From MichaelA: 28mm Cannibals & Cooking Pot (100 points)

Michaeal treats us with another beautifly creative vignette for which he is becoming well known. This time it's a group of cannibals and Mandrills in their 'Heart of Darkness' themed Smeg kitchen.

From Michael:

I'm falling behind again due to an unfortunately timed manic spell at work; that said I have managed to clear the attached from the painting queue.  Whilst I was never going to challenge the awesome turnout of the top tier of extraordinarily fast painters, I have looked to consistently challenge myself to produce the best and most imaginative work I am capable of - perhaps looking to scoop up one of the prizes in the sub categories.  

To that end perhaps these could be considered my entry for the non military category?  They are part of North Star Miniatures 'extreme' cannibal range and painted to loosely represent the Azande of the Congo.  

Some time ago I was gifted a flashing blinky LED from Dave D (One man & his brushes) who cruelly sowed the seed for this infernal project, daring me to use it under a cooking pot to give the effect of the burning embers - challenge accepted Dave!  

The pot itself was all scratch built using bits and pieces but primarily built around a table tennis ball - the top sliced off and inverted to form a 'tray' into which I put greenstuff, beads and ball bearings to represent bubbles and a plastic zombie's arm as the final, macabre gesture of the latest victim! 

The Mandrill guardians were also from Northstar and started life as baboons before a little snip and a bit of greenstuff completed their conversion.  I must try to figure out how to take better photographs to illustrate the flames but in the interim I have included one that gives a little of the flavour of the piece - no pun intended!

So that's 5 cannibals, 2 Mandrills, a set of jungle drums and a giant bubbling pot of stew - could things get any stranger?  

Wow, this is phenomenal work Michael! I've always been a great admirier of your vignettes and this one certainly does not disappoint. I had to smile when I saw your Mandrills as they reminded me of Phil's marvelous pink-arsed baboons from last year's Challenge.

Thank you for treating us with this wonderfully creative work.

This vignette with all its glorious boogey-masked, nose-pierced, blue-arsed detail will give Michael 100 points. Bravo and well done!