Catsong

Indy, Ragdoll Bard
28 mm scale

Tomorrow will take us away
Far from home
No one will ever know our names
But the bards' songs will remain

A bard's coin and living rest on their reputation, and Indy's songs and sagas are certainly well-reknowned.  His passage through town always leaves behind happy, entertained folk purring a new song or two... and the occasional unexpected litter of kittens...

This Cats & Catacombs figure is actually the first bard I've ever painted.  As lovely as it is on its own, I felt like it deserved a well-done pastoral base, to suit a bard's itinerant, poetic nature.  I used bark for the rock, and these are my first sculpted mushrooms, which I think turned out okay.  The figure is posed pretty statically, but makes up for it with a poised, handsome character that suits a notoriously charismatic profession.

 

Come, for the dusk is our own; let us fare forth together,
With a quiet delight in our hearts for the ripe, still, autumn weather,
Through the rustling valley and wood and over the crisping meadow,
Under a high-sprung sky, winnowed of mist and shadow.

Cowabunga Cruiser

Turtle Party Wagon
15mm scale

YO! It's the green machine
Gonna rock the town without being seen
Have you ever seen a turtle get down?
Slammin and jammin to the new swing sound
Yeah, everybody let's move
Vanilla is here with the New Jack Groove
Gonna rock, And roll this place
With the power of the ninja turtle bass

Gotta have some cool wheels while you're cruising NYC to take down Shredder and The Foot!

This (pizza) slice of the late 80's was a random Hot Wheels find at the dollar store before Christmas.  It's a very faithful design, AND pretty much perfectly 15mm scale!  All it needed was a paint job.

Of course I had to add some Big Apple civic pride along with the other graffiti:

And now for the kicker... A while ago, as part of a swap, @winnipegmichael on Instagram sent me these incredibly obscure TMNT figures he'd painted.  They're big-15mm scale, and this van suits them absolutely!

The sincerest form of flattery pt. 2

Ejhin de Vanth
28mm

Fear of the dark
Fear of the dark
I have a constant fear that something's always near

This Rackham Confrontation miniature has been kicking around my collection since... Confrontation was the newest and coolest thing, years ago.  It just never jumped out at me to be painted.  But, as they say... every dog has its day.

I've been following the amazing work of Matthias Radtke, aka @gravewraithterrain on Instagram for a while.  As well as experimenting with unusual materials and textures, his smoldering, dark paint jobs contrasted with intense light effects are both immediately eye-catching, and piqued my artistic interest.  So many of my works are bright... I wanted to try and duplicate his technique, and produce my own thing of sinister darkness.  And this arcanely creepy sorceress was a good sculpt to work from.

I think it worked pretty well... considering I have little practice emulating others' styles, and I deliberately asked for a minimum of technical advice from Mr. Radtke (who was, however, happy to oblige).  The eldritch green glow and filthy smoke coming off her staff was both the first thing I did here, and a great focal point for the figure.

This was a fulfilling hobby project, and I'm pleased to say, a quick one! I didn't agonize over blending or pumping my highlights up to eleven, just matching the grim mood and spectacular depth of my inspiration.  The results are at least fairly close to what I was hoping for.

 To conclude, this is where I plug the Grave Wraith Terrain Etsy store, if anyone's interested in owning one of Matthias' many lovely works.

Jungle Patrol

Jungle Patrol and monolith
15mm

 

The galaxy is filled with mysterious relics: the structures and artifacts left behind by long-lost peoples on a thousand planets...  Some are crumbling ruins, others are active and even dangerous technologies waiting to imperil the unwary explorer.  This squad of troopers have discovered such a relic in the deep jungle... crumbling ruins, but holding a huge crystal glowing with some inner power...

These figures were a gift from @winnipegmichael, they're apparently "Yenpalo troopers" from Brigade Models.  The CO's "fish head" is from CP Miniatures.  The monolith is just made from an aquarium gem and chunks of cork, with a light dusting of very fine foam flocking (so fine I rarely use it, actually, but it makes good moss).

