Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

It is with great pleasure (and no small sense of awe) that I can announce that I am working with the living legend John Blanche on a new range of miniatures based upon his artwork. How cool is that?! This is both a daunting challenge and a real honour.

The forthcoming range are simply called 'Witch Hunters' and will be 32mm. The plan is to launch a small Kickstarter soon to get an initial group of minis done. More details in due course...

In the meantime, here is a sneak-peek of the first miniature from the range!

Artwork by John Blanche

https://www.facebook.com/brassmonkeygames

EDIT: Kickstarter is live

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/johnblanchepresents/morderin-by-john-blanche

Facebook Page:

https://www.facebook.com/p/John-Blanche-presents-M%C3%B6rderin-61555478652967/

This has the potential to be really cool.

Not a very successful render of that particular illustration IMHO, the ref pict model is much taller and slimmer. The details of the sculpt are on point, but proportions are completely missing the mark. Also, the artwork has a skirt and the model has a jumpsuit, are we so desperate to see them apple bottoms?

It's like a Hollywood action movie rendition

 tauist wrote:
Not a very successful render of that particular illustration IMHO, the ref pict model is much taller and slimmer. The details of the sculpt are on point, but proportions are completely missing the mark. Also, the artwork has a skirt and the model has a jumpsuit, are we so desperate to see them apple bottoms?

It's the proportions man. The art is tall and willowy and the sculpt is squat and curvy. I'll guess the problem is 32mm since Blancain proportions don't scale well to that "standard" scale. Should have been a painter's scale and have fun with the thin and thick.

I remember GW doing a run of one of John's minis as well, there's a pic floating around the internet of piles of boxes of the model ready for sale, but it never saw a release as far as I can remember, anyone?

In the late 90s GW did a limited run of Blanche's punk women, it was an odd scale like 40mm and resin. Never seen them in the wild.

As for helpful feedback, I'd recommend Brass Monkey's FB page. I doubt he reads here.

Was it an official GW release?

I know of Femme Militant, circa 2006, with the 40mm women sculpted by a variety of people who also worked for GW, and it may have been advertised in White Dwarf?

It was stopped during the first wave, and I guess GW technically own the rights to the miniatures as a commercial product made by their staff during their employment? Most of John Blanche's output doesn't belong to him, unfortunately

This is really cool, and I really appreciate that they're in a scale that makes them usable in 40K. The render looks excellent, and the proportions are what I'd expect form a 32mm miniature.

 Tim the Biovore wrote:
Was it an official GW release?

I know of Femme Militant, circa 2006, with the 40mm women sculpted by a variety of people who also worked for GW, and it may have been advertised in White Dwarf?

It was stopped during the first wave, and I guess GW technically own the rights to the miniatures as a commercial product made by their staff during their employment? Most of John Blanche's output doesn't belong to him, unfortunately

Yeah that's who I was thinking of, could have sworn it was form around 1998 or so. Ah well.

I think they did a decent job of doing Blanch art to model with Canoness Veridyan, that model was as close to a perfect rendition as you could get at the time, especially with finecrap as the material. Hope this does well, certainly has potential, especially for Necromunda players.

Was Femme Militant that long ago?

God's teeth I'm old now.

warl0rdb0b wrote:
I think they did a decent job of doing Blanch art to model with Canoness Veridyan, that model was as close to a perfect rendition as you could get at the time, especially with finecrap as the material. Hope this does well, certainly has potential, especially for Necromunda players.

The problem with the canoness is that she's very two-dimensional, quite flat in pose and with phoned-in detailing on the back. Hopefully these new sculpts have some input from Mr Blanche to fill in what 'the other side' looks like.

I would have thought the problem with the Canoness was that her proportions don't line up with either the metal models or the new plastics. Which is somewhat understandable for a rendition of Blanche artwork. But if you get a model that doesn't fit in the relevant army, why bother making it in 32mm instead of something larger that makes for a better display piece?

Which is also what I think of as the answer to this:

 Chairman Aeon wrote:

 tauist wrote:
Not a very successful render of that particular illustration IMHO, the ref pict model is much taller and slimmer. The details of the sculpt are on point, but proportions are completely missing the mark. Also, the artwork has a skirt and the model has a jumpsuit, are we so desperate to see them apple bottoms?

It's the proportions man. The art is tall and willowy and the sculpt is squat and curvy. I'll guess the problem is 32mm since Blancain proportions don't scale well to that "standard" scale. Should have been a painter's scale and have fun with the thin and thick.

In my opinion the stylistic choice is to make the models appealing to 40k players, for purely economic reasons. You can get the model to look a lot closer to the artwork, even in 32mm, but in doing so you depart from the super buff dudes aesthetic most GW models have going and discourage sales to players who want models that fit with the other models in their army.

You can sell large scale models to dedicated painters for boutique prices, but my guess is that the lure of the large potential customer base that is Imperium players is just stronger.

On facebook some folks brought up the issue of proportions and Blanche responded:

they’re meant to be thus ..

So there we are

https://www.facebook.com/groups/729113834110813/posts/2070926126596237/


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Additional post be the sculptor James Sherriff

Cheers bro! I tried matching the proportions of one of John's artworks in a test sculpt and she came out very slim and fragile! I've attempted to match something closer to modern GW miniature proportions with this.

