Happy New Year

Hey everyone, just thought I'd pop in and wish you all a happy new year.

My standard bearer didn't quite cut it at December month's Knights of the Brush competition - no wonder, as Santa himself decided to join in on the fun:

Great conversion and paint job by Mikkel, hope you like it as well!

Standard Bearer - Finished

Arrived safely in Norway this evening, but managed to shoot a couple of pictures of my take on the Chaos Exalted Hero, before dropping him off at Games Workshop and catching my plane.

After talking to some friends, I decided to go for a traditional banner instead of a flag, and added onto the plastic banner from the Chaos Marauder Horsemen set. Got a couple of spare parts from the old mounted Champion of Slaanesh and the Dark Elf Cold One Knight boxes. I didn't have time to paint any freehand on the banner, but after I return to Denmark I'll see it through.

I've used a rather limited palette on this piece: only Skull White, Chaos Black, Shadow Grey, Mithril Silver and Scorched Brown (except on the base, which got a few colours more - but I'll make a short tutorial of it later), which I think has worked quite well to tie the whole model together. Granted, not the typical colours of Slaanesh, but I really like the concept of using light and clean colours to represent darkness or evil. And while I have nothing against pink personally, I do find it slightly over-used, so I wanted to try something else to make it stand out more.

With all the armour on this model, I've had ample opportunities to practice shading of metal - or painting true metallic metal, if you like - and I really like the process and results. To top it off, it goes faster and faster for every part, and I hope to keep this level up on the rest of the unit. I have mentioned in an earlier post, I believe, that this miniature will be part of a regiment of Chaos Warriors with the Mark of Slaanesh, and when I get back to Denmark I hope to be able to complete the first rank sometime february. There is some rather extensive converting and sculpting involved, and I have to figure out how to make a couple of things in sculpting putty as I go, but having one model finished surely helps on the motivation!

But now time for some pictures: Hope you like him! As always, comments and criticism is welcome!
The voting for december's Knights of the Brush will take place tuesday the 27th, so if you live in or near Copenhagen, feel free to drop by GW's store there, as I'm sure there will be several really great entries this month as well!

Late night update

So it's 2:30 am here, and I've just put brushes, paint and glue down, and decided that the standard bearer is as good as he gets, if I'm to pack my clothes and christmas gifts as well as catch a couple of hours of sleep tonight.

I never got 'round to painting any freehand on the banner, but I'll get it done when I'm back in Denmark come january. I'll get some pictures of him up in the coming days, as well as a quick tutorial on how I make and paint the bases for my miniatures.

Now I'll have to track down my suitcase and get 'round to packing; watch this spot!

Standard bearer WIP

Just a little WIP shot of the standard bearer.
For fun I thought I'd try something new with his helmet - the freehand need some cleaning, but I think I'll leave that for later - so much left to do! And I've got only tonight and tomorrow to finish him, if I want to participate in december's Knights of the Brush, as there's a plane waiting for me wednesday to take me back to my parents' place in Norway.

Don't know what you think? Part of me likes the freehand on the helmet, but on the other hand the lovely shape of the Chaos Warrior helmet gets a bit lost?

Hoist That Rag!

So, it turned out that my finecast model wasn't of as good quality as I first presumed, and I've spent the last couple of days filling bubble-holes and trying to correct a huge molding fault. It's as if the two parts of the mold hasn't been correctly fitted, so the rear part of the model is roughly 0.5 lower than the front. So his left arm and leg has recieved quite the bit of sculpting, to correct this. Luckily, the rest of the mold line is hidden by the fur of his cloak, or ran down a undetailed area on his right side, and was thus fairly easy to remove with my hobbyknife. Still frustrating.

Either way, I've decided to make him the standard bearer of my regiment, and have started converting a bit: I've replaced the original head with a regular Chaos Warrior helmet sans horns, replaced the axehead of his left-hand weapon with an axe from the Chaos Knight sprue, and filled most of the holes in his cloak. As the unit will bear the Mark of Slaanesh, I want to reduce the worn look typical to the Chaos Warrior regiments' cloaks and equipment, and make them look a bit more like they care how they look. Sure, they've been out raiding and seen many a battle, but they won't be seen dressed in rotting cloth and rusty armour!

