Anybody there? Well, yes, technically...

Man, time sure flies! For the casual reader of this blog, one might imagine that I have not done any hobbying this year.  Well, not quite. The past few months have seen sparse action, but the first few months of 2016 were so busy... I just did not get a chance to post!

Why?  Because I participated in my first Lead Painters League! For the uninformed among you, this is a fun painting competition held over on the Lead Adventure Forum which consists of 10 (this year was 11) rounds of painted miniatures.  Each round you must paint 5 new figures, photograph them, and then users get to vote on which ones they like the best. I am going to take a few entries to post up each of my 11 rounds in turn, and discuss some of my experiences.  It was a lot of work for me, what with the rest of my real-life commitments, but I genuinely feel I came out a better hobbyist at the end.

Without further ado, here was my first entry, entitled "Camp Life"

This being my first entry, I learned a couple things... I think my photo was a tad over-exposed, and my background was a little too busy.  It might have looked better against a white background, and using some foliage to mask the base edges may have made it look more natural.  It was fun to paint though. The figures are from the Pro Gloria range (now owned by Warlord Games). They have a delightful range of Landksnecht civilians and I was happy to paint up a few of them.

Next up, my round 2 entry...

Pleasant Surprise 2015

Once again this year I participated in the Pleasant Surprise exchange over on the Warhammer Empire forum.  Every year it seems harder for me to find the time to create a nice surprise with my growing list of adult responsibilities, but I managed to paint up a figure this year nonetheless.  My recipient received his figure this past week, so I figured it was a good enough time to post some photos here.

I chose one of my favourite Empire figures from the 90's - a hero with sword and pistol.  I remember seeing him painted up in the army book when I was a kid, and I always wanted one.  Well, as a grown-up collector, I have managed to find one and even had a spare who is now with his new owner.

My recipient did not have many posted pictures of an army, so I got creative and chose this bold purple and green scheme.  I was quite happy with the results.  Every year it is a bittersweet tradition... I tend to paint figures I wanted to paint for myself, only to send them away for someone else.  I guess it is better to give than to receive, is it not?

I hope my recipient likes this figure as much as I did, and that he finds a memorable place in his collection!

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.

Lead Adventure Halberds Finished

After a few hours in the painting room I have finally finished my unit of 20 Lead Adventure Halberdiers.  Wonderful models to paint, but I think I need a bit of time off from the intense puff and slash!  These will go along nicely with my other Oldhammer models, all they need now is a coat of varnish (which will probably wait until the warmer weather of Spring) and a banner.

The final colour scheme of green and yellow was quite nice to paint, as I find they work well together.  Its also much easier to clean up one or the other when you don't stay in the lines compared to the blue and yellow scheme.  Here is the whole group together:

Quite a colourful gathering!  I am quite fond of the colourful palettes of the landsknecht at this point.  I gathered my painted Oldhammer Empire and put it on my table for a group shot.  The force is starting to come together (just ignore the bedsheet in the background - I figure it looks better than the couch).

I have a few more units to complete before my 1000 point 3rd edition empire army is finished.  My armylist consists of:

Painted:
- 1 Wizard on foot (Old GW)
- 20 Reiksguard inc hero (Old GW fighters)
- 20 Halberdiers inc hero (LAM halberdiers)
- 1 Cannon (LAM Death Bell Cannon)

Unpainted:
- General on Warhorse (LAM Wilhelm von Shakespeare)
- 10 Handgunners (LAM handgunners)
- 10 Halfling archers (Old GW)
- 5 Knights (Old GW)

I will probably paint some goblins for a while, but my next project for this army will likely be the cavalry.  I got a bits lot a while back which had a bunch of torsos for some of the old GW high helm cavalry.  They are in pretty rough shape as you can see here:

My plan is to get some Perry plastic mounted men at arms and use the bits to fix them up and give them some horses.  Any other suggestions?

Lead Adventure Halberdiers

Finally, the long-promised halberdiers.  I have finished 13 out of a planned unit of 20. Six of them were painted back in July, and I just never posted pictures of them.  The rest were finished this week.

First, we will start out with a group shot so far:

I have opted for a more mercenary approach with this unit, combining several different colour schemes for a nice bit of variety in the unit.  It helps to keep the painting interesting, rather than using the same colours all the time, and it makes for a very characterful unit.  The main schemes for this unit are red and blue, yellow and blue, red and green, and green and yellow (still to come).  Now for the individual pictures:

These guys are a heck of a lot of fun to paint as are all the other LAM figures I have seen.  The casting quality is great, and the details are very crisp and easy to pick out.  They are quite detailed, which adds a bit to the painting time, but the end result is worth it.  Hope you enjoy them.

Dipped Windmill Finished

I have now finished the windmill upon which I was experimenting.  I am quite pleased with the results, though I imagine that the quality of the piece would make it hard to get a bad finish.  This tabletop world terrain is simply mind-blowing.

Anyway, after a bit more painting, and dipping, and pinning and gluing, I had the windmill 'finished' to the point of requiring only some touchups and a coat of matte varnish.

That would work well in a pinch, no?  While it looks nice, I found the metal was too shiny for something left out in the elements, and the stones needed some weathering and differentiation of colours.  A healthy number of stones were given a wash with a mix of brown and red ink.  The metal was given a similar was to simulate oxidation.  I then washed the bottom bit of the windmill with green and brown to simulate moss and moisture growing up from the ground.  Lastly, a drybrush of the stones to bring out the detail, as well as the blue shingles, and a few touchups here and there give us the finished product.  It was sealed with a spray of Testors dullcote.

Lastly, we shall give a parting shot with the wizard of the tower (should we just call him the miller or something?) with a landsnkecht mercenary.

I hope you enjoy the photos.  It would be nice to use all this stuff in a game for once.  One day...

Small Diversion

I recently got distracted from the painting of my Dux Britanniarum.  I assure you, I have some Saxons finished, they just aren't photographed yet :)

One of the online forums I frequent, warhammer-empire.com, runs an annual miniature exchange.  I participated this year for the third time in a row.  For my recipient this year, I decided to paint up not one, but two miniatures to match his army theme of purple and  yellow.  I decided he needed a nice, stately captain - well suited by an old Empire Reiksguard foot knight captain!  To accompany him, none other than a stalwart halfilng would do!  It was a great opportunity to paint another lovely White Knight miniature, as well as some classic Empire goodness.  Onto some pictures!

The duo:

And some closeups of the Captain:

 

Finally, some closeups of his tiny compatriot:

I had lots of fun painting these guys, so I hope you enjoy them!  They are on their way across the ocean to their new home, here is to hoping they make it there safely.