"Fan out and scan for EM spikes!  There might be more of them!"

Oldhammer Original

Mercenary Abbadon
28mm

They say he was there at the beginning.  One of the originals; witnessed the birth of the Imperium.  But that's impossible... he's just a man, a lowly spacer.  Still, the glitchy old holos don't lie; there he is.

This figure is easily one of the most vintage models I own.  First appearing in 1987, the sculpt dates all the way back to the early days of Citadel Miniatures' "Rogue Trader", when there was a lot less rigid backstory or structure to their catalog.  Later, the Rogue Trader universe became the skull-piled Warhammer 40,000 we all know and (problematically) love, and street-level characters like Abbadon, Plunderino Pete, and Irn-Bonce the Squat are now a thing of the past...

1987: first appearance as "Ground Combat Trooper".

 

... then "Abbadon" a few months later.

 

It's an odd sculpt, hunched and bandy-legged with a very vague helmeted face that's almost skeletal.  But I like it, it has a grimy working-class-in-space appeal.

I picked this model up years ago, and a recent post by Matt S. of Oldenhammer in Toronto spurred me to paint it up.  I love his bold, lively painter's hand, and I think this paint job is definitely influenced by it.  I tried not to mimic his version of the figure, but the shoulder patches are identical as a small homage.

(Abbadon's name was of course recycled for a much different, more skull-licious 40k character later on)

"How long were you out there, old timer?... Hmm, a man of few words, I guess."

Chernobyl Man

Pripyat intruder
15mm

I'm nuclear
I'm wild
I'm breaking up inside
A heart of broken glass defiled
Deep inside the abandoned child

To enter the Chernobyl Incident Exclusion Zone is forbidden.  But some do it anyway, out of curiosity, desire for adventure, or to scavenge any remaining valuables.  It's certainly a risky venture however; while radiation levels are now low enough that exposure doesn't mean certain death, there are other, more immediate perils lurking within...

This is an Alternative Armies figure with a bit of detail added to the rifle and gasmask (giving it an oddly spider-like appearance).  The fences and sign are scratchbuilt, with model barbed wire.

"Good you are here, tovarisches!  They are escaping!"

 

Note: this figure and terrain are inspired by fiction like the PC game "S.T.A.L.K.E.R.", depicting the Exclusion Zone as a bleak, sinister, apocalyptic landscape full of savage, mutated horrors.  While this is a cool fantasy, the real Zone is actually what many areas abandoned by humans rapidly become: a safe haven for wildlife and flora to flourish without disruption:

The Exclusion Zone can even be visited safely, without automatic weapons and creepy, grotty Soviet-surplus gasmasks, via professional guided tours that visit highlights like abandoned schools, parks, and even the plant itself.

Paws of Sorcery

Solan, Persian Warlock

28mm scale

Solan paced the perimeter of the summoning circle, uttering the words of power that would draw forth an entity from the planes beyond ours.  One mistake and the spell would fail, or worse, the spirit would escape, free to perform whatever mischief it chose on our world... and the spellcaster who sought to bind it.  Solan's protective wards and potions were formulated with this in mind...

I had a hard time deciding which of my Cats & Catacombs figures to paint after my monk and fighter pair... but since I tend to have a shortage of magic-users in my display case, this guy was a great choice!  He has a distinctive pacing, slightly curved posture, which fits perfectly with a summoning circle on his base to give him a bit of a story.

Removing this little guy from his attached base was a very good idea; I don't know if you could even paint his belly completely without doing it.

 The bottles are from the same WizKids Deep Cuts purchase as the lighted cauldron I posted earlier (though these are from the wizard's accessories).  I drilled them out and painted the inside surfaces to make them look filled with liquid; the plastic's a bit soft and oddly hard to drill cleanly. But the result works, I think.

Light show

Firepower

15mm

Aim for the target
With laser and lights
Releasing the trigger
Puts victory in sight

This was a fun one-day project I did last week on a day off work.  The figure is an Alternative Armies "Star Viking" I've had for a while but was never inspired by before.  I just saw it in the pile, and the idea to paint it up with a gun blast effect and OSL just came to me.  The result, I think, is actually pretty badass.

