Zombie dragon #2

A while back zombie dragon left the painting station but until now it had no master. Real life duties combined with some expected work to do and other crap prevented me from painting. But last week I've finally found some spare time to finish necromancer rider for rhe beast so I can start planning the next project.

As for the necromancer it's old, horse mounted model, which got it's legs swapped with wight lord. It also got banner pole top from old chaos marauder set so it could carry black-and-white banner (stolen theme thing of the Undead army).

As for color choice I tried to keep is as candy-color as possible so it fits Middlehammer era. Besides it contrasts really nicely with pale dragon and the banner behind. 

And here's the model accompanied by other units from Undead army project. Those banners looks just badass and I really don't mind it's not my idea! 😋 I am pretty sure I had some Black Tree Designs zombie horses staggering around - there should be enough models for small cavalry unit - which means another black-and-white banner coming!

Zombie dragon #1

After heavy battle another model just got crossed off the everlasting list of shame. Half-crossed off, because at this moment there's only unridden beast and I'm still looking for the proper rider. Painting this one took me much more then I expected especially given the fact it's the second version of this sculpt I've been working on. The previous piece was painted 10 years ago ( 😳😳😳 ) as contest model, but this time I wanted a center piece for Undead Army project - which I might even bring to an end yet during this lifetime.

There were some ideas about color scheme. At first I was thinking about "classic" green dead flesh but then I decided to use pale tone. Such color should contrast nicely againg base and hopefully - dark rider. Working on this one kinda drained me out so the rider has to wait and in the meantime I can finally start working on Hetzer from Propylene Foliescu.

So here it is: half-finished zombie dragon from golden age of Warhammer. Some more pics and some more babbling when it's done... 

Zee Germanz!!! (+ zee zombie dragon)

Heyah,

Once again I've managed to slap some paint on toy soliders, this time it German tank destroyer: Jagdpanzer 38(t) a.k.a. Hetzer.
It's special piece because this sneaky bastard it birthday gift for my brother - painting that is, the model itself arrived a while back.
Anyway I wanted to paint it so the color fits brother's Heer infantry. Most of official patterns I found in the webspace is fancy camo but I went into something similar to german uniform / feldgrau (based on mix of olive and greys).
Everything was more-less fine until I started adding chipping and mud. All in all now it looks almost like my US vehicles. Next time I think I'll give a try to pure grey as base tone, maybe with nazi flag laying on armour for contrast. Plenty of time for planning 'till the next birthday.

Hope you like it:

 

Because my short "holiday" is over so I decided to get remaining 4 models painted, to get basic US army detachment fully painted. 

Sure, there's still plenty work ahead, but it's just basic ~1000-1200 pts.

Remaining models are 3 Black Tree Design riflemen and West Wind Productions BAR operator. They are all cool: models are more-less same size as my fav Artizan pieces so they all look great as crowd / squad. Besides my infantry constantly remains 100% metal =]

Painting is nothing spectacular: the same color palette as before to keep whole infantry coherent. Backpacks and ammo belts of the shooters were painted with VGC camouflage green, which nicely fits olive uniforms. 

If I find more models with backpacks I hope to build 8-men strong engineer squad: 2x BAR and flamethrower in a single unit sounds just sweet! (and smells gasoline + burnt flesh...).

Field "hospital" in the back (or rather camouflaged ammo storage as my opponent claims...) is adopted spare piece from Rubikon Models US truck I got recently. I was hoping to get more striking colors using chalks, but all in all it didn't turn out as planned. 

Red Cross is another experiment - more successful this time. I wanted it look like soliders painted it in the field, so I prepared simple stencil and used sponge for applying thick layer paint. Some unpainted areas were left on purpose so whole thing looks more realistic (hopefully...). I also hope to paint some camo on next tank (Sherman 76mm or Chaffee) using sponge. Results might be interesting.

And last thing 'bout BA this time: since the last post we've also managed to play some Bolt Action games - improving the matches a bit. 

First improvement is aerial recon. General idea is:

battlefield is set up at least few days before the game and players can find in mail boxes (mail, not e-mail!) photo of the field so the best forces can be chosen. Usually some partisans gets killed to provide such materials for the commanding officers:

Nice, eh?  And below - the actual battlefield.

All in all it's not much effort but lots of fun getting true letter these (modern) days.

Another upgrade is grass: 

until now we played of simple board painted green but last week proper gaming mat was found and suddenly everything looks WAY better. Kinda brings back memories of Warhammer Fantasy Battle 5th ed. reports. Almost pro.

