Falling Behind...

Prompted by the arrival of a Kickstarter that's going to put the painting lead I'd built up back a rather long way, the camera's come out and the paintjobs of the last three weeks are here.

It's an eclectic mix of work in progress stuff, and a "why don't I do that?" project, along with a couple of the models that came in the Reaper lockdown bundle I got at the start of the month.

First up are some Oathmark Soldiers that have been knocking around for a while.  I've got several of the Oathmark Kits, and they're all full of character.  I'm told they're completely compatible with the Frostgrave kits too, which is unsurprising, but likely to be remarkably helpful.  I built one of these as a character model for an RPG, and he got painted straight away, but the rest of the sprue, plus the metal captain model have languished with just undercoat on them on my painting desk for a while.

Hi-res photography always shows up how dodgy my eye painting can be, but for tabletop play they'll be fine.  I was even mad enough to put magnets on the shields.

I think I'll do the next five with bows, when I get around to them.

Forwards men!

Next up some random Reaper Bones - these came with my lockdown survival kit.  Mrs H had some, and I took these.

This Way ...

Anyone who knows me well will know I have a weakness for Redheads, right Mrs. H?  So no surprises that this lady of *ahem* negotiable affections *ahem* was painted with a scarlet mane.  She's been based up to go with my Pirate collection, after all, Pirates need Wenches!

Strike a Pose!

And here's the creature from Devil Reef - it also seemed a sensible addition to the Pirate collection.  Once we're back gaming face to face, I'm sure it'll turn up in a roleplay session at some point.

It's Clobberin' Time.

I've had GW Orc armies before, and even though I've painted my Reaper goblins with 'traditional' GW style green skin, I just couldn't do it with this fellow.  So, Gryph-Hound Grey Contrast it was.  I rather like the Gray skin-tone, so when I get around to my other Reaper Orcs, I'll be doing them the same way.  I think the Oathmark Goblins I have may get even darker grey skin 'cause they look rather like Giaks from Lone Wolf, but I digress.

I've also painted a couple of Crooked Dice miniatures - I've been working through the Pulp Sci-Fi set released earlier in the year (or was it late last year? time is ... strange at the moment) Not-Flash and Not-Ming are still in progress, but I finished both Not-Barin's

A Secret Serviceman and a Man in Tights?

Both of them do a good job of reminding me of certain actors.  I'd really like some Not-Arborian guard with the same kind of jackets as these two. But I can wait.  It's not like I don't have a lot of stuff on my to-do pile!

I also finished a couple of scurvy swabs from my pirate collection - somehow these two got skipped when I painted up my Black Scorpion Elven Pirates.  No idea why, and they don't quite fit with the others as I've forgotten the recipe I used for the others. They're close enough though.

Back to Back they faced each other.

Last, but no means least, I've had these Reaper Nova Guard sitting in the blisters for a while, and they called out to me.  Liberal use of Orange Contrast to basecoat them made for easy, if somewhat slapdash work, but I now have some generic sci-fi soldiers to use as mooks in RPGs.  Once I get Zombicide Invader and Nemesis on the painting table (one day) I'll have plenty of gribblies as well.  I think I'm going to need some more clear bases though.

"I am in charge, and I say we go that way!"

So that's 32 models painted in the last three weeks or so.  Not my best effort, but by no means my worst.  And I'm on 377 models painted so far this year.

Now onto the kickstarter that arrived today ... Mantic's Terrain Crate.  Fortunately some of it belongs to Mrs. H - so I don't need to add the entire model count to my acquired total.  But there's still a lot.

Also, Father's day has happened, and Master H got me a couple of pirates.  Plus Mrs H did an order from Reaper to replace a dragon that our dog ate (yes, really!) and snuck in a couple of models for me too (thanks dear, no, really, I love the models, just not the addition to the pile!)

Sooo ... my acquired total goes up by ... 337.  Ulp!

And I still have several other miniatures-heavy kickstarters in various covid-related states of delay that will quite possibly be turning up over the next six months...

I'm still less than 100 behind at the moment though ... better get on with it!

Running Totals

Painted : 377

Acquired : 475

Better late than never!

