Painted Inquisitor

Here is the Inquisitor painted up with his Deamon Weapon.  I went with a blood and fire theme for it, to kind of contrast with the blue theme of the Nemesis Force Weapons of the other Grey Knights. Hope you guys like it.

Dip the Monkey

The other day I saw one of my fellow hobbyist's miniatures that he had done, and I noticed he had used the Army Painter dip.  I've heard talk about this stuff for a couple years now and had been slightly interested in it.  But seeing his mini made me want to give it a try.  So while prepping my models for 'Ard Boyz this year I figured try it out on one of the models (yes I'm painting my army for it, I'm nuts!). 

It adds a very slight change, and I'm not sure if I left enough on the model, but over all I'm quite happy with the way this model turned out.  One thing you have to do however is also get an Anti-Shine varnish or the model will come off super glossy. 

The only issue is the start up cost, the Varnish was $30 and the Anti Gloss was another $11.  But I'm pretty happy with the result, and will be trying it out on another couple models to see what the results are.

My "Mighty Beast" The Lord of Change

Hey Everyone, I present to you my "Mighty Beast" 40k Entry for the Hobby Town painting contest. As you can see it's a dreaded Chaos Daemon, the Lord of Change bursting forth from the body of a Tzeentch Chaos Lord. This model was a blast to work on, and I'm sure there are still hours that I could spend on it, but at this point I'm calling it done. For my sanity and because I purchased a miniataur a couple weeks ago for the same contest and it's still laying in little plastic pieces.



I think the hardest thing about this model was getting all of the base colors down on it. I have always found throwing base colors on models to be very tedious and boring and with this model it was no different. After trying out one color scheme on the wings, I decided that I didn't quite have the talent to pull it off and ended up priming over it and starting over again. Luckily things went rather smoothly after that but it still took about 3 nights to actually base color.



With the base colors down, I took a heavy black ink and inked the entire model, everything that was blur, grey, green and so on. I did not black in the flesh tones or the white canvas but instead used a regal blue paint, thinned it greatly in water and used it as an ink, and did the same with a couple different browns on the skin until I got it a color I was happy with.



With the ink down, I then gradually started working on dry brushing the rest of the model. Working with Light Greys and Up, and then Light Blues and up. It was interesting how difficult it was to plan out where to work with this model as Dry Brushing the stones meant I'd get grey on the primordial chaos of the ground and vise versa. I ended up getting it worked out and continued on my way.



With all of the dry brushing done it was time to add the small details, the stones, the silver trim on the garments, the eyes, mouth, teeth, and talons. The entire model probably ended up taking me 40-60 hours to complete over a three week period of time. I could have probably gotten in done in about a week and a half, but with the learning curve of green stuff and waiting for items to dry it just took a while.

I hope you guys enjoy the model, and like everyone entering the contest I'm hoping to pull off a win ;)

But with this one done, it's time to start working on my fantasy entry as it's due this weekend... hurry hurry... luckily it won't be as extravagant as this one.

-CKR

'Mighty Beast' Modeling Contest! - Reminder

Hey everyone just a reminder that this contest is coming close to an end. If you've not started your painting for the entry, get down there and do so.

* * *

HobbytownUSA Dallas announces it's 'Mighty Beast' Modeling Contest! With the latest releases in their game systems all centering around the monsters of the Warhammer, 40K and Lord of the Rings universes--Tyranids, Beastmen, Fell Beasts, et al--Games Workshop has made it a great time to model the monstrous, and HTUD wants to see your best efforts!

Hobbyists may enter one 'beastly' model in each category (Warhammer Fantasy, Warhammer 40K and Lord of the Rings). The model must be primarily a Citadel miniature (conversions are encouraged from that base), must be purchased from HTUD, and must be assembled/converted/painted by the submitting participant.

It is up to that hobbyist how they define a 'mighty beast:' while this certainly includes Monstrous Creatures, Dragons, Giants, Minotaurs, Ogres (and Rat-Ogres), Hydras, Trolls, Stegadons, etc, it could as easily be something Daemonic, or a less-enormous but equally 'beastly' character model, such as a bray-shaman, ethereal or saurus-lord; you choose to submit what you consider *your* mightiest beast!

Submissions may begin immediately and are welcome for display in the glass cabinet in the games section at the front of the store, but *must* be brought to HTUD by end-of-business Sunday, March 21, 2010, where they will be displayed until the end of the month. Prizes will be awarded for 'Mighty Beast' in each category noted, as well as a 'Youngbeast' and a Best Overall 'Mightiest Beast!'

The Hivemind calls; the Brayhorn sounds; the Witch King summons! The time of the Mighty Beasts is at hand--at HobbytownUSA Dallas!

My Escalation League Army Build Up Part 2

BLOGS FOR THE BLOG GOD!!!!

Okay so I've been a bit remiss about keeping up with my plan on the Escalation league. Unfortunately life has been keeping me busy and haven't had the time to keep on track with my army build up plan.


I do have some things to report though and of course some pictures for everyone to ooo and aaah at. Okay maybe complain about it being washed out or blurry.

