Brun and Lug

From Stuff I Have Painted

These guys have seen a lot of table time lately, albeit in bare metal. So I figured they would be a fun project to take on. Also, my dwarves had a good showing at a local tournament this weekend, with Gorten and crew winning the whole shebang (Though these guys were not in the list)! I decided to ride the victorious wave and turn it into painting power, always eager to use alternative sources of energy.

From Stuff I Have Painted

From Stuff I Have Painted

Lug was a lot of fun, actually, he was the main reason I wanted to paint these models. This model has never looked very realistic to me, so I decided I had carte blanche when it came to painting him. From there it was just a small step to the realization that the only sensible thing one can do when presented with such an opportunity, is paint an eff-off huge blue bear.

Once I had succumbed to that, the rest of the model unrolled. I used dry brushing on the bear, which I am actually not very good at. The technique itself is always rusty with me because I use it so rarely. It is always fun/challenging/infuriating to try something you are not practiced at. I ended up using a lot of glazes after dry brushing, because he was coming across kind of powdery-looking.

The armor was the same color as my 'jacks, since I use him in my Searforge list. The bright orange plate is a precursor to me using more orange in my other Searforge models, as there is a small piece in the recently released Mercs book stating something to the effect of the dwarves wearing bright colors when on the job to warn people who would try and stop them.

From Stuff I Have Painted

From Stuff I Have Painted

Since I had a big blue bear, my mind wandered to Baloo, and then I couldn't get that cussin' "Bear Necessities" song out of my head the whole time I was painting. It was awful. Though I did decide that if Lug was Baloo, Brun should be a pissed off Mowgli. That brought about me experimenting with the darker, Indian (Like from India) skin tone. I also incorporated the the Hammerfall Khaki and orange color to tie him in with the rest of my Mercs.

You may also notice that the rune stones around his neck look a little flat. I did, when I was looking at the pictures last night and realized I hadn't finished every part of the model. After I had put all my painting stuff away. Quite a few almost cuss words later (Trying to clean up the vocab on account of my little one) and some painting later, and we resolved that. The model is truly finished now, despite the photography.

Lastly, a got a new portable photo studio for like 20 bucks that Deke showed me. These pics were my first attempt with it. I have a lot to learn still, but they look a lot better than my previous pics.

One more quick pic:

From Stuff I Have Painted

Thanks for reading,
T

Skarlock

I hadn't finished a model in quite some time. In an attempt to just be ready for Astro I have been blocking color in on Tau and moving on. I really felt a strong painting urge this weekend and I was riding high from a pretty good showing with a borrowed Cryx list at a local tournament.

With all that in mind, I borrowed the Forces of Cryx book from a friend and decided to paint a Skarlock using the painting guide in the back. Here is how he turned out.:

From Stuff I Have Painted

From Stuff I Have Painted

From Stuff I Have Painted

This model was deceptive to me. It is far more involved than I thought and I found myself being delighted that they are only FA 1. I was a little rusty as far as detail work, OK a lot rusty, and I needed to remember my own cardinal rule of thin paints (doh!).

I am not happy with the necrotic glue, a bummer because of how prominently it plays into this mini. I haven't used inks on anything other than metallics in so long that I forgot how to work with them. We will "get it" going forward through some trial and error I am sure. In retrospect I probably should have brought the skin up a little more, as the black runes, make it look pretty dark still. Live and learn.

Thanks for reading,
T

Battlefoam Hordes Bag

Got me one of these here. They are pretty slick. I have all the Circle Models I own in it, which is one of everything but two units, and there is still room for more. The design of the bag is also really cool, with plenty of pouches and pockets.

It was damn expensive, and I wouldn't have gotten it had I not fallen into a little extra cash, but now I am glad I did. I will say that the bag is not for everyone. If I had to decide between like, finishing an army or buying the bag, the army would win out.

The other bummer is that the stock cut 'jack size tray isn't deep enough for a Feral Warpwolf to be on his base and not have the spikes sticking up out of the slot. On his side he rests on shoulder spikes, so one way or another it is a bit of a pain.

Great bag, looks swank, glad I got it. Now I just need to write my name on it so I can distinguish it from the bajillion others that I am sure will be at Privateer Press HQ this weekend.

Thanks for reading,
T

There

This last Saturday I got to spend the evening with a couple of old friends, and some new friends, at a bachelor party. In many ways this bachelor party was typical of others, but it many other ways it was not.

The venue was a cabin, on some lake north of Spokane, whose name I really should find out so I can answer all the people who ask me. There were no strippers, but there was booze and other bachelor party accoutrement. Quite a few things have stuck with me since this joyous event, some good and some bad, but one thing in particular was something said by a guy named Brad Baxter.

Brad Baxter had another claim to fame that I learned about that night, but I won't go into that. Instead I will speak to how overtaken I was by the gravity of a very small moment.

