Day 31: Grand Finale

So for this, the last day I didn't end up painting a mini.

I painted four.

I figured painting a single mini to close out this challenge could be a bit anticlimactic, so I decided to push it. Here you have three Night Goblins: a Shaman, a Fanatic, and a regular goober, and finally a Dwarf Cleric of Moradin that I bought on Wednesday (I'm playtesting the new DnD Next, and he was the perfect mini for one of the characters). I ended up painting deep into the night, only to discover that I was actually working earlier than I'd anticipated, so today has been fun.

This concludes the daily grind of painting, and to my surprise, I haven't burned out yet. I'm good with being free of the tough deadline, but I'm already thinking about my next minis. I have to get back to work now, but I'll post a reflection and group shot in the next few days.

Thanks to everyone who has supported me this month.

~Muninn

Day 30: Orc Boy

I've never actually played Fantasy, but I have an army of Orcs. I have a general disdain for fielding anything that's unfinished, and O&G have a lot of work that needs to be put into them just to get the army built, let alone painted. This guy is the Champion for a big block of boyz I've been painting up over time. Once again I'm using black & orange, but it's working better now that I'm basecoating the foundation orange.

One day to go!

~Muninn

Day 29: Dwarf Doomseeker

Today's mini came from the Storm of Chaos a few years back.

A good friend & I split a blister back in the day since he only wanted one, and I like to paint all sorts of different minis. I kinda feel like I slacked a bit on this guy, but I feel like I've got a bit of tunnel vision going on. As great as this challenge has been I'm ready for it to be over.

~Muninn

Day 28: Black Guard & Slaver

After yesterday I'm all caught up & I'm on schedule for the home stretch of this project.

Welcome to Warhammer Fantasy Week: The first mini is an old Black Guard figure that was given to me about a decade ago.

I always see Dark Elves with purple or red so I wanted to play around with an alternate, but equally malevolent scheme. My idea would be a black armor with gold edging, and ochre yellow accents. The skin didn't turn out quite how I'd have liked it, so that'll be something for me to play around with in the future. Maybe something a little more purplish to balance out all the yellows.

Monday's mini I picked up at my local stores discount shelf. People drop off bunches of metal minis for him to sell on commission, & I happened across this one. I don't play Skaven, but it's nice to have a couple tunnel crawlers around.

Today's mini shouldn't give me any trouble, and then it'll be smooth sailing since Wednesday & Thursday happens to be my weekend. Hope you like what you see.

~Muninn

Day 27: Fire Angels Sternguard

Turned out that 12+ hour day drained me something awful. I ended painting this guy up Sunday.

Before Forge World changed their look this was the color scheme for the Fire Angels, a space marine chapter best well known for participating on the loyalist side of the Badab War.

This is just one of my Fire Angels though, I'll be puting up more in time.

~Muninn

Day 25: Kasrkin Storm Trooper

This was an earlier attempt at white armor, so it isn't as clean or pretty as some of my others, but I'm just glad to get him done. Yesterday was another long'un, so I didn't put in as much time as I should, & ended up cutting some corners, like on the flame.

Today is going to be another 12+ hour day (State Track & Field Championships) so tonight's mini might not be much better. I hope to be able to spend a bit more time on it though.

~Muninn

Day 24: Raven Guard Captain

My very first army was Raven Guard space marines, I started this guy years back, and he was one of my first attempts at painting the greyish albino skin that the RG are known for. This is another (quasi) limited edition mini that I stumbled upon, and I'm happy it's in my collection.

I've just realized that every single weapon that I've colored this month has been green. Total coincidence.

~Muninn

Day 23: Grey Knight Inquisitor

I'm calling this guy Inquisitor Shrive. Since his colors are the same as you see traditionally at Mardi Gras (Purple, Green, & Gold) I figured I should give him an appropriate name. I was bouncing between Bacchus (King of Mardi Gras/Greek God of wine), Xango (Voodoo Loa of War, Lightning, & Fire), and Shrive (the origin word for Shrove Tuesday, also means to confess). he has one incomplete bit, as he's missing the decorative shield on his shoulder, it's currently a gold nub.

