Genestealer Cult Patriarch

A few months ago, a member of my local gaming group declared he was abandoning his short-lived interest in Deathwatch minis in favor of a Genestealer Cultists army. He had a few things to trade, namely a Codex, & a few minis, and the new conversion sprue that I'd been drooling over.

I'd recently bought a Patriarch & a Primus for cheap off ebay, but they were pretty low on my painting priority, so I offered them in trade. He gladly accepted & offered me all but a single Deathwatch mini in exchange (about $65 worth of swag) for the two HQ minis.

Like I said, I'd gotten a pretty good deal for the pair, & it didn't feel like a fair trade, so I offered to paint one of them to help even the score. He picked the Patriarch.

He wanted the color scheme to match fairly close to the one on the website & I did my best. I tell you what though. There are some minis that are an outright pain to paint. I disliked this guy for 85% of the time I was painting him. It only came together for me during the last few washes, but after that I was happy with him. The gamer was too, & he was happy to report it's the centerpiece for his army & has been doing a good job of wrecking opponents at the local tourneys as well.

~Muninn

Star Wars Imperial Assault: Fenn Signis & Jyn Odan

Over the Summer I ended up taking a few community college classes to brush up on some of the subjects I might be teaching this school year. During a few lectures I'd open a firefox window on my laptop & skim over gaming rumors, GW minis, painting blogs & whatnot. It was a bit of a distraction, but it kept my mind from wandering too far.

During one break a guy approached me, said he noticed I was looking at miniatures, and asked if I knew anything about painting, and if so, if I ever did commissions.

Why yes, yes I do.

Apparently he really enjoys Imperial Assault, & wanted a few of his figures painted up nicely. A week later he handed them off to me along with his phone number and a request that I try to paint them close to their character portraits. Unfortunately I promptly lost the number after one of my kids "helped" clean out my laptop case. Regardless, I did my best on the minis he entrusted me to paint:

The original character portraits:

The minis are kinda soft, like most PVC, but still sturdy enough to hold up to some handling. I boiled & reshaped the weapons & Jyn's posture a bit, but other than that they were fairly stable. They're far better minis than the Fantasy Flight Adventurers I painted last year (David & Maki). Both are fairly well detailed, and although Jyn's face suffers a bit from the flatness you can see with PVC sometimes it wasn't the worst I'd dealt with. 

Painting-wise I stayed fairly close, Painting Fenn's visor was an entertaining challenge that required a good bit of blending. I think I fudged the color of Jyn's coat a bit. The portrait shows a darker orange than I painted. Maybe I'll add a wash of Fuegan Orange to tone it down. We'll see if he likes it.

~Muninn

(Good news, while tidying my kids' room tonight I found his number, so I can actually give them back.)

Days 27-29: Mega Nob, Warp Spider, and Vespid

So July is over, and I didn't make my goal of completing 31 minis in 31 days. I did manage to finish 30 minis, if you include the extra SoB & Seeker, but it wasn't what I was trying to do.

So what happened?

There were a few things I hadn't anticipated. My wife went to a teaching conference in another state for 5 days, leaving me with the kids. That wasn't an insurmountable challenge, but it did mean I had to be a lot more active at night, during my usual painting time. Then, when she was home, she was home. In May our work hours line up in such a way that we have relatively few waking hours together, so I use that time to paint as well. With her home I spent a lot less of my daytime painting as well. Add to that the fact I was taking a few surprisingly tough 5-week classes, & 5 days of family vacation, and you lose a ton of hobby time.

I imagine it didn't help that I also had more large minis, and HQ/Lord characters than I've had in past years, and those are a lot more detailed/time consuming.

Oh well, there's always next year.

In the meantime I slowed my pace a bit, and I've been completing the minis I'd been intending to paint in July. The "27th's" mini was a commission I took on a while back as part of a deal from splitting the Stormclaw box. We couldn't decide who would get the rulebook, and I offered to paint a mini of his choice in exchange for the book. He gave me this Meganob and asked that I paint him red & orange.

