Terrain is everything – Sanctum Imperialis

With every intention to finish of my Dark Shroud I was then tempted to put some effort into my Sanctum Imperialis while my magnetising efforts cured. I’d finished building it in September 2018 and that was a distraction from my Hierophant. I’d also dropped this part like a hot potato when I came to paint the Warplock Bornze on all the buttresses and doors. But with time to fill I finished all the bronze off and in some areas mixed a replacement with some craft acrylics – bronze+metallic black+brown.

I then shadow washed it with a mix of Burnt Umber+Black art acrylics. You can also see I stippled on som vermilion in places – a mistake, as a drybrush would have acheived better results. I also washed the bronze in places and it looks so awesome and yet I’ll cover that all up with extra highlights. I don’t know why I can’t leave well enough alone?

The side walls will be drybrushed with vermilion next.

The taller structure and at this stage this is about as grimdark as I’ve possibly ever got. I need to remember this for a future project as I know I can’t stop here and need to do my usual highlights. But this is just so much more realistic than I normally do and my Honored Imperium statue is what I’m heading for. This means I’ll be verdigri’ing all the bronze, the doors will be less so and all the red needs highlighting.

I’ll be possibly be picking out the scrolls as parchment and the lenses in the lanterns.

The doors will be the same brassy bronze I usually do, while all the vertical support will be well green! This is because the doors are polished while the structure is just weathered.

And this little corner piece. I don’tknow whether to create some broken stained glass panels for the windows, it might be nice as I’ve nothing much else to attempt them on.

And here we are with the highlights and they’re much yellower than anticipated. I might glaze this with Bloodletter to see if it brings back the redness.

I might have goe a little overboard on it, I’m pining for the lost grimdark as I’ve gone down my over-staurated reds & yellows.

How does it compare? I’m not even sure if the Verdigris is the right thing to do now.

I desperately want to do something much greener and I love how the statue turned out but as much as I miss the red Sanctum of 3 highlights ago I also love this grungey version

The dark bronze is just rich and most of is is going to be covered up, which will at least help where I’ve caught the metal with my drybrushing.

The other question is do I keep those gothic finials as solid bronze, or paint each facet as encased red glass? I’m thinking glass because it’ll look cool.

Perhaps the solution is I need more buildings so I can explore these variations…

Genestealer Cult Graffiti

Back in January, before the Genestealer Cult release/’Day of Ascension’  you may recall the Warhammer Community Facebook post about the Genestealer Cult Graffiti.

Well it transpired that it was in Manchester [where I work] and I immediately recognised the area and visited it as my own pilgrimage to meet this 3-armed Emperor.

I took some pictures but promplty forgot to share them on the blog, though probably did on twitter. It was amazing to see Chris Howker’s work first hand [even if it had been defaced and repaired the day before].

It was quite the experience, even if the weather was a bit grim.

But an amazing piece and still in-situ and pristine in Manchester’s Northern Quarter on Thomas  Street.

Alongside the Kellermorph are some equally filthy furry Xenos, which I believe are Flerken.

And these skelebob creatures that might have been done by Jay Sharples Art.

Teh full mural.

And this heresy – burn it! 🔥🔥🔥🔥

Warhammer Underworlds Shadespire Garrek’s Reavers – TO DONE!

Garrek’s Reavers – TO DONE! There was a point with these where I had no idea where I was going with them.

Luckily I had my Imperial Knights to focus on and with no real reason to be painting them the end result and the decisions needed to get there were broadly irrelevant.

Which is a wonderful learning experience -you have freedom to explore with no expectations and no targets to meet.

Although it helped I wasn’t trying to follow a style it was a slight hindrance in that I had those questions about soft fabrics and wrappings.

So I’d definitely recommend doing something purely frivolous if you can fit it in amongst ‘must do’ tasks.

And as a palate [or even palette] cleanser it’s also helpful in setting up your next project. It gives you renewed purpose having explored new territory.

Good old Garrek, he’s a beast of a model in fact. As a sculpt it’s really quite clever how subtly he’s elevated to the leader status

The hair was almost by accident that I used purple to shade it. In fact I used it on the skin and all the armour plates. I’m not even sure if it’s apparent but I felt like it was tying it all together.

I should have got a close-up of the decapitated head, it was one of the last things I did and really rough but came out quite cool – clearly newly severed.

Now, the scars… I’d had them all red but they looked too understated so I went purple on them and maybe they’ve gone too far the other way.

