Pike Dwarfs...Unit building

Well...after enjoying painting that MM15 Dwarf with the Pike for the Paint it Forward event...I've felt the strong urge to build and complete my Dwarf pike blocks.

The Marauder Pike Dwarfs were, and are, some of my all time favorite figures from the Golden Era.  They are the figures that hooked me as a child and continue to do so today.  Though they have been long discarded by modern Warhammer Bullshit fluff they will always hold a holy place in my Oldhammer dwarf army.

After completing the MM15 I pulled out my current pike unit...a 15 strong force that is mostly sporting paint jobs dating to the Regan administration.  To these I added another 13 unpainted pike dwarfs and this is the resulting unit.

Chaos Renegade #16

Well...here we are again.

The renegade painting is coming easy right now so I'm continuing to ride that wave while it lasts.

#16 is another classic Sculpt...This guy comes from the non-denominational portion of the Renegade range.  In the catalog he is known as One Eye

Really a fantastic Sculpt...the leering skull like head with the down turned horns is very effective and suitably creepy.  My thoughts for color schemes went all over the place with figure...and in the end landed in the weirdest place I could have imagined! 

My thought was to employ some of the subtle colors I've used on some of my Bretonnian figures...but the highlighting got away from me and the colors transitioned into something different...but some how more compelling.

Here he is...

I hadn't really planned on a second Pink Renegade at this point...but I think the tone of this one is so different from the more "bubblegum" color of Renegade #13 that they may still be able to remain in the same squad.

Anyway...Cheers for now...

Blue

Paint it Forward...Dwarf Pikeman

Hi all,

Recently there has been a initiative on the forums and Facebook groups that some are calling "Paint it Forward".  The idea is that you offer up a nice model for someone else to paint...you ship it to whomever accepts your offer...and they are obligated to paint that figure and offer another figure to a different painter...who would then paint that figure and offer another up for grabs...you get the idea.

When Bill from the wilds of western New York offered up one of my absolute favorite Marauder Dwarfs as his Paint it Forward figure...I couldn't resist and jumped at the chance to paint this fantastic figure.

Halfman test model...

Hi all,

Here is something a little different from the renegades I've been bombarding you with.  Late in the fall the folks from Westfalia Miniatures announced on their FB page that they would be selling some limited number of seconds from their recent Halfman Kickstarter castings.  This was a very successful KS that I watched closely and was sorely tempted to jump in on...but held off for a number of reasons.  But when the seconds were offered, and at a very tempting price, I took a shot and ordered a batch to mess around with.

Though the castings are in Resin...and as you know I'm a die hard Metal figure fan...I really like the sculpting on these characterful figures and there is no denying the crisp casting detail they were able to achieve in Resin.  The figures are gorgeous and full of character...a true testament to the sculpting ability of Michael Anderson.  The other thing that attracted me to them was their obvious similarities in design to my existing Bretonnian Army.  These Halflings are outfitted in a late medieval style that would fit perfectly with the Marquis' Army.

In the packet of random seconds that I received there were a number of different troop types...spearmen, halberdmen, swordsmen, a few archers and a couple of handgunners...there are even a couple of the amazing Goat Mounted Halfling Knights included.  I should have enough to pull together a mixed unit of close combat troops...and with minimal addition a unit of shooty types...these will be a fun addition to my Bretonnian army.


Once they arrived I did some quick clean up (so easy with Resin!!), patched few gaps (they are seconds afterall) and immediately set about painting one of the handgunners as a test model.

Here is how he turned out:

This was a very enjoyable model to paint...and I look forward to polishing off a few more in the future.

...If these had been produced in metal...I would certainly have purchased a whole army of them...so these seconds have been a fun way to mess around with a few of these great figures with adding tremendously to the lead pile.

Cheers,

Blue

Chaos Renegade #15 ...Tanglefoot

Hi all,

I'm back with yet another Renegade.  While I had intended #14 to be a filler piece while I readied a unit of dwarfs for priming and painting ...I couldn't help to squeeze in one more of these guys....plus the prep work on the dwarfs is taking longer than expected...

