Ewal Dvergar Boar Riders...Part III

Another quick post today...

...And another of Clam's fantastic Ewal Dvergar Boar Riders.  This one is another mix match...the body and Boar are from the Boar Rider release...but the helmet for this one comes from the earlier Ewal Dvergar warrior release, and it is one that I'm particularly fond of.

I've been meaning to try one of my chaos figures with black armor...but honestly I've been hesitant too until now.  Long time readers of this blog may remember a post I wrote about a system I had learned for painting black from a few years ago (LINK)...I have only used it sparingly since this initial attempt and never on a subject with this much area to cover...but this seemed like the perfect chance to give it a try on a more challenging subject.

...but before I reveal the final piece I want to take another opportunity to heap high praise on John Pickford for the sculpting on the boars he produced for this range and for Clam...They are superb and this one was another joy to paint.  Take a look!

Ewal Dvergar Boar Riders

Hi all,

Once again it has been a long delay since I have had a substantive blog post...but I'm trying something new today.  One of the big issues I've been having with blogging is computer related.  My laptop has been on the fritz for weeks now and that is where most of my pictures are stored...so in order to get something up I've decided to write a post on my phone with the pictures I have stored there.  So if the formatting is a bit weird...I blame the phone and blogger app...:)

Anyway...today I would like to talk to you about chaos dwarfs...or more specifically boar mounted Ewal Dvergar!!  My hook-up for all things stunty and Chaotic...Clam... sent me a batch of his newly released Boar riders a month or two ago and I've finally had a chance to get to work on them.

BTW...When you decide to get some of these...and you will...hit up Clam's Blog to order here:

http://claminiatures.blogspot.dk/

One of the fun things about these figures is that any of the chaotic dwarfy heads that John Pickford has sculpted for Clam (and others) fit perfectly on these bodies.  So this allowed me to have some fun mixing and matching bits and pieces from a variety of sets to make unique boar riders for my army.  as I started to play with the options I laid out all my bits...

...and a Special Surprise!!!! I mean it this time!

So in the post I did last week on the fantastic Ewal Dvergar Xbows that have been recently released by Clam I hinted at something special in the title...

...and then forgot to mention that "something" in the post!  DOH!!!

Sorry about that.

Ewal Dvergar Crossbows ....and a Special Surprise

One of the great things about the current state of the "Oldhammer" Community are the number of small companies...and in some cases individuals...who are designing and producing figures that have that "Old School" vibe.  One of my absolute favorite ranges of this sort are the Ewal Dvergar being produced by Clam.  The Ewal Dvergar range takes its inspiration from the classic Chaos Dwarf models produced by citadel and Marauder during the heady days of the 2nd and 3rd editions of Warhammer Fantasy Battles.  Clam's figures allow a general to build a sizable force of evil stunties without having to collect innumerable duplicate copies of very hard to find and expensive classic figures

Ewal Dvergar "Unit Shots"

Building on my last post which featured the Ewal Dvergar that I painted up for Round one of the LPL... here are a few pictures of all the Ewal Dvergar that I have painted up to now.  In total I have 9 of these fantastic figures painted (though a few are still missing shields)...in order to round out the unit to two nice ranks of 5 I have also included the MM90/WK conversion that I refer to as the "Green Knight"...though I've stuck him in the back rank.

While this isn't a huge unit its starting to look pretty good!  I had orginally thought that I would mix in Clam's sculpts with my MM90s to make a big unit...now after seeing these guys all together...I'm thinking I need two units :)  One of MM90s and one of Ewal Dvergar!

Anyway...here are the pics.

LPL Round 1: Ewal Dvergar

Well...the time has finally come!  Round 1 of the Lead Painters League has closed for voting and Round 2 has begun....therefore I'm allowed to post up my first round entry for public consumption.

The entry requirements for this year's LPL have changed from previous iterations of the contest.  This year you are allowed to only enter one picture of your team...with no composite images allowed.  In the past I had the option of using a combination of images to best illustrate the details of my figures....this year one picture only.  So this was picture that I submitted...