Back at the beginning of the Iraq war I was sent to do some training in Denver. While I was there I came across a guy in the local game store that used a terminator mini I'd never seen before. Since it was so interesting I bought it off of him that day, not realizing it was an old, incomplete, Grey Knight terminator. I tossed a pair of GK metal arms onto it. They're a bit big, but they fit better than anything else I have.

Hope you like him.

~Muninn

Day 22: VanSaar Juve

Now for a more micro look at the Imperium.

This scared looking lad has been kicking around for a while. I'd had him mostly painted for a few years now, but I couldn't finish it for lack of a head and left hand. The head posed a particular problem because Necromunda models are a bit smaller than most 40k stuff you see. The head I found belongs to an old metal Space Marine scout. The owner sawed it off in order to put a helmet on his guy which left the noggin ripe for conversion.

Today's mini is coming along splendidly. I'm walking a fine line between regal and prissy, but I think I'm pulling it off. You'll see tomorrow.

~Muninn 

Day 21: Inquisition Cherub

If you'd told me a year ago that I would be painting a horrible cyber-cherub's buttcheeks at midnight, I'd have looked at you funny. But that's what I did last night.

This is another mini I picked up at the onset of my gaming career during the first wave of Daemon Hunter releases back in 2003. I picked up a number of cyberskulls & henchmen at the time with the intention of a combined Grey Knight/Raven Guard list & just never got around to incorporating an inquisitor into the army. Now that he's done a buddy of mine tells me cherubs aren't henchmen any more. I've got good timing in that regard.

~Muninn

Day 20: Female Commissar

This is another mini I picked up while living in Japan. I was just getting into the game itself, so I'd regularly scroll around the GW website archives looking for neat minis, which is how I picked her up. I wasn't aware at the time that it was the only female Commissar, originally from Games Day 1998, and only actually sold in the US, so i was pretty lucky to get her.

When I was figuring out how to paint her I thought she looked like she belonged in a Mordian Iron Guard regiment, so I did my best to give her that "parade grounds" kind of feel. It looks a little old school, but I like her.

~Muninn

Day 19: Wraithguard

Aaaand, another Eldar.

I've had this mini for almost 12 years. One of my high school buddies painstakingly painted one up and I figured I would too since his looked so good. I didn't have any kind of idea where to start though, so I never did. I like it a great deal, although in my eyes he isn't truly complete yet. I painted the sash, but I intend to freehand the Craftworld symbol on the cloth (the same symbol that's on his forehead). I still haven't come up with a name or finalized their back story, but I'm working on it.

~Muninn

Day 18: Kroot

 
As per usual I didn't get off work til later than I'd expected, and I had to work the early shift at work the next day, so this guy was an exercise in speed painting. I'm proud to say he took less than two hours start to finish (not including wash drying time). I only own one of each of the new paints, but so far they seem to work great. His skin was simple: Castellan Green worked up to Nurgling Green with a wash of Athonian Camoshade. Someday when I get a box of (plastic) Plaguebearers for my Daemons I think this will be the color I paint them.

~Muninn

Day 17: Hormagaunt

 
This was to be a test mini for a bigger project, however I quickly discovered that orange is a pain in the A$$, so I scrapped it, and this guy was left unfinished until yesterday.

First, a little context, Here in Oregon there are two major rival universities. Oregon State University (Colors: Black & Orange. Best well known for a mascot that's a common sexual slang & not living up to their athletic potential), and the University of Oregon (Colors: Green & Yellow. Best well known for having more outfits than a Kardashian, & access to anything they want from Nike).

A long while back I entertained the idea of creating a school spirit diorama for OSU. The concept would be an overwhelming group of Orange & Black nids "Zerg Rushing" their way towards a faltering group of Green & Yellow Eldar. Well, like I mentioned, painting orange is like a war of attrition. So this guy got shuffled to the back of the mini cabinet.

It's worth noting though that this diorama is also the basis for my current Eldar scheme.

~Muninn

Day 16: Tau Fire Warrior

Wednesday was all for the greater good.

 I'd played around with various Tau schemes in the past, but after picking up a few techniques from Spikyjames' blogs I came up with this one. I'm not totally used to lining recesses of armor so it looks a little sloppy up close, but at arm's length it looks great.

Also, this is my 16th mini, so I'm over the hump. 15 left to go.

