Raising the Blog from the Dead

Hi all,

what an appropriate model to showcase for my first post on this blog in over a year. Suffice to say I've had a busy year with lots of changes in my life, but I'm back on the hobby horse now in a big way. 

As a Vampire Counts Warhammer player the release of an updated Nagash model really got me excited and the creative juices flowing. The majority of hobby websites have suggested to build this model in sections and this is exactly what I've done. The first section I started and completed was the base and the ghosts/cloak, the finished product you can see below.

Front showing the ghosts and base

The base was made slightly more interesting by a couple of Hirst pieces I had lying around, I like the effect it gives, like Nagash is floating through a ruined city or building, This is also the first time that I've tried to add puddles to my bases, something you can only really do in large bases like this and I am very pleased with how they turned out, considering they are only area's of the base left empty from the Vallejo Pumice I use to base pretty much everything, given a coat of wood glue and then when dry washed with Secret Weapon Baby Poop wash.

Rear of the model and base

Starting Nagash was fairly daunting and starting him on the largest and most intimidating of his sections even more so! Saying that I'm quite happy with how he's turned out so far.

Until next time,

Vinny

Vampires, Airbrushes and Cygnar

Hi gang,

over the weekend I finished up the Vampire Countess I have been painting. I've been painting her over the last two weeks and it's a miniature that I really enjoyed painting.

Vampire Countess (Avatar of War)

I'm fairly happy with how she turned out, especially the reds and the skin. The pictures may be a bit dark and they are something I need to improve but I was also quite happy with the dark black armour, which I highlighted with Turquoise Blue to try and give it a steel look. I was really trying to achieve the classic, white skin/black hair/red cloak vampire look and I'm reasonably happy with how she turned out.

I also started work on the Cygnar Battlebox I purchased a month or two ago. I had the set already cleaned up and glued together but I broke out the airbrush and set to work with gusto. Firstly I primed white with Vallejo White Primer.

White Undercoat Cygnar Battlebox

I then used masking medium to block out the white areas I wanted to keep.

Blocked of masking medium

 I then used Vallejo Game Colour Enchanted Blue to give a good base colour to work from.

And that's where I left that battlegroup at the moment. The plan is to darken the blue up a little bit but at the same time have a very clean bright colour scheme. I don't normally undercoat my mini's white so it's going to be a learning curve for me.

Talk to you guys later.

Skeleton Base, Dark Souls and Cross Country Running

Hi everyone,

I hope everyone had a great weekend. This will be a quick enough update. I'm just going to share a couple of photo's and one video.

Firstly I did get some painting done over the weekend and the base for my mounted vampire is nearly finished. I am thinking about giving it a coat of the Army Painter varnish to finish it off. (maybe after another highlight of the red)

So the plan is to highlight the red a little more, go back over the bone in places to tidy it up and give it a coat of the AP varnish. I must say I am quite happy with how the weathering powders worked for the metal areas. But has anyone any experience using AP quick shade varnish over weathering powders, how does it work out? It won't make a mess will it?

Secondly something I don't really cover too much on my blog as it is more focused on my miniature painting hobby but I wanted to bring up Dark Souls. I finished this game over the weekend (Friday night) after playing it solidly since it came out. 

Hard? Hell yes!

I had an absolute blast playing it over the last 4 months, racking up nearly 90 hours overall and nearly 420 deaths. How do I know I racked up nearly 420 deaths? Because I kept a record! As a game who's tag line is "Prepare to Die", I certainly did!

So I was cursed once and found Obstein and Smough the toughest dying nealy 100 times at those two alone!

Finally between finishing Dark Souls and painting I also got some exercise. My first ever cross country run. The weather on Sunday was awful but here's a video of the first obstacle in the 10k run. A very enjoyable day but very very muddy.

I was in the third wave so it was fairly muddy. I'm hitting the water around the minute mark. Did I mention it was muddy?

Until next time.

40k Battle and Updated Vampire's

Two posts in two days! What the hell is going on?

