid green stuff to fill the tiny bubbles on two of the Boo Booty markers from Forgotten King.

Everything is now ready to undercoat, so assuming nothing goes wrong tonight, I'll get 'em all sprayed, then be ready to start work on them tomorrow or Sunday. At the last minute, I added a fence section from the Garden of Morr to the undercoat set, as it'd been waiting for an undercoat for a while now.

**Dysartes**

I'm pretty sure y'all don't need me to talk you through undercoating - spray from four sides, leave to dry, realise you were spraying from above so lie everything on its back and spray carefully to catch recesses, then brush paint the recesses on the fourth side rather than spray again. Once I was sure everything was dry (and black as Azazelx's soul), it was time to start work.

Razor Boars

Getting the simple steps out of the way first, I painted the sand on the base with P3 Battlefield Brown, which is my standard basing colour. The longer fur/main/hair/whatever-you-want-to-call-it got a not-very-neat basecoat of P3 Umbral Umber, which will get drybrushed down the line for some contrast. The skin areas got a careful(ish) layer of P3 Beast Hide, with special care paid to the ears and snout. Didn't want to get Beast Hide on Beast Hair, now did I?

Garden of Morr Wall

The stone pillars and fence framing got a thinned basecoat of P3 Bastion Grey. I tend to find this makes for a good neutral grey that takes washes well. The "base" section got a coat of P3 Battlefield Brown, though at this point I realised I should probably have applied basing material to this area. Oh, well, in for a penny, etc...

There were some areas which I went back over with P3 Greatcoat Grey to be chunks of slate in the mud, which should tie it in a bit with my current Garden of Morr statue, currently the only bit of the set to have been painted.

SDE Treasure Chests

I'm on the fence a little with these - do I go realistic, or do I try for the cartoony style seen in the game art. More research required, at present. As it is, all I've done is paint the base on the chest that is based with P3 Bastion Grey, ready for a wash, so it looks like stonework.

Current progress:

**Dysartes**

MOAR PROGRESS!11!!1!?

Given I'm working from home a lot at the moment, I can get away with taking short breaks to do a spot of breaking as a way of letting my eyes rest from looking at the screen. This means I gets to progress while I work...

Razor Boars

I was going to pick up by basecoating the armour, but realised that I needed to drybrush the fur first, so game it a drybrush of P3 Bloodstone for a bit of a ginger tinge, and to bring out the fur texture. I may go back to a couple of areas with a lighter tone again, but for now, that should be enough.

Once that had dried, I went straight to picking out the armour elements, using VMA Rust. The intention here is to then drybrush (or wetbrush) a steelish metallic over the top, followed by a brown or black wash. This was the first time I'd used one of the VMA metallics, and I'm pretty impressed with it, though things ended up very shiny. Once the Rust had dried, I did a wettish drybrush of Boltgun Metal over it, trying to leave the Rust showing in the recesses.

The tusks got a basecoat of P3 Gun Corps Brown, followed by P3 Jack Bone, trying to leave some brown in the recesses.

Garden of Morr Wall

With basecoats in place on the framing elements, I turned my attention to the metal fence itself. As with the armour on the boars, I tried out VMA Rust for a basecoat, with the intention of a dry/wetbrush of steel (or equivalent over the top). I followed through with the intention, using Boltgun Metal in a slightly dryer wettish drybrush compared to the Razor Boars - I need some new terminology here...

The skulls in the fences were then painted in a similar fashion to the Razor Boar tusks. I also went back and tided up the Bastion Gre where I had been a touch careless with the metallics so far.

Super Dungeon Explore

Doing a Google Image Search for "Super dungeon explore chest" was one of those moments where you hope the Internet hasn't corrupted something. Fortunately, the search results weren't as scary as I thought they might have been. There were quite a few examples done in a cartoon/comic style, and quite a lot of NMM floating around. Equally, some people had the sense to use proper metallics, and there were even some painted to look like wood, shockingly enough.

Now I've done my research, I may be able to make a start on 'em...

Progress Pictures
Stage 1

Stage 2

Stage 3

**Azazelx**

I haven't even thought of starting my SDE stuff yet. Too many bloody miniature & mini-boardgame kickstarters, I tells ya.

