Painting Competitions: Objective Marker & Holidays

This year has been pretty productive in terms of mini painting. Aside from my May Madness thing, and preparing my army for the Portland tournament, I also slipped into some painting competitions. Here are a few that I haven't shown here before.

Objective Marker
The most recent competition was to create & paint an objective. I was working on my Daemon army for the OFCC, so I decided to create a Chaos-appropriate marker.

These books come from the Burning Chariot mini from GW. The books attach to the chariot with pegs at the end of their ribbons/tentacles, so I melted them to give them a more organic look. It's a little difficult to tell from photos, but I did my best to make it looks like the books were floating/flying. The paint job is pretty standard.  The monsterous book stands out the most to me, although I do kinda like the patina on the metallic binding, and I tried to draw the Konami code in the lower right-hand corner of the floating book.

The contest is still pending, but at the moment I think I stand in second place. I'm not being humble when I say my mini won't take first place either. One of my fellow local painters produced a beautifully converted Imperial Fist casualty holding up a banner with a NMM freehand chapter symbol.

Holiday
The other contest I've neglected to mention on this blog was last Winter's Holiday themed competition. The store owner left it open ended, but most people made Christmas-themed submissions. There were a bunch of great entries, like a Santa Orc tormenting a grot as it painted a toy train, a Jewish Space Marine wielding a power-menorah, a Krootox & rider painted up as the Grinch who stole Christmas (one of my favorites), and a literal Hel-turkey with cultist pilgrims on its base.

My entry was one that the store owner had requested. He's said he hoped someone would turn in an Ork wielding a giant dreidel. I figured I could do a bit better than that even.

You can see I made a few little conversions.
1. The dreidel is a real wooden dreidel. I trimmed the handle, carved out some grooves, glued on some plates, and added a ton of little rivets. So many rivets.
2. The ork is actually from WH Fantasy. The legs are actually from the chariot box.
3. There are a few little extra conversions on the ork. I added treads to the feet, a yarmulke, and sideburns. That's right, he's "Orkthodox"
4. The Santa Marine is wielding a candy-cane shiv, cuz there's nothing more dangerous during the holiday season.

I got second place, but I still ended up receiving the prize I wanted (Sisters of Twilight on Forest Dragon), so it's all good.

It sounds like the game-store owner wants to do the holiday theme for the next painting competition too, so I'm already trying to brainstorm a few ideas.
1. A Tau Snowman
2. A Wood Elf Dryad decked out with Christmas tree trimmings
3. An IG "Nutcracker" (maybe a Mordian or Commissar Gaunt) vs a Rat-Ogre "Rat King"
4. An Orc riding a rocket-powered sled

I'm leaning toward the Dryad, since it seems easier and a lot cheaper. Plus it'd be creative enough that no one else would do it.