Airbrush replacement...

A word to the wise, when it comes to getting an airbrush name brands tend to be quite a bit better constructed. I made the mistake a number of months back of buying a cheap airbrush from some company in China. It worked great for the first week... then became a huge pain in the butt to work with. So I just dealt with it for a few months, until I reached the 'what was I thinking' point and went and bought a new Iwata brush. The change from cheap to Iwata was amazing. The new brush works sooooo much better it is like night and day.

Now, something that can be helpful for those doing a lot of hobby things.

Hobby Lobby is a great place to pick up odds and ends, as well as basic materials for hobby use. To make things even better hobbylobby.com allows you to sign up for their weekly newsletter. This newsletter gives a new coupon every Sunday for use in their physical stores OR for use with online ordering. Some weeks it is for specific things, others it is a straight percentage off of one regularly priced item. Many times it is either 25% or 40% off that one item's regular price. So signing up for the newsletter is a no brainer if you want to reduce the cost of certain items in their store (such as airbrushes/airbrush accessories).

Until next time!

Finalized DieCon GT list

With DieCon only a few weeks away, I've completed finalization on my Blood Angels list for the GT. At 2k this list has given me so many headaches it's silly, far to many ways to go at that point level. But, in the end, I've settled on a DoA list with Mephiston.



2000 Pts - Blood Angels Roster - Meph DoA 2k

Total Roster Cost: 2000

HQ: Mephiston, Lord of Death (1#, 250 pts)
   1 Mephiston, Lord of Death, 250 pts

: Honour Guard (5#, 350 pts)
   1 Honour Guard, 80 pts + Chapter Banner 30 + Equip with Jump Packs 50
      1 Sanguinary Novitiate, 23 pts
      1 Honour Guard, 68 pts = (base cost 23 + Power Fist x1 25 + Storm Shield x1 20)
      1 Honour Guard, 68 pts = (base cost 23 + Power Fist x1 25 + Storm Shield x1 20)
      1 Honour Guard, 58 pts = (base cost 23 + Lightning Claw x1 15 + Storm Shield x1 20)
      1 Honour Guard, 53 pts = (base cost 23 + Meltagun x1 10 + Storm Shield x1 20)

Troops: Assault Squad (10#, 255 pts)
   8 Assault Squad, 159 pts = 8 * 18 (base cost 18) + Infernus Pistol 15
      1 Assault Marine with Meltagun, 28 pts = (base cost 18 + Meltagun 10)
      1 Sergeant, 68 pts = (base cost 28) + Infernus Pistol x1 15 + Power Fist x1 25

Troops: Assault Squad (10#, 255 pts)
   8 Assault Squad, 159 pts = 8 * 18 (base cost 18) + Infernus Pistol 15
      1 Assault Marine with Meltagun, 28 pts = (base cost 18 + Meltagun 10)
      1 Sergeant, 68 pts = (base cost 28) + Infernus Pistol x1 15 + Power Fist x1 25

Elite: Furioso Dreadnought (1#, 140 pts)
   1 Furioso Dreadnought, 140 pts = (base cost 125 + Extra Armor 15 + Talons)

Elite: Furioso Dreadnought (1#, 140 pts)
   1 Furioso Dreadnought, 140 pts = (base cost 125 + Extra Armor 15)

Elite: Sanguinary Priest (2#, 180 pts)
   1 Sanguinary Priest, 0 pts
      1 Sanguinary Priest in Power Armour, 90 pts = (base cost 50 + Jump Pack 25 + Power Sword 15)
      1 Sanguinary Priest in Power Armour, 90 pts = (base cost 50 + Jump Pack 25 + Power Sword 15)

Heavy Support: Stormraven Gunship (1#, 215 pts)
   1 Stormraven Gunship, 215 pts = (base cost 200 + Extra Armor 15)

Heavy Support: Stormraven Gunship (1#, 215 pts)
   1 Stormraven Gunship, 215 pts = (base cost 200 + Extra Armor 15)

Okay, now here are the disadvantages of the list as I see them:
Short on bodies, with only 32 models total this list is very 'elite' in feel at 2k points.
Depends on deep striking, or doing a flank smash. Anti-DS will hurt to a fair extent.
Not a shooty army, needs to get stuck into CC as fast as possible.

Then there are the advantages I see to this army:
Can kill most anything in CC.
A fair amount of melta, and a lot of Pfists.
FNP and FC bubbles for all the troops and HQ (Meph + Honor Guard = 1 unit)
Can basically pick the point of attack out of DS, DoA helping to get more units out quickly without stringing out dribs and drabs.