Game of 40k:

Well my regular gaming buddy Phil, sent me on a couple of pictures of our game of 40k the weekend before last. A classic Ork vs Guard match up, 1500pts each. I was playing a boy heavy Ork army (90 slugga's) supported by 3 deffkopta's, an eight strong Nob mob with a painboy and a Weirdboy, a Big Mek with a Shokk Attack Gun and a looted wagon with Boom Gun. I can't remember exactly what Phil ran, but there were definitely 3 sentinels, some snipers, a couple of platoons, a veteran squad in a chimera, three autocannon teams, three heavy bolter teams an a Leman Russ of some sort.

Phil's Deployment (with objective)

My Deployment, beginning my first turn (with objective)

We had a great game, despite the fact we were both fairly rusty with the rules having not played a game of 40k in a couple of months. I gave Phil a bit of a shock in the first couple of rounds with my Weirdboy warping the unit of Nobs up the board right into his lines. The painboy made the unit quite durable and they caused a lot of damage initially, but eventually weight of fire wore them down. By this stage two of my maxed units of boyz were almost on the Imperial Guard lines. But Phil stayed disciplined with his firing and eventually wiped out both boyz units. He eventually counter attacked in turn 5 with his veteran squad in the chimera for my objective. It would have been a drawn if the game finished on turn 6 but his chimera tank shocked the remaining boy unit to contest my objective in turn 7 and earned him a hard fought win.

I really enjoyed this game and about half way through thought I had a good chance to win it, but two mistakes really cost me. Firstly I just didn't have a enough anti-armour weapon's in my army. I had neglected to give any nobs power fists, and relied two heavily on the Shok Attack Gun and BoomGun to do the damage. While the Shok Attack Gun was decent (I managed to roll a str9 shot for 3 turns) and only rolled a double once, relying on the looted wagon with a BS of 2 to do a large amount of damage may not have been the best plan. Especially with the amount of terrain we had on the board. The second mistake was calling the Waaagh a turn too early, and not actually getting any of my ork units into CC. A rookie mistake made due to lack of game time with my boyz.

But a very enjoyable game over all and well done to Phil for staying the course and eking a win out of a hard fought game.

Vampire Counts:

So here is a quick update on the painting of my vampire counts. Firstly I did a quick basecoat and wash on the mounted vampires base. It was a basecoat of GW Khermi Brown followed by a heavy wash of Devlan Mud.

Inital work on the skelleton's

I have spent more time with the female vampire (stop snickering down the back!), focusing mainly on the reds. I have been experimenting with shading and highlighting with complementary colours.

Initial work on the red dress

Back

Currently the closest to finished part of the dress

So the recipe so far looks like this:

1. Undercoat Black

2. Basecoat Vallejo Gory Red

3. Shade 50:50 mix of Vallejo Gory Red and Dark Green

4. Darkest Shadows Vallejo Dark Green

5. First Highlight 50:50 mix of Vallejo Gory Red and Livery Green.

The use of complementary colours to shade and highlight is only something I have recently come across but I think it's a very interesting technique and something I would really like to get to grips with.

Until next time.

Vampire Counts Vampires

Hi,

so I've had a fairly productive hobby weekend. I built the Vampire Count Coven Throne and am now worried whether I should have painted it on the spruce rather that after the building. I have kept the 3 Vampire's off of the mini for painting though. I also converted the 3 banshee's in that kit for the Mortis Engine into normal banshee's which I hope to use place in units in the future.

My main work though was the cleaning up and undercoating of two of my Vampire models. The first of these was the female vampire from Avatars of War. A model that I really love.

Vampiress Count cleaned and given a black wash for detail

Link to this mini on the Avatars of War Store

The second vampire I was working on during the weekend is mounted and comes from the great German Gamezone Range.

Gamezone Mournful Knight 1

Link to this mini on the Gamezone Store

The base does not come with the mini, but I have taken it from the Harry the Hammer limited edition release GW produced a couple of years ago.

