Star Wars Legion: Snow Troopers and Pit and Pendulum room submission (Byron)

Painting has been slow over the holidays, with lots to do, but little getting done...  I have been assembling and priming more than painting over the last few days, but I have managed to get a few really quick things painted.

First up is a unit of Stormtrooper Snow Troopers for Star Wars Legion.  While they are relatively plain, that is how they are supposed to be, as you can not do a whole ton with white before it doesn't look white.

These were painted up grey then highlighted white. The black painted in, and then clear coated.  I then used a light tan oil paint to put all over them, then wiped it off with mineral spirits to leave it only in the crevasses.  While it may be odd to put a sand colour onto snow troopers, this was done as they are actually going to be used with my normal stormtroopers as part of my desert force.  Not traditional, I know, but I did not want them standing out against the rest of the force.

Next up is a submission for the Pit and the Pendulum room.  I had no idea what to do for this room, so I went off to thingiverse and grabbed a guillotine to go along with my French Napoleonic forces.  I am sure I can find a use for it as terrain in a game or two in the future.

Again, just a very simple paint job, mainly to play with my new "Instant Colours" from Scale 75 that showed up just before the holidays.

Overall, two very simple and basic submissions, but at least it is a few things complete! 

Hexa Gear BULKARM (Steve)

 My first build of a kit produced by Kotobukiya.  I experienced a different feel doing this Kotobukiya build than ad with the Ban Dai kits.  The 4 Ban Dai Kits I have built thus far all seemed more 'finished' when assembled,  just needing some pen lines to make the model look like the box art.  This Bulkarm kit when assembled, looks good, but does appears in need of a base coat of black paint and metallic paint job to get the model closer to the box art. 

I started this build a couple days ago, so this one is 100% assembled during our shadow painting challenge.  

Of course, just days after I talked to Byron about how I'd use this challenge to focus on completing gaming minis,  I go and build a total non-gaming model I had picked up before the lock down just for the 'looks cool' and fun to build.  That said, I did spent the time building with Z as she too was doing holiday builds these past days for lock down vacation fun. 

 Gundam Assembled!  Geara Ghirarga !          (Steve)

Another "bought it because it looks cool" model.   I tell myself I will make a point of watching the anime this Gundam appears in.  This model from BAN DAI  was about 80% done before we started rolling with our shadow Painting Challenge.

Analogue Hobbies Painting challenge 2020 - Entry 1

Once again winter is here, and with it, my friend Curt's annual painting challenge! 

The first figure I painted this year was something I picked up from a patreon that I immediately fell in love with and had to have.  It is from Great Grimoire and supplies monthly fairy tale themed STL files for 3d printing at home, and this was from a few months ago and I have been itching to get to work on it.

I painted this up with what is in real life a brighter green glow (but it kept getting washed out in the images) to show as an eerie eldritch magic allowing the hands to come through the cabinet.

While I had planned on having the green glow reflect onto the floor and the girls back, the figure is for my wife, and she didn't want it "ruined", so I left it out.

The girl was very tiny when printed the first time (as was the cabinet) with the base being less than 40mm.  At that scale it was correct for 28mm, but just seemed too small, so I reprinted it scaled up to a 55mm base, so the girl is actually 30mm tall just to get enough size to deal with the details that were there, since it is not for any game, and just for a display piece, scaling up really didn't affect anything.

It is amazing how many great Patreons and Kickstarters there have been for STL files over the last year, so this is the first of many 3d prints that I will be painting up this year.

Byron

Steve starting with works in progress....

My first objective for our Washed up Painting Challenge: Complete the miniatures and models I have started!  To keep me honest, this picture is to mark my Dec 21 2020 "starting position". 

(Arena Rex, Gaslands, Gundam)

Arg!

Who are we?

 This blog has been a long time in the making.  We are a group of friends that have gamed together for many years (some of us probably 20+ years) and have talked over the last few years about getting a blog up, if for no other reason than to document our many awesome games of Kingdom Death.

This winter with the Covid lock down in full effect, I (Byron) am participating in my friend Curt's annual Analogue Hobbies Painting Challenge, and Steve and Mike both wanted to shadow that challenge and kind of participate but not officially.  So it seemed the perfect time to get off our lazy asses and actually start the blog, so they had someplace to post as well.  Then once we can start getting together again for KD we can start posting our stories up here as well.

So, who are we?

Byron

I have been a gamer as far back as I can remember, both video games and board games.  I grew up playing games with a ton of people, I remember as early as grade school getting together with friends and spending all night playing Talisman, D&D, Axis & Allies, Car Wars, Ogre, and many more!  I tried painting things back then, but sucked horribly.