Tactically this army works on the idea of loading each raven with a furioso, one loading up with Meph+honour guard, the other possibly loading with a combat squad from one of the ASM squads. Deep Strike everything in, and do everything possible to concentrate them on one section of the enemy army. Then begin to roll through other units, with the ravens as fire support and armor suppression.

Overall I think this will work, it's downsides can be its downfall, but in the end I think that using it in such a way as to keep constant pressure on enemy forces will allow the low model count to not get it wiped.

Comments, critiques, suggestions, etc always accepted. Feel free to speak your mind!

Clearing out some space

Well seeing as I have just a 'touch' to much in the way of miniatures/models... and limited storage space... I've put a bit of it up on eBay today. In the next week as I go through everything I'll be putting more up for sale there. Today saw the introduction of an OOP Catachan Jungle Fighters Army box w/6 additional Catachan Mortars (including crew arms), as well as a Gaunt's Ghosts box with an additional commisar/captain fig from the 1994 GW line (metal). Both auctions are easily accessible with my widget on the right hand side of the blog, so feel free to take a look, bid, buy them outright... I gotta get space for projects I'm working on. Not to mention I may be getting some commission work in the upcoming future.

So feel free to comment, etc. And have a great night!

Delays delays

Things were going so great, then suddenly I somehow strained my wrist. So my productivity went right into the toilet. Can't work for more than 20 minutes at a time without major pain, which is extremely annoying. Though there are some upsides to this lack of painting/modelling... Dean's List at the University again, and a Summer off to work on hobby/business things before I get going on my Bachelors program in Business Administration.

I've had a lot of time to think on some things, and came to a few realizations.

1) Putting together to-do lists is a life saver.
2) My 'fandex' project has to go on hold indefinitely, due to a number of reasons.
3) Need to sell some of my 'stock' to pay for some upcoming business related things.
4) Must finalize my Blood Angels Successor army.

To-do lists are a life saver, they've helped me keep on track and not go off on my 'normal' tangents of sporadic hobby work. Definitely have to get a little better at time optimization, but overall they've done a lot of good.

The 'fandex' is a great idea, but until I get a lot of other things out of the way it's just far to time consuming. So it's on the shelf until I can get the dedicated time for work on it.

Having to sell some of my stock has brought me to the point of doing an inventory. I have a TON of stuff I haven't touched yet, or only got to the priming phase. Then again I have a LOT of stuff I never even opened... So I'll be having a 'cleaning out the workspace' sale starting Friday on eBay. This will include my 3rd Ed. Space Hulk game (never opened), Catachan Jungle Fighters Army box (The older out of print one), and some other things. But overall I'm just wanting to get back what I paid on this stuff, so keep an eye out as I'll be posting each time an item goes up on eBay.

I've reached the point where I have an army that I can field, but it has a handful of figs I have to finish. As well as some weathering and detail work on some of it. At this point I'd put it at 80% finished overall. My goal is 2250 points total, and I currently have 1700 points finished to what I consider to be 'Excellent' quality. And roughly 300 points finished up to what I feel is 'table top' quality. I won't be taking any pics until I get at least 2k worth to what I feel is excellent quality, and with my wrist being what it is that might be about 2 weeks off. So basically just in time for the DieCon GT. One issue I'm debating is whether I should do a display board for them or not.

Needless to say I need to spend more time blogging and working, but it's been a hectic couple weeks, as well as painful. I'll be posting more though now that school is over until September, and I have a few articles roughed out that I'll be posting up soon on hobby topics.

Have fun and feel free to comment!

Ideas for a project

I've been having this series of ideas for a 40k project. Something a bit off the beaten track, and not at all the usual thing for 40k. A lot of the idea revolves around pirates, old time river transportation in the USA, and how things like that could work in 40k.

This idea is starting to gel into the basis of a fandex and hobby project. Though, this isn't going to be your typical fandex, as it won't be limited to one 'army', but to an entire campaign. I'm a few days off from working out a few of the preliminary details, but once I do I will be posting up things like crazy for a few days.

One of the things I'll be posting up will be the plans to build 3 different riverboats, 1 a 'chimera' analog, 1 a hellhound/etc analog, and the last a Leman Russ replacement. I also have ideas for a Valkyrie 'replacement' that is based on the idea of a zeppelin. Another thing I'm working on is the plans for a 'armor transport' for carrying 'typical' vehicles and troops.

Along with this project I'll be working out the details of a new gaming table I hope to build. One which is 'reversible'. With one side water, the other typical solid ground. As well as ideas for various terrain and buildings to be made for each of the sides.

