The dead rise again!

The Headless Horseman!

28mm scale

In the dark shadow of the grove, on the margin of the brook, he beheld something huge, misshapen, black, and towering. It stirred not, but seemed gathered up in the gloom, like some gigantic monster ready to spring upon the traveller.

The ghostly Hessian rides through Sleepy Hollow again, seeking a replacement for his head, shot off in battle!

This was painted as a gift for a horror- and Halloween-loving friend.  I don't do mounted figures very often, but this was a pleasure.  The dark, glossy black coat of the horse came together surprisingly easily, and it's just such a dramatic figure overall.  Dark undercoating did a lot of work towards the mood here too.  

I have no idea where the figure itself is from, I received it in an exchange many years ago.

Skeleton Warband

28mm

 Do this rattling squad of undead freebooters obey the foul will of some evil overlord?  Or do they roam of their own accord, seeking to pillage and kill?  They may be "lowly skeletons" but don't ever underestimate their menace...

A fun assortment of Reaper figures, led by Rictus the Undying.  The three mooks were modified for character with the addition of various items, and a weapon swap.  I especially like the axeman with the afro, he's inspired by "Brook" from the anime One Piece 😁

Galaxy Guardian

Baby Groot
180mm

"Groot, you can't.  You'll die!  Why?  Why are you doing this?
"WE are Groot."

This one's a slightly different project from my usual.  My 5yo son is a big Guardians of the Galaxy fan and I made this to decorate his room.  Groot is made from Fimo, sculpted over a wire and tinfoil armature.  I filled the pot with plaster with a bit of pea gravel to give it some heft.  I've never worked substantially with Fimo before, it was surprisingly easy and forgiving to use.  I had to make this in stages so it was baked probably 4-5 times and the first part I did (the head) shows no discoloration, cracking etc.  I added a bit of dark washing to enhance his wood grain, and a few painted details which I think make him look very similar to the recently-sprouted Baby Groot as he appears at the end of the first GotG movie.  He's about 18 cm tall and another 10 cm for the pot, so this is definitely not a small item, by my standards anyway.  Lots of fun, and hopefully my son will like having this cute guy hanging out on his dresser!

Stag Party

Peryton
28 mm

Here's another model that's a bit different from my usual fare.  It's not often that I have a chance to tout fantastic(al) Latin-American author Jorge Luis Borges on this blog, but here's my chance.  The griffon-like Peryton is his creation, from his 1957 Book of Imaginary Beings.  If you read one Latin-American author ever... maybe it should be Gabriel Garcia Marquez, but Borges seems a lot more fun ;)

The figure is Reaper Bones Peryton (A Julie Guthrie sculpt!); it was a Christmas gift from my daughter :)

As usual, I'm seeing a lot of things I should improve or fix now that I've taken photos, but that will have to wait for another time...

Birthday Monster

Lizardman Soldier
28 mm

You hear the door come crashing down
The birthday monsters are in town!

This is kind of a special project for me.  My 4 year old daughter thoughtfully selected this Reaper Bones mini for me for my birthday this year, and I wanted to paint it up as soon as I could to show my appreciation.  It's a good figure, a bit "flat" but still exhibiting a dynamic character.  The Bones plastic was even softer than I'd expected, but the hot water trick worked to straighten the spear and generally make him stand more upright.

I'll admit you can tell my skills have slipped in the last few years, but on the other hand, painting 15 mm has made me accustomed to using strong contrast, which I think suits this scaly guy.  The other figure she got me might have to wait a bit, I have some 15 mm projects I'm anxious to get going on once the back-to-school madness settles down.

Hell Divers WIP, and a gift

Hell Divers are fantastic.  Really.  I'm working on another six right now and as good as the sculpts are, I think what I like most is no doubles!  I'm pretty sure that in the three packs I bought (Alpha, Bravo and Omega squads) every figure is a different sculpt, so no bending arms and cutting heads to avoid your squad looking like a chorus line.

Obviously I'm painting these to match my previous four, so lots of Ordic Olive/Okavango Swamp.

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Robot Monster (redux)
15 mm

I enjoyed painting this Khurasan figure again, this time as a birthday present for my brother.  Retro-licious!  I have to say I got a lot of use out of these packs...

Untoten Soldaten - finished

Nazi Zombies
15 mm
 

Corporal Bauer huddled inside the ruined bakery, listening for any hint the hideous creatures outside might have detected his presence.  The scratching and moaning continued to come from the street outside however, interspersed with wet sounds he was sure were his dead squadmates being dismembered and consumed.  After a day of heavy fighting, they had been caught by surprise, by what seemed to be a group of their own Waffen-SS... but empty-eyed men soaked with blood and stinking of death, attacking with bare hands and teeth.

A tiny scuffing noise made him look frantically around the debris-strewn room.  In one dark corner, a British soldier crouched, a heavy coating of grime and mud making him almost invisible.  Bauer spasmodically clutched his Mauser, but the Englishman only brought a finger to his lips, and with his other hand, held up a cloth bag bulging with heavy, egg-shaped objects.  Bauer stared for a moment, then glanced down at his own belt, where a single grenade remained...