Possibly a couple of more washes, even a black might have made them less cartoonish but I wanted something else and that’s what I got…

This guy’s brand looks more like and open wound – the Tamiya Clear Red X-27 really came into it’s own on these.

And just adding the gloss varnish on his helm I felt was a nice touch.

Come at me bro! Some black wash was added to the Tamiya Clear Red X-27 blood to make it darker. it also makes it matt, so you have to offset that with another dab of Tamiya Clear Red X-27, or gloss varnish.

A touch of blood from the spines rupturing out of his back – little touches just add more drama to the mmodel.

I don;t know why but I think this is my favourite of all the reavers. Maybe it;s because I think he looks like Willem Defoe?

The white background pics.

Individual character shots

And the Big Teal Stamp of Approval for giggles.

1.5 million

It was November 2016 when I hit one million views, that’s an impressive milestone I think one all bloggers aspire to. However, I’m probably not alone in thinking at that time we’d been having a lot more visits from our Eastern European bot friends so what this stat really meant was anyone’s guess. Subsequently I didn’t think I’d do many page view milestones, unless it was a big one. I was perhaps thinking 2 million, but 1.5 million became a bigger deal because page views have dropped significantly over the last two years.

I’ve said many times that these arbitrary milestones feature only to serve as a thank you for those that visit the blog and as some justification that the effort is all worthwhile and, if so many get pleasure from my ramblings, to keep on doing it. I also think us bloggers aren’t really courting numbers, afterall we’re not YouTubers constantly saying “Guys, hit the subscribe, like the video and click the bell”. Where those sorts of metrics actually mean something to their success as a channel, we get by whether we have a view or not [Dave adopting the moral high ground 😉]. For us it’s just nice to have folk come along for the ride, but they don’t have to contribute to the journey.

Interestingly though, January had a spike of 20,418 pageviews, well above the 12,641 of December and six year low of 10,197 of November [although with the hiatus in effect that’s understandable]. It’s all just numbers really but for us bloggers they are some interesting statistics to ponder over, if not fully comprehend. And for those that are interested that traffic also generates between 1p or 2p a day in AdSense, regardless of clicking [for which I received a princely 6p off 2 clicks the other day!]. I don’t even know if the adverts are even an issue now and I’d say it doesn’t really matter but it’s made £195 over the past 8 years and got me some interesting extras I wouldn’t normally have bought.

Thank you everyone for your continued support.

Warhammer Underworlds Shadespire Steelhearts Champions – TO DONE!

Second of my completed Shadespire Warbands – Steelheart’s Champions.

And I know it’s now Night Vault and the actual game is Warhammer Underworlds but these technically were Shadespire warbands and the name is just altogether better.

Just a reminder I [loosely] followed Rob Paint’s Model’s base guide for these.

And I also followed his painting guide for the Stormcast Eternals themselves.

He obviously did a much better job and I threw in some battle damage too but I’m more than happy with the result.

2 things about steelheart: 1. I love the blending on his sword – I wish I could do black like this ALL the time. 2. The pupils for his eyes or on his top eyelids. It looks OK, but it isn;t right and one day I may have to fix that.

The purple wasn’t quite as smoothly blended as I’d hoped. It had been looking quite dire and just the edition of that white line across the bottom made it far more interesting and draws the eye away from the dubious blends…

I also glossed all the weaponry, again to make up for what I didn’t explore on the Chosen Axes

Pics on the white background.

See what I mean about his pupils. However, do me a favour click on the pick and zoom in to the leather groin protector – see those individual brush stroke highlights? I love them! While you’re at it look at the blend on that sword closely – I need to do all my blends like this!

Anyway, a Big Teal Stamp of Approval for these guys.

Warhammer Underworlds Shadespire Chosen Axes – TO DONE!

I finished the Chosen Axes just before the end of the last Hobby Season, but I didn’t take my TO DONE! pics, well apart from one for the end of the season review.

With Garrek’s Reavers done I thought I’d do all three warbands in one sitting and I ended up loving the Camera360 shots so much I didn’t even bother with my digital camera – too much faffing.

It’s really weird to look at these now, I haven’t really paid them much attention since I finished and I’m pleasantly surprised what I actually did.

I’m not 100% convinced about the grey on the base, but the flock and skulls are OK.

Individual facing shots [where appropriate].

Gratuitous 360° rotation.

