The 15th Annual Analogue Hobbies Painting Challenge

 

It's time!

Head over to the Challenge blog to see the full announcement for Challenge XV.

It's going to be hellishly good fun! :)

Curt

So, to catch up...

Yeeash. It's been almost two full seasons since I last posted. I find that spring and summer demand being outdoors to soak up the sun. That being said, I did manage to putter along with a few things during the warm weather. The most significant of these was a return to the Wars of the Roses. I love this period and have eked out a small collection of singly-based 28mm figures for skirmish gaming, but I've always wanted forces large enough to play the larger battles. That's all well and good, but I am also quite aware of my time and patience for taking on a project that would require hundreds of figures. After several Napoleonic armies, Italian Wars, WWII, WWI,  etc, etc, I just don't think I have it in me anymore. 

As a bit of a rewind, about 10 years ago I picked up a few of Peter Dennis' books featuring his cutout paper soldiers. I was immediately charmed, especially his WotR book. I duly made colour copies on thick cardstock and began to scissor them out. And I scissored. And scissored. It didn't take long for me to discover that the time I was saving in painting was being quickly absorbed by having to carefully cut out the intricate serried ranks of archers and men-at-arms. I managed to get a few units done, but the blush quickly came off the rose and I abandoned the project.

Now, fast forward to this past year where I discovered that Peter Dennis had partnered with WoFun Miniatures to print his WotR flats on plexiglass. The units come vibrantly printed on neat little plexi sheets and are an absolute breeze to punch out. 

I ordered a bunch of the 18mm frames and came up with some basing designs on Inkscape that would fit with my 'To the Strongest' and 'Strength & Honour' collections. My good friend Byron over at Northern Lights Terrain was good enough to cut them for me. Here are some of my efforts with the first batch.

incorporated unit identifiers etched on the bases

Archers waiting to do archery things

The Heavy Hitters, but also great arrowstorm targets

Light cavalry to sow confusion on the flanks

Archers with stakes arrayed in front.

Assorted commanders

'A horse! A horse!'  Here's Richard III chasing for a remount. 

Men-at-arms

A few units of billmen

For fun I put in red flowers for the Lancastrians, red for the Yorkists and a combination for those cads who flipped sides (Boo! Hiss!).

Finally, a shot of where the collection is at now. 

Not bad, but I still have quite a few units to base. Hopefully by the end of it I should have enough to do some of the larger battles of the period.  

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Moving on, we recently returned from a great vacation meeting up with hobby friends in Toronto, Holland and Belgium. 

While we were in our stopover in Toronto, my good friend Greg treated me to a wonderful game of Warmaster featuring his beautiful Empire and Orc collections. 

I think the battle came down to the last stand between us, which always is a sign of a great time.

We arrived in Holland and met up with Nick from 'Moiterei's Bunte Welt'. To escape the congestion of Amsterdam we stayed in nearby Hilversum which we highly recommend. The three of us spent a few great days hanging out and taking in the Rijksmuseum. Nick brought out his copy of 'Undaunted: Battle of Britain' which was excellent. I think we played around 8 games of that in total! Terrific time.

Nick paying homage to that curious Corsican artillery officer...

Nick, Sarah and I enjoying 'The Best Apple Pie in Amsterdam' at the Rijksmuseum restaurant.

Next we were off to Belgium where we met up with Martijn and his lovely family.

Martijn and I had a great game of SAGA featuring his excellent collection of Vikings and Bretons(?).  Even thought I tried to snatch a win by going after his warlord, the dice were not with me and he saw me off to my longships. A great game with wonderful company.

We also had the delightful pleasure to meet up with Sander and Arthur in Antwerp's city center. We had a wonderful visit with lots of stories and laughs. 

Otherwise, the majority of the trip involved eating and drinking lots of decadent things, while walking and cycling in the vain hope of burning it all off. A great way to spend a few weeks!

Next Up: I dunno, who's up for a group paint thing this winter? :)

Ick the Mage, his homunculus Funnel and Nick aka 'The Red Right Hand'

A trio of fantasy characters for this week. 

First up is 'Ick the Mage' with his long-suffering but faithful homunculus, 'Funnel the Scroll Caddy'. 

Creeping in the shadows is the assassin Nick, better known as 'The Red Right Hand'.

Nick is a public relations troubleshooter (troubleslicer?) for those situations where discrete action is required to bring other parties into 'enlightened alignment'.

All three of these miscreants are prints from Knucklebones Miniatures. 

Have a great week everyone!

- Curt

Ben the Cleric and Molly from the Town Militia

Just a couple new additions for the fantasy collection.

Today we have Ben the Cleric along with Molly from the Town Militia. 

Both of these models are from Knucklebones Miniatures. I've been painting a lot of Knucklebone stuff over the past year and continue to really enjoy them - they have such great character, with lots of sculpted detail to play around with.

Case in point is Molly here with her polka dot skirts hiked-up to reveal her Landsknecht puff-and-slash uniform and assorted ironmongery. Formidable.

Molly came off the printer with a seam across her face. Instead of trying to remove it (a task I was not relishing), I decided to work with it instead. Using a tiny amount of milliput, I gave her a pair of tinted spectacles, incorporating the printing artefact. I figure this way she can comfortably blast away with her musket in the glorious bright sunshine.

I quite like the stolid pose of Ben the Cleric. 'If the blessing doesn't work then the warhammer will surely sort things out.' 

I kept it fairly simple with him, with white tabard and leather scale mail over red robes. I just realized that the purity seals need some suitable lunatic script on them... Hmm. Time to pull out the fine nib pen I guess.

Thanks for popping in for a look! I hope to have a few more Fantasy figures coming off the bench soon.

Have a good one!

- Curt

Chaos Warriors with Possessed Shields

I'm sure there are many mini painters who have had those weird hobby sessions where you pick out a couple of figures at random and the mojo just settles in, and before you know it they are gazing back at you, done in no time at all. I had that experience with these two fellas this weekend and thought I'd post them together as they seem to fall into a similar theme.

Here are two Chaos Warriors from Knucklebones Miniatures. 

I always really enjoy the wonderful textures and character that the sculptor puts into his figures. Of course the standouts for these two are the shields. I look at them and imagine that the warriors themselves are mindless constructs, and rather it is the shields which provide the sentient force of will. Yeeash! Creepy AF. 

They were a fun pair to work on and they will be fine additions to the Nasty Lads collection for Warhammer Fantasy and Forbidden Psalm.

Thanks for dropping by and have a great week!

- Curt