Empire Warrior Priests

It’s been a while since I updated the old blog, but I did recently complete this trio of Empire warrior priests. They were released around 2007 I think and I bought two of them, for some reason I never completed the set. They were painted purely for painting sake, I wasn’t gaming at the time and have never played Empire, even though their background is potentially the best part of the Old World. Certainly, I have always considered warrior priests to be a central part to the Empire lore. And if you consider the Empire to be central to the whole Warhammer universe, then this trio have to be at the very epicentre. 

I think I painted the two hammer priest as part of a Warhammer forum Glass Cabinet challenge (remember those, the good old days). Then the preacher with book, as I liked the model and I had vague ideas to make a small force from Ostland, which got as far as this one figure and no further! The final figure, with the great hammer, was a gift. I mentioned online somewhere that I had never bought the third of the trio and I had given up trying to find it online as prices were so expensive. Up popped a fairy godfather (aka Andrew Rae of Statuesque Miniatures), he just gave it me and I promised to paint it. It took me a couple of years to get to it, but finally the trio is complete.

Mordor reinforcements

I have to admit that I neither play nor paint that much these days. I think it was late summer or autumn of last year when the dice were last rolled. On the painting side, it’s very infrequent and sporadic. Having said that, I did manage recently to knock out this troll, which I had converted some months back. 

For the palette, I ignored any film references and went to the original source, the books. Trolls are described as black skinned with red eyes, so that was my main aim. I did consider black armour too, but thought it might look too much against the skin, so settled on a dark metallic look. 

I have also cobbled together a unit that will play as linebreakers in games of Oathmark, if we ever return to it. These are troops that are heavily armoured and typically armed with double handed weapons. The models are old metal orcs that I picked up on a forum marketplace I think. They have been lying in my cupboard for a good while, I had intended to strip them and repaint them to fit in with my style, but in the end I glazed over a few washes to remove the zingy colours of the previous owner. They fit in well enough, the front and centre figure is the orc commander that I painted years ago. The rear rank is plastic Mordor orcs, armed with great weapons they make decent enough rear rank filler fodder. They will, of course, be useful in games of Erehwon, Rampant and other skirmish system.

Here’s a head on photo of the troll, you might be able to make out the red gleam of his eyes under that helmet. Let’s hope he gets to lumber on to a battlefield at some point.

Orc champion

I painted up an old orc champion, originally released around 1992 when I started playing WHFB. The shield design was hand painted. I have found that orange is the best colour to use as a contrast on green skinned orcs. I tried a square base on this one, but really I much prefer round, two pence coins in fact are my go to base of choice.

More green skins to come maybe in the next few weeks and months, if I can find the time.

A few random vikings

 I was ratching* about in my boxes the other day, when I came across this set of vikings, which were mostly painted but had never been finished. Always happy to get a result with little effort, I applied the last few touches and the shield transfers, adding another half dozen vikings to my collection. I have recently thinned my collection, offloading quite a few old painted figures to eBay, so I am happy to say that I now have got back to six points of painted figures for Saga.

The two central figures are by V&V miniatures, still my favourite manufacturer by a long chalk. The others are by Victrix Miniatures, which offer a decent, more affordable alternative. The shield transfers are by Little Big Men.

Here’s the single point of hearthguard, with the temporary leader (Thor is a busy guy and he can’t play this role forever). At some point he will be replaced by a suitable, more historical figure. I chose to restrict the shields to red, black and white to tie the unit together a little. I have another unit of hearthguard with great weapons that are not yet painted. 

*ratch is a Cumbrian/Scottish/northern dialect word, meaning search or looking for. I was hoping it was Norse in origin, but it seems to be medieval of unknown origin.

Realm of Chaos Spawn

This is a figure I have had in my collection for a long time. I cannot remember the date it was bought, early to mid 2000s I would hazard a guess. Back in those days, I was an old fogey in the glass cabinet section of the Warhammer forum. I bought the pack and split it with [fiend], a fellow painter on the forum, the idea being we would paint half each. I never got round to it for whatever reason, until all these years later. It’s kinda sad that it took so long.

I did make a start back in the day, it was glued to a square base and I had a notion to paint it as a Nurgle spawn, so it was already based in light green and bone colours. But my painting style has moved on. I wanted to give it more interest and more contrast, so I started adding hues and they developed at random. The left head I thought looked a bit alienesque and was shooting for a silver grey look, like a shark, but overdid it with the blue, decided I liked it and stuck with it. The right hand head stayed green and yellow. The middle head I was trying for a flesh colour but it turned out angry pinks, but again I quite like it so stuck with it.