Choosing to not be much of a drinker lately I spent the evening in a camp chair sitting around fire with my buddy Matt. We kinda held it down as people came and went for poker, more booze, or apparently to jump in the lake. At one point, Brad Baxter pulled up a camp chair and with a simple smile and nod to everyone around the fire said, "I'm there man, I'm there."

At the time I remember thinking how cool it was that he had arrived where ever "there" was. His "there" was not my "there" but you have to be happy for a guy that made it "there". After that I was kind of distracted by other conversations and shenanigans so I didn't think much more of it.

Since Saturday, there have been at least three times where I have remembered Brad Baxter's proclamation of arrival, and each time I feel a little sad. See I am not "there" in much outside of my new family life. I want to be "there" with my hobby, but I don't know if I remember how. I was pretty sure I was "there" once, when I was painting and playing my Dark Angels. Does one only get to go "there" once in their hobby and that is it?

I spend and hour each week night painting my Tau and counting down the 59th minute until I walk away from my table. I am pretty sure it isn't supposed to be like that. I have 3 months and 16 days to get this army done, and I am in entirely the wrong head space to do accomplish it.

So what is the trick? How does one get "there"? Maybe I just need a few beers like Brad Baxter and the path to "there" will clear. Either way, I got to do something to get my mind right.

Thanks for reading,
T

Stripe Happy

As the basecoat extravaganza continues I found myself working on the drones for my Devilfish last night. I know that a lot of the folks in the Tau intertron-meta scoff at drones on Devilfish in favor of Smart Missile Systems, but I have a very good reason not to use them. That reason being, the Devilfish kit doesn't come with Smart Missile Systems, and I will be damned if I am gonna buy them as bits. Tactical, naw, but 'eff it.

Because of my blatant disregard for strategy in favor of a lesser fiscal burden, as well as my love for Fire Warriors in APC's, I end up with a lot of friggin' drones on the board during the games. In the past, this has caused problems for my opponents because it is seldom clear which drone is with which other drone/s... because my shit wasn't painted. Now that my shit is getting quasi-painted, I wanted it to be pretty clear what drones are what. The drones I had assigned to various crisis suits I just painted the squad marking on, to tie them into their suits.

From Mars Project Blog

For the sake of identification I blocked in the markings, not worrying too much about how fine the lines were. This doesn't differ at all from the way I normally freehand. I will always block in the basic design, then wash it it, shade, it, highlight it, and clean it up as I am doing the same thing on the rest of the model with the other colors.

After looking at the various squad drones I realized that, because the Tau markings are often just lines of varying height and thickness, the drones still kind of looked the same between squads. Not a huge deal because there were suits next to them, however on the the drones that operated independently, I could totally see grabbing one and moving it with suits unless there was a noticable difference.

Most of the men in my family, myself excluded, have served in the Armed Forces in some "grunt" capacity. Not too many of my kith and kin joined up for job skills. I remembered one conversation where-in someone in my family accused the Airforce of being "stripe-happy" as it pertained to rank. Real quick, let me just say that I have the utmost respect for anyone willing to give of themselves and risk their life for the defense of this country, so I am not taking a shot the brave men and women of the US Airforce. More to the point, I bring this up because this was the basis for my design on the Devilfishs' drones. I wanted their markings to be fancier, somewhere between like what you would see as Tau Sept markings and the logos on F-1 racing cars. Not only does it add to the futuristic feel, but I figured the hot-shot pilots would their drones to look fancier.

From Mars Project Blog

The design is vastly different from the crisis suits drones, easily identifiable, and still within the feel of the Tau, so all in all I think it worked, I guess we will see in my game on Friday.

Thanks for reading,
T

4 Months Today

The clock is ticking, by this time in August I will have to be done. No pressure right?

I have 16 Kroot, 9 Kroot Hounds, 3 Devilfish, and 6 drones to block in still. Then I make with the details till the deadline.

In the words of The Joker, "And...here...we...go!"

Quickie

Just dropping a line very quickly to refute the the fact that my last post did not contain any lesbian bondage. It is there, layered deeply in subtext and metaphor. I blog like a fucking Russian playwright. Dig deep, and you will see it, and so much more.

On an actual working note, I did some last night, but not in the Tau direction. I got my Warstore in order so I assembled some Circle Orboros stuff I had coming. Among them was the Pureblood Warpwolf, which I really dig. Most of the time, because of the huge amount of character PP models have, I build lists that would look rad to me in a movie, or a short story. This weekend I placed in a tourney and was able to pick up Kromac without spending any money, and risking the ire of the wife. From there a 25 point list that I was really excited about sprung forth. I can't wait to get my brush to some of these Circle models I have been accumulating.

As far as the Tau/Astro extravaganza goes I am trying to secure the use of an airbrush and some expertise for the vehicles. It will greatly speed things up. I have one big and one little squad of infantry left to block in the colors on, so nearing the finish of the first lap.

Thanks for reading,
T