12 Day Modelling Challenge: Day #8

Day 8 and I’ve actually reached the end of the time I’d set aside for this modelling challenge, mostly due to what’s becoming a Christmas tradition, a dose of man flu. I’m going to extend the challenge through the rest of the month although it’ll be strictly weekend endeavours for the rest of the month.

I wasn’t feeling like airbrushing, as coughing and sneezing tend to upset precision painting, so I thought I’d sit down and chop up some plastic. After completing my test Empire miniature I set about raiding my bits box with the intention of creating a few figures for a Mordheim war band.

As I’d previously mentioned the Empire State troops are somewhat limited in poses, or more accurately, pose, as there’s only one. The Empire Archers set, mixed with a few different sets of Empire arms, however offer much more flexibility and as I want to paint up a wealthy band of Marienburg Mercenaries the long, expensive, coat look fits very nicely with the theme. These guys are going to be better dressed swords for hire, a cut above your average militiaman.

I really like to spend time testing poses and trying to make the figures look dynamic. This set, of which I had a nearly complete box of, offers plenty of opportunity to create such figures. After an hour or so of test fitting this is what I have, heads will be added later once I get more of a feel for the each figure.

12 Day Modelling Challenge: Day #4

Between ongoing decals and paint stripping I decided to revisit a few miniatures tasks I'd been meaning to be getting on with.

First up was finishing off a test paint scheme for some Warhammer Men-at-Arms. I was reasonably please with the colours, green and purple, so I think this has potential for a future Mordheim, or Frostgrave, war band.

As an aside these Empire State Troops, or Freeguild Guard, as they're now called, paint up nicely. You're pretty much limited to the pose above, or swaping out the spear for a sword and shield which is the only downside, if I was going a war band I'd want a bit more variation.

Next up I decided to do a bit of base work. You may remember my moving skeleton diorama, I've disassembled it with a view to updating the base and reusing it for a new, yet undetermined, diorama while the skeletons will be tidied up and individually re-based.

After repainting the individual tiles to add more variation I gave them a wash with Flory Models Grey wash. Firstly this was to see if it improves bases and secondly out of curiosity as I want to use it for the first time on the undersides of the Airfix Typhoon to compare with the Dark wash which I've used before.

Now I just need to let it dry and see if it adds anything to the base.

Completed - Games Workshop Moving Skeletons Diorama

Finally, something has been finished! My moving skeletons project.

When I first started building these skeletons I had an idea that they'd be facing off again an opponent (or opponents) who would be in a similarly dynamic pose. Unfortunately searching through my spares box yielded little in the way of suitable figures. The one candidate was an Empire halberdier but he was holding his weapon aloft rather than in a combat pose. So this meant rather than a fight, a pursuit would be the theme of the diorama.

And so on to the final hurdle, finding a suitable base. The first time I had the idea of a pursuit an image of a dungeon corridor came to mind but I felt the skeletons didn't complement each other well on a rectangular base. I felt a circular base would work better allow the chase to develop from several side (especially with the figures I had).

It was then that I found some perfect circular resin bases from Fenris Games. After picking one and waiting for it to arrive, (which was not long, they provide a very good service), I could finally complete this project.

So here it is:

And as the whole point of this project was "movement," here's an animated version:

All in all this has been a thoroughly enjoyable project. I've had a chance to paint skeletons for the first time and was surprised how satisfying they are to paint. From that one moment of thinking, "those skeletons need to look like they're moving" to finishing this project I've really enjoyed trying to bring some life into static figures. I certainly hope to try something along the same lines in the future.