More goblins for the warband...

I know I am slow at painting, but I did not finish this last batch of Orcmas goblins 6 months late.  It was only 4 months late, it just took me two months to post them!  These were the last of the goblins I had planned to paint.  They still need another coat of matte varnish, but I am quite pleased with them!

These old figures have so much character, I look forward to painting some more of them (at some point).  Here is a shot at a slightly different angle:

I hope you like them!  That's the last of the Orcmas theme for at least 4 months!

Some more Orcmas Orcs!

As promised, I have painted five lovely orcs to add to my Orcmas warbands.  These are from the currently discontinued Wargames Foundry line of Kev Adams orcs (my fingers are still crossed that they are re-released in the future!)  These were some of my favourite sculpts from the entire line, so I am glad I was able to purchase them before they disappeared.

As you can see, the character and goofiness of these figures is amazing.  I had some closeup photos of each orc on his own, but I think I will have to save those for another post to give a little backstory to each one.  Personally, I think they deserve it, don't you?

Enjoy!

Goblins join the fray!

In my ongoing efforts to finish projects I have started, I have been plugging away at my Orcmas themed miniatures.  This past month, I finished a few goblins, which I finally got around to photographing this past week.

The goblins are Kev Adams sculpts, classic stuff from the 90's!  These guys have been sitting in my stash for a couple years now, so I was very happy to finally get some paint on them.

The jester goblin is actually from the currently discontinued Wargames Foundry line, while the rest are GW night goblins.  The double-based goblins are squig prodders.  I experimented a bit with the fleshtones on these, with some receiving a more green-yellow-brown shade, and the others using the Wargames Foundry Moss Green palette (Triad 29).  I find the Moss is great for goblins, but a bit too pale (IMO) for orcs.

Here are the little blighters with their Boss, Gobbo Clawz:

What I have left for this project: five foundry orcs (painted but not posted) and six more GW goblins (just waiting to be primed).  I hope you enjoy these little guys as much as I did, any feedback is appreciated.

Two More Orc(mas) Guards

As promised, here are two more orcs to go with the Orcmas theme.  I know, Orcmas is long past, so we can just appreciate these guys as orcs.  These being from the Foundry mercenary 'orcs' range rather than the 'ogres' range, they are a tad smaller than the previous two (though not by much).  Their sculpts were a bit more simpler, so the painting progressed a little bit easier.

I was quite pleased with the brown fabric on the orc on the left, I had a good time with those highlights.  The expression on his face is also quite appealing.  The orc on the right looks cool with his big book (I assume it's the Naughty or Nice list, though orcs can't read, so...).

I have almost finished  a few goblins to go with this project, so you can hopefully expect those pretty soon.

Santorc's Guards

While Orcmas many officially be over, I am still plugging away at the few figures I wanted to complete this season.  As you saw last time, I had a teaser of two WIP figures - Santorc's festive guards.  I finally finished them, and I am quite happy with the results.  These are some of the Wargames Foundry Mercenary Ogres.  They were sculpted by Kev Adams.  Very challenging figures to paint, with all of the puff and slash, but it is a nice effect when it is finished.

The blacklining on the clothing for the guard on the left took me forever.  After roughing in the colours, I went over each patch with some vallejo black ink, watered to about 60% with water and some flow improver.  Afterwards I had to redo the highlights and brighten up the white, but I really like the use of blacklining in figures like this, as it makes a nice border between the colours.  The other fun part was the gem on the right of the right-hand orc.  It's always fun trying to paint gems.

Finally, I will leave you with a shot of the terrible triad.

Kinda makes you wonder whether you should have made such a long Orcmas list, eh?  I still have a few more figures on the painting table which will hopefully make it in before the New Year.  Namely, I have a couple guards to do, as well as Santorc's biggest rival! (cue menacing music...)

Here come the little folk!

"What are you doing?"

 "Tomatoes, sausages, and nice, crispy bacon!"

Hobbit references aside, I am now pleased to share with you all a secret project which I had worked on this summer!

White Knight, with his wonderful range of landsknecht gobins, gave in to popular demand to see a separate set of halfling heads sulpted by Kev Adams to fit on the goblin bodies.  In my conversations with him, I was able to trick/beg/barter a set of mastercastings of the aforementioned halfling heads to paint up so he could show the world some painted examples.