Base without the Knight

I'm delighted with this little bit of a conversion. (Does a base swap count as a conversion) because I really think it adds a sense of dynamic movement to the model. Like the Vampire is charging over the useless ranks of skeleton's to get at the enemy more quickly.

Coming in the next post: Basecoats of the the vampire miniatures. 

Current painted Vampire Counts Army

Hi gang,

A very quick blog today to show you guys (and keep a record for myself) of what I have completed for my Vampire Counts army as of the 20th of Jan 2012. I finished off my 60 zombies last night. These were painted and based last but I wanted to magnetise them and their movement tray and give them a coat of Matt Varnish. So I did this and took a couple of pictures of the finished unit with my Ghouls, Dire Wolves, Spirit Hosts, Wraiths, Necromancer and Banshee.

Vampire Counts Army-Jan 2012

So from the list and the picture you can see that this army is missing it's title character. My next project with this army is to add not one but two Vampire Counts. A male vampire on a nightmare and a female vampire on foot.

Expect an update in relation to these soon.

Vampire Count Dire Wolves

Hi guys!

just a quick update to show you the finished unit of Dire Wolves. Like the Ghoul unit before it I had the basecoat of the main colours done well before Christmas but they had been sitting in my 'to finish' pile for a couple of months.

So once again I gave them a good coating of Army Painter Quickshade followed by a spray of Matt Varnish once they were dry. I then added the snow to the base and called it a job.

Three large photo's when one could have done!

Once again I'm quite happy with how this unit has turned out. The Army Painter Quickshade really does take a lot of work out of getting these mini's finished and looks particularly well on browns I think. So that is the majority of the low hanging fruit painting wise finished this year. I don't think I'll be making such quick progress for the rest of the year but 31 finished miniatures before 2 weeks of 2012 is over is easily the record of productivity for me!

My next project is to go back and magnetise all 60 of my zombies and give one or two of them a repaint. As well as start on painting the first of my Vampires to lead this army.

Laters!
Vinny

Vampire Count Ghouls Finished

Hi gang,

over the Christmas break while I was at home (about 200km away from my paints and models) I really got the itch to paint. This feeling is always the same for me, If ever I go a couple of days without doing something hobby related I really start to feel a need to sit down and glue or paint something.

When I finally got back to my hobby desk I set about satisfying that itch with gusto. I got my secret Santa for 2011 finished and in the mail. (I will post finished pictures when the person who it's meant for confirms delivery) I then set about finishing a 20 strong unit of Ghouls for my Vampire Count army.

With the new army book being released at the end of this week I thought it was the ideal time to go back and revisit the two VC units I left in mid-paint, the first of these was the unit of Ghouls. Over Christmas I resolved to get more of this army painted but I needed to find a way to do this more quickly than what I was previously achieving. Eventually I remembered that I had done some previous experiments with The Army Painter Quick Shade range of products and that the browns of these shades would be perfect for a grotty falling apart Vampire Count Army.

So I broke out a used paint brush and gave each of the twenty models a fairly liberal coating. After leaving them dry for about 24 hours I then gave them a coat of Army Painter Matt Varnish. I finished the whole unit off by basing them with a couple patches of snow.

I have to say I am really pleased with how this unit turned out. It is not going to win a Golden Demon anytime soon but they are a good solid tabletop quality. So that hobby itch is being satisfied but it's not quite gone yet, but 21 finished models since the beginning of January is not a bad start to 2012.

Next unit on the painting table is my 10 man dog unit of Dire Wolves.

Until next time.

The New Year Plans

Hi everyone,

I hope you all had a very relaxing and peaceful Christmas with families and loved ones and are now fully refreshed for a new year of hobby action!

The big news over Christmas is of course the leaked pictures of the new Vampire Counts miniatures and army book on Christmas Eve. My initial thoughts from the blurry scans are very positive and as a vampire player I think I will definitely have to pick up at least the Coven Throne, Wight King and Black Knights.

