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

Day 8: Kovnic Andrei Malakov, Journeyman Warcaster

Back in August of last year I was touting the Warmachine: Tactics kickstarter. Sure, the video game sounded exciting, but I was more enticed by the limited edition minis you could get for pledging. The one I was most intrigued by was Malakov. I liked his look. In particular, he had this long, characterful face that struck me as neat.

My Miniature rewards showed up a few weeks ago, and while I was thinking about minis for this project Malakov came to mind.

He was mostly red & black (two easy colors for me) and this project helps keep me from overthinking the fact I'm painting a limited edition miniature. I tend to drag my feet about painting limited minis. I don't want to screw them up, so I never actually end up painting them. It's silly, but it happens.

I'm happy with Andrei here. There was a lot of little detail to work through. The minis isn't quite as large as I was expecting, and there was a ton of fine edging. I suppose these CAV models allow you to add small details an artist would be hard-pressed to add. Everything is pretty crisp though, and he'd stand out on the table.

He's a bit walleyed, but I don't want to try to fix that until after the month is over. I don't want to go back to repair the problem & make it worse in the process. Overall, I'm happy.

The next week or so will be dedicated to Space Marines. I'm finally going to finish more Night Wolves, and probably break into some of the marines I've neglected to finish over the years.

More tomorrow.

~Muninn

Day 7: Duergar Grenadier

I accidentally poured a glass of water on my laptop last night, which is why I'm so late in posting this (I got it turned off, upside down & on a towel almost immediately, so it's fine this morning)

I decided to go ahead & wrap this guy up. He's the fourth dwarf mini in the Chainmail booster I bought two years ago. I spent Wednesday at my inlaw's place a few towns away. When I do that I take a few paints with me & I a mini that only requires a limited palette.

This guy was pretty easy to finish up, all things, considered. All I needed was some browns & washes, so it didn't take super long. Had I put a bit more thought into my paint selection I probably would have diversified a bit, since a few places look kinda one-note. At very least I probably should have made the grenade lighter to add some more contrast. Oh well. It's done, and it fits in nicely with the rest if the Duergar, so I'm happy.

If the kids give me enough time to paint today it should be a nice new mini that many of haven't seen before.

Day 6: Maki Watanabe

What can you say about this mini's face that you couldn't say about a flat shovel?

This is the second mini I was given to paint from Fantasy Flight's Adventurer's box, Maki Watanabe. The mini is alright, but everything from the neck up was a bother. Where David Gore had a few notable aspects on his face, glasses, a nose, etc. Maki here was almost featureless. the eye holes were slight indentations. The lips were a slit. Not the best.

The original artwork

Looking at the picture I can tell my paints were too thick. It looks a little caked on, but I did what I could with the time I had. I'd tried to make the coat more red, but it ended up more brown.

On the plus side, I don't have any more of these things to paint. :P

~Muninn

Day 5: Duergar Gunner

The Cinco de Mayo mini is one that I picked up two years ago for my very first May Mini Madness. Back then I bought a 4-pack of dwarves from the old WOTC skirmish game, Chainmail. I painted the cleric the first year, the legionnaire the second year, and now the gunner.

There's also a grenadier that I'll paint in the next few weeks. No need to save him for 2015.

I want the Duergar to look drab, so I've been using browns for much of their clothing, and using Agrax Earthshade to mute the golds. She isn't perfect, but she's a proper cave-crawler. I guess I'll have to write a duergar encounter to put into a game someday.

~Muninn