Some progress, and a haul from Derby

Unusually, I've got myself into gear, and actually done something early in the month. So, the Steam Altar is underway!

As you might be able to tell, I've used the roof of the steam tank for the base of the front of the altar - this is where the Arch Lector will be standing. At the rear is the boiler and wheels from the steam tank, which will show the furnace part which is normally inside the finished model. Then I've extended the whole thing to allow a model to stand stoking the boiler and remove the idea that the arch lector would otherwise have to keep turning round and shoveling coal during the battle. 

A bonus point to anyone that can tell me where the rails on the side of this bit come from!

Now, more interesting stuff. I went to Derby Worlds yesterday, and of course spent some money. This is what will be distracting me as I try to remain focused on October's targets.

First off, some buildings from Sarissa Precision. I love these! I've actually got another floor coming in the post - the floors all lift off, and are interchangeable between the two buildings. These will definitely be November's target.

Then, since I got a free copy of Saga for my playtesting services for the Triples game, I also got a free Viking:

And I foolishly went to the Ainsty Castings stand again - so got a security desk:

.... and some baggage for Saga:

October's Target

Here we go then, new month, unseasonably warm weather, time for a new target!

Since I finally got around to playing 8th edition of Warhammer, I've been rebitten by the fantasy bug. I've been an Empire player for several years and already have a large painted Nuln army. However, one thing I've wanted for ages but haven't done yet is a converted war altar.

I previously started making one that would be held as a litter by flagellants, but that always slightly annoyed me as the altar is a chariot and having flagellants charge at the same speed of horses isn't right!

As I was looking for something else I came across a selection of bits of the old metal Steam Tank model in my modelling studio (alright, back bedroom) and was struck with the inspiration to create a steam driven war altar. Makes sense with the speed of the thing and getting impact hits, and fits in with the Nuln theme a bit better as well.

So, the target is to turn this heap of bits:

Play "spot the sprue" and win, er, nothing really

into a painted War Altar. I'm also aiming to have the SWAT and Criminals I painted in September based up - I'm going to give up on the "indoor" look and make them look like they're on tarmac instead.

Oh, and for an added challenge, I have to go to Germany for a week for work during October, so time's going to be a bit limited...

Pulled it out of the bag!

You see what you've done to me? I'm so keen to meet targets now that I actually took the afternoon off work to get these finished!

Well, I had some hours built up and needed to use them. But it's nearly the same!

I have to confess I suffered some "target drift" as I went through the month. Basically, I realised I actually have 12 SWAT (instead of 11 like the target post says, so that's a bonus, extra points please) and instead of mucking about with the Mini I made 3 shipping containers to use as terrain.

Here we go:

Here's everything all together in a lovely pose...

I'm very pleased with the results I've got here, apart from on the Caucasian flesh I haven't used any inks, it's all highlighted up. This is very unusual for me, it's really the first time I've tried it so it's not perfect but I'm really happy. It's definitely more time consuming than using ink but the results are much much nicer.

The criminals, with the shadow of my lens because I'm a brilliant photographer

 As you can see, I haven't based these. Basically, this is because nothing I've tried seems to work, so I'm going back to the drawing board. They'll be based when I come up with something that works!

The SWAT team, slightly out of focus and with lens shadow (I really do rock at photography)

Check out my freehand work! If I never have to write the word "POLICE" again it'll be too soon

The criminals give a curtain call

Close up on the big boss fella (who has a Luger for some reason)

Nice focus work there, genius

POLICE POLICE POLICE POLICE POLICE aaaaargh my eyes...

And there's a bit of freehand work. I'm pleased with that too - it looks better in the flesh than on these blown up photos, and it's definitely something I'll try more of in future. So, you know, look out for that. Or don't, I suppose.

Time running out!

As I said in the last update, things are really not looking good for me getting all the models in the target done in time.

So, to get somewhere this month, I decided to try to get all the models (except the mini!) in my target at least base coated so that I've got some progress.

Here's the pile:

As you can see, the base coats are mainly done, I do need to cover a couple of areas on the criminals and the grey bits (the vests and webbing) on the 4 SWAT models at the back.

These 5 models are done, they just need basing:

For the bases, I'm planning to create tiled floors using card. I was also thinking of trying to make litter by printing out shrunk down newspapers etc. - watch this space to see whether that works...

Struggling!

Ugh, I'm really not getting a lot of time for painting this much - too many "real life" things are gettting in the way!

That said, I have done 4 SWAT and 1 criminal to "almost ready" status, and another 4 SWATs and 3 criminals are "underway". So there's still some hope, but I'm going to have next to no time this week and not much next week either...

At least I've done something...

Secret Weapon!

That's the old "exciting title" trick deployed then.

In reality, my secret weapon isn't too exciting, it's one of these:

It's my new laptop paint station dooberry from Warlord Games. The idea is that I can sit downstairs and get some painting done, as opposed to only using the times I can sneak into the spare room. I gave this a trial run tonight and it sort of works. Using the desk is better, but I can do things like base coating, and basing, and the other more repetitive bits. 

Anyway, I've made a bit of progress towards the month's goal. I took a leaf out of Andy's book and got one of the SWAT models almost completed to check out the colour scheme. I've gone for a different painting style to the one I used on the Romans. This is mainly because these models have less detail than the Romans so I've had to do more highlighting and haven't relied on inks (in fact I've only used ink on the faces so far). 

I've done 3-4 levels of highlighting on the test model, and it came out pretty well I thought - so I've done another the same way. I've also done the first coat on one of the criminals, I think base coating those will be a job for a "laptop" session.

Oh, and I tried my hand at freehand to paint the "POLICE" logo onto the back of the first two SWAT models...

One thing though - at the moment I have no idea how to base these as I want them to look like they're indoors but don't know how to do it. I'll have a think about that one.

A Change of Plan

The results of August's marking left me marked down for not having a very high model count, which is fair enough. So, I'm revising my target for September upwards, even though I'm not sure I'll get much time.

This picture is my main goal:

The primary target - 11 SWAT, 9 suited bad guys, and a Mini. Oh, and that photo in the background is from my third year prom at uni, but unfortunately I'm behind the stapler so you can't see my 21 year old self in a tuxedo. Sorry about that.

There are 11 SWAT guys altogether, although 7 have been started (the uniforms are painted blue but they've got chipped and need redoing).

There's another 9 models in suits - these are the criminals.

Then there's a 1:43 scale Mini. I picked this up for £2.49 today, and it is already painted, but it looks far too clean for me, so I'm going to see what I can do to take the shine off it. This is going to be terrain for Flashbang.

This photo is the backup - if I run out of time I'll move on to these:

The "if there's time" pile - 4 redneck criminals and 4 hostages

These are 4 redneck criminals, and 4 hostages - again, these are for Flashbang (which you might remember is a game I'm writing).

I've decided to ignore the furniture for this month. I think I'm going to quite enjoy doing it, but I want more time to plan and I think the models need doing first.