Shadowsea - Rise of the Draconids Kickstarter

This has been mentioned in my post a few days ago, but I thought I would highlight this specifically.

Antimatter Games is currently funding the production of some more lizardman figures for their draconid faction (along with a few other stretch goals).  The funding has unlocked the initially targeted figures, and with another 10 days to go, there is still lots of potential to unlock more!

Additionally, there will be a published painting guide by Eric Louchard, showcasing his painting technique using washes and glazes to bring out the best detail for these figures.  I have followed many of his tutorials, and am always amazed by the skill he possesses.  It should be a great resource to have in my quest to improve my painting skills.

Eric will also be sculpting the lizards, as he has sculpted most of what is currently available in the range.  He has already started on the draconid Royal Guard:

As with previous Antimatter KS projects, you can order figures from the existing range as pledge rewards, and they can typically be shipped within a few weeks.  I am looking forward to complete part of my collection of their figures - they are always a pleasure to paint!

You can check out the KS here.

Gorkamorka! (More distractions...)

Inspired by some of my local gaming buddies, I have started to put together a trukk to play a few games of Gorkamorka.  After getting interested in assembling a force, I went about collecting a bunch of things impulsively.  One thing that was noticed was the small size and somewhat uninteresting design of the classic Gorkamorka vehicles.  So, to that effect I decided to try my hand at some converting and kitbashing.

Now, this trukk is still very much a WIP, but it has the back end of a Gorkamorka trukk, the body of a plastic Ork Deffkopta as the cab, it will have the dozer blade from a tank as a ram and will have bits from the current plastic trukk along with some scratchbuilt stuff to make it interesting.  Hopefully you like it so far.  As with all of my projects, it may or may not be completed sometime in the near future.

Enjoy!

Shadowsea Axibalan Coyotl Warriors

Time for some more Antimatter goodness, this time from some land-based Shadowsea figures.  These two sculpts were part of the original Cavalcade line of Dragonblood miniatures which were purchased by Antimatter last year when Cavalcade closed its doors.  Sculpted by the ever-talented Kev Adams, when I first saw these minis I knew I had to have them!  They are definitely some of my favourites from the Shadowsea line.  Just really great detail and character, and very fun to paint.  I made some heavier use of inks and washes on these, particularly with the feathers and the cloth.  The bronze and gold were painted using washes over a light primer which were then drybrushed with the appropriate metallic colour to help differentiate it.  I think ti worked out quite well.

In case you had not noticed, Antimatter is currently running a Kickstarter campaign, titled Rise of the Draconids.  If you had not figured it out, this one is primarily to fund the production of more lizard/draconid figures.  It is going quite well, with all of the Draconid starter set now funded and further figures as stretch goals.  There is a little less than two weeks to go, so feel free to stop by and pitch in!  The bespoke Coytol are available as rewards, so you can definitely pick up these beasties at a nice discount.  Check it out here.

Painted Fortune Hunters

Finally getting around to posting my next warband, the Fortune Hunteres.  Some really nice human models here, and they take quite well to washes for the general painting - the metal dive suits can be painted to look really nice without the need for hours and hours of detail work.  I have the standard deluxe starter with the Sea Dog captain added in for good measure.

I think the Sea Dog Captain was my favourite figure out of this lot.  Though I did have to patch up a slight miscast on his left shoulder.  Nothing a little greenstuff couldn't fix!  The scattergun really looks deadly at close range (and dangerous for the shooter too!).  Yep, I also missed a small spot on the back of his base.

Next up, Marie du Chatelet, the scientist, and the Heavy trooper.  Initially I was not too fond of the female model, but this one grew on me as I painted her.  A very nice esthetic, with a few small details to make the figure pop.  That and she is fully clothed, which marks it approve for family use.

Finally the big Mech and the Recon trooper.  The Recon trooper is a really cool sculpt, but it seems to be a different sculptor than the rest, and the scale is a bit off.  Not a huge deal, as you can't really notice from a tabletop distance.  I think the cool propulsion system makes up for it.