This guy is really scratch-built. I don't know where the bits come from, what the weapons are, or how it should look at the end of the day, so I figured I'd just ork it up, then add battle damage. I think it turned out pretty well, but I haven't gotten any feedback from the owner yet.

A long long time ago when I first learned about 40k, I wanted to build an Eldar army. One my my friends, Abusepuppy (who now writes for Frontline), was keen to help me, and I was immediately drawn to Warp Spiders. For me, they were like the poster-boys of the Eldar. I bought a few blisters, but it never went far past that. They have a sleek look, but I've never had a lot of luck painting them. I always try to paint them using a real spider as inspiration, but it never really worked out. To date though, this is probably my most successful stab at it.

Warp Spiders can get really busy really fast, so I wanted to keep it as uncomplicated as possible. All the cloth/underarmor was light grey, all body armor was green (except for the shins where I felt it needed a little black to balance it out), metal was silver, gun/shell black, & energy/gems were purple. Ideally, this kept it simpler, and cohesive. I feel like the green & light grey work well together, so it's pretty successful. I never know what to do with the gun barrel, so I was pretty content with my purple energy dots solution as well. 

While trying to find another Xeno race I remembered the oft-maligned Vespid. I had a plan for this guy, but I really didn't have the time. I intended to paint it up like a wasp. Yellow armor with black sections where the plates meet to give it a really insectoid vibe, but that was going to take way too long, so I played around with grey with a few organic speckles. It wasn't my original vision, but it was awfully fast.

I'm going to have to revisit this guy in the next few days, since I noticed the Tau symbol in incomplete. I might fix that next time I bring my paints down.

I have the last two finished as well. but I thought I'd do it in two posts to keep it from getting too wordy.

Night Wolves commission: Logan Grimnar

My regular customer, Rhapsody, approached me last year about painting a new Logan Grimnar for his Night Wolves army (sans Rocket-Sled). I said yes, since I'd wanted to paint one since I first saw the model, but had no interest in paying that much for a mini I'd never use.

I got the mini a while later and holy crap was he detailed. It's easily the most intricately modeled mini I've ever been paid to paint. Rhapsody always preps minis before he gives them to me, and the only things he doesn't glue are bits that would make it difficult to paint the nooks and crannies. This usually means a mini will show up in two pieces. Grimnar here showed up in five. I wasn't even able to start assembling him until I was 90% done.

I knew this would be a visually busy model, so I did my best to limit the palette. The armor was either blue, or brass, the fur all had a base of Stormvermin Grey, etc. To make sure Grimnar's head stood out amongst the rest of the details I made sure his hair was the only area of pure white on the mini. Ideally this will draw attention back to the head, and differentiate it from the rest of the fur.

There were several entertaining details to this guy. The chest armor has a nice embossed scene of a trio of stars and a wolf, but it's almost completely obscured by the necklace he wears. One of the areas I wish I'd spent more time was the axe blades. My goal was to create a kind of marbled red glow, but I think I kept it too dark at the surface cracks don't read well.

Here are a few other Long Fangs I painted alongside Logan. They're done a lot faster, both because they're far smaller and less detailed, and because they just need to look good at arm's length. They're decent, but Logan Grimnar is the centerpiece of the army.

~Muninn

Halfing Assassin & Cautious Marine

Now that I no longer have to be focused on a single army to paint I've been letting myself work on a few extracurricular minis just for the heck of it.

The first one is a little halfling mini from Reaper, Dicarus Darksword. You'd think "little" and "halfling" would be redundant, but this is easily the smallest halfling mini I've ever seen. I was compelled to give him a cork base just so he'd look to be about the right height.

It'd be too obvious to paint him black

As far as the size is concerned though, it might actually be correct. The D&D player's guide lists halflings as approximately 3 feet, or roughly a few inches taller than my 2 year-olds. Now that I have context for that kind of size difference it makes me think about how they'd adapt in a fantasy world. In my mind a rogue character would want to keep their distance, and probably play dirty to compensate for the fact their bow looks like a kid's toy. Hence Jimson here who would use traps & poison to drop his targets.

The owner of my FLGS has a handful of "demotivational posters" hanging around his shop. This one motivated him to create his own version.