Finally, here’s the chaos sorceror of my warband, to give a sense of scale. I am hoping to play games of Warhammer using the old fourth or fifth edition chaos book, in which there is a possibility that a character will be turned to a spawn for the amusement of the chaos gods (and my opponent, no doubt). At the moment the warband contains just one character, this sorceror, so he had better make sure he impresses those fickle deities!

Realm of Chaos Beastmen

Another unit painted for the Realm of Chaos warband. These twelve figures are a mix of metals from the early 90s and plastics, from the later 1990s I think. I reckon the plastic Beastmen to be one of the best kits ever released by Games Workshop, and with a few extra bits they really look the business. More info on the build in this post.

Painting was problematic at first. I tried a yellowish skin tone but it did not work. Then I tried a ruddy flesh tone, again I was not happy with the result. So I decided to make them similar to the ungors, but with a darker skin tone, it was meant to be a mid grey, but it has ended up more blue than I would have liked, but I just went with the flow (otherwise I would have given up completely). Finished but flawed is better than unpainted and abandoned.

The banner was another thing that did not go to plan. I knew that I did not want an elaborate design, that doesn’t fit the background for me, a crudely scrawled symbol was my choice. I added some runic script, copied from the chaos warriors shields, but it looked a bit amateurish, so I obscured most of it with some dark washes. It looks okay now, like the banner has been continuously draped in the blood of slaughtered enemies. 

Those problems aside, I am happy with the unit now it is finished. I have always liked the beastmen plastics and it feels good to have them as part of my collection. The warband feels more like a warband now. A leader, some scouts, some average troops and some elite fighters, just about enough to go raiding. I would like to expand on the scouting element by adding some hounds, still pondering over the choice of figures. I have a couple of quick and easy cheat units I can add in the meantime. 

Realm of Chaos Sorceror

This is a scenario many of you will no doubt recognise. I started painting this mini in a flurry of excitement and inspiration. I blasted through the cape and added the decorative border in a couple of sessions and was really pleased with the progress. I had an idea on the skin and put down a base coat and then put it to one side, meaning to pick it up again later in the week. But when the allotted time came round I didn’t fancy doing it too much so I left it, get back to it next week. And then the next week came and I was busy with something else. And so on. Eventually, it was four weeks later before I finally picked it up and finished it off. So it took one month to paint one figure!*

This is a metal figure, a limited edition chaos sorceror released around 2002 (according to Stuff of Legends, who seem to know their, er, stuff). It’s almost 20 years old, by the gods I have been doing this for so long now. It originally had a tail protruding from the front of the cloak but I chopped that off, partly on a whim, partly because I don’t like having too much of the model hanging over the the edge of the base. Nobody likes massive dangly bits.

The palette was mostly determined by previously completed chaos warriors, but I flipped the dominant colour to a deep red. The pale skin was suggested by the face looking a bit vampiric, a bit like the Emperor of the stars wars movies. Most evil guys have a very sickly, pale pallor, they obviously spend far too much time secreted away in dark towers and deep dungeons. The green flames were a natural contrast to the red robes, and green flames just look magical.

Slowly, very slowly in this case, the chaos warband is coming together. With ten warriors at his side and ten little goatee men scouts, there is a possibility to play skirmish games at this stage. Ideally, there would be at least one more unit before gaming could start in a meaningful way. I have already built the next unit (see my previous post) and hopefully I can get them painted quicker than one model each month!

This last photo shows the sorceror alongside two of the chaos warriors. If we ever play games of Erehwon, these would be the bodyguard/acolytes. While the warriors were painted almost exclusively using contrast paints with no highlights, on the sorceror I did employ some traditional techniques, layering and highlighting. Is there a great difference in the quality of the finish?

* these days, I spend most of my spare time painting canvas rather than toy soldiers

Realm of Chaos Warriors

The first unit of warriors for the Realm of Chaos project are completed. Black armour, red cloaks and white fur makes a striking scheme I have used before and wanted to try again, though this time using mainly contrast paints. There is very little highlighting involved on these figures, it’s mostly glazing with diluted contrast paints. I explained the process in more detail in my previous post. I am happy with the way these turned out, black armour can be flat and dull, so getting the texture and variation there was probably the hardest part. I could also make improvements on the red cloaks, but for now they are done.

With the recently painted ungors, that’s two completed units for this project. I feel I have earned the right to paint a character, so that’s my next job. An old sorcerer model will do very nicely. A chance to stretch my wings a little and add some more detail rather than production line units. That’s what I need now, to keep the interest level high. I find as I get older that I have less patience with painting units, one reason I am keen to exploit the contrast paints in any way I can. 