Witch's Cauldron

28mm scale

 

I picked up a couple of WizKids Deep Cuts sets recently: "Witch's Den" and "Wizard's Room".  so now I have a fun assemblage of arcane dungeon dressing that I'll probably use to embellish bases or set up some fun photos.  The coolest item was a cauldron with a clear insert for the "potion" inside!  So I did the obvious :)

 

This was actually pretty easy, just a bit of drilling and positioning to get the LED snug inside.  The hardest part was fitting the wires under the very thin base I used.  I'd suggest a regular 30mm base if you want to make something like this.

Lady Liberty

Sunrise on Liberty
28 mm

"Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.
Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me,
I lift my lamp beside the golden door!"

 

I've had this great little Hasslefree Miniatures model for ages, I probably got it in a mini exchange back when I was a regular on Cool Mini or not.  It's not a perfect replica of the actual Statue of Liberty, rather it's one of a range of figures modeled after the proprietor Kev's wife.

Anyway, for some reason I felt like now was the time to paint it up.  I wanted something a bit more dramatic than "statue on pedestal", so I tried some heavy directional lighting here, as if the statue is facing dawn over the water, complete with an unlit back and a shadow cast behind it.  I'm not super happy with how the "light" looks on the rocks or water, but the statue itself has a good warm glow that I'm satisfied with.

The "rocks" are obviously just cork, and the waves are haphazardly sculpted from clear acrylic gel medium.

Paws-itively Adventurous

Cats & Catacombs - Fighter and Monk
28mm scale

Having unsuccessfully searched the castle library for the necromancer's grimoire or any useful magical items, Sonya and Han were taking a moment to plan their next move when suddenly, the heavy oaken door began to creak open...

A few months ago I snagged a small pack of these amazing Cats and Catacombs figures at my FLGS.  They're AMAZING!  I love cats so really, anything cat-related is a pretty easy sell, but cat versions of D&D characters?  As the meme says, "shut up and take my money".

I had previously painted some "Dungeons and Doggies" figures for a friend, and they went very well, but I felt that I should have done something with the attached bases.  So for these, I snipped the bases off and based them properly, with a bit of dungeon or castle flavour, adding stone floors and the coins and candle (unlit, to spare Sonya's fluffy tail!) beside the stack of books.

 

I'm particularly proud of the fish snack hanging from the monk's belt:

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..."

Everyday people

Sci-fi civilians
15mm

I am no better and neither are you
We are the same whatever we do

 

Sure, the swashbuckling space smugglers, adventurers, alien death bots, and heavily armored troopers get all the glory... but somebody has to live in the universe of the shiny spacey future.  Those somebodies are all the workers, merchants, spacers and countless other "little people".  And they deserve their own figures :)

I had a lot of fun with these; I think they turned out as real little characters, all unique.  The minis are from CP models and Ground Zero Games, with a few light conversions.

 

Come and play, everything's a-okay
Friendly neighbors, yes that's where we meet
Can you tell me how to get, how to get to Sesame Street?

Doctor Death

Plague Doctor
28 mm

Ah, the classic medieval plague doctor.  Robed and masked to prevent infection, he might show up at your bedside to poke your armpits with a long stick and inevitably deliver tragic news to your loved ones.  Or he might... roam around the muddy streets with a skull on a chain, just being generally creepy.  Since they hadn't invented golf yet.

 

I actually love this figure, despite its odd choice of accessories.  The original CP Models figure had a ball and chain, but I felt that was pretty non sequitur, so I sculpted a (somewhat lantern-jawed) skull over it to provide a visual focus on what I'd already planned to be a very dark-coloured character.

 

 

I mixed a very brownish black for his robes, and a straight black for his mask; a subtle difference that's supposed to indicate the difference between fabric and leather, but is of course completely invisible in these photos.  Oh well...

Of course it's raining... it's always raining...

Happy Spooktober!