As I got older, I got into miniatures more and more.  Initially Legions of Steel and then into the GW product lines.  I got into miniatures to the point that I started running tournaments with various friends and my wife in the city for Warhammer 40k and Warhammer Fantasy.  I then started running events with Games Workshop themselves as an Outrider, travelling to help run Games Days and Grand Tournaments.

About 6 or 7 years ago, I started my own business (Northern Lights Terrain) to create and sell laser cut MDF terrain for wargames, and am now branching out into 3D printing for people as well.

Having played for so long, I have a huge collection that spans many eras and themes, and have the attention span of a squirrel when it comes to gaming, so expect to see drastic changes in focus all the time!  Just a brief listing of games that regularly get played would fill a page at least!  

I started out years ago as a horrible painter, I literally cringe when I see some of the stuff I painted when I was young.  Then I got better, through time, practice, and experimentation, to the point that I was a decent painter (not great like some of the masters you see posting online that make you want to cry figuring out how the hell they are showing stitch work on a 28mm tapestry) probably high middle level in skill.  But now as I get older and the eyes are starting to go, I find I need to relearn how to do things to deal with lack of visual focus, which is surprisingly common as I talk to other friends my age and older, but still not fun to deal with as you are so used to seeing everything clearly.

Mike

I have been interested in miniatures since I was about 10, about the same time I saw the animated Lord Of The Rings film. My grandmother bought me my first lead minis, a couple of Orcs, Skeletons and, for some reason, a single American Civil War soldier. I painted them with Testors paints, and made a bloody mess of them. At around age 12, I discovered Dungeons and Dragons. With that game, came even more minis. By age 15 I started playing guitar, convinced that I would be a rockstar. I was still interested in minis, buying Rogue Trader and the first Space Marine boxset. I didn't do much with them for a few years. When I was going to college, my interest was peaked again. I went to the local gaming store, Campaign Outfitters and was immediately blown away with all the ranges. I was especially drawn to Kryomek, because of my love of the Aliens franchise, and 40k. I also bought some of the Mithril line of LOTR minis. It was truly then that I discovered tabletop wargaming and I haven't really looked back. I spent a small fortune on GW stuff since. I met Steve and Byron shortly after that and we have gamed together, off and on, over the years. 

 These days I am mostly working on Infinity models, along with some 15mm Sci Fi stuff. And, of course, 40k stuff. I want to point out that Byron is an extremely bad influence, talking me into trying out new game after new game. The latest endeavor is Darklands from Mierce Miniatures. While he is a bad influence, it is offset by the inspiration he creates by getting so much stuff painted.

Steve

I have been a gamer since grade school. I recall my fascination with miniatures and dioramas began when my age was still a single digit, and I first saw model trains and displays in museums.  In middle school, the first 'miniatures" I attempted to paint were a cheap bag of plastic knights from a box store, using Testors oil paints and cheap plastic hobby water paint brushes,  rough efforts which did see action for a few old basic D&D games before being retired and lost to spring cleanings. 

 After high school I was exposed to 40K and  Warhammer and met Mike at a hobby store, (back in the years when I still had hair on my head).  I also resumed playing RPGs like D&D and WFRP supported by miniatures.  Both due to my own interest in the hobby and Mike's ever contagious enthusiasm for new toys, I amassed a fair sized miniature collection. Through painting for games and sheer interest I had painted a couple display shelves worth of miniatures by my mid 20s.  Then after some life change distractions my gaming time shifted into video and board games long enough for all my paint pots to dry up and were not replaced.  So the dedicated hobby desk was cleared and disposed of, and the boxes of unpainted shame were stored away for a couple of decades -- but always, my couple of shelves worth of painted minis were on proud display.

During my early years of online gaming and metal concert wanderings, thru Mike I met Adrian.  Adrian and I, often with Mike, had many an online world adventure and wrought metal show mayhem across some 20 fun years...we each made some mention of our appreciation of miniatures painting, both thinking it was something we'd never find time to do again...... though Mike would raise our interest in minis from time to time.

A couple years ago, thru Mike I met Byron, and in playing excellent games like Kingdom Death within the colorful glow of Byron's magnificent painted miniature collection, my love of minis was reignited, more miniature were bought, paints were purchased. The old box of unpainted shame has been dug up and unpacked, and a new hobby desk was established.  

So now I find myself to embarking on a new arc of painting, notions in my head of filling new display shelves with fresh painted minis and plans for fielding painted teams/armies atop table top fields of battle....  dice will roll, paint will flow.....