Good call on the difficulty on picking a style for the SDE chests. Going for a bright, cartoony style that fits in more with SDE, or more generic so you can use them for most any game. On top of that, do you base them all, or leave them unbased like typical scenery pieces.

Great progress on the piggies and the Morr walls. You can always add sand to the bases of the walls at any stage - and flock goes on last of course, so you're covered whichever way you decide to go.

**Dysartes**

I haven't decided if I'll go back and add texture to the Morr wall or not, yet - it is something I normally do before undercoating, and there looks to be a level on the edge where you want to leave it untextured so the bits will fit together.

So, what did I end up finishing for month 1 of the Tale?

SDE - 4 Treasure Chests
IK:RPG - 2 Razor Boars

Not quite as much as I was hoping for, but more than I had finished year -to-date. What did I do after the last pictures?

Razor Boars
- Wash the skin, silver metallics and tusks with GW Agrax Earthshade (trying it in place of Devlan Mud for once)
- Picked out one earring and one piercing on the back with GW Chainmail
- Washed said item with GW Seraphim Sepia, for a gold effect
- Picked out remaining piercings on the Boar's back with VMA Rust

Treasure Chests
I ended up painting these four inside a 18 hour period, starting one evening and finishing the following morning. I opted to started with the chests which have wood grain carved into the surface.

- Basecoat wood with P3 Gun Corps Brown
- Wash with Agrax Earthshade
- Pick out steel with VMA Steel (very shiny...)
- Wash steel with Nuln Oil
- Pick out padlock with a VGC Gold (can't remember which one, but will come back and edit this when I'm at home and can check) - I felt an actual gold paint, rather than my Sepia over Silver approach would fit better with the SDE look.

What're my plans for August, at the moment?
For next month, I'm going to be slightly more ambitious with my goals:
SDE - Remaining chests + 5 Boo Booty
IK: RPG - 4 Farrow Brigands
Misc. - Finish Garden of Morr wall segment; 6mm Castle Keep from Leven Miniatures; Hermann's Tortoise from Oathsworn Miniatures

**Dysartes**

...I last posted here in July, huh? Whoops. Looks like I'd set myself quite a hefty goal for August, too.

Safe to say, I didn't meet that goal - though I did manage one part.

August's output:

Yup, three SDE treasure chests - the resin ones, rather than the plastic ones. I was trying to give the impression of stone chests with these three, so used greys as their base tone (Bastion and Ironhull, from the P3 line) washed with Nuln Oil. The steel elements were VMA Steel, also washed with Nuln Oil. The gold padlock was VGC Glorious Gold, with a little Leviathan Purple wash over the top. Finally, the different gold band over the top of the chest was based with GW Chainmail, then washed a few times with Seraphim Sepia.

With three more chests out of the way. September saw me tackle the last four, and a dash of Booty:

Red chests started off with a basecoat of VMC Cavalry Brown, with P3 Khador Red Base as a highlight - this was then washed with GW Agrax Earthshade. The steel was GW Boltgun Metal washed with Nuln Oil, while the gold skulls and padlock were VGC Glorious Gold washed with Leviathan Purple again.

The Boo Booty models were a pain, both because some of the detail was soft, and because I keep finding flaming mold lines that I couldn't see when I started painting - and I'd hit the point of just wanting to get them done. In terms of methodology:
- Wood: P3 Gun Corps Brown washed with Agrax Earthshade
- Gold: VGC Glorious Gold washed with Leviathan Purple
- Steel: GW Boltgun Metal washed with Nuln Oil
- Tongue: VMC Royal Purple with the centre crease washed with Leviathan Purple
- Teeth: P3 Gun Corps Brown as a base, with P3 Jack Bone over the top

I may come back to add some further highlights to the tongue and/or teeth, but I need to leave them for a while first.

I'm going to take a break from the board game models for a month in October, and take a look at one Kickstarter haul instead - in particular, some of the Dark Dwarves I got from Macrocosm Miniatures. I know I want to get the character out of the way, then I'll probably look to paint up one of the 5 man units as well.

**Captain Brown**

Dysartes,

Nice Treasure Chests and Razor Boars. I think that a highlight on the teeth will definitely add some pop.

Cheers,

CB

**Dysartes**

Thanks Captain - I was thinking a Jack Bone/VMC Ivory mix as a highlight on the four "canines", and maybe on the very tips of the other teeth, along with a Royal Purple/Ivory mix as a highlight to the tongues.