No update last week, as I didn't get anything painted.

Instead, I went to the theatre with Mrs. H to see Back to the Future: The Musical for her (very late) birthday present.  It's not my fault her birthday was in August and the show wasn't until now. In short, it was amazing. To borrow and bastardise the tagline from an old-but-well-known film "You'll believe a car can fly"

I also provided her with a Crackpot Inventor and Unearthly Traveller from Crooked Dice - any similarity to characters in the films/musicals purely accidental.

Images from Crooked Dice

Maybe I'll be able to feature her versions of them in the fullness of time (yes, Mrs. H.  that's a hint).

This week, however, I got back in the saddle and have managed to get some painting done.

Skull Tales has now officially been painted in its (owned by me) entirety.  The final 7 heroes are done, and it's a fully painted game.  I'll have to learn how to play it now!

Clockwise from top: Gunner, Witch, Noble Rebel with War Dog, Musician, Alchemist, Lookout, Sea Dog (in centre)

Only the Musician screamed out at me as a reference to something else here.  Were Peter Dinklage to ever turn Piratical Musician, who knows, he might look something like this...

As it's the first week of the month, I also took a look at my work in progress pile to see if anything jumped out and told me to paint it.  I wouldn't say that that was exactly the case, but I did still remove a few things from the pile of shame.

First up are some re-purposed HeroClix models, originally they were used as mooks in a Savage Worlds Necessary Evil Campaign (Essentially Super-Villains-Save-The-World).  They only ever got as far as being re-based and then undercoated, so I've got them painted and I expect they will form a 7TV SWAT Police Cast - I'm hoping to get some 'out in the sticks' terrain done over the next few months as well, so they may end up paired with a group of cultists or similar that have been abducting folk for some kind of foul ritual.  This might mean a Children of the Fields cast, or maybe some reclusive survivalists - I've not really decided yet.

First up a Tough Detective and her Dependable Deputy, ready to lead their strike team to rescue the abductees.

Sculder and Mulley?

They'll be backed up by a SWAT team  - at first I wasn't sure what to do for these, because the only Police SWAT team appears in the Paranormal Investigators guide, and precludes the use of 'English' Police (the "Across the Pond" SFX) - which would mean I couldn't use Riot Police, which you'll see below.  However, I realised that an Army Unit 1) Also has the Law Enforcement Genre, and 2) the Dependable Deputy also has the Military Genre - so I'm covered both ways by using the Army Unit profiles for these - 9 Privates and a grenade-toting Corporal.

"Fire at Will!" "Which one's Will Sir?"

And here are the aforementioned Riot Police. Or the meat shield, as they are likely to be.  The Sergeant is so hard he doesn't even put his visor down. I may have to get hold of some kind of Police Car or Van to make best use of their "You're Nicked" SFX.

"Let's go Clubbing, Lads"

The Last few figures I have will likely represent a Dog Handler (the chap with the pistol and empty hand), for whom I shall have to acquire some Dogs, and an Explosives Expert - as a cast can only have one of the latter, I'm not sure what I'll do with the duplicate figure.  Perhaps a hand swap is in order to provide me with a second Corporal so I can split the SWAT team into two units.

Why does this make me think of a boy band
that will soon be firing their stylist?

Also in the work in progress pile were some character models for yet another RPG setting - this time a Sci-Fi one-shot that I ran, with pre-generated characters.  Another undercoated but never painted tale for them.  These are my first time using clear bases - mostly as an experiment to help me get my head around how to use them for a future project.  I think they work nicely, though I'm not sure I'd use them for a lot of things, they might just be the best idea for Board Game miniatures (yes, I'm aware I've just finished painting a boardgame, and I sanded and painted all the bases ...)

So, here are the crew of the Starship Lakota, from left to right a Crooked Dice Time-Lift Security Operative, Karl Drax and Kaela Yu from Hasslefree (I removed Kaela's Cigarette as the character it Psychic and it made a nice 'mind reading' pose, I felt), and a Reaper Miniatures Sligg.  I still need to get a 'drone' for the Sligg to control - fortunately it won't be that long until Crooked Dice's Sci-Fi Pulp miniatures will be heading my way, and there's a rather wonderful Major-Domo drone coming that will do the job perfectly.