So here's how he's standing at the moment - not pinned or glued to his base yet, I prefer to paint them separately.
As his right arm also suffered from the faulty moldline, and in addition had two bubbles ruining the chainmail, I thought I'd sculpt the whole arm from scratch, and I hope to finish it by the weekend, so I can start painting next week. Speaking of sculpting, I've giving brownstuff a go at this model, and I'm very happy with how this putty's working. It cures harder than regular greenstuff, making it easier to cut and file should one want to do that, but it also stays more in shape than greenstuff: making it easier to get those sharp and defined edges you want when sculpting armour. Greenstuff, by contrast, acts in a slightly more "liquid" way: if you don't return and work on a spot regularily until it cures, the putty tends to go soft and gives rounded edges - which can work out very well if you're trying to sculpt something organic or soft, like flesh or cloth. So both putties has their uses, and I'm still very much at a learning stage, but hopefully this project will get me a few more steps along the way.

The standard itself will also be scratchbuilt from a 2mm iron pole and some putty, and I made my first attempt yesterday:
I got some nice tips from Mati over at Massive Voodoo on how to sculpt cloaks and the like, and used the techniques he suggested when I made the flag (as you can see from my setup below, I opted for paintpots instead of wire, as the flag was so large).
The technique seems to be working fine, but I'll have to remake the whole thing and make some minor adjustments before it gets where I want it, I think. For one thing, I managed to make it way out of proportions, it's too large! Secondly, a combination of too thin layer of putty and the wrong ratio of putty-parts made the flag slightly softer than I'd like. But I'll give it a new go and hopefully improve the outcome.

I have been debating with myself whether a flag or regular banner will look best on the tabletop; any thoughts from you guys?

Here they come!

After tallying the votes saturday, it turns out I once more have the honour of picking the miniature for GW Copenhagen's monthly Knights of the Brush painting competition - and hence forth we are allowed to do a bit of converting, which suits me just fine. I'm sticking to the army of my heart, Warriors of Chaos, having chosen the Chaos Exalted Hero - and I do hope this doesn't bother too many; I was slightly dissapointed to see only three entries, including my own, last saturday. Anyways, fingers crossed that more will join in on the fun this month!

I picked up the last box in the store, and while the curse of finecast-bubbles still seem to linger, it doesn't bother me that much, as I'll play around with some greenstuff either way. Without revealing too much at this point (my initial plans for any model are always prone to change as the project progresses..), I have planned to make him fit into a Chaos Warrior regiment, which has been collecting dust in an unfinished state since the early months of 2010. The concept of this regiment was, well first of all, it will have the Mark of Slaanesh, but that's not so groundbreaking. But what I really wanted to do with this unit, was to break up the very rigid and boring poses the otherwise greatly sculpted Chaos Warriors suffer from, and to make it look as if the whole group was charging headlong towards the enemy. And it went fairly well with the first miniature, until I started to resculpt the cloak. I couldn't get the putty thin enough, or it didn't look natural, and attempts to use paperclips or plasticard didn't get me anywhere. So I lost motivation and shelved the project - until now!

I'll use the Exhalted Hero as part of the regiment; granted, he does not run, but the pose is rather nice and unique, so it will break up the rather monotonous look of most Chaos Warrior regiments. Furthermore, after I am done converting him, he'll serve as a nice model to test the paint scheme and has given me much needed motivation to dust off the box of unfinished Warriors and other bits and pieces I thought I could use for the project. I got to spend a couple of hours among plastic, glue and greenstuff, and this is a snapshot of my workspace and the state of my regiment.
I've still not figured out how I'm to make the cloaks (any tips or links to good tutorials would be greatly appreciated!), but I did experiment a bit with a grey putty, called ProCreate the other day. I was unable to make a cloak out of it, but it felt really nice to work with, so I'll probably give it a shot. Also have a batch of brownstuff lying about somewhere, which I have yet to test, but I have heard it's best suited for armour plates and other bits with sharp and defined edges.