Four A Miniatures...Chaos Dwarfs I

Hi all,

Over the previous summer I was contacted by the sculptor John Pickford who was interested in having me paint a couple of pieces for him that he had recently sculpted for Four A miniatures.  I was obviously very humbled to have a man of his talent ask me to "pretty up" his sculpts for him so I gladly accepted. (it had nothing to do with the other lead he offered me as payment...I swear!) :)

A couple of weeks after our initial discussions a box full of goodies arrived from John in my mail box.  Amongst the assorted treasures therein were three brand new Chaos Dwarf sculpts... Though these aren't you normal chaos dwarfs...more of a kind of blend of Chaos Dwarf and Beastman/Werewolf.  Suffice to say they looked fantastic and I couldn't wait to get down to work on them.  But as you know the last summer was a rough one for old Blue....that whole broken ankle thing threw a monkey wrench into many of my plans.  So they weren't really finished until well into the fall.  As the release date for these figures is now drawing nigh (they should be out toward the end of February) I thought it would be a good time to post up some detailed pictures of them.

First up lets look at them as a group and then we can talk about them each in more detail....

Warhammer Skirmish Homebrew fun game

Howdy all,

Last night I managed to convince a couple of my buddies to have a game of Oldhammer...and we opted to do something a little different....we played a total skirmish game.  I home brewed a set of rules using 3ed as the base with some input from Rogue Trader and Realms of Chaos as well as other ideas that randomly popped into my head.  The idea was to have a fairly fast flexible game with smallish units (8 max).  I think we succeeded...and most importantly we had a lot of fun doing it.

The forces engaged consisted of Dwarfs and Humans (my 5th ed Brets) on the side of light...commanded by Brian....and Chaos Dwarfs and Orcs and Goblins on the side of Chaos...commanded by Tom.

Here are a few pictures of the nights activities...sorry for the quality...they are all done with my iPhone and under the crappy florescent lights in my garage.

Here is an overview of the table with Tom starting to move his forces of Chaos (chaos dwarfs and O&Gs) onto the table...

No smart ass comments about the exercise bike in the background...

As you can see we had a fairly dense set of ruins in the center of the table representing a burned out village...this is composed of card building from Dave Graffam.

Bret Halberds Complete...and something Chaosy this way comes

Howdy all...well the heart of the summer is upon us....my ankle is healing well and my work load has gone off the charts...seems no one did anything at work while I was laying on the couch for a month...lazy sods!  So my hobby time has been quite restricted but I do have a couple of updates to share with you.

First of all I finished off the last of the infantry units for my Bretonnian warband....these are the halberdiers I was working on for the Monthly Unit Painting Challenge over on the Oldhammer Forum.  They still need a banner and few shields but they are done enough for now.  This unit didn't inspire me the way the others did but I'm glad they are finished and I'm fairly happy with the way they turned out.....take a look for yourself.  Sorry about the crappy wooden movement tray...its a WIP

This shot shows the 3 R&F sculpts...nice but a little more variety would have been great!

Shields detail...these guys look better from the back!

With the completion of these guys I'm getting fairly close to being finished with this small army.  On my painting table right now are a unit of 10 knights as well as a general and army standard bearer.  The only other thing I have to add are more mounted yeomen....I'm still hunting a couple of the sculpts down but that unit can grow slowly.

On a completely different note....last weekend my painting mojo completely vanished so I found some time to clean a prep models for future efforts.  Recently my boy Clam sent along a set of his new Ewal Dvergar sculpts for me to play around with.  So I spread them out with a batch of the first release castings that were still patiently waiting assembly and I went to work....here is what I started with.

As you can see there are a LOT of options here....so I spent the better part of night just fiddling around and trying different head and weapons options on the various bodies.  By the end of the evening here is what I had come up with....a group of 4 with pole arms...

I particularly like the guy second from the left...

 ...a couple with two hand weapons

here I used weapons from both 1st and 2nd releases

....and a sizable group of hand weapon and shield warriors

A right evil looking bunch eh?

Additonally I built this guy on the left with the two handed sword and started on a couple of conversions with some of the extra bits...which are sill very much WIP.

Bonus points if you can ID the base bodies on the two models on the right...

I hope to get these guys primed up in the next few days so they can join the great unpainted masses awaiting my attention on the painting table.

Of course if you want some of these babies for yourself you should check out Clam's Blog HERE

...tell him Blue sent ya...

Cheers for now!

