28mm Napoleonic British at Waterloo

Hi there!

As promised, I've finally managed to take a few photos of the British that I have managed to get painted up so far! They are all Perry Miniatures 28mm models and the infantry are plastics and the cannon and crew are metal. So without further ado, here they are:

2nd Battalion Coldsteam Guards

95th Rifles

 A Royal Horse Artillery 9lb cannon

Most of the above models were painted using GW acrylics over a white undercoat, followed by a brown wash over the top. Quick but effective! Useful when you know you've got several hundred models to get through! The exception was the Rifle companies who were painted over a black undercoat due to the large areas of black and dark green. I also too the opportunity of having the camera set up to try out a few dioramas to set them off nicely! And here they are:

Members of the 95th Rifles advance in a skirmish screen ahead of the main infantry line.

As the french close in, the Guards form a square to protect themselves from enemy cavalry.

The plucky brits hold their fire, waiting for the optimum moment to fire on the advancing French columns.

Napoleonic Frenchmen WIP

Hello there!

In recent days I have been getting pretty excited about Napoleonic wargaming. Specifically the Perry Miniatures range of miniatures and the Warlord Games Black Powder rules set. These look like simple but effective rules, and should be a lot of fun to game with! All I need now are some models to play with...

So I've been working on some! I have recently completed some british models which I will blog about soon (when I have found the time to get some decent pics!) but in the meantime, here ar a few shots of the first French battalion I've been working on:

Due to the fact that I'm going to need to paint a fair few of these fellas I've gone for a style of painting that should mean a decent finish in a reasonable time! I've gone for a white undercoat and then filled in the tunics, boots, hats etc with blocks of colour. (For those interested I used Runefang Steel for the metal, the tunics were Kantor Blue, the hat covers and brown great coats are Steel Legion Drab, the skin Kislev Flesh and the black was Chaos Black. Other great coats were painted using Space Wolves Grey and Bleached Bone. Any gold trim was Burnished Gold)

The 3rd Fusilier Company of the 2nd Line Regiment

I've then washed the whole lot with Agrax Earthshade to put in the shading and done a little bit of highlighting on the white straps and faces. The flag was a piece of paper cut to size, folded in two and stuck together using some wood glue. I then gloss varnished it and, using a home made waterslide transfer of the flag I wanted, added the detail. Gloss varnished it again and sprayed it with matt varnish to seal it all up. Basing is just Mournfang Brown with a Steel Legion Drab drybrush, edged with Mournfang Brown. The grass is a mix of GW static grasses and a little bit of the big fat 'ol flocky stuff!

All in all I think they've turned out pretty well! Now, to get the whole battalion finished so I can start some cavalry...


UPDATE:

Just a quick addition as I finally managed to get the second company finished! More to come:

Blood Bowl Orc Team - Update 2

Hello again!

Well, not only have I managed to finish the Skaven Blood Bowl Team, I've even managed to polish off an Orc team for them to line up against! And here they are!

GRUNTFUTTOCK'S GRINDAS!

They consist of the Orcs from the Blood Bowl boxed game with a few converted additions to add a few more tactical options. They faced my Skaven team (Queek's Headtakers) yesterday and were soundly beaten, but I have high hopes for them! A bit more of a play around with troll and goblin tactics and I think they could be formidable... Anyway, here they are in all their individual glory:

Thrower

Number 02: Lobba Litepants

Linemen

Number 73: Ungul Face-smasher

Number 51: Morgut da Grinda

Number 54: Bogga Slowpoke

Blitzers

Number 94: Bugrit Fublefist

Number 90: Bentstil Git-splatter

Black Orc Blockers

Number 63: Urguk Face-sitta

Number 72: Big-gob Grunta

Goblins

Number 13: Gribble But-scratcher

Number 16: Pickit Finger-licka

Number 81: Arthur the Git

(All three are conversions using gnoblars with imperial guard shoulder pads)

Troll

Number 60: Thicky Trout-breath

(A river troll and green stuff conversion with plastic rod rivets and paperclip face cage)

Well, there they are! I hope you like them (and their shiny helmets. Well, they are Evil Sunz after all so have a lot of teef to spend on shiny things!) and I'm looking forward to seeing how they fare in the future! I'm looking for games, so if you're in the east london area and want a match, leave me a post! Now, I'm off to get started on the boxed games human team...

Skaven Blood Bowl Team Project - Update

Hi there!

Bit of an absence recently I know. Apologies! However, I have some updates to share so without further ado, may I present the complete (well... full strength anyway!) converted Skaven Blood Bowl Team!