The Crew of the Lakota

The last bit of painting I completed this week was, in all honesty, done because of how simple it would be.  One warning when you look at these Reaper Bones figures.  Don't blink. Don't even blink.

Blink and your dead.

Perhaps these will be Animated Statues for the Cult the 7TV Police cast are investigating.  Maybe they're up to something more mystical than mundane ...

In total that makes 35 models painted this week, which somewhat makes up for the week before when nothing got completed at all.

Mrs. H. has already chosen my next project.  The Investigators from Mansions of Madness 2nd edition.  We don't quite have all the supplements, and Mrs. H. has already painted one of them, so I'm only left with another 30 to do (at the moment).

Because of the lovely boards they move around on, I'm intending to finish these with clear bases - some of the feet/contact points are rather small but, having already done the crew above,  I reckon with a sharp knife, and some patience (along with a lack of canine or junior interference) I'll be able to get them sorted.

May also appear as a 7TV Pulp cast, or two, or three ...

Will I manage to get anything else painted this month?  That's going to be a very big maybe ... 30 individual characters means that not much in the way of batch painting is going to happen.  I might build up a couple of MDF scenery kits and do something with them though - it all comes down to time in the end.

Running Totals

Painted: 292

Acquired: 65

The Heroes, The Zombie, and the Scenery.

No, not a pastiche on the C.S. Lewis novel, but what I've been painting this week.

I've finished 7 more of the Skull Tales heroes, plus a Zombie Sidekick, leaving just 7 more Heroes and a Dog to go to have completed all the models I have for the game.  I say "I have" because there were some Door and Treasure Chest minis as an add on, that I didn't buy, but they were more money than I felt they were worth, so I stuck with more 'gamey' pieces.

Again, there are some definite pop/geek culture references amongst batch two, one of which I really wish was different, but I can't have everything.

The Joker

Today was the day I finished painting
"Almost Captain Jack Sparrow"

Native Huntsman
"Hawkeye" I said to Mrs. Hill.
Then "No, not M.A.S.H.,
Last of the Mohicans."

Freedman
No specific reference here I can see.
Though he does match an NPC in an
RPG I'm running very well

Swordsman
Hello.  My Name is Inigo Montoya
You Killed My Father.
Prepare to Die.

Voodoo Shaman and Zombie
There is a certain Baron Samedi-ness
to the Shaman, but I think that's more
the skull makeup than anything else.

Far-Eastern Spy
No reference here for me
though theremay well be one
I'm not that up on my Eastern Cinema

Bodyguard
Kevin Costner he ain't.
When I heard there would be a "Turkish Bodyguard" that
would be a 'big fellow' I was hoping that as we had Inigo
this would be Fezzik.  Instead, I reckon this is Strong Belwas
(from the Game of Thrones novels - he didn't make the TV
series) which is just as good.

I also painted the The Walking Dead All Out War Scenery Booster from Mantic Games this week - I wanted to get some vehicles done for a painting competition, and these did well for that - and some objective markers and scatter terrain are always handy to have.  Not only that, Mrs. Hill will be running a Deadlands: The Wasted West RPG at some point, so Post-Apoc terrain will be very handy.

More Barricades

Barricades

Yet more Barricades

More Objectives.
So are Baked Beans

Objectives.
Campbells Soup is Important Stuff

I tried to do that sky/earth highlighting thing for the windows of the vehicles.  I've tried it once before and I'm not sure that I've "Got it" yet, but I think I'm getting better.

I also used a colour shift paint for the first time (and promptly covered it up with rust, muck and scratches).  It's interesting stuff to use, and I've been told that an airbrush will make its use much easier.  I've never really used an airbrush though, and don't want the expense of setting one up.  Nor do I have a "hobby room" outside of my area in the living room, so such things may have to wait.

Colourshift Paint

It makes for nice self-highlighting!

Black.

It'll never go out of style.

It all used to be one colour.

Honest, it did!

I think I should have done some kind
of Mechanic markings on this one.

"Dave's Garage" or something similar.
Maybe next time ...

