Orc Blood Bowl Team: Work In Progress

Since my most recent post, I have been working on both an Orc Blood Bowl team and 5 Stormcast Eternals from the Storm of Sigmar set.

Both are progressing nicely, however, moving on to a whole Blood Bowl team soon after completing a Blood Bowl team wasn't a great idea! Batch painting 12 mini's at a time isn't a huge amount of fun... that's why I'm splitting my time between 2 different 'units'.

So far, for this set of models, I have base coated the skin with Waaagh! Flesh (what else?), blocked in the red of their kit with Mephiston Red and base coated the base with Mournfang Brown.

I want to get all the base coats completed as quickly as possible as the thin coat of the Waaagh! Flesh, applied via airbrush, is beginning to chip off. Once the base colours have been applied I will set the decals before applying gloss varnish in preparation for shading the models with gloss shades. After that I'll matte the models down, tidy up the shading and apply the highlights.

My aim is to get this unit complete before September... so loads of time 😀

Games Workshop Wellington (New Zealand)

Whenever I get to visit a new GW store I like to post about it on this blog. Whilst on honeymoon in New Zealand during September/October 2016 I had a few hours to spare whilst in Wellington... so what else is a hobby nerd to do?!?! Go find the GW store! 

I managed to rock up bang on opening time and the typically awesome manager welcomed me in and we spent a good half an hour chatting about the hobby. Of all the GW managers I have spoken to, I have to say that this chap, Nathan I believe his name is, was up there with the best. A very nice chap indeed! 

As a souvenir I picked up a Blood Angels Sanguinary Priest (still unopened!). I did notice the price difference which I've heard Aussie and NZ gamer's mention... this model cost $40.00, which is £22.30 at current exchange rate. Compare that to the £18 which the models costs on the UK web store. So that's roughly a 20% price increase. 😟

Stormcast Eternals: Work In Progress

Whilst working away each week I have been working on these 5 Stormcast Eternal models. They are from the Hammer of Sigmar starter set and having such a small set of models is ideal for when I'm travelling. I can easily transport the models and paints in my hand lugage and can achieve the targets I set myself each week. My plan is to move on to the Chaos models which also came in the set once these are completed.

These stunning models have been base coated with the traditional Stormcast Eternal colours: Retributor Gold, Kantor Blue, Screamer Pink, Mephiston Red and Gunmetal Silver (Vallejo) with a coat of gloss varnish on top. I have shaded and highlighted the armour prior to painting the other base colours however due to some poor coverage of the gold paint and some errors which I have to touch up, I will probably reapply some shading and highlighting when I move to perform those steps on the other colours.

I have made a small error with these thus far.. I should have applied the decals prior to applying the gloss varnish so, to rectify this, my next task will be to apply the decals before applying a further light coat of gloss varnish.

Blast From The Past!

Back during my first stint in the hobby (roughly 1989 - 1997) a large part of my hobby time was spent at my cousin's house. At the time both myself, my cousin (Geoff) and my second cousin (Nik) were all immersed in 40k.

I collected Blood Angels, Nik collected (mainly) Eldar and whilst I have no photo's of my army, or Geoff's, Nik still has his army and recently sent me some photos. These you can see below. Considering Nik was a little younger than Geoff and myself (so must have been around 13 when he painted these) I think his standard of painting was really good! I especially love the 'old skool' Goblin Green bases on these models.

The weekends we spent playing 40k were a highlight of my first stint in the hobby. I vividly remember the huge battlefields which we would set up on the floor of Geoffs bedroom (often much larger than 6ft by 4ft). These were populated by our own home made scenery... converted Pot Noodles pots, broken up polystyrene painted to looks like ruins and as much lichen as we could get our hands on! I also don't think we ever finished a game... good old second edition eh!