QUEEK'S HEADTAKERS!

They had their first game yesterday and did me proud getting me a 2-0 win against the Orc team I've also been working on (wielded by my good friend Matt! A cunning adversary). A handy MVP and casualty combining to get me my first upgrade for number 90, a lineman, who is now the proud owner of the 'Kick' skill! Hurrah. Anyway, here are the team in all their individual glory:

Thrower

Number 01: Chuckit McFlashpants

(A green stuff, imperial guardsman shoulder pad, stormvermin and ogre punch dagger conversion)

Linemen

Number 62: Sneelitch Snaggletooth

Number 65: Rustik Lofar

Number 67: Burk Vermintide

Number 69: Adrian Brown

Number 74: Sneeki Kakstep

Number 90: Benjaminty Stillk

(All stormvermin, imperial guardsman shoulder pad and ogre punch dagger conversions)

Stormvermin Blitzers

Number 38: Morslick Krakskull

Number 55: Skleet Krittersplat

(Both stormvermin, imperial guardsman shoulder pad and ogre punch dagger conversions, with added 40K Ork shoulder pads and arms)

Gutter Runners

Number 11: Skquik Ikistep

Number 18: Bazflem Skitterleap

(Clanrat, imperial guardsmen shoulder pads and green stuff conversions)

Rat Ogre

Number 50: Masskil Vart

(Island of blood rat ogre, greenstuff and 40K Ork shoulder pad conversion)

Now to get some more games! If you're in the east london area an play, leave me a post! Now, off to doa post for my Orc team...

Imperial Fists Legion Army WIP 1

Hi all!

Just a quick update to show the rest of the tactical squad, pre-undercoat and before I break out the air brush. Ever wondered how a marine with a powerfist holds a boltgun? Now you know! Looking forward to getting on to painting that plume! I love plumes:

Note: the things they're standing on are just bits of old cork heat proof mat. Easy to hold when airbrushing. However, they do make good rocks too, FYI!

Imperial Fists Legion

Hi all!

All happily married now thanks (it went very well, ta!) and have found a little time to finish of the Imperial Fists that I showed a few (shoddy) WIP shots of in my last post. So, without further ado, here they are.

First of all, here are the first 5 of my first Legion Tactical Squad:

And here's the Contemptor, front and back:

And his base, complete with guardsman who really chose the wrong place to take cover:

And here they all are, hanging out together and having a lovely time:

And in profile:

If you have any questions about the models or any of the techniques I used, scribble a comment and I'll see if I can help :)

I'm off to start gluing together the next 5 tactical marines, including the squad sergeant with his plumed helmet! Nothing says "I'm gonna conquer your planet, so be afraid" like a plume!! I'll post them up here when they're done.

Thanks for visiting!

Pre-Heresy Imperial Fists WIP

Hi all! Sorry about the wait! So, I got an Aztek airbrush and compressor... OH MY GOODNESS!! Why did I not do this years ago! It has revolutionised my modelling life!! Here's how, with my imperial fists which I am currently in the middle of working on. (Sorry about photo quality! I'm in the middle of getting hitched so not had a great deal of time! I'll get some good ones soon.)

I'm painting 5 MkIV marines and a Contemptor pattern dreadnought. Here's how:

Undercoated black and then oversprayed with a rusty brown colour (bestial brown) and then given a layer of matt varnish (Testors matte coat). This is to seal it for the next stage where I gave it a spray of hairspray (any old cheap stuff will do!) and sprinkled some large grain salt over the model so it sticks to the wet hairspray. When dry, I then basecoated over the top of the salt with a brown/yellow and then a brighter yellow on the top. When dry, using my thumb I gently rubbed off the salt, taking the paint with it, and leaving the rusty colour showing beneath creating a GREAT paint chip effect! Here it is:

Realistic ruggedness or what?! More to come very soon!

Guardsman Horrific Death Conversion

This is a model I converted a while back to go with my Imperial Guard and Tyranid forces. It has no game purpose whatsoever but was good fun to make and paint! Thought you might like to see it:

Nurgle Chaos Lord

Another one of the awesome, single sprue, plastic heroes that GW have started making! Once again, I just wanted to paint him (also it'll give the Savage Orc Big Boss someone to face off against). So here he is, all glued together and ready for undercoating:

I'll post some pics when he's done!