As I've mentioned before I have about a dozen Renegades primed and ready to go on my desk so my habit has been to pick them up randomly...decide on one that strikes my fancy at that moment and get to work on it.  This time the figure that stood out to me was one of the Nurgle Marines...in the 1991 Blue Catalog he is called "Tentacle Arm Skull Head" NICE!  This guy has got it going on!

Chaos Renegade #14...back on the Crazy Train...

Hello all,

I'm back after yet another long hiatus.  I could make excuses but whats the point...luckily I have not been completely devoid of hobby since my last post.  Just the opposite in fact...I have relocated my painting "mojo" and now have a variety of projects percolating along...in addition to that I have had some fantastic gaming with the Monolith as well as with my local gaming crew.  So I have plenty of things to blog about...I just need to sit my ass down and write a bit more often.

Anyway...to the point.  Among the other things that I have been working on I managed to squeeze in another Chaos Renegade.  There is so much amazing sculpting in this range...amazing and varied. This renegade is no exception.  His pose is quite unique and the fact that he has a traditional space marine beakie helmet and at pink horror arm only make him more interesting.

Here he is in all his glory...

As you can see I went with a gray and orange color scheme for the armor and a dark pink for the mutated arm.  The gray is quite similar to the that used on Renegade #9...and when I published the blog post for that figure I had a couple of requests for a walk thru...so I managed to remember to take a number of pictures as I worked on this guy so that I can share the process.

Now I should start by saying there is nothing special (or efficient) about the way I paint...I use a lot of layers...there are almost certainly much quicker ways to paint a figure...but this is the result that I prefer and that's a good enough for me.

As with almost all my figures, this one was primed with dark gray auto primer.  Then I set about blocking out the the base colors...I like to get each base color established, this helps me think about the overall color scheme, and then I can highlight each color individually.

As you might imagine I started with the Gray base color which I applied to the large open armor surfaces.

 
For this I used the old Citadel foundation color Adeptus Battlegrey

Next was the Orange Base coat...for this I used Vallejo Panzer Aces Light Rust (301)...this was applied to the edging of the armor and on a portion of the backpack.

And this was followed by applying Bolt Gun metal on the ribbing of the armor as well as hoses, back pack vents, and weapons

Now with all the base colors in place (other than his mutated arm which I will do last) I set about highlighting the gray.  The first highlight consisted of Vallejo Game Color Cold Grey

To increase the contrast I started mixing in a much lighter gray in the form of Vallejo Game Color Stonewall Grey

Now we are getting somewhere!  Finally I used straight stone wall grey for the final highlight and at this point the figure is really starting to pop well.

Feeling satisfied with the gray, I moved on to highlighting the Orange portions of the armor.  This was accomplished by mixing in a bit of Vallejo Panzer Aces Yellowish Rust (303) in increasing amounts.

As you might imagine the next highlight was straight Yellowish Rust and then I started to mix in a Rich yellow from Reaper...Palomino Gold

When I was content with the Orange I moved back to the metals.  For the "silver" portions all I did was give them a black wash.  For the Gold I used Vallejo Old Gold which was highlighted by mixing in Silver...and then it was washed with Sepia wash...quick effective metals.

At this point the figure was pretty much complete...except for the Mutant arm...and here I ran into some trouble.  My first issue was color selection...I attempted a Green color first...hated it and re-primed...I tried a blue color...didn't like that either...and so decided to paint the arm a very light base color and then to use a variety of washes and inks to give the arm an interesting color while maintaining a more organic feel vis a vis the Armor.  I'm still not 100% sure about the color but I'm going with it!


Luckily for you I didn't take pictures of all my attempts so I won't too you too much...in fact I have only this one WIP shot of the arm...

After this picture was taken I added one more layer of color with my ancient chestnut ink...which mellowed out the pink a bit and brought us to our final product. 