Automatically Appended Next Post:
Speaking of John Blanche, I love my new art book - Scions of Voodoo. 29 Euros.

Blanche recently retired from GW and has had health issues so I'm glad to see he's still producing.

https://hollow-press.net/products/scions-of-voodoo?fbclid=IwAR2fko38JT-xquvALujJz9djy1kBpOQZUkpWL9xJED3i91qcgGqFMpEAzD0

Facebook update -

Good day fellow humans!
Got a test print back from Zealot Miniatures today for the official John Blanche Witch Hunters project and couldn't wait to put her together. Ended up being nine parts in total to ensure the best possible casts!
She is 32mm to the eyes (35mm with the heels). Just a couple of little areas I need to clean up on the digital model before we start casting resin masters - for example the hat skull needs the teeth fixing, whilst the flintlock mechanism on both guns needs to be slightly thicker.
I've included plenty of different angles, plus a scale shot next to GW's Canoness Veridyan miniature (herself based upon the legendary Sisters of Battle painting by John Blanche).
Let us know what you think!

The print is lovely. On the proportions - it's definitely more chunky than the art, but that's just how the translation to gaming miniature goes. Particularly if they're producing in resin, going with the slender proportions of the artwork, the model would never stand up. The model is always going to be chunkier than the art... and this one's a fantastic translation, IMO.

 insaniak wrote:
The print is lovely. On the proportions - it's definitely more chunky than the art, but that's just how the translation to gaming miniature goes. Particularly if they're producing in resin, going with the slender proportions of the artwork, the model would never stand up. The model is always going to be chunkier than the art... and this one's a fantastic translation, IMO.

To me, the proportions are just one annoying change from art to miniature. Why no skirt? Why add a sword? Why lower the head from a straight-ahead stare to a moody hatbrim-hidden face?

It's still a good model, but it's the combination of minor deviations that bother me.

 Shakalooloo wrote:
Why no skirt?

From FB -

Warhammer Quest fanpage
The skirt was divine! It's a shame you opted for the skin-tight pants instead (right down to the tight crease lines in the front crotch). Unnecessarily sexes up the miniature compared to the more elegant original picture. Please reconsider covering her legs and crotch with that awesome skirt instead! It was so reminiscent of the classical witch hunter cape!

Brass Monkey
I may still add the flowing cloth at the waist, we'll see. One reason was that she needs to be split into 7 or 8 parts for casting as it is, but I could change it. As for the tight trousers, that's what they looked like to me from the art (plus it matches the tight corset/top). I do appreciate where you are coming from, though.

Why add a sword?

Why not?

I suspect the sword will be a separate piece, so you can always just opt to leave it off. It makes the mini look more balanced from the front view, though.

Why lower the head from a straight-ahead stare to a moody hatbrim-hidden face? .

Her head (or at least her hat) is slightly tilted forward from the art, but I think part of the 'hidden face' effect is also because the brim is chunkier and protrudes further forward and down. The front of the brim in the art is thinner and shorter, and likely wouldn't be castable. I like it, though.

Kickstarter coming soon.

https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=61555478652967

These look like great inquisitor alternative sculpts. I'll have to keep an eye on it.

 Chairman Aeon wrote:

 tauist wrote:
Not a very successful render of that particular illustration IMHO, the ref pict model is much taller and slimmer. The details of the sculpt are on point, but proportions are completely missing the mark. Also, the artwork has a skirt and the model has a jumpsuit, are we so desperate to see them apple bottoms?

Is it just me or are some people annoyed by people complaining about seeing a ladies assets under reasonable conditions in context, they sound like early 90's soccer moms. On top of that in the art work under the skirt you can tell that there is a jumpsuit under skirt of the character based on how the shading is done and the very nice curve of the buttocks that skirt is hugging. Would I have preferred the model to have the skirt, yes because it is part of the original art work. As a sculpt rendition of the artwork it is just fine as is and it looks great.

Updated the title now that it has something more evocative.

John Blanche presents: Mörderin

They look great, now let's see the prices...

Why 32MM?

Blanchitsmut

 sing your life wrote:
Why 32MM?

Here’s a size pic from the sculptor

Well I'm interested. Price will be the decider though.

The kickstarter is live and about 10x funded:

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/johnblanchepresents/morderin-by-john-blanche

Ends June 11

30 GBP (~US$39) for four models plus unlocked bonuses. Shipping extra.

Hmm, I'll admit to not having kept up with The Industry in recent times, have we had many projects delivered using Siocast yet? Does it actually meet the claims of its marketing?

We have a siocast machine at the local club, it's good stuff.

I dont think any of these manage to capture the essence of the original artwork. The og artwork torsos are catwalk shaped (tall, slender with barely any muscles), whereas these are all thicc fitness chicks. So will therefore pass on them. But seeing as the kickstarter goals have been met many times over, a lot of people will be digging these nonetheless. Hope we will see more models, perhaps more faithful to the og artwork in the future..

I was excited at title, then looked at models and felt strangely let down. Oddly pedestrian and interchangeable with many other models out there.