More Death Watch WIP (pic heavy)...

I had hoped to get these guys finished today (before the end of the year) but the temperature is currently at 44 degrees and our cooling isn't up to it so painting today has fallen by the wayside.

I have finished the chapter pads, weapons and metallics, and only need to do the parchments/purity seals, flesh/hair and then black highlights.


Quite happy with how they look, particularly the Blood Angel pad. The one that gave me the most bother is the Dark Angel. It was hard to figure out how to highlight the green without being too bright. The end result is really subtle and I'm not sure the camera picked it up.

I'm now planning a lazy new years eve at home with some movies. The missus came home from work early sick and is having a kip (she's a new years eve baby so now she is sick not only on new years eve, but also her birthday - lame).

Best wishes to you all and your families for the new year, and hopefully the dice gods smile upon you in 2011.

Cheers all for a fantastic 2010.

Pom

Washes can work wonders...

I was feeling guilty about not doing much painting this last week so I had a crack at finishing of my first Death Watch marine last night.


Overall I am satisfied, but am still left scratching my head a bit when it comes to the black armour. I did repaint the black armour with a mix of Chaos Black and Regal Blue (tending more towards the black) so the base coat wasn't pure black. I then edge highlighted with a Chaos Black/Shadow Grey mix and then straight Shadow Grey.


I think the overall effect is very blue and the pictures only serve to over-emphasise that fact. I'm not bothered enough by it to try to redo it, and am just glad I don't have a whole army to do in this colour. Four more guys left and the little squad is done.

And the reason for the heading to this post? After I finished the Death Watch marine off, I turned my attention to my Nurgle marine.

I was a bit slap dash with the base coats (a mix of Knarloc and Gretchin Green foundation paints with metallics done in Tinny Tin game colour) and was thinking I would need to strip and start again as the miniature looked horrible, even at this very early stage. Instead I looked over my washes and picked out the Thraka Green and Devlan Mud. Two heavy washes later and I have this look.



I am happy enough with how this turned out (the washes actually worked like they are designed too) that I think I will tidy up a couple of the little details, maybe apply a slight verdigris look for the metal, a few highlights and will call him done.

So just a short post today, and now back to the paint table.

Cheers all,

Pom

Holidays...

Just a quick post to say I haven't done any practical hobby over the last week as I have been madly trying to tidy things off at work ready to close down for the year. I started 3 weeks holidays today.

I have re-read a few Black Library books, and generated my player sheet for Death Watch, but no painting has gotten done on anything (apart for priming my Nurgle Marine).

I also get in 2 Kill Zone games against my non-gamer mate Jay, beating his Space Wolf force with both an Imperial Guard force and an Ork force, although both games were really close. We played a home brewed capture the flag style game with a mash of different rules from 4th, 5th, Necro and Kill Zone. They were fun little games and Jay is hungry for more (and a win).

I figured I would get all the house stuff out of the way today and tomorrow to try to maximise the time I have for hobby and other pursuits over my break.

Its just come in overcast outside so I guess I am finished in the garden for the day, plus my back is now telling me its had enough. Hopefully tomorrow I can get the last odd jobs done and then its all hobby (and Christmas).

Cheers all,

Pom

Death Watch night...

Our group had our first RPG night on Wednesday, although only 3 of us could make it out. Luke our GM has a couple of cool ideas on how he wants to run the show.

The first is that we build artscale/truescale versions of our characters, the better to suggest the 'true' scale of a Marine compared to the NPC's. Originally I thought this was a bad idea, but Luke's enthusiasm has gotten the better of me and we agreed this is probably a goer which means the normal scale mini's I started painting probably won't get used (or at least not after the first couple of gatherings after we have built our true scale versions).

This is the stage I am currently at with the painting of my normal scale Death Watch. I'm quite happy how they are progressing, and mainly only have the black to sort out which I think I will use Ron's FTW tutorial for, as well as some smaller details and the Chapter symbol.


The second idea Luke had was to run the band as Chaos renegades as opposed to loyalist Death Watch. This idea ran into some doubts from myself and Phil (the other player who turned up). We think it might be hard enough to play the game as loyalists the first time out, and we don't think it a good idea to complicate the matter further by subbing in Chaos stories etc - it puts a lot of pressure on Luke as GM.

We did agree to design characters which we may use in the future, and may turn up as nemesis in game which I thought was a cool idea. The loyalist Marine I designed belongs to the Imperial Fists chapter (using the Storm Wardens Chapter traits) and will be a Tech Marine. Phil has gone with a Devastator Dark Angel. The Chaos renegade will be a Death guard (Nurgle) Assault specialist (again using the Storm Wardens Chapter Traits).

We haven't started the build process yet for the 'truescale' Marines, but Luke did give me a lesson on Green Stuff (GS). He is a bit of a master with the GS and his armies are full of all sorts of crazy conversions. Given the discussions regarding having a Chaos nemesis, and having ready access to Luke's enormous bitz box, I decided to try my hand at a kit bashed normal scale representation of my Chaos character, and had a crack at sculpting the fly symbol seen on Typhus' right shoulder pad on this kitbashed Marines pad. The results were passable, and showed me how easy GS work can be if you have the right tools, take your time, and break it down into simple steps.

I never realised how cool the Chaos Marine range was until I went through Luke's bitz box. Their basic troop sculpts have so much more going for them than a standard Tactical Marine. It was fun to mix and match bitz until I arrived at this guy. This guy uses bits from a normal trooper, Terminator, Land Raider driver and Possessed.

We will be getting together each week and either getting on with our Death Watch campaign or doing general hobby things (gaming, kibashing, sculpting, painting etc). I'm looking forward to having a dedicated hobby group to do things and bounce ideas off of.

And that's all folks, as always, happy gaming.

Cheers all,

Pom

Hazard suits final...

I finished off the hazard suits from Hasslefree tonight. Overall experience was so so. Yellow is still a colour I need to work on.


I mentioned in my last post how I had fluffed it by applying a wash. I didn't bother stripping and starting again and have left the darkened recesses more because I'm lazy and this way I have a physical reminder not to do it again.


As a group they look OK, and will make useful, if irrelevant NPC's in any of our RPG games (which we still haven't started - maybe next week I hope).

Next on the desk are my 5 Death Watch Marines. I have started them but they are a bit too WIP to show just yet. Maybe if I get them progressed over the weekend I will aim for another post.

I have 3 weeks holidays coming to me over Christmas and new years and I have been talking with my mate Luke (one of the RPG/Vets night players) about holding some painting days. Ideally I would like to try to get some more terrain finished and maybe a vehicle (another Christmas Sentinel maybe like I managed last year) and a squad of something done.

Odd jobs around the house and my garden are taking a lot of my weekends though so I will need to wait and see what time I have.

Happy gaming all,

Pom