Blue

Unboxing Goblin King's Battle Chariot...A brief LPL Respite.

This week I thought I would give you all a break from the endless stream of LPL entries....particularly as the next two I have to post are virtually identical anyway...and show off a little something that arrived at my home while I was away on business.  I carried out a trade with Abear over on Bartertown ...I sent him some classic Marauder and Citadel dwarfs and he sent me some 4th ed Savage Orc Boar riders and the classic Citadel Goblin King's Battle Chariot. 

I felt we achieved a very fair trade and didn't give it another thought...until I returned home after being gone for two weeks and found a sizable box on my desk....it seemed too large for the trade that we had arranged...when I opened it I found out why...

...the Chariot came in its original box!  Abear had not mentioned this fact in our discussions so it was a VERY exciting bonus to this trade.  I'm not one to get too caught up in opening blisters or collecting old figure boxes...but I have to admit there was a wave of nostalgia that hit when I held that box in my hands.

...So I thought I'd share the experience with you.

Here is the front of the box...a little beat but still full of charm...

 I love the border on this box...I see where Zhu gets his inspiration!

Here is the back with the Stats and Fluff...

Click for a larger version

Here are all the components in the original Styrofoam tray...The Chariot body and Boar have been assembled already but the other pieces are still loose and untouched.

Here is a close-up of the boar....a very nice model and the right balance of pig and fantasy...very modest in size compared to the boars of later editions.

...And here he his with the cart attached...

Here are the crew member and the Goblin King himself...pretty similar to the one from the new Hobbit Movie right...:) ?!

Here they are in position on their new ride!

Fitting the driver is a little fiddly...but I figured it out eventually...

And an Overview shot of the whole model...

This is really a wonderful model...its a pretty puny chariot in comparison to others from this time period like the High Elf Chariot.  Goblin King's Battle "Cart" might have been a better name for this peice...but it oozes character and charm like most models of this era....and having the original box to go with it is a real joy.



Cheers for now!


Blue

Blue does the "Dip"

WHAT!? Two posts in one day!  That is unheard of!!!....

hehe...well lets give it a go...

After seeing the results of several recent posts about "dipping" I decided to give it a try myself.  Now no one around me carries Army Painter Products...and I didn't really want to pay $30 for an experiment anyway...plus several people "in the know" assured me that the AP version was just repackaged wood stain ...so...I decided to go with the Minwax Polyshades "dip".  Now in my copious reading on the subject most people suggested AP strong tone or, its rough equivalent Miniwax Antique Walnut, as the most useful colors.  I actually had a $5 coupon to my local hardware store so I picked up a tin...only $3 with the discount so why not! 

To test this technique I thought some of the 4th edition Savage Orcs would be useful. So I primed one in white and slapped some base colors on it...I used the old Goblin Green that I've had for eons for the flesh...this is my normal highlight color.  The rest I did with "brighter than you would think necessary colors" and then I Brushed on a coating of the Antique walnut stain....I let it dry and it looked HORRIBLE!  But I knew that it needed a coat of matte varnish before I should make my final judgement...so hit it with some Testors Dullcoat and it looked better...still not good... but better....take a look...

To my eye the Brown colored stain was just the wrong choice for this figure....it looked bad on the Green flesh and just wasn't working for me.  So I found my way to an ACE hardware...the only place that seems to carry the black based Tudor Stain in my area...luckily they had a can...from the dust on top I could tell it wasn't a popular color but I was very happy to find it.  It cost me another $8 but I'm still coming out ahead compared to buying AP Quickshade.  Here are the two cans side by side.

With the Tudor stain in hand I picked another Savage Orc and got to work...and I remembered to take pictures this time!  :lol:

So again I primed white and slapped some bright colors on this dude...it took me about 15minutes to block in the base colors....here is what he looked like pre-dip

I then brushed on the well stirred Tudor stain....using the brush and a paper towel to remove larger than wanted pools of the stuff...and let him dry over night....here is the result.

YIKES!  That is terrible!  Quick! Get the Dullcoat!

Ahhh...that's better....in fact that's a LOT better.  I personally think he looks pretty good!  considering the time I put into him he looks alright!

Of course everybody looks better with a completed base...so I finished him off like my usual figures.

