nerodine

So, I've temporarily paused work on Guild Ball as the active project to allow myself to be sidelined by the Colony 87 figures. Too excited by them to put on hold until existing projects are completed and let the enthusiasm wane. Preparation work all done so they're primed and based with the CMON bases, and choices were adjusted with to allow better positioning of the feet. It's possible to cut out some of the basedetail to anchor them in place as it's only resin, but I wanted to try and find a natural position for them - and did! Very pleasing. Each figure has been pinned through both feet, as I wanted to keep them well anchored - they're heavy and I wasn't confident superglue alone would retain them. Only minor damage to two feet and once painted you won't know who it happened to. Promise. For basing, the original colours from the Kickstarter were as follows: The picture is very helpful as a reference piece to determine what's rubble, wreckag

My favourite thing at the moment is the arrival of Jon Boyce's new Colony 87 figures from another Kickstarter. They hark back to the Rogue Trader mindset of sci-fi, where not everything and everyone needed to be shooting someone, or grotesquely muscled, and really captures the futuristic civilian feel. (images nicked from the Kickstarter and joined in sequence, as his photos are better quality) From left to right, they are Kay Dee, Pash Grolin, Lady Greiss and Creaster, Lord-Governor Manduc Greiss, Barcoon Krobosh and Wandering Alexei. Look on the Kickstarter for a little more detail. Worth noting that it was funded mid-May, and delivered end of June/early July - basically on schedule. Kickstarters are notorious for being delayed, so it's very pleasing to see smaller operations like this do well, and I look forward to backing more of them in time. I've paired mine with some of the Tau Ceti bases from the CMON Kickstarter mentioned previously, and longer-t

A wise man once said "Kickstarter projects, they're like getting a little present from Past You to Future You" and in the last couple of weeks, Past Me has been a very generous soul and bought Future Me a few excellent things. CMON produced a range of resin bases with Micro Art Studios and if you've ever wondered what 272 resin bases bagged up looks like, then wonder no more! (You also receive the bases they fit into, but those are standard and boring so not included in the shot) Quality is great, and I'm very happy with them. Estimated delivery date of February '15 was missed by a good four months, but if you go into a CMON Kickstarter with the understanding that they're flat out lying on delivery dates then you won't be disappointed with the actual goods when they arrive. Each style came as 2x 50mm, 12x 40mm and 20x 30mm which is a handsome set and enough to base an entire skirmish warband in some games. Cost of these? Includin

Had an offline request to run through a process of quickly painting tabletop quality characters, so I adapted my plan to paint up the two Abominations properly and now we're trying to see how fast they could be wrapped up. More importantly, with one eye on my recent Kickstarter backing of Zombicide: Black Plague ... I've had the realisation there's a lot of figures coming my way 2016 (no-one believes CMON's 2015 delivery date) and I'll go round the bend trying to paint them all in the traditional fashion. This means corners need to be cut. It's time to try out Army Painter dip! I bought a jar of this a few years back with the express purpose of doing a Skaven Warhammer Fantasy army, but that idea never got off the ground, and the tin hasn't been given a thorough workout. One thing putting me off the idea was the literal dipping of the figure, but turns out modern wisdom recommends painting it on. After a few YouTubetorials on the subject, basically I'm

Brief detour from the usual painting. As a keen tabletop gamer, dice rolling features heavily in my current hobby activities. After a while, it gets a little tiring having dice scatter over the table - so a tray to roll them safely in is a requirement. I spotted this article on the excellent Ikea Hacker blog last month, and knew I had to build my own - and deviated only slightly from the original. Buy the following: IKEA Ribba photo frame. The 9" x 9" frame should be sufficient, unless you play to roll dozens of dice every round. Felt. I bought non-adhesive and just had rolls of double-sided sticky tape, but you can buy self-adhesive felt too - but that's a little more expensive Sticky tape. Only required if you buy the boring felt. Total cost for the above? £4.50, which is £3.50 for the frame, £1.00 for the felt and tape. Open up the frame, and remove all the inserts. Apply the sticky tape to the four edges on one side of the glass, then line up the fel

As a brief interlude from painting the Fisherman's Guild, I've started work on a few Zombicide pieces for a friend. Thankfully not the whole box of them ... He bought a fully painted Zombicide Season 1 set, but it came with two Abominations unpainted, so I offered to complete them as we're both a wee bit obsessive about things left unfinished, and this will scratch that itch. In addition to the Abominations, the Zombicide Season 3 set came with a couple of very nice 3D barricade pieces to replace the 2D tokens usually in place on the board. From a gaming perspective, I'm a fan of this approach and they're doing more of it on the new Zombicide: Black Plague set. Touch of the Heroquest about having doors and room objects scattered through your encounters. (how they started life, as reference) Quite literally a quick paintjob, with maybe 2-3 hours for the pair at a guess. There are a few noob errors, but they'll remain as is as they'

More painting has happened, and now I find myself with a pair of Kraken models completed. Is the plural of Kraken still Kraken? Anyway, there's definitely two of them - and now they're finished. One is a little more worn and rusted than the other, as I love my rust effect in a bottle and felt obliged to use it on at least one Kraken. My attempts to do skintones still need improvement, as what feels like a super smooth transition is exposed for the lie it is when you take photos at this distance. That's okay, I won't beat myself up over it - just try and do a little better on the next one. Happy with how the Experimental Pants (tm) worked out, and blue glazes on the leather and metals worked out better than I hoped, so there'll be more playing with glazing in the future. It's subtlety beyond my understanding, but I'll continue to try them out.

A month has passed, and work has been all consuming. But happily progress has happened. Having examined the team, the trickiest part present on all the figures is the rope; it's wrapped around roles, hanging out of clothes and generally used well to establish the nautical theme across all the models. It's also proper fiddly (technical term). Kraken underway. Part of me is now regretting not upgrading to resin figures for the weight reduction alone, as this fellow is a serious chunk of metal. Primer had a 'mare in places (by "primer" I mean "me") but painting the basecoat of Bronzed Flesh seemed to level that out just fine. He does have an arm, but it will remain detached for a while longer. Salt finished. Can't quite get a shot with the little fellow in full focus. Khaki base, some wet blending of White on his adorable little tummy, more Khaki and a thin brush to pull out some individual hairs. I didn't go with the white and grey dapp