As noted, though, I'd reached the point where I just wanted to Get. Them. Done - so I'll leave them for a little while, and come back to them alter

**Dysartes**

And as evidence that I'm still painting, here's a WIP of the Dark Dwarf Mage from Macrocosm:

The gold is my usual gold-free technique, the robe is VMC Royal Purple (only one coat in this shot, but I have now gone back and evened out the basecoat), while the boots are VMA Steel washed with Nuln Oil.

I'm happy with the boots & helmet - next stage is shading & highlighting the cloak, and considering whether an eye-glow effect might be an idea.

Oh, and painting his hair...

**Dysartes**

It turns out that one of the two wargames shops in my city have begun holding a Hobby Evening on a Friday, so I decided to pop down with a bunch of stuff I needed to assemble, and some models I could get some basic painting elements done on.

Got there about 6:15pm, left at about 11pm, and in that time I managed to...
- Touch up the undercoat and basecoat the bases for four Oathsworn Burrows & Badgers figures
- Assemble Hammer and Strongbox for Guild Ball, as well as partially assembling Tater (I wanted to look at some reference pics of how to attach his scythe, as it looked like it could be delicate)
- Assemble an Arcane Tempest Rifleman, a Swamp Gobber Chef and three Swamp Gobber River Raiders for Warmahordes
- Partially assemble the hand weapon and shield Dark Dwarves from Macrocosm - I've left the shields off for now, and I needed to drill out a socket on one axe arm
- Build three Otherworld D&D figures (two Dwarves and a Halfling)

I foresee a basing session this week, along with a spot of undercoating (having acquired a new Chaos Black spray), with a view to doing more painting and less building if it is on again on Friday.

**Dysartes**

Another week passes, and some progress is made.

During the week, I managed to go through and base all the figures I'd assembled at the previous week's hobby evening, along with a couple of other Guild Ball figures that had been assembled for a while. I also conducted repairs on Harmony and the KS Honour, as bits had fallen off at some point. I also managed to assemble Chisel and Wrecker, as well as basing them, so I believe that means I have a complete assembled Mason's Guild team, before anything else gets released. I also figured out what the issue was with Tater's scythe - I'd missed a slot on his shin where a tab on the scythe connected - though I needed to trim Tab A down a little so it'd fit in Slot B. That's gives me a couple of batches of figures ready to undercoat - and while I could make a start on that, I may need to wait...

...because a couple of orders I made recently turned up. One of those was a batch from Oathsworn, including a replacement Hermann's Tortoise, while the other was from Anvil Industries. I was impressed by the speed on both orders - they were placed last Sat/Sun, both sent me a shipping confirmation on Monday, the AI order turned up on Tuesday, while the Oathsworn order arrived on Wednesday. Given I'm part way through writing a review of the Tortoise for my blog, and I only emailed Jo there about that miscast on Sunday, that's great service.

What miscast, I hear you say? Here, let me (hopefully) show you, with the benefit of non-flash photography...

I really should've noticed that before I started painting, but somehow I'd managed to convince myself it was fine. Jobs for today include cleaning up and basing the replacement (along with a couple of other Oathsworn figures I picked up), so I can try to undercoat them by mid-week and get (re-)started on painting Hermann to get the review completed.

Friday evening marked another hobby evening at my NSLBFGS, and this time I went down with the intent of getting my paint on - though I then forgot to pack most of the paints I intended to use on the Dark Dwarf Mage

On the other hand, I did manage to have a discussion with the staff member (and good painter) on the subject of shading purple, so I have some better pointers on how to cope with the deeper crevices on the Mage. Shading them (and dealing with his hair) are on the docket for today, I think.

Various bits of the four WIP models from Oathsworn got worked on, as did the four Dark Crossbowdwarves - here's some updated WIP shots as of this morning:

Let's see if I can recall what I did on Friday, as I wasn't making notes...