He's been trying to get me or Yorrik to paint this mini for a long time now, but we always have too much on our plate to take on pro bono miniatures. This changed a few weeks ago, as I was preparing for OFCC.

One of the tasks I decided to take on for the team event was creating team T-shirts. While I was getting price estimates the game store owner offered to pay for the shirts and sponsor the team provided I would a.) add the store's name & number to the shirt design and b.) finally paint his cautious, plasma-wielding marine.

The owner asked for a halved blue & orange scheme. Orange is a pain, but I did it anyways. I've never seen a creamsicle colored marine, so I figured I'd make the orange a bit lighter. The plasma gun bothers me. The owner gave him a gun that melted in a hot car, so it's bent upwards. Sure it looks like it's more likely to explode, but I prefer undamaged looking gear.

More when I have the time.

~Muninn

What I've been up to: Night Wolf Terminators

Hey all. Been a while hasn't it?

I've been keeping pretty busy in the last month or so. Following the May Mini Madness I concentrated on the remaining Night Wolf commission. For the most part this consisted of a terminator Rune Priest, a Lone Wolf, and a generic Wolf Guard.

The Rune Priest was fairly detail heavy, and had a few fun conversions to it. The client added a large Fenrisian wolf pelt onto the shoulder. I'd painted a power armored Rune Priest for him two years ago, and he wanted this to be the same character in different armor.

To accomplish this I had to duplicate the face, hair, and greying patterns of the original mini. I've replaced many of my paints from back then with the newer line, so matching colors took a little time. In addition to the fact, I replicated the lightning technique on the blade, and the glowing effect on the extended hand. you can see the comparison below.

These two should fill out his ranks nicely. Or not, I hear the Lone Wolf minis I painted can't use the weapons that were modeled for him. I haven't seen the new codex, so I'm taking his word for it. In that sort of situation I'd probably trim off the chainsword blades and swap in an axehead or hammer.

Most recently I've been plugging away on my Daemons. I signed on for the Ordo Fanaticus tournament in Portland, Ore. and now I have to paint my way up to a 2,000 point army. At the moment I have about 40 days to paint up a Lord of Change, 7 Bloodletters, 6, Pink Horrors, 5 Seekers of Slaanesh, a Soul Grinder, and a Skull Cannon of Khorne.

Doable, right?

Wish me luck.

~Muninn

Days 30 & 31: Night Wolves pack leaders

Muninn's May Mini Madness is complete for another year. This year was tough, but I made it.

Here are the final two minis for the month:

Two pack leaders for the Night Wolves. Rhapsody (the client) wanted them to stand out, so he decked them out with command-level bits. The wolf backpacks, the pelts, the veteran shoulder pads, etc. He also wanted them painted to a slightly higher level, and for the fur to be white instead of brown.

My only contribution to the conversion was the first leader's head. If you don't recognize it, I don't blame you, since it's from the Empire Hurricane Priest. I'd bought the mini for my Tau Ethereal conversion, so I had a head left over, and I thought it would fit nicely on a wolf body. All it took was a little Greenstuff work.

I finished each of these guys on their respective days, but I didn't have time to take their pictures until today. it worked out alright though. I wanted to finish three more Night Wolves for the last day, but I just ran out of time. I still finished 31 minis in as many days, so I'm happy.

I'll write up a recap later this week. Take care all, and thanks for following the madness.

~Muninn

Day 15: White Scars Terminator

Last week a friend of mine took to my local 40k facebook group with a problem: He was headed to a TSHFT event in Washington in a few days, but he was short a Lightning Claw terminator for his new list.

We have a friendly little group, so another buddy, Abusepuppy, offered up one of his termis that'd he'd built & primed white for his old Blood Angels army. I gave him a few pointers on how to paint it up quickly, but he asked if I'd give it a once-over for my May Challenge.

So here we are:

I call him Brother-Sergeant Come-at-me-Bro

When I got him last Thursday he needed a little work. Abusepuppy had done some great work converting him, but there were a few small mold lines to clean up, the soft armor at his armpits looked a little off, and his right shoulderpad had a GS skull that didn't fit with the White Scar theme.