And a Collage, because I put one together for my
painting competition entry and wanted to use it again.

So that's 28 models painted this week, and I didn't buy any models either.  However a good friend, apropos of nothing, bought me a bit of TT combat scenery - the Wild West Undertaker, which comes with 7 gravestones too.  And a Reaper Gravedigger to go with it.  So, that's 9 models acquired.  And very nice they are too.  More MDF and Plastic for the pile!  Still not quite 200 ahead, but I might get there next week, if going to the theatre (Back to the Future, the Musical!) doesn't get in the way of next week's painting.

Running Totals

Painted: 257

Acquired: 65

50 Shades of Brown

I'm a day late on my updating every Saturday.  So maybe I'll just say I'm going for every weekend... until that doesn't happen as well.

In my defence, I spent a lot of yesterday drybrushing brown, brown, brown, and brown.

I decided that this week I would build and paint up the TT Combat crates that I got for my birthday.

All they need is an 80's Detective in an Audi...

While building them I remembered I had some other crates that I'd got for Christmas (2018 *cough*) that I'd built, but never painted - so I dug them out too before I began painting.  I'm not sure which company they are made by, it's been that long since I built them.  I think they came with a couple of "Jungle Outpost" buildings though.

... or an Intrepid Archaeologist searching for a stolen McGuffin.

While trying to find them I came across some fences, and since I'd be painting them in similar colours to the crates, they got added to the painting pile.  Which meant that the fencepost/columns that came went with them would also need to be painted.

8 Fences, 2 Fences with Gates, 10 Columns.  I'll need something for them to fence off now.  I've been having ideas for a new skirmish gameboard that they might work with - but I'll be waiting for better weather before I start painting up new base boards and suchlike.

Oh, and there were some chairs and tables too, so I added them as well.

These will most likely find play as added decoration for RPG battlemaps.  They're a little strangely scaled against each other, though they all came in the same set.

I did manage to get some paint on a couple of other miniatures this week as well.  I'm currently running a couple of Savage Worlds RPG campaigns, one of which is Pinnacle Entertainment's 50 Fathoms setting - think Pirates of the Caribbean meets Pirates of Darkwater (for those that can remember that cartoon) - one of the races, the Scurillian, are a group of magically created Crabmen, and my players have recently recruited one as a member of their crew.  I was frantically scratching my head for something that could represent them when I remembered I backed the Skull Tales - Full Sail Kickstarter last year mostly for the large number of Piratical/Fantasy miniatures.  The Darkclaw monster, while not exactly matching the description of the Scurillians, is close enough, so got painted up to add to the crew.

I just want a hug!

The same game has a set of Redcoats as well, so I painted one up, mostly using Contrast paints, with a few highlights, as a tester.  I'll hopefully get the other 7, and the two officers done over the coming week.

Ready, Aim, Fire!

I expect a lot of my painting is going to be RPG or Boardgame related for a while, possibly both linked together.  I do need to get a new 7TV cast together for July though - not that I'm able to go to Wargames Illustrated's 7TV Day V: The Crosstime Caper - as it clashes with Summer Stabcon (again!) - but I'll be having a game there with another 7TVer, just as I did for the Pulp day last year.

Hopefully the Supers Unlimited models I backed on Kickstarer from Kitbash Games will arrive in plenty of time so I can add to my 'acquired' total, but also get some painted up as a cast.


One thing I've noticed this week is that there's nothing like high-def photography to make you realise just how sloppy your painting is, but that I really don't mind all that much.  They're never going to win any painting competitions, but they're plenty good enough for my gaming table, and that's what really matters.

So, with 8 Fences, 2 Gate Sections, 10 Columns, 13 Crates, 6 Pallets, 5 Tables, 4 Chairs, 1 (very low) Bar, 2 Bookshelves, 1 Darkclaw and a Redcoat painted this week, I've managed to complete 53 things.  Drybrushing is my friend!

I'm still ahead of the game, and building up a bit of space for future arrivals.  I've still avoided any new purchases, and I'm not likely to head off to any shows - though Chillcon IS tempting me - so I'm pretty sure I'm going to end January well ahead.

Running Totals

Painted: 130

Acquired: 56