Either way, will be nice to work on a regiment again; single characters are all very nice, and I do love the Knights of the Brush concept, as it not only lets me paint wonderfully sculpted miniatures, which I probably wouldn't buy normally (e.g. the Wood Elf Highborn), but also the deadline ensures that I finish them! But to complete a new regiment, that's something I honestly haven't done in a long time, but it also looks so much grander, doesn't it?
Strength in numbers!

Chaos Sorcerer Lord

So slooooow!
I think I have to enter some regular "painting time" into my weekly schedule, 'cos a single model painted in a month, that's hardly progress at all. Won't get my army finished this century, that's for sure!

Either way, the Sorcerer Lord for tomorrow's Knights of the Brush painting competition is finished, and I do hope you like him! Very happy with how he turned out myself, although I caught a glimpse of another contestant's mini at the store today, and he's also gone for the magma-armour, which I had hoped would score me some easy "uniqueness points"...
C&C welcome.

Chaos Sorcerer Lord - WIP

Progress has been slow this past week, or rather nonexistent.. But this morning/afternoon I managed to get some painting done - it's not much, but at least it's a start.
It's my first try on magma-armour, heavily inspired by Vincent Hudon's Magmatrax and redmanphill's Warriors of Slaanesh, and I think it fits a magican attuned to the Lore of Fire quite well.

I did the plates on his back first, and might redo them, as I personally find the smaller grid on the frontal plates more to my preferances. The remaining armour will be painted as dark steel, although I haven't decided on whether I'll try some lighting-effects from the magma (or if that will be too much?), or simply giving it a ever so slightly bronze-tint. Any suggestions?

To the Top!

Just thought I'd drop by with a quick update, as I just was notified that my Amethyst Wizard won october month's Knights of the Brush competition!

This means that I get to choose the miniature we'll be painting this month, and I've choosen this chap:
The (relativly) new plastic Chaos Sorcerer Lord.
As you can see, I've started on a dark-red colour scheme, which in the end will mark him off as a sorcerer devoted to the Lore of Fire.

Epic Battle of Ultimate Doom!

Irdgar saw the Dragon Ogres to his right advance against the Necrosphinx, as he led his retinue towards the horde of skeletons assembled before him. Arrows whistled through the air, but failed to pierce the armour plates and shields of Irdgar's elite warriors.
Drawing upon the unreliable winds of magic, Irdgar felt his dark lord Slaanesh's blissful caress, and smiled with pleasure as his spell made the undead bowmen crumble to dust by the scores! He opened himself further to the destructive energies of Chaos, becoming a true instrument for the dark gods, each millisecond bringing him closer and closer to his master, the Dark Prince. A tiny voice deep inside his mind pleaded him to stop, pleaded him to let go, but Ingtar ignored it in favour of the glorious choir rising higher and higher for every sliver of magic coursing through him...



Dusted off my miniatures and took roughly 1000 points worth with me to a local gaming club/store "Farao's Cigarer" yesterday, to partake in their Epic Battle of Ultimate Doom. All in all we were 14 players; the organizer split us into two even teams; the battlefield was chosen and our armies deployed. To cut it short: it was a blast!

The other team consisted of Dwarfs, men of Bretonnia and the Empire, Lizardmen, Wood Elves and Tomb Kings, representing the forces of good and order; my team on the other hand were mortal and daemonic followers of the dark gods and a handful of Dark Elves. As we were starting to converse and plan our battle strategy (few of us had ever met or played with/against each other, so there had been no planning in advance), a Bretonnian Paladin arrived at the field with his trusted knights just in time to see a band of traitorous Orc mercenaries leave the Encampment of Order, in favour of the armies devoted to Chaos and Destruction. Funny enough, the Orc Warlord turned out to have the highest leadership of all our heroes and commanders, so this shift of allegiance also gave my side a brand new commanding Warlord...

