nerodine

I haven't been to a wargames show before, but Salute's been on my "to do" list for a few years - and yet life has repeatedly gotten in the way of being able to book. 2015 was when I could finally go along with a friend, and it was worth the wait. Essentially it's a large hall with 150 trade stands, and a lot of demonstration games running throughout the day - visited by ~6000-8000 people in a 7 hour period. You're encouraged to participate and spend. That's the facts, but it would do the whole day a disservice with just that description, it was a lot of fun. As grown men, our teen nerds and adult wallets were unleashed in combination and we spent a good five hours walking around, looking at games we'd never heard of, skim-reading rulesets and getting excited about figure ranges we'd never seen. The haul for the day as follows: Top row: Infernal Golem (Titan Forge), Nazi zombies (Studio Miniatures), Weathering effects (Modelmates) Mid

With the recent spark ignited by the Battlefront & Episode 7 trailers, a friend with the Imperial Assault board game (similar to Descent) entrusted me with painting up a couple of the figures. The game doesn't quite work the same way as Descent, so there isn't a master unit in the group - they're simply required to be distinct from each other, hence the different coloured bases. The three are painted in different styles, but all sprayed metallic as the base. Blue had his top half painted in chipping fluid, painted black, then scrubbed back. That's a technique which requires significant more practice (my first attempt) and wasn't great. Green was shaded and highlighted as normal. Red was shaded, drybrushed then I tried for a lighting effect around the sensors. Not entirely satisfactory, but conveyed the effect. All three were finished with gloss varnish on the black sensors painted to give the feel of glass - and I'm happy with that. In revi

Gretchin done. Family group shot for posterity, just missing the final matte varnish to seal in the red pigment. Haven't quite worked out how to get the right focus on such a broad spread of figures, but hopefully it conveys everything. Rummaging through old boxes, I found a couple of old painted Runt Herders so rebased them and added to the group. Happy that my painting has moved on in the last 12 years from what was my best possible painting at the time to a little below my tabletop standard now. Yay for visible progress :D Loving pigments to finish off bases, but learned that you should leave it until the very last minute to apply - because that stuff goes everywhere. On a personal note, it was pretty cool to work my way through a 20 man unit in under six months. My previous Orks and Space Wolves have taken significantly longer as I got caught up trying to make them perfect - which negates the purpose of big units. They need to be painted and on the table, and not to

Over on the Ammobunker, March was Green Month and that got me hankering for Orks. Once I started hankering, I started reminiscing and next thing you know I've picked up this box on eBay ... Very, very excited. Fond memories of buying this at release back in '87 for probably the princely sum of £10. Delighted to snaffle it as a bargain with everything mint. 1987 saw Terry Waite captured, British Airways privatised(!) and Maggie elected for her final term in office. Considering how long ago all this was, before diving in and ruining these beautiful miniatures, I've pulled out a box of Gretchin to practice on ... Also found my very old Goblin Green spray in a can. Not quite the shade of green I'd used previously on my figures, but it'll do for a quick and cheap unit like this. After realising there was no chance of completing 20 Gretchin in one week, I opted to switch focus to just completing a couple of test models instead. Would rather have som