A return to the desk and slow progress ...........

It has been four months since my last post on the blog. To be honest I had thought that maybe I would not return to blog anymore.  There were conflicting challenges of the Family, Study and work. The Bride and I have begun the seemingly Everest size task of buying a property in the Melbourne property market. If this blog was political I would have allot of things to say about what I have found over the last few months, suffice to say I will not bore you the reader with such details. Suffice to say we are still looking.  My study has progressed well but this was in essence what has taken up my spare time.  Studying at masters level in a subject I love still means I needed to dedicate allot of time to reading and truly learning my subject matter.

Garman Fallschrimjager and my 1st game of Bolt Action

So here are my 1st 9 figures for 2014.

That's right German Fallchrimjager  by warlord games!  Early last year I bought these with the intention of painting them up and then put it off in favor of other projects.  Well after playing Chain of Command by TFL and also starting to get some interest in Bolt action I thought it was time.

Painting Blood effects with Tamiya Clear Red

I have had allot of questions about how I paint blood on my models-  I decided to post up the tutorial I found recently that describes the technique. 

Hope this helps out a few people

Cheers

JP

Vikings and Saxons Project Episode 2

 Hey guys 1st command base pretty much completed -  Happy with the outcome and looking forward to getting into the units -  waiting on the order from Warbases who by the way have been awesome with helping me organize the bases I want, the order is in and i'm patiently for the postman to deliver all the bases.

Anyway hope you like the below.

The Frustration of Arthritis

A bit of a random post today, but one that has been on my mind at times over the last few weeks.

Ive been painting for a few years and I enjoy it immensely I would say from putting some Napoleonic miniatures out on the table and having my Austrians thrash some French there is nothing more I enjoy, it takes me away from the stress of the world and I can lose my self in the process.

Of late my hands have not been up to the task,  be it either change in weather or a change in diet it has been a stretch to get some painting in without some arthritic pain.

Space Wolf 13th Company Update

Bit of an update today, lots of painting to do and much time to do it in.

So I have been working on some wolf guard - these guys will also then form part of my seeker squad (Heresy Sternguard basically) and then ive been also working on the 1st of 3 Long Fang squads.

Logan Grimnar Work in Progress Update

So here he is so far- there is work to be done on the Bolter and the axe. I'm not happy with the definition of the metallic paint so a bit more to do there and some of the blue from the axe has found its way to the haft.

Knight Of Santiago WIP Shot

So Ive been painting for a few knights now the new infinity figures - I had a disaster with the 1st figure when I accidentally sprayed white primer instead of Flat Matt sealer.

Musing on Infinity

Well the last few days Ive been reading up and talking to people about the game Infinity- even going so far as buy some models and I'm contemplating playing a game this Saturday.

It's not that 40k is no longer grabbing me, I love the game and love playing my grey knights and space wolves. Its more the grind of finding players who dont complain about the power level of grey knights - the seeming lack of tournaments right and well Ive finished in principle painting my Grey Knight army so I'm looking for a new painting and gaming  challenge.

Purifer Unit Updated

So yesterday I mentioned I was hoping to see the Armorcast bits arrive so I can move the progress along with the army upgrade.

Well I checked the post box today and there they where!

Weathering the Grey Knights Test

So tonight in my effort to post on a regular occasion as I work on my Grey Knights I sat down to start weathering the models.


I'm working the back story as I go and that's starting to inform the state in which the Armour will be.

These guys haven't just stepped of the strike cruiser. Oh no they are currently marooned on a temple world fighting off hordes of daemons and renegade space marines.

Weekly WIP 2

Well this week was about finishing the 1st terminator squad.

I was keen to work on a banner for the squad as well as get them based up as well.  Initially I had contacted Ron from From the Warp about the possibility of him being able to complete a commission for me on flags as his work is really great and maybe one day I will but unfortunately Ron's schedule will not fit in with mine. 

Shades, In perspective.

So it came to light (pun intended) this evening as a friend was visiting, that shades can make all the difference to a colour in some very subtle ways. The point arose when he sighted my Stormraven in progress and the blood red I had liberally coated it with, he then said to me "Why did you paint this model in a brighter red than the rest of of your army?"

Well I hadn't done so of course, what I had done or more like hadn't was paint the special grey blend over the slightly darker Codex Grey base coat. Now that grey is very close to white and when painted on next to the blood red makes the colour pallette look in proportion, but of course this trick has some very subtle uses in your own painting some of which im sure you already use without knowing it!

Now as you can see from this picture the two squares marked 'A' and 'B' appear to not only be different shades or saturation but drastically so! Well as you can see in this next picture that I have taken the liberty to modify that both the colours are in fact the same, not only that but the dark grey squares are in fact almost black!

So where does this leave us? Well not all of us can be masterclass painters, but many enthusiasts win awards and even the coveted Golden Demon with not to much more skill than us. What they have is a good understanding of the human eye and well... tricks of the light!

So take a moment and think to yourself, was that model you drooled over last time actually that well painted? sure I wont deny that some people slave over their work, and hell some people are just dumb lucky enough to be some sort of paintbrush savant, rocking backwards and forwards while they shit Tiffany cuff links but more often than not they have slaved over one detail on the model (usually the face or head) that catches the eye and filled the rest with the right shade to make the details they want "pop" from the mini!

So give it a try sometime, you dont need blue to make that yellow pop if the colours around it have a little touch of black mixed in, the shade will do the pop for you!

As always, Good Gaming!

Von Drakin

The Interwebs is procrastination...

So I have now completed one subject, done, dusted and hopefully i have passed well... time will tell. I have another big exam to sit on wednesday, an essay to compose and a final physics exam on the 28th... Until then im afraid its study and procrastination. Unfortunately I cant qualify painting as valid procrastination, where as interweb trawling... welll im doing "research" (sure lets call it that) and if I happen to stumble across someone's blog in the meantime (so many good ones to choose from) then that's a casualty of the study process.

Anyways until I get painting again you can amuse your self with this picture of my favourite I can has cheezeburger!

**as an aside, to give myself and all of you something to look forward to, when I do get back to painting, the first person to name the movie this picture parodies will get a special model painted in their honour (in space marine, chaos marine, rogue trader marine, tau, dark eldar, genestealer or ork flavours) in whatever scheme they like, a special expose on their blog of choice and a link to that blog topside in pride of place on my blog!