Hey hey! Not Bad!  Not going to win any contests with them but overall quite pleased...and a complete unit of these is going to look great.  The only post-dip highlighting I did was on the blue war paint where I picked out the VERY highest of highlights...took a total of 3 minutes.  I also painted the metal...in this case copper rings on his arms and neck...using my usual highlight and sepia wash and he was done.  Obviously he still needs a shield but I haven't found the right ones yet... :?

So...overall I will be quite happy to use this technique on certain troop types.  For now it will be restricted to my 4th edition Orcs and possibly my Marauder Beastmen (I'll try the walnut on them again...might be a better fit)...but if I can get them on the table fairly quickly I will be more than happy with this experiment and the paltry sum I laid out to conduct it.  I won't be using this on units that are closer to my heart...like any of my dwarfs etc.  Those I will continue to paint in the normal fashion....which produces much better results overall...but does take a considerable bit longer to complete to satisfaction.

As an after note I was a little concerned that if in the future I wanted to re-paint these in a more traditional fashion that the dip would make it hard to strip the paint off.  This proved to be a non-issue....I put the first orc with the brown stain in my normal Simple Green bath and it cleaned up very nicely.

So...thats my experiment...for what its worth!

Cheers,

Blue

Bitz Box Bonanza!

Howdy all...

A brief respite from the Bretonnian bombardment....

During a recent troll through the depths of eBay I came across one of the Marauder MM32/34 Goblin Wolf Riders that I am still missing.  This set is one of my long term projects and finding the last few has proven to be a challenge....though a fun one :) so I was pretty happy to find this guy from a seller in Germany...

  Sure he doesn't look that great now...but he should clean up nicely and will look great when he joins his brethren.

...but thats not the point of this post...as I often do when I find an overseas deal that I can't pass up...I looked at the sellers other listing to see if I can combine shipping and pick up a couple of things at once.  One of his listing was for a pile of bits from classic Marauder and Citadel figures.  I threw in a low ball bid and waited...and scored a win!  I was pleasently surpirsed and it cost me less than $4 US...plus a share of the shipping of course.

A heavy envelop arrived today from Germany so I quickly popped it open and was quite excited as I shifted thru the pile.  Here were a bunch of pieces of classic figures that I would never have the ....uuummm... "intestinal fortitude" to butcher myself....and now I won't have too!

Fair warning....if the sight of mutilated Classic figures is disturbing to you then go no further!

Here is the pile as I dumped out onto my work surface....

Ummmm...heaping pile of lead.....yyyuuummmm

...Go ahead...take a moment and see what you can pick out....I'll wait a minute....

(whistle...whistle....)

You Good?  Ready to see what we got here? ....ok here goes....

First your obligatory pile of random limbs and feet...

Mostly Plague Bearer parts...

 Then there are a few random warrior types

I'm pretty sure Orylgg just showed that guy on the left on his blog...

 Here we have a Chaos warrior missing an arm...part of a Battle Lord on the right...and a mystery figure in the middle...anyone know who he is?

Here are the Plague Bearers that used to belong to some of those feet...

Having never seen these figures in the flesh I've never had much interest in them...but now that I see some first hand...they do have a lot of character!

There are also a few dismembered Orcs...real classics here...

 ...including a villager...a standard... and a mage...

Next there are a few chopped up beastmen...

...this includes some of the Marauder Beastmen...I'm working up a unit of them so this might be useful for adding some variety to the rank and file.  There is also a couple of classic Iron Claw beastmen.

And here is the part I'm most excited about....the upper torsos of no less than 7 Marauder MM90 Chaos Dwarfs...(plus one CW torso...)

I see some Badass Bull Centaurs in my future!

These will be great for conversions...These are figures I would never cut up on my own but having it done for me minimizes the guilt and opens up a lot of possiblilities for mixing with the other MM90s and even Clam's Ewal Dvergar....oh yeah...this is going to be fun!

...now to find the time....sigh

...back to the batch painting!

Cheers,

Blue

Incoming!!!

While I still slave away in my giant batch of figures... (they are starting to look pretty good...but they ain't done yet...sigh)... I want to take a moment to show some pictures of a really cool figure I just received.  I think that many of you have seen examples around on the internet of Crooked Claw Miniatures Goblins...if you haven't then go check them out HERE ...When they showed off a new Goblin catapult a few weeks ago I knew I had to have it.  Plus the price was very reasonable.