Of course there is nothing like a new army book to refocus your thoughts on the unpainted models in your army. So with this in mind I have gotten out my half finished regiment of Ghouls and my old long forgotten tub of army painter dip. I have liberally applied the varnish with a brush and the ghouls are now sitting around drying. I think it should be a matter of a few spot highlights here and there, the basing and I can call them done. I also have a unit of five Dire Wolves which are going to get the same treatment.

From there it will be onto the units of Skeletons. I plan to use the army painter dip for all of this painting and really hope it will help me speed up the production of the 60 or so skeletons I have to get through.

So in this very soft and fuzzy outlined plan I'm setting out my new year hobby resolutions. So expect to see Vampire Counts stuff for the first six months of the year from me. (With maybe a little Warmachine stuff thrown in for good measure.

I hope you'll be able to follow me in the year ahead.  

Movement Trays and Magnets

Hi gang,

so last week I have been focused on getting work done on the ghouls in my Vampire Counts army. I have nine of the 20 man unit done and I should be able to finish the unit off by the end of this week if all goes to plan. Also involved in getting this unit done was to make them a movement tray. So I purchased some plasticard and Pollyfilla (Spackle in the USA?) and set to work using the cut off from a sprue to make the edging.

Ghoul movement tray marked off for a tweny man unit.

So I wanted to magnitise this tray, mainly to stop the models beening knocked over and after much searching in hardware and picture stores I finally came across what I was looking for in my local €2 shop.

€2 for 2 sheets of A4 Magnetic Paper

 So by sticking this to the movement tray and to the bottom of the bases of the ghouls I now have a front rank that defy gravity!

Finished front rank just hanging out

The magnetic grip is relatively strong but I doubt it would do for heavy metal miniatures but for light plastic miniatures like this it's just the ticket.

An interesting thing I took a while to figure out was that if the magnetic paper I stuck on the base of the miniature does not align with the magnetic paper on the movement try it will not stick! I had problems with the ghast mini not sticking to movement try when facing forward in the front rank. But if I turned the mini 90 degrees to the left or right it would stick no problem. Obviously I had cut the magnetic square for the base out of the A4 sheet, but turned it sideways when sticking onto the base, therefore the magnetic fields couldn't 'click'. I can only imagine this is something to do with the creation of the magnetic sheet.  

Until next time!

Finished Vampire Counts Models

Hi gang,

I may have been quiet on the blog front but I've been busy. Firstly I've finished the Necromancer and about time too, as I was just getting to the point where I was sick at looking at it and wanted to move onto something else. I polished him off in a couple of hours to get him out of the way before I moved onto something else.

Finished Necromancer

Things I'm happy with: How the purple and yellow play off each other, the skin, the warpstone and the frog. Things that need work: The contrast
Things I would change: I'd change the base if I could go back.

So onto the next stage of the Vampire Counts army. I decided to do all the spirit units in the army in one foul swoop as I intended to paint them all the same. The airbrush really came into its own here. A undercoat of GW Foundation Astromican Grey followed by a zential highlight from the top of PP Morrow White. Once these were dry I gave each mini a wash with GW Thraka Green and Asurmen Blue. I then added my army colour to the units by picking out one or two objects with a light wash of GW Leviathan Purple. Enough of waffle...........photo's!

Banshee

The snow on the base was made using a mixture of PVA and Biacarbonate of Soda. It's not perfect I'm still trying to get the mixtures right.

Ghouls and Dire Wolves next I think.

Necomancer WiP Continued 2

Hi all,

I'm continuing slowly but surely with this Necromancer model. I really am enjoying painting him. Since my last post I've completed the yellow stoll and moved onto getting the basecoats done for the satchels and the cards that are pinned around the mini. 

Necromancer WiP 8th May

I think this is the most representive picture of the mini I've gotten to date, taken just in plain daylight with a little bit of threshold work done in GIMP. There is a nice shine off of him but a final matt varnish coat should take that out of it. I'm trying to come up with some nice freehand symbols for the cards. I might have a look through the Mordheim and VC Army book for some inspiration.

Laters.