All I have to do now is somehow force the opponents to paint their minis. Or at least spray undercoat, so the battle photos don't look like US army faces bunch of T-1000...

And last but not least: Photobucket recovery series.

This time I'm bringing oldie Zombie Dragon painted on February 2014. 

The model is quite old and for me it's still one of fav miniatures from Warhammer Undead army. I think I should give it new pictures next time I get it cleaned. 

And maybe finally assemble Dieter Helsnicht...

Since we're around Oldhammer - recently I found oldie chaos champion model in the back of glass case. Sadly I have no use for it so decision was made to find new home for the piece.

If you think it might feel better in your place - let me know (here or via FB), for gaming purposes I can remove the plinth and replace it with standard base.
Some more pics in the proper Facebook Oldhammer Trading Post thread.

Till the next time!

Zombie dragon - finished!

"North of the Kingdom of the Dead, and east of Worlds Edge Mountains, lies the Plains of Bones. The land is a desert of multi-coloured refractive sand from which huge rib-cages emerge. For this is the place where dragons came to die, to rest their bones among those of their ancestors as they had done for millions of years, before any other sentient being walked the surface of the Known World..."
 
For a bit more of that fluffy story you have to get a copy of Warhammer Armies Undead rulebook. Lots of other cool bedtime stories there as well...

Anyway this post is kinda special: it's dedicated to only one piece: very recently finished zombie dragon from distant past of my early gaming.

I remember I've been hunting for this model on local market for a while when it finally became affordable (purchasing such toys in high school was just bit beyound my reach). When I saw it first in the Warhammer Armies book I wasn't impressed at all, in fact I rather thought that piece is just crap compared to other armies' dragons.
It took a (long) while to change my mind and realise what a cool piece the dragon is.
My only regret is I couldn't field it while I was still into Warhammer Fantasy Battle but it's better late than never I suppose.

The story behind the thing is sth like the dragon corpse was animated on Plains of Bones buy some sort of wind of chaos and now it's heading for the caller through Border Princes or other dangerous area of the Old World.
The call is so strong that presence of the dragon makes foul undead creatures rise from their tombs and join the death march.

For the base I chose 3 models from 90's: wight* (not sure isn't it deader from very late 80'), plague zombie adopted from Necromunda and placcy skeleton. At first I wanted to use only metal miniatures but what the hell, I just love these skinny necro-cockers ^^

The banners represent Gork and Mork because:
- it's my model so I can hang on banner pole whatever I want
- it's fantasy piece
- orks and goblins artwork from 5th edition is supercool
- banners are J.Blanche inspired (Evil Sun for sure, not so sure about Bad Moon)

My vision was all the gods represent the same cosmic force so no matter you are savage orc (worshipping rocks), bride of Khaine or well conspired member of Purple Hand Order there's the same thing hidden beind each of the "gods".
So apparently these guys have crossed some greenskins settlement or war party and banners are the trophies taken from cold, green hands.

It's took a long time to finish it, sadly not only because it was lots of work but mostly because of stupid life issues. But it was worth it, no doubt. Watching the model standing behind the glass make me believe I can also start (and finish!) my fav dragons of all - Egrimm van Horstmann's Chaos Dragon.

Hope you like it.
I surely do =]

Cheers!

*thanks Bun!

Something wicked is coming through the swamp...

Hey,

It's been a very long way but the end is near...

Last week the beast has been attached to its plinth, the edges were secured with masking tape ready for artifical water so below it's the last work in progress shot from painitng the oldie zombie dragon.
I'm not writing more about the model because the next post (when whole resin is dry) will be 100% dedicated to that project but you can see more-less the final result. Whole piece has been sprayed with matt varnish to set pigments used for some shading and for base but I think it will be also sealed with super matt Revell varnish.
There's never enough of protection plus taking photo of matt object (especially the banners) should be easter and more effective. We'll see...

Anything more?

Hell yeah! Also last week I got a day off work for blood donation. After the fluid of life* was pumped out from my veins system I had some free time which was just enough to get into gaming spot and put the first layer of paint on the gaming table.
It's finally happening! The colors are appearing! The vision of playing games using PAINTED miniatures and PAINTED table is materializing!

I was bit worried because it was my very first attempt of painitng such a thing, but I am quite satisfied of the result after paint dried. I think I will add another layer to make the structure more battle damage proof - I used heavily diluted water based paint mixed with lots of white glue. The next step is drybrushing some mild sand color to make whole area look more less like nice ash wastes with a touch of rust. 