Upon receiving them in the mail, I was delighted to find the 12 crisp heads, with great details and expressions.  The pick of the crop to me (and WK will agree) were the bare headed halfings, who simply oozed with character.

I set about assembling the 6 heads that most appealed to me, and slapped on some paint.  Here are the final results!

First up are 2 of the bare heads and a nice feathered cap.  The strapping chap in the middle is my favourite of all 12 heads.  Nice bushy eyebrows and a full face.  I found the sculpt somewhat resembled my late grandfather, so in his honour the middle halfling with the halberd has been named Tom.  I don't normally name my miniatures, so that's a pretty big honour :)

Next up were some more heads, a couple with handguns and another halberd.  I made a slight slip up with the guy on the right - adding a blue wash to add some colour around the eyes ended badly.  My wife said it looked like he got a black eye, so I decided that was a better story than taking time to fix it.  So the halfling on the right got into it last night with a surly (and quite drunk) dwarfen merchant at the hogshead tavern.  Today he showed up for duty with a nice shiner and his pride mostly intact!

These guys were lots of fun to paint up!  The details pick out nicely, and they don't overwhelm the models.  I find models with tons of little details can be somewhat cumbersome to paint, even if they give good results.  To me, these little guys are both fun and rewarding to paint, and nicely fill a gap in the miniature market.  I hope to finish off a few GW halflings soon so you can compare the size and scale of each.

Enjoy!

Crowdsourcing...

In the past couple months, I have been made aware of crowdsourcing sites such as kickstarter and indiegogo.  For the uninformed (as I once was) it is an online platform where small companies can raise capital by advertising their product to a wide audience.  Typically this is done by showcasing their product, and by giving incentives for supporters (ex if you pledge $50 you will get $60 worth of merchandise, etc.)

I was initially hooked by the amazingly successful Kings of War campaign on Kickstarter.  I am sure in line for a lot of swag once it is produced!

Letely I have been impressed by a few other active fundraisers for miniature-related projects.  The first is a small project to have the illustrious Kev Adams sculpt some pirate goblins: http://www.indiegogo.com/pirate-goblins?c=home


Basically the guy is going ahead with the goblins regardless of funding levels, but you can get a better deal through the preorder.  I will be down for some of those, as I can never seem to get enough goblins...  The greens are already done, and the models really look stellar! (photo taken from the indiegogo page)

Speaking of which, a new project on indiegogo by Titan-forge miniatures: http://www.indiegogo.com/drakskullsmenace showcases their plans for an undead greenskin army!  I like this, as there is a distinct lack of quality undead greenskins.  Sure, there are the awesome skeleton orcs from the old GW cursed company (I painted these up a couple years ago):

But those were only one pose, and have been out of production for years.  I think this will be a pretty successful project, mostly because I like the concepts and models.  Not sure if I will have the funds to join in, but its pretty cool to look at!

I say as long as we get a steady stream of high-quality, reliable projects, crowdsourcing projects like these will be a big boost to the miniature industry!

Some worthy sea dogs!

Between working and enjoying the summer weather, I have been able to put a few more strokes of paint to lead lately!  Namely, I have been trying to finish some crew for my Nipponese Junk.

First up, we have the captain.  Haru of the Shugyosha Sueshiju (my meagre attempt at a Japanese name using an online translator).  Its an old preslotta citadel oriental hero.  Also, my first model using a gradient background (wooo!).  I got the gradients for free online, here.

The base was sculpted into a woodgrain effect with greenstuff.  At the time I had no other ideas on making a decking base, so that is what I came up with.  Not my greatest result, but functional enough.

Next up I finished two Cathayan crewmen, using wargames foundry chinese pirates.  Pretty nice models, though the hands are a little big...

 

I have a couple more of the chinese pirates to add, and then there are some nice old citadel samurai awaiting my loving attention.  Though my attention has been on a different project as of late.  A secret one.  Intrigued?  Well don't worry, the project is not that *big* ;)

Also, a special thanks to the Kev Adams Challenge for posting a link to my blog and highlighting some of the WK goblins I have painted!  I hope there are many more to come!

Thats all for now!