At this point the 'armies' I plan to include in this project are...

Planetary Defense Force
River People Clans
Ork Raiders
Space Marine Mobile Strike Group (specialized)
Cultist Pirates

The planet is a very swampy and river delta like planet with only a few dozen truly solid land masses of any real size. Mountain ranges poke out of the water, and the quasi-hive cities of this world bore into them for their mineral wealth. Each of the cities is home to tens of millions of people. Transportation is based on river traffic as well as somewhat primitive airship traffic. The River People Clans hold sway over territories across the planet, based around small solid land masses. They trade foodstuffs as well as organically produced chemicals to the hive cities in exchange for refined metals and other useful things.

More to come...

Feel free to comment, critique, give suggestions, etc. I'm definitely wanting input on this project!

Stormravens and Furiosos

Deboxing has happened... now I'm debating whether to attempt to paint on the sprue (has some advantages) or desprue and partially assemble for painting. At this point I'm thinking partial assembly would be simpler in the long run, so I'll likely go with that. I've also begun work on several furiosos. One metal furioso (which was a pain to gap fill), and very likely 3 more (1 furioso box, but also a venerable and ironclad available to work with). At this point I may end up with 2 furiosos, 1 furioso libby, and a death company dread out of it.

I've been working on the paint scheme for my Blood Angels successor chapter. The chapter symbol is a set of pail brown/gold wings with a blue blood drop. Their color scheme is red for most, and bone for death company and sanguinary guard. Libby's will be bone with left arm red and right arm blue. Sanguinary priests will be bone with red left arm, and chaplains will be black. All will have red shoulder pads. Squad markings will be in their own right up once I finalize some of the thoughts on this chapter, which I have named the Angels Tears.

Oh, and time for me to bring back something I used to do...

More to come, feel free to comment!

Basing Blood Angels

Took the time yesterday to get the bases nearly finished (minor touch-up to do) and based 10 of the 30 assault marines. Got some nice pics of the WIP from early in and near the end to share.

I started the bases with a base coat of grey primer, over this I used P3 Battledress Green for the areas of earth, and Fortress Grey on the stone tiles and piece of broken column on the bases. Over this I used a wash of the old GW Striking Scorpion Green mixed 1:20 with water to wash the earth areas, and 1 drop of blue ink with 20 drops of water which I washed over all the stone on the bases.

These pics show how the bases looked at this stage of base coat and washes. Admittedly they look rough, but as the work progresses they look better and better. At this point I also did a dry brush highlight with the Battledress Green to dampen down the effect of the green wash, which was pretty intense initially.

This is after some minor edge work with Sky Blue and Skull White. I did this to give myself some guides for the final stage of work, which is to blend in some striation lines in the stone. To this I added some of the truly excellent The Army Painter Battlefields Jungle Tuft. Using that really made the bases 'pop', making them more lively and breaking up the earthy/stone look.

Here we have pics of the asm's with the bases.

Really should have fiddled with the contrast and brightness on this one...

grrr.... needed to get out the lightbox but got lazy...

The bases really help the figs, with their contrasts to the marines, as well as the  active posing of the figs giving them a feeling of motion.

This pic really shows how the colors and jungle tufts really help make the base stand out from the fig.

Next update will have the finished asm's, as well as the initial phases of work on the next 2 stormravens. Overall the hardest part is done with this project, and the vehicles and dreads are going to be a lot less time intensive.

Comments, critiques, suggestions, questions, feel free to speak your mind!

WIP Blood Angels

These are pics from earlier that I finally got around cropping and such. I'm basically down to final detail touch-up, faces/hair/eyes, and basing at this point for the 30 BA assault marines. Overall I've spent 37 hours total so far (not counting replicating bases), and I feel it's been worth every minute of it.

Here are the pics of the WIP from earlier (which doesn't show some of the current work that has been finished). This is only 1 squad out of the three, since I figured they all showed basically the same level of work this morning.

I've done weathering, as if they've been in the field for a long time without a chance to repaint and fix the dings and dents of war. Next step in the weathering is a few thin washes from the knees down.

Each of these shows a bit of the weathering at this point, which is before going back and lightly stippling in some pale orange/red to help fade it into the armor. I used a cut piece of blister foam dipped in mithril silver then hit the edges of some places, and on the main armor on other places. Doing this shows the wear and tear of various things rubbing the armor and removing the paint leaving shinier areas of wear.

Feel free to comment, critique, and all that stuff. I'll be posting again on Monday with work on the bases and some updates on the finalization of the touch-up work and face work.