And the last thing for this update.
Last but not dreaming... Hmmm... Dead but not least? Hmmm... Last but not least?

CTHULHU FFS!!!

Last Thursday I took a visit to the tattoo parlour from where Great Cthulhu has risen about 3 years ago. Getting inked is a pleasant thing but it's also quite addictive (God... errr... let's say Great Ancient Ones know why actually) so some time ago I decided to pull the sleeve down from right arm to just above the wrist.
After ~3,5 hrs of work here's more-less the current state of the picture. For now it's just a nightgaunt and the well teaser, some more will be revealed after the next visit to the parlour. Again I took some photos while the tattoo was applied so after whole piece is done (hopefully about March) I should have enough material for another article.

I just hope with this sleeve the lust for ink will be totally fulfilled...

Laters!

*which in my case is formaldehyde

Animated corpses, pigs, Facebook...

Kinda :)

The first thing is technical announcement - I decided to give a try to Facebook and some time ago the test FB site of the bloggy has been launched. I don't think there will be anything more published than links to new posts but we'll see if I can use it for something productive.

The site is just raw now - some background photos will be added just when I get any time (so don't expect it shortly). And because it's Facebook - there's brand new "zombie-like" linky on the right panel. Will probably replace it with more personalised pic sometimes.

And now something more hobby related.

I've been trying to learn taking decent pictures of my models since always. The more I tried the more I was sure it's equally hard to painitng models. My mentor in this matter is constantly Mahon - just check the pictures in the Chest of Colors gallery he took. Some of these were taken using dedicated vinyl backgrounds - there was review of that stuff somewhere on the CofC, report worthy checking.

I thought such backgrounds might actually be the improvement I've been looking for so I ordered some patterns. These is not any pro stuff dedicated for miniature painters bullshit, but samples of vinyl wallpapers. It looks quite interesting now but I will wait with the final opinion until I manage to place it behind miniatures in the light box and take a shot.

Which leads me to work in progress picture of zombie dragon project:
Few days back I managed to more-less finish the wight lord rider. The model is awful, no doubt about it, but it fits well the old dragon - and I really like the beast. It's one of the minis I've been trying to get painted for a looong time for several reasons, so be ready for a whiny, nostalgic (for me) story when I get it eventually done.

The plan was to paint the whole thing the "oldschool" way which means vivid colors a'la Warhammer 5th edition. Evil Sun banner is part of the story behind the project which will be revealed when the piece is done.

The pictures above were taken straight on the painting station, but I also gave a try to one of the new backgrounds. I am sure the results would be better if I took pictures in the light box but I am quite satisfied of the brick wall behind.
There are still 7 pieces of vinyl to be tested so expect to see them used on the next painted models.

And the last thing for this post: conversions.

The first one is nothing more but original model provided with new head: the master plan was to give it brand new set of spider legs or spider torso plus some minor modifications.

It didn't take long to realize my converting-fu isn't strong enough to do the job well, so I walked easy path. 

More-less easy: it is truth what people say on forums about assembling this spider bitch. Getting it done is huge pain in the ass and probably wouldn't be possible without joints already casted with the limbs. Mortenebra is fully operational, armed and dangerous (and last night washed off the battlefield Dr. Arkadius and his band of war hogs).

Another model prepared for painting is epic version of Deneghra - my fav Cryx warcaster.
Even though I like the fluff and special  rules the model is just horrible. So the decision was made to customize it a bit so I can field her with no mental resistance.
Basically I needed to get rid of the lower half of the miniature. I've already seen some really effective conversions, where most of the model was replaced by Rackham's spectre (or whatever is was) mini, but I wouldn't feel comfortable mutilating any of Rackham's classic beauties so I've been looking for something else.
About 3 weeks ago by accident I spotted a ghost model from Reaper brand, which I thought might be good material for the job:

The description said it was plastic, but this seemed to be rather good news:

- plastic is easier to convert

- Reaper is (supposed to be) quality.

The model came. It was light but what else could one expect from plastic?

The problem was it wasn't plastic like EE or PP uses but some weird rubber-o-placcy crap! After I got it I read it's sth from new "Bones" series, and it was my very first contact with that substance. And the last one at the same time.

Model was very easy to cut but was so bendy it was pretty hard to make is the center of the model. Moreover because it's more rubber than plastic I've found it impossible to file (sic!), so all mold lines had to be removed with a knife...

Anyway I am very glad she is done now, nothing special but way better than original sculpt. The field test of her nasty spells arsenal is planned for the Sunday night, so I hope to harvest some pig souls for the glory of Lord Toruk!

 

Laters!