From AndrewS: Challenge Desperado - 28mm 'Sheriff Saunders' (23 points)

Andrew starts out of the blocks with this very fine sheriff figure who will take his place amongst the other Challenge Desperados.

From Andrew:

The loon is off the mark!!!!

I decided to open my account this year with the entry fee figure, This is a Foundry sheriff from their excellent range. I picked this and a Mexican up from Ebay a while back and myself and Kevin drew straws to see who got what figure to paint.  I undercoated in black and worked up using Foundry paints and various techniques to achieve the finished look.  

The base took rather longer than planned and my bright idea of making a few bits of tumble weed got rather messy and took several attempts to get the desired look I wanted. I decided to have him walking past a horse rail that I had tucked away the bonus was that it had a nice little cacti attached. The tumbleweeds came from a few experiments with different products this final incarnation is the result of some polyfibre and a fair bit of dry brushing. 

Overall I am happy with the final finish, and hope he is a fitting model for this years theme.

Wonderful work Andrew! The figure is brilliant and the basework really places him in context - excellent stuff.

Sheriff Saunders will give Andrew a base of 20 points but I'm adding another 3 for the wonderful basework (who knew tumbleweeds could be so fiddly!).