It was an interesting mini to paint. I gave it thorough coating of white primer, then lined the recesses with Mechanicus Gray mixed with Lahmain Medium to make it more of a wash. After lining the piece I cleaned it up with a few layers of White Scar paint (how appropriate). It took a bit of practice, but I think it turned out nicely.

One thing I've noticed is that white primer sucks for bases. I had to pant and repaint that base several times because the black kept rubbing off with casual handling. Anyone else notice this problem? I suggested that he seal the mini with dullcoat before it saw any action on the tabletop. Here's hoping he kicks some ass at TSHFT. (and by extension, my friend as well)

Either way. It was a nice mini to work on, and it's given me a few idea on how to paint up my Ethereal conversion, since my Tau army is mostly white. I'll have to see how well the technique transfers to xenos.

~Muninn

Day 14: Long Fang (5/5)

Alright, this unit is done.

I still have 5 Night Wolves to finish this month: 3 sergeants, a Lone Wolf terminator, and a Wolf Guard. All of them are here on my painting table, quietly waiting their turn to reach completion.

There's quite a bit on my painting table at the moment actually. 5 termis, 7 marines, a daemon herald, a Tyrant Guard, some warmachine, reaper, and my end-of-the-month game store painting contest entry. That might not seem to be a lot, but my painting table is a GW painting station sitting on a tray table (now that the twins are walking I have to be able to move my bench to the top of our dresser for protection, for both the twins and minis)

More tomorrow,

~Muninn

Day 12 & 13: Celestial Lion (1/4) & Long Fang (4/5)

Years and years ago Yorrik & I were contemplating a Kill Team campaign at our FLGS. If I remember correctly he was working on a SoB team, and I decided to create a group of elite space marines. I started getting interested in 40k when the Armageddon books were coming out, so I always liked the fluff behind the Celestial Lions.

Who better to play in kill team missions then a group of dejected marines fighting to regain their honor and save their chapter? I started five minis almost a decade ago, but I've only be able to find four of them to finish this month.

I've always liked their color scheme, although the gold can look a little grainy. I'm still using my old Shining  Gold though, so I don't know if newer line, or other manufacturers have smoother application.

The next mini is the fourth Long Fang to grace my painting table this month.

Say what you will about Space Wolf minis, but good lord are there a lot of head options. I've been painting this commission for a while now, and he has yet to duplicate a single head. It's kinda nice actually.

~Muninn

Day 11: Night Wolves Long Fang (3/5)

Here's another Long Fang I finished. Like I said, I'm hoping to hammer out the remainder of my commission this month, so get used to this scheme. :P

The armor scheme was relatively easy for these guys. As far as the armor & details were concerned I didn't blend or fade. Just color, color, wash, color. Sometimes not even that much.

I put the same amount of detail in the face and hair as I do for all my minis, since people pay more attention to faces & heads so they need to be presentable.

Blue: Necron Abyss basecoat ---> Hoeth Blue highlights ---> Asurmen Blue (watered down) wash
Bronze: Warplock Bronze basecoat ---> Runelord Brass layer ---> Agrax Earthshade (watered down) wash
Silver: Boltgun Metal basecoat ---> Nuln Oil wash ---> Boltgun Metal highlight
Leather: Balor Brown ---> Agrax Earthshade wash ---> Balor Brown layer
Fur: Bestial Brown basecoat ---> Agrax Earthshade wash

More tomorrow, I'll try to break up the stretch of Night Wolves a bit with a different chapter or two. We'll see how it all shakes out.

~Muninn

Days 9 & 10: Night Wolf Long Fangs

 This weekend was crazy. My family is sick, I was working until late, then up early the next day, then it was mother's day, excuses, excuses.

Suffice to say, the last few days have been long, but I'll be caught up shortly.

Friday & Saturday's minis are missile launcher Long Fangs for my friend's Space Wolf army. (I'm not sure if he has an official name for them, but I call them Night Wolves)

My goal was to batch-paint these, so they aren't as precisely executed as a lot of my other work. When we were negotiating prices he wanted them to look good at a distance, but didn't need them to be showpieces like some of his other minis. I also cheated a bit with the lining of the shoulder pads. In an effort to save time I used a .05 micron pend to line the recesses. It doesn't look great up close, but at an arm's length it's fine.