Crossbows
- Basecoated the crossbows with P3 Gun Corps Brown.
- Robes on two basecoated with P3 Battlefield Brown
- Helmets had previously been basecoated with VMA Steel

Oathsworn
- Frog fixer - skin basecoated with P3 Traitor Green
- Squirrel rogue - knife hilts and guards basecoated with Citadel Chainmail. Fur basecoated with P3 Bloodstone.
- Hare Warrior - elements to be gold basecoated with Citadel Chainmail (grail detail on chest, guard and pommel on sword). Need to figure out decent colours for a greyish brown hair fur colour.
- Pug (the) bounty hunter - Armour basecoated with a Bloodstone/Battlefield Brown mix (roughly 1:1). Undertunic basecoated with VMC Cavaly Brown (though it has ended up a bit shiny). Wooden club basecoated with Battlefield Brown, then drybrushed with Gun Corps Brown.

**Dysartes**

Made some more progress on the Oathsworn group yesterday:

Frog fixer - Used P3 Bootstrap Leather to basecoat his belt & pouches.

Pug bounty hunter - Used Bootstrap Leather on the strap across his chest/back, and the small strap leading from his knee armour. Lightly drybrushed/sidebrushed/highlighted the wood texture on his club with P3 Rucksack Tan.

Hare Warrior - Washed the Chainmail elements (grail, guard, pommel) three times with Citadel Seraphim Sepia to get a gold tone. Used P3 Bootstrap Leather on the wrap around his sword handle.

Squirrel Rogue - Washed his fur with Citadel Agrax Earthshade twice (the second wash may still be wet in this picture). Used two coats of Seraphim Sepia over the Chainmail on the pommel and hits of his daggers.

While I had the Bootstrap Leather out, I also used it on the quivers of the three Dark Dwarves that have them. The Dark Dwarf Mage also had some surgical use of Agrax Earthshade on some recesses/dents on his helm - though neither of these are enough to warrant an additional picture, I don't think.

**Captain Brown**

Oathsworn are starting to look like real people...I mean animals.

Cheers,

CB

**Dysartes**

Thanks Captain - I'm really enjoying the sculpts, and the Badger Mercenary I got in an order last week is a bit of a beast...

Further progress has been made - on two of the figures, at least.

Macrocosm - Dark Dwarf Mage

Added more shade to the robes - firstly with a Leviathan Purple/Nuln Oil mix (roughly 1:1), then straight Nuln Oil in the deepest recesses. Used a variety of greys to bring his hair up in shade, then washed it with Nuln Oil. There may have been some Agrax Earthshade used on the dent in his helm and in a couple of recesses, too.

To do - highlight hair with VMC Ivory, highlight robe with a mix of Royal Purple & Ivory, decided if I want to have red eyes or leave them black.

Oathsworn - Red Squirrel Rogue

After washing the fur, I brought it back up with a straight P3 Bloodstone drybrush, followed by a lighter one with a mix of Bloodstone and P3 Ember Orange (2:1, I think). With that dry, I basecoated the lighter fur with a mix of P3 Jack Bone and VMC Ivory - the marks on the face and hands were painted on, while the arms were stippled.

A bit of rogue white was touched up with Bloodstone washed with Agrax Earthshade, then the white was highlighted with straight Ivory.

Next steps: Eyes & claws to get P3 Coal Black, bracelet on far wrist to get either VMA Steel or Citadel Boltgun Metal (either way, washed with Nuln Oil), then figure out the robe and bracelet on near wrist - might go for a fake black leather technique for that bracelet.

**Dysartes**

Well, one of the guys in the last post got finished off last night:

Dark Dwarf Mage, by Oathsworn Miniatures

The steps I took were exactly as I described in the last post - highlight the hair with VMC Ivory then highlight robe with a mix of VMC Royal Purple & Ivory. I'm never that confident in my technique for painting cloth, so I've picked up the new White Dwarf to take a gander at the article in there on the subject - that, and because I picked up a copy of Burning of Prospero yesterday.

The two tufts I added to the Mage's base were glued on with some PVA, and when the glue has finished drying overnight, I'll need to adjust how some of the strands are standing. I used a Lavender tuft from the Gamer's Grass range by Great Escape Games, along with an Army Painter Mountain Tuft. The Lavender was originally to be used on the Oathsworn bases, but I thought it might tie in nicely with the purple cloak - the Crossbow Dwarves will just get Mountain Tufts when they're done.

**Azazelx**

Nice work. That Dark Dwarf really benefits from your colour choices, and the squirrel model looks very cool indeed! The armour on the Hare also looks very nice, even at this early stage of the model's completion.