The Alien With No Name

Kisathi Gunslinger

28mm

"If you're gonna shoot, shoot. Don't talk."

 

A dusty town... who is this blue-skinned humanoid facing down a notorious bandit, his gun hands twitching?  Nobody knows him... is he a grim heroic figure protecting the innocent from cruelty?  Or just another bounty hunter mercilessly taking down his target?

I recently entered this figure in a painting contest at my local game store, The Dragon.  It didn't win, but I did have a lot of fun conceptualizing the character of an alien spaghetti Western gunfighter and capturing the look I wanted.

His poncho is a piece of "Kimwipes" brand lint-free tissue soaked in PVA glue and paint, and carefully draped over the already-basecoated and shaded figure.  I had to paint over it one it was dry, but pre-tinting it saved a lot of work.  In the end, I think I created a nicely Clint Eastwood "Blondie"-like character...

Dare to be Punk

"Maggie, You ****"

28mm

Twenty five quid to live on
Seven days a week to survive
Five and twenty pictures of the queen
You won't see the starvation in her eyes
Twenty five quid to dish out
And you're already ten in debt
So with fifteen singles left over
The landlord gets the rent

Maggie, Maggie you c*** Maggie, Maggie you c*** Maggie
Maggie you c*** Maggie Maggie Maggie Maggie you fucking c***

- The Exploited, "Maggie" 

This is my entry for the Instagram "Punk Dare" contest run by Dark Elf Erin.  I envisioned a Britain where the Falklands war dragged on, depressing the economy to desperate lengths, and where the 1984 attack by the IRA succeeded in wiping out most of the British Cabinet.  In response, Margaret Thatcher institutes emergency measures and turns Britain into a real police state.  But some people still resist...

 I tried to load this figure up with old-school punk style: red Royal Stewart plaid, ripped fishnets, and a bold mohawk... contrasted with the totalitarian propaganda posters plastered over old punk material on the wall behind her (and already torn down and defaced).

I also decorated the back of the piece, with some fun old punk show posters:

Check out all the superb contest entries here: https://www.instagram.com/explore/tags/punkdareentry/

Orctober surprise

Grot Gunslinger
28 mm scale

Don't take your guns to town son
Leave your guns at home Bill
Don't take your guns to town

I grabbed this figure out of the depths of my lead pile as an entry in the popular "Orc-tober challenge" on Instagram, started by Old Man Paints.  I don't expect to win, and I'm not even sure what the prizes are, but it was a fun exercise.  I don't usually do greenskins at all, and it was a chance to stretch my style a bit and do another "dark style" figure... without it being largely black like my Plague Doctor.  I also follow Grave Wraith Terrain on Instagram and love his unique style - grim and dark without being monochromatic.  I didn't go quite that far this time... but I should try it.

The mini itself is apparently a Gorkamorka grot from c. 1999, which doesn't seem that "Oldhammer" to me... but it's as old as many of my coworkers, so I think it qualifies :)  I added the gunsmoke as an impulse at the last minute, and was convinced I'd wrecked it, but it turned out greasy and wispy which really suits him.

"I don't like the looks of that fella who just walked in..."

Wolf Clan - the Red and the Black

Werewolf
28 mm

Hallelujah when the moon is up
We are werewolves, all we need is blood
Take a silver bullet for your shot
We're immortal, all we fear is god!

I'm very much a "f*** it, it's done" kind of painter, so this doesn't happen very often: after posting this figure here, I received some very helpful feedback, and took it back to the painting desk.

On the original post, my official Most Loyal Reader, Javi of Lazyminis, bluntly told me "your werewolf isn't bloody enough, and that severed hand looks like a cheap Halloween prop".  And he was, unsurprisingly, RIGHT. I couldn't un-see it.

Anyway, I think it looks much better now. I avoided real grand guignol with blood splattered from head to toe, but he's definitely torn something up.  And, it turns out the key to truly ghastly gore is mixing red and black...

"... I'd like to meet his tailor."

Thanks, Javi.

Menace of the Wolf Clan

Werewolf
28 mm

This figure kind of came together unexpectedly.  My FLGS, the Dragon, is having a "we're all stuck at home" Instagram painting contest!  The terms were pretty open, but I decided that I should support them since in the midst of all this they're still operating, making local home deliveries!  I ordered a couple of blisters of Nolzur's figures and this is the one I went with.  Done in four days, and I think the result is pretty satisfactory :D

The kilt is a passing version of my own family's clan tartan, actually only the second time I've painted tartan on a figure.

Colour Commentary?

So I'm working on these GOTA troops from Khurasan, and while I'm generally happy with the colours I've picked and how they look on their bases, I am stuck on one thing.
 