I can honestly say right now I don’t quite know how I did the gold on that axe head. I need to go back and see if there are any tips. It might just be my standard brassy bronze with some extra highlights but that’s what I’ll go for on my Deathwing Knights when I get round to them.

Gratuitous 360° rotation.

Gratuitous 360° rotation.

Gratuitous 360° rotation.

And on a white background, with more natural colours.

I had considered coating their skin in gloss varnish, glad I didn’t now; although I glossed the armour on Garrek’s Reavers so I got to see what it would have looked like.

That ‘gold’ tho!

Of course these were completed in my 2017/18 Hobby Season and as I’ve only just got round to taking some pics here’s the appropriate Big Gamboge Stamp of Approval!

The joys [and benefits] of being a hobby butterfly

Having set out my stall for my next projects and just finished my last Shadespire Warband I actually had a few nights off. With my son’s initial treatment complete I’m back working normaly and my boss deservedly took a week off to recuperate from holding the fort. This left me to pick up the slack which was a little more tiring than I thought it’d be thanks to a staff away day to Birmingham and a frantic period producing materials for a road scheme public consultation.

Liam’s Mortarion, just to illustrate ‘butterfly’

So I spent some nights just going to bed, not necessarily ‘early’ but without going out to the man-cave. However, I found the motivation and time just to nip out with the intent to add a few small magnets to my Dark Shroud so I could swap out the Heavy Bolter and Assault Cannon. At least that was the plan. Go out, do some cutting and drilling add the 3 magnets job done! Except having cut a notch in the gun mount the gunners arms detached from the body. I glued them back in place but with the time for the poly-cement to set I was otherwise without a task.

Which left me looking around for something else and I went for my Sanctum Imperialis, it is afterall next on my list. It required some Warplock Bronze on its external ‘skirting boards’ and buttresses and I’d been actively avoiding it since the last time I applied some bronze over 2 years ago! And herein lies the joy of having a number of projects on the go/lined up. Flitting to this terrain and actually completing something long since consigned to the ‘onerous task’ lot, brings about a huge sense of completion. Sure, it’s just a basecoat and I’ve another [bigger] piece that needs the same which will no doubt become wearisome, but there’s some serious endorphin reward for getting past this hurdle.

Whats on my palette?

Bless me readers for I have sinned, it’s been over 8 months since my last confession! I’ve been otherwise preoccupied so I’m sure I’ll be forgiven though.

So where am I at? Well I’ve completed my two Knights and just finished Garrek’s Reavers [pics to follow] so what do I have next? The Warband was a lovely little intermission and with them out of the way I’m actually gee’d up to tackle and finally finish off my Ravenwing Dark Talon, so that’s next on the list. Right now, the only things I can envisage painting is the Dark Talon, a Callidus Assassin and the Sanctum Imperialis pieces I have knocking about. The first and last seem significant projects, with the Assassin as a little intermission piece again, but nothing else is speaking to me.

That might be in part because nothing else is primed and ready to go. To remedy that I’ll be looking at my Big Build and actually trying to spend a lot of time building. I have these items I’m looking to do:

• 2 x Hive Guard conversions
• 3 x Ripper Bases
• 3 x Tyranid Warriors
• 9 x Abberrants

The latter one will require a purchase of some more bases to match my existing Genestealer Cult. I feel a concerted build phase might have happened at the wrong time, although priming weather should be nice. Ordinarily this is painting time, where motivation is high compared with the winter months but I’ll just see how it goes. I just need stuff prepped and ready and this will be the start of it.

Wait a minute I have an urge to finish painting my Deathwing Knights too! Obviously after the other stuff, so my urge might have waned by the time I’m free but I think it’d be nice to finally see them complete. THEN I will be happy 😂

Warhammer Underworlds Garrek’s Reavers pt2.

With the Knights complete it’s back to Garrek’s Reavers and when last we looked at them in December I was unsure about the bases. My conclusion was to just block out the colours and then I might have an idea how to deal with the ‘sand’. And so now you can see what my concept is…

Yep, they’re all red. Given it’s Khorne I just wanted them to be red-skinned, which obviously makes their armour and clothes an issue as usually they’re the red things. However, a quick view of RobPaintsModels video helped me to just use Incubi Darkness on the fabrics, while the armour was always going to be glossy black.

I added copper in places just for something different instead of my bronze and silver as all the pointy sharp bits.