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It took me way too long to do these, but some days I feel like a zombie myself. I think I'll keep them to admire for a while before the go in the mail to my brother...  Anyway, you can check out a much, much more impressive 28mm WW2 zombie project, entitled "Don't Fraternize with Germans" at Anatoli's Game Room.  Amazing!

Nazi Z's in progress

The Obersturmführer:

The mooks:

So I guess they're Waffen-SS, for that extra dose of evil :O Finishing the leader (do zombies have leaders?) has definitely helped motivate me to work on the rank and file (all 5 of them, ooh!). So far so good, though I was hoping the uniforms would look "field grey" which is actually more green. Maybe I can fix that with the highlighting.

Untoten Soldaten

Zombie Nazis
15 mm

These guys will be a birthday gift for my brother, so if you are reading this M___, I guess you spoiled the surprise! Anyway, $11 got me a good handful of these from Rebel Minis, and they're going to be fun to paint. They're pretty cute little sculpts, I like the guy dragging his rifle and the missing-arm/carrying-an-arm pair (I based those two together).

The gift minis will have dirt-n-bushes bases to match M___'s Flames of War Panzergrenadier army... but if I ever get to paint some for myself, they'll have winter bases... Død Snø style :D

For my own future reference, FoW base sizes are:
Small: 1 1/4" x 1"
Medium: 2" x 1 1/4"
Large: 2 1/2" x 2"

Gingerbread 2010

A yearly tradition of mine. Yes, it takes away painting time, but it's a lot tastier in the end! These were all made as gifts for friends.

Toronto, Ontario
350 mm



Christmas trees
250 mm

Don't look a gift elf in the mouth

Caelon, Half-Elf Warlock
28mm



Well he's done. I really enjoy painting things green, it seems...

I originally planned for the base to look a lot like these from Micro Art Studios, but ended up being more inspired by a friend's photos of the Cambodian temple of Angkor Wat, overgrown with trees and vines.

Canned Meat

Barrel Zombie
28 mm



This canned meat tends to eat you instead.

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Also, some progress on Caelon, the elf. I like how the green is turning out.

Character project

Half-Elf Warlock
28 mm



This is a Reaper mini, chosen to be as close as possible to my friend David's Dungeons and Dragons character "Caelón". I thought he might appreciate his alter ego in tiny form :) I'll convert the staff to hold an orb, as per his description.

Barrel Zombie
28 mm



A fun and gruesome mini from Eureka. It's a pickled zombie, escaping from a 40 gallon drum.

Wehrmacht H39 gun
15 mm scale





Just finished one more WW2 mini, another gift from my brother. Very kind of him. This is an assault gun Germany made from a captured French tank. I'm happy to say my results with static grass were much better here than in the past. It looks vaguely like grass.

Monkey Demon
20 mm



All done... no water reflections anymore since I'm not feeling very masochistic right now.

Reflections

So this doesn't look much like a reflection of fire on water, does it?



In fact, it looks more like sugar-tripping schoolchildren threw craft paints at a moving target as some kind of demented performance art project. Pity, that. Oh well, try, try again.

New projects

Monkey Demon
20 mm



This came all the way from Italy, so I'll try and paint it well. He kind of reminds me of the art from Hellboy, for some reason.

M3A1 Stuart tank
15 mm scale



An American tank of WW2. My brother, who loves these little tanks, got me this for Christmas. As usual I've added some extras to make it look lived-in. Soldiers in the field tend to accumulate useful things if they can, because the only thing worse than being shot at, is being shot at when you're cold, wet and hungry.

What could have been...

... if World War 2 was fought with big stompy robots!

"Gear Krieg" British Walker
~50 mm



Definitely a different take on WW2 war games! "Weird War 2" is a popular miniature genre right now so maybe this line will become more available. This is a Christmas gift for someone who hopefully doesn't read my blog...

Feeling of Accomplishment

"Buger thyss, I'm goinge home!"
28 mm



Well he's done, I mounted him on this little wooden base to make him a little more gift-worthy. The dead grass is bristles from a cheap paintbrush. My dad will have to wait a little longer for his gift though, I can't bring myself to put this guy in the mail...

Just in time too, there's another Mini Exchange underway. "Thoth the Keeper of Scrolls" is on his way to dougaderly in New Hampshire.

Lazy bum

(That'd be me... almost no painting for weeks. Didn't help I was sick TWICE.)

OK so I really have to finish this gift for my dad. Here's what's done so far:



I'm thinking a freehand-painted patterned border on the tunic, and maybe some tufts of dead winter grass poking out of the snow would make him more visually interesting. And he needs rosy cheeks since it's winter.

Gift for my Pop

"Buger thyss, I'm goinge home"
28 mm



This is a belated birthday gift for my father. I imagine this fellow being a warrior who has just decided that he doesn't want to fight on the battlefield anymore, and is heading back to his family instead. It's a crisp, characterful sculpt, available from Discount Hobby for a whopping $1. Dad always taught me to be frugal :)