Before the end of the month I hope to have 8 more night Wolf commissions done.

More later today.

~Muninn

Muninn 40k!

I started this blog in July of 2012. I wanted a place to post my commissions, ideas, techniques, and all sorts of mini goodness. I genuinely enjoy sharing my work, and really like hearing the feedback.

I've been a bit busy lately, working on a large Night Wolf commission (pics coming) so I kinda missed the fact that I've recently reached over 40,000 hits on my blog. That normally isn't a significant number but hell, I play 40k, so it's significant to me.

The last 21 months have been pretty exciting. The kids are growing like weeds, so I've had to find new ways to keep my paints and swallowable minis away from them. In addition, my family recently got a puppy. Here's Pepper.

"I pooped somewhere in the house, but I'm not gonna tell you where"

The last month and a half has been dedicated to the Night Wolves. Here's one of the recently finished pieces: a Chooser of the Slain. The client furnished the mini, and wanted it to look like a neophyte. I wasn't quite able to capture a youthful appearance, but I still think it's neat.

I had some fun with Lahmian Medium to create the OSL from the candle. I'll have to try it again soon.

In future news, I may attempt my May Mini Challenge for a third year. I haven't decided yet, but I'm leaning "yes." It's a great way to finish a lot of the incomplete minis I've started, but never finished. I certainly have enough minis, but I'm not sure if I have enough time.

We shall see.

~Muninn

For sale: Khador Starter

I just finished snow flocking the Destroyer this morning, so I thought I'd show off the whole battle group.

This is first time I bought & painted minis with the expressed intent of selling them. I'd been wanting to try out the Zenith spray technique for a while and this seemed like the best way to get it done. So now that these guys are complete I'll probably seal them, & toss them on eBay. Don't worry, I won't be labeling them "pro-painted." I reserve that label to folks who are a lot better than I am. Rather, I'll probably say they're painted to a "high-tabletop standard."

I've never sold anything online before, so I'm not sure the price they'd fetch. I suppose I'd like enough to pay for the investment in the minis, as well as enough extra to buy some more.

~Muninn

Warmachine: Khador Juggernaut

Contrary to the low expectations I set in my last post, I did, in fact, finish the Juggernaut last night.

All it really took to finish him up was some washes & highlights for the metals, the blue for the eyes and axe (to match Sorscha) and the basing. All told I think he took about 6 hours of painting, so it was a really good turnaround for a model of this size.

I'll definitely be duplicating this technique in the future. Probably at least one more time in the next two days in order to paint the Destroyer Warjack. Once that guy's done I'll be selling the lot of them. Not sure how much I could get, but hopefully enough to make my money back, and buy some more minis.

~Muninn

(P.S. One final plug: The Warmachine: Tactics kickstarter is in its final hours. Go check it out.)

Test Mini: Zenith red

A while back I came across From the Warp. The author, Rob had a nice little blog going with some good ideas. Sadly, he stepped away from his little corner of the internet about 6 months ago and hasn't been seen since, but his words live on. I've pondered over one of his speed painting techniques for a while, and this week, with the onset of my rekindled interest in Warmachine, I've decided to give his Zenith overhead painting technique a go.

If you don't feel like clicking the link above the premise is simple: using two cans of spray paint to create a two-toned basecoat for your minis. Rob posits that you need a black basecoat, and a dark color for a secondary coat, but I'm trying something a little different in order to paint a Khador Juggernaut Heavy Warjack.

Khador's army usually uses a red scheme, so in the interest of selling this guy on eBay that's what i went with.

I used two colors of Krylon: Burgundy, and Pimento (both with satin finishes) I wanted two tones of red, and for the lighter color to be a bit more orange instead of "cherry."

