A detailed account of my various commission/hobby projects.
Warhammer 40,000 – I love making lists. In fact making lists quite often leads to me getting new stuff. Which is a problem. I've been making a concerted effort to only build lists with models that I own or have the parts to build already. I've also been making an effort to only play with stuff that is fully painted. (at the minimum I have to have the purple, white and gold on a model)
Read MoreWarhammer 40,000 – I've been playing and painting 40K also exclusively as of late. Not that you couldn't tell based on the current glut of content on this site. Granted I'm not playing 2-3 times a week with a tournament every Saturday like I used to back during the heyday of 3.5 Edition with the special assault rules and god-like Chaos marine book. But I am getting a game in every other week at a minimum and as such am really getting a grasp on the subtleties of seventh edition. I'm still not 100% on all the rules all the time and don't do a whole lot with crazy formations yet. But on the whole I really like the game.
Read MoreWarhammer 40,000 – I'm still keeping my head above water, it's crazy every spring I seem to get flooded with a bunch of new commission work, typically it's for a game that just released the previous season or that has recently seen a upsurge in popularity. As of late i've been seeing an awful lot of 40K models come across my table. This seems odd to me as if you believe the interwebs that game might as well be on it's last legs with the amount of "new" games; that play better, are cheaper and generally better designed; that are stepping up to knock the champ off it's proverbial golden throne.
Read MoreWarhammer 40,000 – Storm Ravens have to be my least favorite model to paint. I'm not sure what it is about them the model is really pretty cool looking with a decent amount of detail so it should be quick and easy to paint. But for some reason I just can't get into the groove with them.
Read MoreWarhammer 40,000 – Busy in not a strong enough word to describe what I've been lately. My latest commission of a White Scars-ish Space marine army has been devouring most of my free time at the moment. I'm really happy with how quickly I've been able to get through these models considering about 75% of them needed to be assembled and based as well as painted. My client is pretty laid back about how quickly I turn these around but I'm really pushing to get everything done ASAP.
Read MoreWarhammer 40,000 – Bikes, bikes and more bikes. Right now I'm working on a really massive Space Marine commission, this includes not only a bunch of stuff that will need to be assembled or converted, but also a bunch of "budget" models that are in questionable condition. As with many of my 40K jobs this is a straight up 3-Color+ job just meant to get the army to look ok on a tabletop and meet painting requirements. As such my primary focus on getting these done is speed painting.
Read MoreWarhammer 40K – I couldn't resist picking up the two new supplements for 40K that came out this month. As I'm preparing to run a campaign I figured there'd be some great content in here as well as some cool rules to add to the campaign.
Read MoreWarhammer 40,000 – My Grey Knight client has some interesting ideas, I guess he's working on setting up a team tournament where you'll randomly be assigned to a teammate. In order to make up for the inevitable lack of even numbers at an event he decided that the house team would be five Vindicare assassin. He handed me one metal model of the "good pose" that had been painted as well as a box of finecast "bad pose" models and said make them look cool.
Read MoreWarhammer 40,000 – The second half of the Grey Knights commission I'm working on consists of two stormravens, three dreadnoughts, and two nemesis dreadknights. These go along with the last batch of models and are in the same three color + level of painting. It seems that this is a very popular level as it's not to costly and the models look great on the tabletop.
Read MoreWarhammer 40,000 – The first group of Orange White Scars is done, I'm not 100% sure what my client is calling his chapter but the logo he gave me for their shoulder pads is a sun with a spear. If I would hazard a guess or was naming them myself I'd go with Dawn Spears.
Read MoreBook Review – So there was recently a kickstarter to the Ghostbusters Boardgame based on a combination of the movies, cartoon and IDW comic series. This campaign reminded me of how much I loved the franchise as a kid and made me eager to devour anything Ghostbusters related I could find. So yes I did manage to track down the Xbox 360 version of the game and plan on playing the "official" third installment as soon as I can find the time to indulge my console.