With 14 000 divided between two opposing forces, I soon lost track of what was happening everywhere on the battlefield, but my side's battleplan was roughly to harass/kite the Lizardmen on our left flank, keeping them from the core of the action; send our Flesh Hounds, Seekers of Slaanesh, Marauder Horsemen against the hill the cowardly Dwarfs and men of the Empire had fortified with their fearsome artillery; concentrate our superior heavy infantery on the right side of the battlefield's centre, to punch a hole through their lines, while our farmost right flank was screened by Furies and scouting Nurglings.
And I think it went rather well.

With an army consisting mainly of Chaos Warriors, with a trio of Dragon Ogres thrown in as support against tough opponents, my troops were deployed along hordes of Goblins, Plaguebearers, Black Orcs and Chaos Marauders on the right - except for a unit of Marauder Horsemen, which command were turned over to the captain overseeing the capture of the Artillery Hill.

Stones from Bretonnian Trebuchets fell among our ranks, while Skeleton Bowmen showered us with a rain of arrows, but it could not halt our advance! We answered with dark magic, softening them before the inevitable charge. Unfortunately, the commander of my troops became slightly overeager, let his control slip for a second and was rightly punished by the unforgiving winds of magic. Although his spell removed half of the skeleton horde deployed before the bulk of my units, the magic backlash of his miscast destroyed not only him, but half of the regiment he was accompanying. Nevertheless, the next round saw my screen of bloodthirsty Warhounds charge the crew of an enemy Trebuchet, which gave my Dragon Ogres a clear path to the enemy Necrosphinx. Although the Warhounds were soundly beaten, the fury of the Dragon Ogres turned out to be too much for the Undead construct, which was reduced to lifeless stone and dust.

At that point, the organizers tapped his finger at his watch; it was time to settle the score. I raised my eyes from the nearby melee, and inspected the battlefield surrounding me. At the far left, our flank had been pushed back by the Lizardmen, but our careful manouvering had placed the cold blooded warriors in a position where they could be of little assistance to their allies; our various fast units had successfully breached the defenses by the Artillery Hill, and enemy crewmen were either fleeing, slaughtered or fighting desperately for their lives. Although hampered by the dangerous march through Wild Woods, our horde of Khorne Marauders and Black Orcs had arrived to assist the cavalry by the hill, turning the enemy counterattack into a rout. My Dragon Ogres were in the midst of the enemy, awaiting orders to charge the next unit, while my Chaos Warriors were within charging range of the enemy bowmen. A valiant charge by Knights of Bretonnia had chased our Hydra off, and while this potentially left my rear vulnerable, Plaguebearers and a Herald of Khorne mounted in a war chariot had halted the human advance.

Although a lot could have happened if we hadn't had to stop at the end of the third round, I think we would have carried this home in the end. And the victory conditions counted at the time we stopped, were also in favour of the forces of Order's defeat:

- 1 point to the forces of Chaos/Destruction for having most units with Standards and/or Battle Standard Bearers on the enemy's half of the battlefield.
- 1 point to the forces of Chaos/Destruction for slaying most enemy heroes and monsters.
- 1 point to the forces of Chaos/Destruction for having captured most enemy Standards.
- 1 point to the forces of Order for having most painted units.

I think the opposing team were a bit unlucky, in that sense that their warmachines were unable to take out our heroes, and thus score points. My Sorcerer were our only casualty, in fact, and he died by his own hand... They were also unable to soften our units enough with their ranged attacks, and so we brutally butchered our way through their lines as soon as we made contact. Excepting the Bretonnian cavalry on the right flank and a regiment of Dwarf Longbeards (double 6 on the charge roll, what's up with that?!) were their only units on our half of the battlefield, as the rest of their army tried to defend their guns and stonethrowers, which gave my side some easy scoring points, as we got several banner-bearing units over to their side of the battlefield.

My side might have had Lady Luck on our side, though: the Necrosphinx for instance, missed on its monster-killing-blow strike, while my Dragon Ogres just cut through it, insane toughness and all, like a hot knife through butter... Granted, they had Strength 7 with Great Weapons, but still... But I guess luck can be put to blame in any battle.

Closing words: it was tons of fun, and I hope I'll be able to make it the next time such an event is organized!