Let me start off by saying... I hate painting red over white. I used the white so it picks out the detail better but man what a pain. I started out layering up Brick Red as a base for the red bits. This took about 3 to 4 coats on most areas, but some places required 6 layers. It was an interesting color to say the least, kind of had a purple hue to it, but it actually worked in the end.

Here's a mini with the first coat of Brick Red put on it. As you can see one coat allowed quite a bit of the white to show through. The Brick Red seemed to rub off quite easily too on the tips of the model. Just handling them caused a bit to rub off.

My next color I used to layer up was Reaper's Blood Red. It's a more vibrant red then the Brick Red, but not as bright as GW's Blood Red. I didn't get any pictures of the mini in this color but you'll see it on the Rhino below. This is close to a color between GW's Blood Red and Red Gore I think. Not too bad a color over all, but not as vibrant as the Blood Red from GW.


As you can see it's a nice red, I've left the Brick Red in some of the more recessed areas for shading. I really like how this Rhino is turning out, also like how the Berzerkers are turning out.

Unfortunately I didn't take into account the many layers of reds I would need. Even this Blood Red from Reaper still took several coats to cover up the Brick Red completely. I do have to say though I'm pleased overall with it, just wish I could find a short cut to save some time.



I'll have to look into that at a later time. To the right you see the Rhino with the final layer of red. I used Vallejo's Game Color Blood Red as I like their paints a little bit more then GW's.

I also used Brassy Brass from Vallejo and Tarnished Steel from Reaper as base coats for the other bits you see on the Rhino. I'll wash the brass with a brown/black ink wash I use for most of my metallic colors. I will also wash the tarnished steel and then use a chainmail color to highlight those. Same with the Brass color. I'll most likely just use the base color over top the washed brass first layer.

Half finished Berzerker

Below is the top down look on the Rhino from Steps 2 to 3 with the red colors. Second one is a bit blurry, sorry about that, but you can definitely see the color difference. I think an army that looks like this is going to be very sharp on the tabletop indeed.

Primer

Recently someone asked me my opinion on Primers. So I figured I’d go ahead and put my thoughts to paper and actually update the Blogs as well. So here are my thoughts on Primer.

I won’t say that any Primer is superior to any other; I can only tell you what I’ve experienced and what I’ve seen. I used to love GW’s Primer; I had a can of white that lasted eons.

Eventually I ran out, so thinking I would get the same results I went and bought more GW Primer. Granted I was a little sticker shocked at the price that the Primer had risen to, but I was willing to pay it for the quality I got.

So I took my purchase home, walked out into the garage and got ready to spray a Rhino. Boy was I in for a surprise. The spray came out hard and fast which is not a good thing as it tends to push light plastic all over the place. Another thing is it tended to be chalky and grainy. Some people say “Oh you got a bad can”, I thought so as well and returned it for another. Same thing happened with the new can. Sure it could have been a bad batch of cans, but for the price I was paying quality control should be better.

What I needed now was an alternative. I went and tried various sand able Primers from the automotive section in Wal-Mart and such. While the price was right, the primer was too thick and tended to diminish the detail on the minis. Also the fumes of that primer got really bad at times, I continued my search.

That’s when someone told me about Armory’s Primer. I knew about their Primer, it was one of the first one’s I got way back when. When I first used it I wasn’t impressed with it. I didn’t think it was a bad Primer, just not a great Primer. I saw the new can and thought to myself, “Hey cool, they got Kovalic to do their can wrappers.” (For those of you who don’t know Kovalic… shame on you…go here at once www.dorktower.com)

I can say their Primer is better than it used to be and in my opinion better then the new GW Primers. They also have Grey which works well for medium shades of color and to me a little bit easier to get a darker red to work. They also have the traditional White and Black Primers.

I used Armory Primer up to about a year ago. I stumbled across a Primer that I never would of thought would be very good. Rust-oleum’s Painter’s Touch Primer. So far I’ve used the White and Black, but they also have Red and Grey (although I haven’t seen these at the store yet). You can get them at any Lowe’s or Home Depot and it’s about a fifth of the cost from GW’s Primer.

It goes on even and dries quickly. It is a little thicker then GW and Armory Primer so you have to be a little more aware of how much you’re spraying, but not nearly as thick as the automotive Primers. It was a nice middle ground, and since it’s thicker than normal you use less of it overall per mini. So now that can of Primer will go a long way.

I’ve used it on plastic, on metal and even on Resin. It sticks to them all. Leaves a nice even coat when it dries and I haven’t had a grainy can or one that starts spraying like silly string. It’s very resilient as well, I haven’t had it rub off or chip with normal moving of the mini. I feel that it’s well worth the cost and time to learn how to use this primer.

If I had to point out a “bad” thing with it is that sometimes it tends to dry shiny. Not really a big deal since it doesn’t “shine” through the base coats, but if you wanted to base coat a large structure and leave it black it might be dull and shiny in places. So just a heads up.

So there you have it, my thoughts on different Primers that I’ve used. Of course this is all relative as I’m sure others have used the Painter’s Touch Primer and thought it was horrendous, or others that love Armory Primer. To each their own, and it’s why I say there is no absolute perfect primer. A lot of it hinges on personal choice and also personal style.