Crooked Claw Goblin Stone Thrower

 I think that Crooked Claw is one of a small number of miniatures figure companies that are making new figures with the "oldhammer flavor"...and a nod to the Golden era of Citadel miniatures...much like White Knight's excellent Dwarfs/Goblins/Halflings (HERE).  The fact that Kevin Adam's is sculpting this range makes the quality of the work undeniably great...and this piece certainly lives up to that expectation

As you can see the set comes with a good sized stone thrower that is fronted by an wonderfully detailed and characterful "face plate" ...and three crew members as well as a small wind indicating flag.  The face plate certainly harkens back to the wonderful sculpting on classic Citadel war machines like the Lead Belcher and the Man Mangler both of which also sported excellent "face plates"

That's gonna be fun to paint.

 The wooden structure of the weapon is also covered with excellent little details.  Many of these details are reminiscent of the other classic greenskin war machine the "Skull Crusher" which was covered with similar faces.

As you can see here mine is held together with poster tack for now

Even the business end of the throwing arm has been given the "Kev Adams Treatment"  Check out this face?

 
I don't often say that I'm excited to paint a warmachine...they are usually rather dull to paint...but this one is going to be a blast!  The hard part is going to be trying to decide what approach to take for painting all the faces on this wonderful sculpt.

The crew is also very characterful...particularly the commander...he is fantastic.

 Anyway...if you need another piece of machinery for your Greenskin Horde...and you want a new take on the stone thrower that has a classic feel with new embellishment ...you should check out Crooked Claw.

Cheers,

Blue

Golden Hat and Brush Slave Gobos

I finished up a decent sized group of goblins to cover two different painting contests over at CDO.  5 of these were used as my Golden Hat entry and the other 3 were used for the first round of the 2nd year of the Brush Slave League.  The plan was for the GH entry to be displayed and voted on before the BSL team made an appearance but due to some delays the GH pictures were actually posted after those from the BSL...so much for being an anonymous event...haha.  Anyway...on to the figures.

These are all from the Marauder MB4 Goblin Raiders Unit...perhaps the best goblins from the Marauder range.  It is an interesting unit...originally sold in a blister box of 12 figures...4 command, 4 warriors, and 4 archers.  As we all know a unit of 12 goblins is just asking for disaster on the table top so I have expanded my unit to 22....and I equip them as archers and just move the warriors to the front rank if they engage in melee.

here is the Golden hat entry which includes the musician from the unit

Front...not undead shields...also known as Bacardi shields

Here are some closeups of these guys

These three are my favorites of the bunch

And here are the Brush Slave boys...

And...All together now!

Thanks for looking!

Blue

CDO 6-hour Painting Marathon and Miniature Exchange...part 2

Well...things are finally settling out here in VT after a hectic Thanksgiving holiday that saw me out of town and not getting any hobby work done.  But over the last few nights I've managed to fulfill my 6-hour time allotment and I was able to finish both figures that I previewed in the last post....(we're not going to talk about how depressed I am to have only finished two figures in 6 hours...sigh) 

First off is the converted Chaos Dwarf drummer that I completed for the miniature exchange...still not overly happy with the drum head design but I will let the receiver of this figure decide if he wants to change it or not.  I actually think that this version looks quite a bit better than my original...the red just works better with this figure.

He put down the Crossbow and picked up a drum!

Secondly is the White Knight Zweihander that I was finishing up for the monthly Bugman's Painting challenge...I quite happy with how he turned out.  As mentioned before this is a figure that really spoke to me...I feel it is the best of the Zweihander set....but that is my personal opinion of course...there are a number of great figures from this set.

"None shall PASS!"

...and while I had the camera set up I went ahead and snapped a couple shots of the complete unit with this bloke and the drunken sergeant added.

I'm hoping to add just two more figures to this unit to bring it up to a respectable 3rd edition size of 14 figures...not bad for an elite unit...I will be running these guys with Hammerer stats so they will be doing some serious slicing and dicing of their opponents.

Next up....Blue actually plays a game!!! (Ok...I just GMed but still!!!)

Cheers,

Blue