Blood Bowl Orc Team - Update 1

As promised, here's the work in progress on the Orc team currently in production! I've finished 3 linemen so far and here's one of them:

I've used the new paints for the flesh, and have to say they we're pretty good! Very nice to use and cover really well (though not with one coat as sometimes boldly claimed, but then which paint really does AND keeps detail). I've glossed the armour with 'ardcoat to give it the shiny, laquered effect that american football helmets have. I've also converted a some goblins to be chucked by the troll and here's an example:

A knoblar makes up the main body with a cadian shocktrooper shoulder guard for the shoulder pad. I'll add more pics as they get finished off! (I will try to improve pic quality too as i appreciate its not great! sorry!)

Blood Angels Task Force

I have been wanting to paint a few blood angels for years and recently decided to go ahead and put together a small task force so I could try my hand at the classic space marine paint scheme. I have so far completed two units for the force. Firstly, a combat squad of tactical marines:

The sergeant was vaguely based on the picture from the old Warhammer 40K second edition boxed set, but toned down the yellow a little! I still need to finish the banner off, but they're pretty much complete! The second unit is a Furioso Dreadnought. A great model and I wanted to make it look mush more dynamic, like the close combat monstrosity it's meant to be! So I've pinned the arms out and added bass guitar string cabling to make them less rigid looking. I've also made him taller by adding a few metal washers in at the waist. If you do this, best to pin the torso to the legs of the model to make him less likely to snap in half during games! The left leg was also cut carefully at the knee and re glued to look as if he is stepping up onto the rock. Finally I carefully cut off 3 of the four fingers and repositioned them to make it look like he's pointing out his next victim:

I thought that the base could do with a bit of work too. I added the rock as something for him to be stepping up onto. The rock is a real rock from the garden, washed off and stuck on, then blended into the base with a bit of milliput. I also thought it would be cool to have his latest victim on the base, so added a skeleton and painted it to look like it had just been immolated by his flamer! The way to get this effect is to paint the skeleton with oranges, yellows and reds, making sure to get into all the crevasses, and then overbrushing all the raised areas with black. Looks like he's glowing from the inside as he cools!

I have some Death Company on the go at the moment so I'll add them on as they're finished!

Savage Orc Big Boss

This model is soooo awesome I knew I had to paint it! So here he is, fresh from the sprue, all glued together and ready to rock:

What a great model! I love how dynamic it is! I'm looking forward to having a go at painting tattoos, which is something I've not tried before. I'll let you know how I come along!

Blood Bowl Orc Team

As well as the Skaven team I've been working on, I'm also painting up the Orc team thats come with the Blood Bowl boxed set. However, I also wanted to add a few extras so I've made a troll and some goblins to go along with the standard models you get in the game. And here he is on the workbench:

He's based on a river troll from the river troll boxed set and I've just modeled on a large left shoulder pad with a sheet of green stuff, and the right shoulder pad is a smoothed off old chaos warrior shoulder guard. The helmet was just built up using green stuff and the bards are a paperclip, cunningly bent using a pair of narrow nosed pliers. To make him fit the style of the rest of the team I added some rivets using small discs cut from a piece of very thin plastic rod and glued in place using super glue. Now to paint him and finish off the goblins for him to throw!

Warhammer 40K Ork Conversions

I really am not a fan of metal models (Hallalujah for finecast!) so when I began building my Ork army I wanted to keep the models completely plastic. This meant making a few conversions, especially for key characters. So here they are below Firstly, the Big Mek with a Kustom Force Field:

He's a plastic Nob and I've greenstuffed on a scraggy beard to make him look a bit old and wise! The weapon is the head of a Big Choppa with half removed and replaced with a cut down shoota from the Ork Boys boxed set.The shaft is a piece of plastic rod and the component that joins the two is part of a Tau Fusion Blaster. The Shield generator itself is made from the communications set from the vehicle command sprue, along with the barrel of a tanks sponson lascannon. The rest of the sponson lascannon was used for the bottom of the generator. Some more plastic tube and rod, some greenstuff and some guitar wire provided the finishing touches. And here he is all finished:

The second conversion was based on one seen in White Dwarf and is based on the Warboss from the Assault on Black Reach boxed set. I Pinned his right arm so it was less square to his body and added a harpoon to his shoota. I used a head and metal jaw from the Nobs boxed set, to make him look a bit sterner than the standard head, and attached it at an angle so it looks like he's pointing down the claw. The claw was modified by carefully cutting down a Big Chopper from the Nobs boxed set to fit the claw where the lower claw should be. The lower claw was then added to the bottom to make it look suitably, ridiculously huge! And here he is all finished:

Sorry there's no work in progress shot! I made him well before I even contemplated this blog! :)