Oh...of course I also painted the "eyes"...and I stuck with yellow for this as I have with most of the other Renegades.

For a figure that I wasn't very fond of at first, I now find myself quite pleased with it overall...he is quite unique...even among the renegades...but some how it all still "works"

Cheers for now...I'll be back with more soon.

Blue

The Marquis has Arrived...

Hi all,

Long time no see!

Thanks for stopping by!  I actually have a painted figure to share with you today!

My painting Mojo has been at a low ebb for the last three months...but the prospects of some 3rd ed gaming in my near future have motivated me to actually get something done!

For the upcoming gaming I hope to run my Bretonnian army again...and it has been lacking in mounted leadership...so the focus of my painting efforts was to complete the General for my force...the Marquis de Saud-or! 

...Also known as Sir Great Helm...:)

As you can see I have decided to use the 5th ed Grail Knight Champion as my general.  I find most of the Grail knight figures from this release to be a bit over the top...but I think this figure works great when elevated to Nobility.  To add a bit of interest I decided to mount him on the horse from the Green Knight.  This mount features much more elaborate barding and a rearing pose than the regular knights and that will help the Marquis stand out from the riff-raff.

I'm embarrassed to say that I picked the components to complete this figure as far back as 2012!!!  So it has only taken me 4 years to get this done...lol. 

Below are a series of WIP shots if you are interested to see how tings progressed.

Purple has always been one of my least favorite colors to paint...but I'm feeling pleased with the way it has turned out on this figure. 

I'll be working up some photos with him and his troops when I get a chance.

It is also time for me to write up the fluff for this army which I have had rolling around in my head for quite a while. 

...these will be the subjects of future blog posts....

Cheers,

Blue

Olhammer in the New World 2016

Howdy all,

Sorry for the long delay between posts...my fall has been enormously busy with Real Life and, frankly, my painting mojo has been at a low ebb for the last 6-8 weeks.  That said I have been accomplishing a fair amount of other hobby related tasks...mostly getting movement trays for most of my troops and magnetizing bases.  But that is the subject of another post for another time...The big news since my last post is that at the beginning of October we had an amazing weekend of Oldschool gaming at Oldhammer in the New World event.

This year the event was held at Huzzah Hobbies is Ashburn, Virginia and we had gaming spread over three days.  We had about 20 attendees and played a whole host of quality Old school gaming.  While I didnt take enough photos of any one game to pull together a true battle report...I did take enough pictures of the entire event to give you a flavor of the doings.

The first gaming to take place was a quick game of Donnybrook between my Bretonnians and Airborne Grove's Classic Chaos force.

This was followed by a free wheeling Rogue Trader game with all the early arrival involved...the climax of this fight (for me) was the engagement of my Renegade Squad by Ben's Eldar Harlequins.

Gaming on Friday continued until 10om when the shop closed but picked right back up again the following morning...and i immediately got stuck into a truly epic game of Space Hulk put on my Kronos and his pal Buford.

Once my Squad of Termies was finally reprocessed into new Genetic material for the growing Genestealer threat I moved onto a game of WFB against Rusty and his Orcs.  Now Rusty and I have been trying to pull off this game for the last three years...and we finally managed it this year.  This was a 2500 pt battle between the Greenskin horde and my Dwarf army.  We settled into what we expected to be a game that would last all afternoon...but that was not the case.  Rusty's army contained a giant who quickly shattered my line and caused my general (!!!!) to rout off the table...the game rapidly went down hill from here...it was quite embarrassing...

...but a lot of fun

After this humiliating defeat I resigned the rest of my day to simply observing the rest of the great gaming that was going on around me...here is a selection of photos...

All in all it was a wonderful weekend...as always it is great to catch up with the Core OHNW crew and to meet plenty of new faces.  The staff of Huzzah Hobbies was tremendously helpful and the hard work of Andrew in organizing thing really paid off in a great event.

Here is looking forward to the next one!

Cheers,

Blue