All the skulls got picked out, although there were some jawbones I missed – watch out for those. The realisation was then NOT to do anything with the ‘sand’. I’ll be making the grand glossy, like it’s Shadeglass and the sandy areas will remain that colour just matt. Adding in another patch of colour would have just been more distracting.

After a purple wash to shade all the red skintones [and to tie it into the other purples on the base] I then highlighted all the skin with Khorne Red and then Valejo Bloody Red. I also threw in some purple wash on his hair, again to connect everything together.

This guy has just had his face highlighted with Khorne Red + Bloody Red. The rest of his body is just at the Khorne Red stage, which looks pretty good anyway, I could have stopped here! Strong and Dark Tone washes were applied to all the metallics.

All the Khorne Red highlights are done.

And all the Bloody Red Highlights are done too.

I went back in with more purple wash in places to add greater depth and increase contrast. I picked out some fake musculature too. Eyes were picked out in yellow and some of the teeth were painted in brown – y’know dental hygiene isn’t high on their list of priorities.

A also did Dark Reaper highlights on all the clothing and picked out the armour plates with Incubi Darkness, but only on the sharpest points. I also did a first black coat on all the base rims.

And that’s the last of my WiP pics. further highlights and details were picked out, varnishes [matt and gloss] and lashings of Tamiya Clear Red X-27 and you’ll see it all when I finally take some TO DONE! pics.

Imperial Knights – House Corvus Twins in manufactorum pt14. Interim TO DONE!

With a bit of a push these are ‘mostly’ complete. OK so some weapon options haven’t been finished, some haven’t been varnished and the banners haven’t been added. Not to mention these pics are just what I set up in the back room, when I probably need to do some ‘proper’ ones but that can be said about a number of completed projects recently.

But they are done and if you see all those folk claiming their models are ‘done except for the base’ – so they’re not done! I think I’m owed some latitude but right now, regarding my To Do List, if it’s all I complete this Season I’m happy with that. It’s unlikely this would just be it, but all things considered they mean a lot.

Which is where the contradiction occurs, because as I’ve touched on before, they mean so much but their game play and the reputation of Knights in tournament setting are just at odds with how much I would love to play them.

Sadly you can’t even dilute your force with other Imperium without being dubbed a ‘soup’ list player. It’s a no-win scenario and it’s just a bit galling really. You never know, now I have 4 Knights and 2 Warlgaives they could play differently but we’ll see when I next have a ‘friendly’ game with my mates.

Lady Pettorini, she’s going ‘full tilt’ on this. Really looking forward to showing them off at some point.

But I think I may have titled them wrongly, in that their namesakes – one is short and one is tall and I’ve switched them because this Gallant will be at the forefront and part of me thinks that representing that spirit was more fitting, than actual physical stature.

But I’ve already caught myself accidentally calling this one Lady Pettorini, when it’s Ser Ellenbogen.

Considering I was originally not a fan of this face plate I absolutely love it now. As soon as I put it on I could see no alternative.

I’ve started a banner for this, but I can’t imagine it will suit unfortunately. The space between the legs would be too cluttered I think.

The Gallant also has a banner that’s less progressed but it might still fit and not spoil the silhouette of the model as it is ‘in flow’.

Top view, sometimes I wonder how this stuff happens. I’m under no illusion this is Golden Demon level but I can;t quite comprehend what I’ve achieved. perhaps it’s rooted in my history of not finishing things and now I do, to a standard I’m more than happy with.

I never expected this model to feel so ‘alive’, given the static pose, but somehow it does look like a captured a moment with it.

These are my desktop/wallpaper pics, suitable for phone or PC.

Although my Armies on Parade background is a little busy. Maybe when I do the Ferron Proxima mat background they’ll be even better.

Something about the cheek guards and their old skool grime sings to me.

And a more sensible right hand image for PC desktops.

50:50 split

And what lies beneath the mask, so you can see what was lost in the eyes with the Tamiya Clear Orange X-26

My House Corvus is ‘complete’. There’s obviously a Castellan I should add, but I’m not overly fussed on the model. I’d love some of the other Cerastus but not really going to explore that. I might get some Helverins at some point but not sure I really need anything else.

If the Lancer is ever an issue – cost/performance benefits I’ll swap it out for Euronymous to keep the other Knights in check and bring the points down. And I actually think the Freeblade rules give you extra benefits without spending CPs for extra Warlord Traits/relics

Anyway, a Big Teal Stamp of Approval for giggles.