~Muninn

Day 15: Ork Burna & Farseer

So this project wouldn't be called a Challenge if it weren't challenging, & I hit my first speed bump.

I ended up putting in a 13+ hour workday one day, and had to work early the next, so I didn't finish Monday's mini on time. I managed to get it about 70% of the way before I had get to bed. I rallied yesterday though & got them both done.

Here's Monday's mini. An old metal Bad Moon Burna Boy.

 He's a little sloppy looking, but really, it's an ork. I don't even remember why I have this guy. I think these guys came in blisters of two, so I probably went halfsies with a buddy on the blister just so I could have something different. I painted him up as a Bad Moon, since I haven't done much with yellow so far, and I don't know if I've ever seen one in real life.

Yesterday's mini is a return to my Eldar scheme. This time it's a Farseer though.

This guy I've had since I got out of the Navy in 2005. I used this Farseer's spear as part of the base for a Space Wolf Runepriest, so I ended up having to create a new one for him. What you see here is actually a shaved down chainsword with some added gems.

~Muninn

Day 13: Eldar Guardian

Around the time the last Eldar codex came out I bartered with a friend for some Eldar bits for a test mini. I ended up mocking up a color scheme that I liked, but newver actually painted it, until Sunday.

I always really liked the Uthwe color scheme, but I also really like green, so this was what I came up with. Black under armor, green plates, with bone accents. To me it looks pretty cohesive, and different enough from any existing Craftworlds.

~Muninn 

Day 12: Crab Clan Samurai

With this, I'm done with my second week of painting.

This is Hiruma Tokaji. Years back I played a Crab Clan samurai with few social graces, and fewer qualms doing whatever it took to complete a mission. A very ends-justify-the-means type of character. He was a tough, sneaky scout character, so this mini seemed to fit well. Later in the game he ended up getting horribly burned by some fire shugenja, so the bandages across his face and arm ended up being completely appropriate.

So now that the week is done I'm moving on to my week of 40k Xenos minis. I've never actually played a xenos army but I've collected a fair share, so this seemed like a good time to get a few done.

~Muninn

Day 11: Eladrin Warlord

Sorry about getting this one online a little later than usual today. Normally I can shoot and upload before work , but I had to start at 7:30 a.m., and have only just now been able to take a break. I originally bought this mini to be an Eladrin Warlord for a D&D game that never actually got off the ground. I loved the way the mini looked online, but once I got my hands on it I noticed the head has some odd proportions to it. The cheeks are sunken, the ears are high on the skull, the eyes aren't quite level, etc. The forehead was also really high, so I modeled her a circlet to mitigate that.

If you're curious, & you don't know 4th edition D&D, they divided elves into two categories. Woodland type elves (copper & wild elves in prior editions) stayed "Elves", while magical leaning subraces (like the sun & moon elves) became "Eladrin". Eladrin also tend to have seasonal themes, so I picked a summery green.

~Muninn

Day 10: Ember

The mini I intended for today was a total time-sink. I based & washed & started on the details, but it just wasn't working out for me. So with a few hours left in the day I brought in a new, unpainted mini & started from scratch. Meet Ember.

For those of you who remember the D&D 3rd Edition release 12 years ago you might also remember the line of metal miniatures that came out at the same time. Along with generic heroes, they also put out minis for each of the iconic class characters like Regdar (the Fighter), Jozan (the Cleric), and the rest. Ember here is the human Monk that was released. I think I picked her up about 8 years ago online while i was living in Japan.

Either way, the mini is simple, clean, and easy to paint. My only gripe is that she's a little small. I don't know how large the character is, but if I were to judge from the mini I'd guess maybe 5'1".

~Muninn

Day 9: Shiba Tsukune

This was the mini I was planning on painting Tuesday. Years ago I was part of a Legend of the Five Rings campaign & bought up a big mess of old Clan War minis to go along with it. For a while I really liked the idea of playing a Phoenix Clan bodyguard, so I started painting up this gal, Shiba Tsukune.

I actually based the color & scheme from a really well painted mini on CMoN, by a mini painter named "mrika." A year or two later I actually met mrika at a convention where she was painting to kill time while her boyfriend played cards. She's a phenomenal painter. 

~Muninn