Menelduir's painting & building blog: January 2023

Monday 30 January 2023

6th post to the AHPC XIII [358 points]

Mostly GW figures, maybe Ral Partha figures Will Scarlett

Mix of Gorillas

Pulp Figures island of Dr Moreau

Mix of Nuns on the run

The Flying Squad

GW forest

So this week I finished off 31 x 28mm figures and 4 GW forests, not much. I do have a lot of stuff nearing completion, maybe for post 7. None of these figures needed to be done this week, beyond fulfillment of studio and limo requirements. They were for the most part just a random grab.

5th AHPC XIII post 445 points Gladiators, Supers and Rockettes

Mighty Fortress, possible AHPC XIII entry

So, inspired by a fellow challenger and his wall project, I have been poking around the garage for some old GW stuff. On the painting table right now are 4 forests terrain features. They might be ready for this Saturday. But, the item I was looking for in the garage was the mighty fortress, three in fact. I found them.

I think this may become a background project to be worked on during the course of the challenge. Three mighty fortress consist of 13 wall sections (including gate sections) for a total length of 390cm roughly 192". There are also 8 towers roughly 5.5" square.

The points calculation

Each 6" square cube counts as 20 points.

The 4 wall sections when placed side by side form a square roughly 12" by 13".

So that would be 4 x 20 = 80 points per fortress, x3 for a total of = 240 points.

Four towers make a square roughly 11" by 11" so 20 x 4 = 80 per fort x3 = 240 points.

My admittedly poor math skills suggests that this may well net 480 points for the 3 fortresses. Then add in 20 points for the lone extra wall section (1/4 of 80 points) and this would bring the total to 500 points. This would be nice to go out on.

Sunday 15 January 2023

4th post to AHPC XIII A regular cornucopia of stuff [635 points]

So, first up some French cuirassiers for Mars/VSF.

Next we have some Empire foot

Third post to AHPC XIII (production line picking up speed) ECW cavalry/Ancient Germans/Sisters of Sigmar/Assorted monsters [308 points]

An eclectic mix this time, maybe a bit more so than usual. Some miscellaneous monsters, all but the big green guy are Reaper miniatures, the big green guy is from Flying Frog games.

The Bull is about 4 layers of bronze paints, 3 GW and on Vallejo.

The skeletal creatures were primed black, base coated brown, over brushed bone, washed with GW Contrast skeleton horde them touched up with Army painter bone and Game colour bone.

The Minotaur was primed black then about 3-4 layers of brown before being hit with GW Reikland flesh wash. The wash made it a bit darker than I was aiming for and I may eventually go back and highlight it a bit.

The big green guy was primed white, then contrast Plague Bearer flesh, then dry brushed dead flesh and rotting flesh before being hit by a mix wash od Vallejo sepia wash and Vallejo light green slime. The tongue/tentacles were any and all shades of pink that I happened to have with a pin wash of GW Carroburg crimson to try and separate the tentacles.

Sisters of Sigmar painted with contrast Space wolves grey, Fleshtearers red and Guilliman flesh. As usual, some touch ups were required (still need some more touch ups)

Foundry wailing German women, based for Infamy Infamy! Ultimately not the best figures (or paint job) They are a little clunky in places, low detail in some spots. Also had difficulty figuring out the stole on their shoulders.

Warlord ECW metal riders and plastic horses. Painted as Royalist, sort of, but might be better as Parliamentarian. This is the first of 11 cavalry regiment that I have to paint, right now there is only one in the cue. I had fun painting the horses, tried to highlight the flesh, need more practice on that. I do like the flowers!

Sunday 8 January 2023

New aquisition, Vallejo Express color

So, this just arrived at my local hobby shop, Hobby House. Thankfully the owner was kind enough to give me a call when they arrived and put aside one of each bottle for me! Vallejo is the latest paint company to throw their hat into the quick paint system arena. The initial release consists of 23 colours and a mix medium. I got all 24 bottles.

I have made use of GW's contrast paints and Army painter speed paints so why not another one? Well many reason why not, I suspect. Cost, too many paints already, possibly not good paints just to name a few.

Cost for 18ml bottle.

$4.99 Vallejo Express color
$5.95 Army painter speed paints
$8.95 GW Contrast paints

So cost is not bad by comparison.

Too many paints?

Well yes that is a good point and a good reason not to buy more paint, but what can a paint addict do?

Quality of the paints?

Well on that point, the jury is still out. I just bought them yesterday and I have not had a chance to test all of them out. The colours that I have tested are pretty good. They are a matt finish as promised by the company, and they flow just like the other paints of this style. Like the others they have a nice capillary action that see the paint flow easily over the miniature surface and settles nicely into crevices.

So far some of the paints seem to be more intense than others. The black has a distinctive blue hue to it and comes out very light. The dwaf (sic) flesh is a much lighter and welcomed flesh wash and compliments the other flesh colours by the other companies. So far none of the colors have the same blotchy quality of the GW contrast paints. One could almost get away with just using express paints to paint a figure.

As I said they are too new a purchase so I have not done a proper test. However, I am in the middle of a painting challenge, so I am confident that they will get a full test real soon.