One thing I tried to do with the armour plating in this warband was to have a gradient of brownish/orange hues up to blue from the ground up, to reflect the colour of the ground on the lower extremities of the metal models.  You can see it a bit more in person, but it was a fun experiment.  I kinda used that to combine NMM-type elements with metallics.  I don't have the patience (or time) to go full NMM at this stage in life.  Maybe that's a good thing :)

Hope you like 'em!

Dark Mariners Warband - Award Winning!

Good evening ladies and gentlemen.  The past couple weeks have been a blur of activity as I shifted my painting into overdrive to finish my starter sets.  This past weekend, I used said sets to GM a DeepWars demo at the 1st annual Hold The Line gaming convention in Toronto.  That was great fun (and will be expanded upon later).

First up, though, I wish to share my DeepWars Dark Mariners warband.  It is based from the deluxe starter set plus the captain model.  It took home first place in the wargames scale unit category of the golden  helmet painting competition!  It was my first competition ever, so it was very nice to win something.

Ok ok, on to the pictures...

These were a blast to paint.  I almost did not get to fully enjoy the experience due to my tight schedule.  Almost.  These were painted using a grey primer with a white zenith prime, followed by liberal applications of inks and washes.  Details were picked out and tidied up using opaque colours, but I tried to minimize that as the reason for using inks is to capture the natural highlights and shades from the whites and greys from the primer.

I did some of my other units with a black primer with white zenith prime, and I find the grey turns out better.  It is more forgiving if you miss a spot with the white, and the colours pop quite nicely IMO.  The models were finished off with a liberal brushed coating of vallejo matte varnish.

Some closeups:
Captain and Annihilator Biomech

Octopod and Vanguard Marine:

Scientist and Scavengers:

The Vanguard Marine is by far my favourite DM pose, possibly my favourite figure from the whole DeepWars line (well, the Dagathonan Brute is awesome too...).  I am quite happy with how the colours turned out, and I hope you enjoyed the pictures.

Ancients of Atalan Starter Finished

I finally got around to posting pictures of the last pieces from the Ancients starter set.  Here we have the mechano-crab and the robo-shark.  Or, if you wish to get all 'official' on me, the Chariniform Light Assault Mech Construct and the Exoform Salvage Mech Construct.

I am more satisfied with the results on the crab than the shark - I was more patient in my painting and used more translucent colours to get a nice blended colour from the legs up.  The idea in my head was that the metal alloy is quite reflective, so the colours we see are more a reflection of the surrounding colours (ground below, water above) than the actual colour of the mech.  I hope you enjoy them regardless.

Finally, a group with all of the 'Ancient' friends together:

Apart from the initial five figures for each faction, I will also be painting up a leader for each group.  I am going to finish the groups first though.  Any comments or suggestions welcome!

Airbrushing! With some unexpected delays...

It's been quiet on the blog front lately, mostly due to it being summertime.  One fancy addition to my hobby arsenal lately has been a new foray into airbrushing!

I recently purchased a Badger TC910 Aspire Pro compressor, and a Badger 105 Patriot airbrush to get me started.  Well, to my surprise, the adapter that came with the TC910 does not fit the Patriot air hose!  There is a separate adapter which does fit, but I cannot for the life of me remove the other adaptor from the air regulator.

Perhaps a photo will help?

The top photo shows the male end of the adapter which fits the airbrush hose.  The bottom picture shows the female end of the bespoke adaptor.  I though perhaps it would fit on the male end of the installed adapter, but it does not.  The adapter on the air regulator looks like it might even have some glue holding it in place as well.  I have tried several wrenches and ratchets to no avail.

Perhaps there are some airbrush gurus frequenting my blog who might have some advice??  I can't really show you any of my airbrush progress without getting the setup up and running!