Here are the simple steps:
1. A light black primer basecoat
2. 1-2 coats of Krylon Burgundy. When you first spray the paint on it doesn't look like it's well covered, but just give it a few minutes to dry, and it'll be more obvious where you need more paint.
3a. Wait for the dark basecoat to dry, then hold the lighter color, Pimento, at about a 45 degree angle above the front of your mini, so you're spraying down on it. Then make 2-3, light, even passes with the paint. The first layer looks really splotchy, but it evened out with a few more coats, and also as it dried.
3b. The initial spray didn't cover the back of the gauntlets, so I sprayed them individually, using an envelope to shield the rest of the mini from overpaint.
4. After that dried, I went through and painted highlights along the edges (I used Mechrite Red through Firey Orange, through Sunburst Yellow).

Steps 1 through 4 literally took a single hour. So I'd definitely call it a speed painting success.

Finally, I coated all of the red bits with a wash of Baal Red. This served a few purposes: It deepened the red into the right shade, helped even out the fade between the two colors, and it dulled down the glossy sheen of the spray paint.

Here's how it looks now, after about three hours of painting. I might actually be able to finish it tonight before I go to be. (Unlikely, but possible)

I think this technique is ideal for large minis with wide flat areas. I imagine the smaller you go the dicier it becomes. The Khador 'Jack is idea since it has these wide, flat panels, but detail-heavy Menoth 'Jacks might not fare as easily.

As Rob noted in one of his last posts, this method can easily obscure finer details. For instance, the holes in the Juggernaut's face plate appear to be divets instead of vents (or whatever they're supposed to be).  The best way to prevent this is by placing a bit of masking tape over details you don't want painted, or want to protect. You finish painting, and the tape strips away clean once the paint is dry.

The next step for me (other than finishing this mini, and it's brother) is to try a new spin on the Zenith technique with Fenrisian Wolves. I'll keep you updated on that once I give it a go.

~Muninn

Privateer Press Kickstarter

I mentioned yesterday that I've been getting pretty spun up about the Warmachine: Tactics Kickstarter.

I'm not invested at a very high level, but it definitely has my attention. In addition to liking the tabletop game and story background, the developers say game is modeled after Valkyria Chronicles and Final Fantasy Tactics. If they manage to capture a fraction of the enjoyment garnered from those classic games it should be a fun ride. Plus there are a number of great looking Limited Edition minis you can get in addition to the game, and I've been lurking extensively on the off chance they'll post more.

Of the eight minis they're releasing, I've ordered five: Two for myself, one that I'll paint and sell (the Evil version), one for Yorrik, and one for a friend's birthday present.

One of the minis that's piqued my interest is the smarmy, greasy, self-interested young Khador Journeyman Warcaster Andrei Malakov (below in white metal). The artwork is really characterful, and I think it will just be a fun mini to paint.

I don't actually *own* a Khador army, but I've been looking into it more and more. To that end I found a really good deal on the old, metal starter box which I decided to paint, sell, and hopefully turn a nice little profit (that I would then use to buy the plastic Khador box. I realize that makes no sense).

Here's the metal Khador warcaster, Sorscha. When I got her it looked like the previous owner has smashed her nose, so I had to re-sculpt it.

She turned out pretty well for the little time I put into her. The Warjacks are coming along even faster. I'm testing out a new painting style and it's working quite well for me. I'll show you the results tomorrow.

In the meantime though, Go check out the Warmachine: Tactics Kickstarter. There's less than 3 days left to pledge, so if you like what you see I'd encourage you to invest.

~Muninn

Day 2: Commission, Judge Dredd

For the second day of this months challenge I thought I should complete a commission that I'd started earlier last month, the Judge Dredd Commissar.  It has been mostly complete for the last week or two, but work was stalled as I bartered for an converted the Judge Fear helmet on the base.   You can see the colors aren't as cartoony as in the source photo I as given.

Here's the converted Mk III head. It took me a while to figure out how to model the wings since I'm not the best with greenstuff and it'd be really flimsy to model it without anything to brace it.  In the end, I cut up an old credit card, anchored it to the helmet with a pair of pinned staples, then modeling greenstuff over that backing.   

The mini is from Mongoose Publishing, and was a breeze to paint. I had a good time with it and the client is really happy with it too, so I'm glad it's going to a good home.

Another update tomorrow,

~Muninn