Read MoreWarhammer 40,000 – I've been hit with a deluge of Warhammer 40,000 commissions lately, which I take as a good sign for the game. It seems that locally people are flocking back to the game as something tried and true after being disappointed by the latest hotness too often. I have to say I'm glad as 40K was my first real mini game and it still remains one of my favorites.
Read MoreWarhammer 40,000 – Another batch of these Chaos Marines is done. This time around it's mostly infantry models with a few cultists and terminators mixed in with the two helbrutes.
Read MoreSuper Dungeon Explore – My forgotten King Expansion arrived recently and I'm super excited to try out the revised version of the game. The box that arrived was quite heavy and was jam packed with not only the base game but also a Boo Booty themed box which contained all the extra backer bonuses from the campaign. It sounds like the add-ons will be shipping at a later date which is ok with me, getting part of a kickstarter within the time frame projected during the campaign is way better than having to suffer through months (or years) of delays while everything is completed. (Looking at you Kingdom Death)
Read MoreWarhammer 40,000 – Oh yes I know that's a terrible title. (Let's just pretend I'm a hipster and it's meant to be ironic, alright?) This little 40K revival has been good for business as of late. My newest client has a Space Marine Bike Army that he needs painted to a three color+ paint job as well as some conversion work. From the list he sent over it looks to be a fairly large force so I'll be up to my ears in Marines for a while.
Read MoreTerrain Making – Now I can have joining rooms. The next sections I worked on are the two-side corridor rooms these sections allow to have a room on both sides of the section. If I had the narrow side rooms this would be perfect to set up a row of holding cells as it if it works pretty good to add some additional interest areas and potential ambush sites.
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Terrain Building – Sorting through the sections of Bug Hunt Corridors I have left to paint and build, I can across some nifty components that I forgot were included in the pledge.
First up were some nifty acrylic counters to indicate if doors are locked or open, these are pretty cool and I'm sure I'll use them once we start laying some games on this terrain set. They fit right over the tabs that are used to slide the doors open and closed so very useful counters.
Next is the really cool bonus bit: The Ganeway Load Lifter. This wonder of engineering is used to move around the hex crates that were also included in the pledge. Unfortunately it doesn't appear to be available for general sale which means this was a Kickstarter Exclusive. Really a shame because I'd love to pick up a few more of them since the model turned out so cool.
When I first dumped out the tiny little baggy of parts I thought it was going to be a giant pain to assemble. In actuality it took me less then five minutes to glue the hole thing together. Really impressive and full of character. I haven't decided how I want to paint it up yet so I'll put it in the pile with the load of crates to be taken care of at a later date.
Book Review – Recently I finished reading Judge Dredd: The XXX Files. I picked this compilation book up because the cover art is really fun and kept catching my eye. I'm slowly reading the Complete Case Files but opted to take a break from them to read a stand alone compilation.
Starting with the book itself, this is a nice trade paperback with a soft-touch finish on the cover which looks and feels great. The interior full color pages are printed on a nice glossy stock that reproduces the art well. This would look great on a coffee table as a conversation piece. (given you're ok with the content)
The stories inside are from mulitple time periods by different authors and illustrators, sharing the common theme of love, sex or other adult industries in Mega City One. Some of the stories are just plain weird like the Sex Olympics while others are a really compelling read with great art like the Jack the Ripper style sex-droid killer. Even the weird stories are an interesting read and provide a look into the seedier side of the Big Meg.
I picked this up for some inspiration to finish up my Slippery Kitty Lounge terrain piece. The art definitly gives me some good ideas on how I should decorate the interior. The added bonus is I also have some ideas on possible story arcs to use once I can get my group back into playing the Judge Dredd Miniatures game.
If you're a fan of Judge Dredd this is a must read.
Terrain Making – Just a short update today, I realize these posts are starting to get a little repetitive, but bear with me. I've gotten the three end rooms painted and assembled for this project. Painting and assembly is the same as the rest of the project which you can read more about here.
Read MoreTerrain Making – Next up in my quest to complete this giant terrain set are a few of the standard side rooms. These attach to a corridor section and swap out with the narrow side rooms (for if you need to put a bunch of rooms next to each other.) Painting these uses the same technique as the other sections which you can read about here.
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