Until later!

Extended day off

Since my day off from working on miniatures has gone so well, I decided to put off taking the pics of the current WIP until tomorrow (Saturday) morning-ish. So at some point tomorrow I'll be posting up pics, and hopefully I'll get out of the workspace and get a game or two in at a LGS.

Later!

Updates coming soon!

Once I get the pics taken, I'll be posting updates on the Blood Angels assault marines. At this point I'm nearly done, some minor touch up work and basing to finish. Unfortunately that means getting out my resin and casting the bases, so tomorrow I'll be doing that most likely. Otherwise I'm taking the day off from painting, maybe I'll actually get a game in this evening, that'd be a change of pace.

Well until later today, be well all!

Blood Angels WIP update

Things are going well on the Blood Angels. I took a day off from painting yesterday, but came back with a vengeance today. Today I redid all the purity seal ribbons, as well as doing a version of non-metallic gold for all the wings on symbols. Also all the skulls have been redone with a leather through white layering. Later tonight I'll get back to touch-up work as well as doing work on weapons.

Today's pics:

The various packs are roughly 95% finished at this point.

This sword's scroll work is being done in a similar fashion to the purity seal ribbons and other 'banners' on the miniatures.

The non-metallic gold is easily seen in this and other pics. It worked out quite well.

At this point I'm 95% done with all the packs, roughly 80-85% finished with the marines, and about 50% finished with the weaponry.While working on these marines I realized that I have a certain style I use, with rough highlighting and using the tip and edge of brushes a LOT. I may just have to do a post about painting styles at some point. But here we are, another 5 hours work on them bringing me to a total of 28 hours. I believe that at this point I have roughly 2-4 hours until I am finished with them.

Comments, critiques, suggestions, questions, feel free to leave a comment!

Blood Angels WIP

Having posted earlier (well a few hours ago at least) my eBay sale of a Space Wolves army, I figured it was time to put up some WIP pics of my Blood Angels. Overall I've been spending a LOT of time on the Assault Squads... all 30 guys of them. And at this point I'm at what I feel is 75% finished with them after roughly 23 hours of work. Luckily when I finish them up I only have 20 more marines to do, 2 more stormravens, 4 dreadnaughts, 2 predators, and 4 rhinos. Of course that may seem like a lot, but this army is coming along nicely. I'm really using all my skills on it, and doing everything I can to make it look the best I can. Which is quite telling in the amount of time I've spent on the 30 marines I've been working on so far.

I've decided that this is going to be a 'showcase army' of my skills, and most likely won't go for sale unless someone is willing to shell out some big money for it. So it's getting all the care and critical work I can put into it. At this point I have pics for my initial work, and the first stages of detail work. I lost pic taking time this last weekend, so my next update won't have 5 of the stages I went through and will be jumping to post-varnishing, highlighting, face/eye painting, detail repaint, and touch-up work.

So here we go...

In the beginning there were legs with torsos and jump packs... and it was good.

Here we are after the spray with Pure Red and a few of them getting hit with white in areas.

A bit further along, now all the marines have white on them in some places.

At this point I've begun using a charcoal grey color to fill the areas that will be black. Weapons, assault markings, flex joints, etc.

This picture shows that not all weapons are going to be done with a base of charcoal grey/black. Some are going to be red or other colors.

My mass of swappable packs for them, for those times that I want them to run around and not jump.

At this stage only the red base and charcoal grey are in use on the packs.

 Of course, I spent the time and effort to magnetize the packs and jump packs for the marines. I also magnetized a handful of them for weapon swapping. Here are some pics that show what was done to do just that. (I might just do a magnetizing tutorial when I get more magnets in).

I use 1/8"x1/16" rare earth magnets for figs. Using a 1/8" drill bit I hand drill into the torso to allow a magnet for each side to be placed and glued.

To allow for pack swaps I snipped off the nub that marines usually have on their back, and drilled there. Placing the magnet in and glueing.

To make sure packs work correctly, I place a magnet on the torso location, and after drilling (or with jump packs not drilling) I put a drop of glue on the end of the magnet and push it into the hole I've created. 

With arms it is key to make a pilot hole with a very small drill bit, then follow up with the one sized for the magnet. This allows you to apply much less pressure to the arm, which makes it less likely to be broken while drilling.

 As it stands I think I have roughly 6-10 more hours of work for the assault boys, then I can get to work on other parts of the project. I've also opened up a slot for commission work in my schedule, so anyone interested in having me do some work feel free to contact me to work out details.

Until next time!