My robot!  I don't want it to be exactly the same scheme as the troopers, and just blend in.  But I don't want to do it in a wildly contrasting or too-colourful style either because I'm trying to make them look realistically military and of the same faction.

Any suggestions, oh readers?

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Also, my Planet Tubby entry in the Titanium Dropship painting contest has finally been posted on Dropship Horizon, along with a lot of other very, very nice entries.  Check em out, if you haven't already!

"They Came From Planet Tubby"

Mysterious Tele-Aliens
15 mm

The origins of these strange biomechanical aliens are shrouded in mystery.  They dance and babble in childlike voices, until they suddenly disappear, only to turn up on a new world.  Strangely, they can communicate instantly with others of their kind via their abdominal view screens, and so have become a widely used faster-than-light messaging network for other species.  They have been known to alarm some human religious leaders, but are considered an extremely useful oddity by most sentients.
 

(This "squad" was my entry in the Dropship Horizon 15mm SF painting contest.  A lot goofier than my original plan, but time was tight.)

The figures above were my original plan for this contest.  Khurasan GOTA Clan riflemen with Mekanoid Melee Bots for support, on scratchbuilt starship bases.  But my KM order just arrived this week and there's no way I could have finished them nicely for the 15th.  So, Tubbies it is ;)

Ooh! A painting competition!

The excellent blog Dropship Horizon is holding a 15mm sci-fi painting comp.  Their post itself is pretty clear, but in a nutshell:  three categories: squad, vehicle/mech, terrain piece.  Must be sci-fi.  You can enter one entry per category.  Lots of prizes.

The comp closes in a month so, if you're me and your stock of 15mm figures is sadly depleted, time is a bit tight.  But hopefully I can pull something together and even have the time to paint it nicely.

No crown for Victoria

Well, The Chick Challenge verdicts are in , alas my Queen Victoria didn't win anything. But I pretty much knew that as soon as I saw the other entries. It is rather gratifying that neither of the best of show winners were "topless barbarian swordswoman" type subjects, although to be fair that genre was less represented in the contest than it tend to be in the hobby overall...

Hell hath no fury like...

...a small pewter woman, well-painted. The Chick Challenge 2010 entries have finally all been posted, and they are an interesting bunch! My "Victoria" is in the Open category, where the competition includes things like this... and this... and this.

Yeah, this is why I don't play to win :P Fortunately, seeing such amazing work by others is a pleasure in itself.

Queen of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, Defender of the Faith, Empress of India

Queen Victoria
25mm




So here is my Chick Challenge entry, presumably okay to reveal since today is the contest deadline. The miniature is a Victoria Lamb sculpt, which I bought from Eureka, though VL also sells them through her own website. I really enjoyed a lot of aspects of painting this figure - figuring out what all her medals and things were, rendering the rich purple, and just generally doing something a little different. As mentioned before I don't think I really have a chance of winning anything, but that's not the point... I think painting for contests, as rarely as I do it, really does bring out my best work.

(The plinth is a wooden toy makers' train wheel, stained with GW Chestnut ink. Worked perfectly!)

Motley Things

Chick Challenge* Entry
28 mm



OK, I can't actually show this, at least not before the Dec. 5 closing date for contest entries. But I will say it's a lovely sculpt by Victoria Lamb, and it's not at all like a lot of the things I have painted lately. Also, it's very purple.

* The Chick Challenge, in brief, is a female miniature painting contest. It was run for years by Jason Moses, but is now ably managed by Legio Pictorum, a group of Italian painters.

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I recently managed to acquire ($2, church bazaar) a battered copy of Heroquest! This was a Milton Bradley fantasy board game from the 80's, with game pieces produced by Citadel/Games Workshop. Essentially a canned version of a RPG dungeon crawl, complete with treasure to collect and orcs and other nasties to fight.

It came with a large number of "game pieces":




Hmm, yeah. They remind me of the figures from Battlemasters, or the old Bloodbowl box set. While they're not exactly high-quality even by the standards of modern plastic figures, I have done decent paint jobs on such things in the past.

I feel like these have... potential. We'll see.

A winner!

Well, I'm pleased to say my figure "Esmeralda the Green Velvet Pirate" took first prize in the "Wenches" category in the Exodus Road Hobbies Pirates painting contest!

Pirate
32 mm



I'm really happy with how this turned out, especially the face, velvet effect, and metals. All the contest entries are posted here.

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Chutney and Mango
7 mm



A little tribute to two lovely cats, one of whom has recently passed on. We miss you, Mango :(

Figures are from Mega Miniatures. I haven't decided what to put on the base yet, perhaps some plants and grass.