Contrast Chaos Warriors

I am making some progress with the chaos warriors. Over the weekend I finished half the unit, the remaining half are quite well progressed too. I had the camera set up for commission work so decided to grab a quick shot and waffle a bit about the painting process.

As with most of my work I started with a light undercoat. In the past I have sprayed white, then added a wash and worked from that point. For these figures I primed black all over, then from above with a grey, then dry brushed with white. This gave me a much better range of tonal values, albeit monochromatic to start with, a good base to glaze over with contrast paints. 

I painted the cloaks first as I thought these (front bits) would be hardest to reach with the brush. I used flesh tearer red contrast paint, diluted with a little flow aid and matte medium. This gave a surprisingly good finish, I could easily have left it at this, but I did add a little more shading in the deeper creases using contrast cygor brown, which is a red brown.

The fur trim was washed with skeleton horde contrast, as usual thinned with flow aid and matte medium. I suspect this is how contrast paints are made, with pigment added of course. I then dry brushed with white for an easy, effective, light fur effect. I splashed in other glazes to the fur as I painted the armour, greys, browns, yellow at random, to make it look a bit less uniform, a bit more natural.

The black armour was a bit more fiddly. I used black Templar contrast paint, which has a green/blue tendency over white. Ideally suited to sci fi figures but not my taste. So I glazed with browns and yellows to warm the tone. I then added random patches of grey and highlights with light colours from my palette, and also used white contrast paint to really try to achieve some variation in tone. Black alone is so flat and uninteresting. There was quite a bit of lightening and darkening going on with white, grey, brown and black, some glazing, some stippling, until I was happy with the result. It’s not as simple a process as the fur but then it’s a more complex thing to paint.

Hopefully it will not be too long before I finish the rest of them and I can put up a unit shot. The project is ticking along at a nice pace so far, hopefully I can keep at it, not get distracted by other projects. I spend more time painting canvas than miniatures these days, this Realm of Chaos project could be my swan song.

Ungor Raiders

The first unit in the Realm of Chaos nostalgia project, ten ungor raiders. I would say these are 90% painted with contrast paints and the results are pretty decent. I have been painting using self made glazes over a white undercoat for years so the switch to contrast was not difficult. I found contrast paints, like virtually every paint I use, to be far too thick and diluted them using flow enhancer and matt medium, but maybe that’s just a habit I have picked up.

These are the first unit to emerge from the Realm of Chaos, part of a larger army I have started as a nostalgia project. The plan is to build a small force and play some games over the summer when restrictions have eased. The aim is to play using WHFB fourth edition, a return to my roots, though we might end up using fifth edition as we seem to have more books from that version. They were very similar so we can probably mix and match easily.

Eagle eyed chaos generals for that era will no doubt be aware that ungor did not use bows in those versions, but as easy going gamers we will ignore that little oversight. They are also round based, which probably is no hardship for skirmish troops but might cause some consternation among the wargaming basing police. I will be using rounds on all my figures as I simply prefer the look. As casual gamers we usually can fudge along quite nicely irrespective of rules, bases and the like. 

These figures are, as stated, mostly glazed and I have skimped on a lot of detail. They are designed for gaming and not for entry into painting competition. Having said that, I reckon the standard is good for speed painting and am happy to show close ups to the nerd world.

Contrast Paints review: how to paint using glazes

A new project is a good opportunity to try something new. I decided to try Contrast Paints, having read both good and bad things about them. They seemed to my eye to be very thick glazes, and as I use a lot of glazing in my painting I thought it was high time I put them to the test. 

A good undercoat is essential when glazing. A glaze is translucent, so you will see something of what is beneath. With this in mind I prepared a unit of little goatee men by priming grey all over, then white from above. Then I applied the first glaze, apothecary white straight from the pot, no thinning. When dry it gives a good starting point, a neutral base to work on.

I then dry brushed white to emphasise the details. Next I mixed gryph charger grey and wyldwood, hoping for a mid grey to use on the skin, but the brown won. Still, not a problem, I used this brown on the hairy bits. I also thinned it with flow enhancer and Matt medium to glaze face details, horns and a fade on the lower leg. By the time I had finished the tenth model, the first was dry and I went back in for a second coat of this brown mix on the areas I thought had dried pale or needed stronger shading.

I wanted the skin to be pale but have some variation and definition. Thinned gryph charger grey was applied, trying to keep it on the lower areas and wiping off on the upper sides of arms, chest, head. It’s subtle but you can now see the muscles better defined, especially on the little goatee six packs.

Next phase was the bow and arrows. I used skeleton horde, which is a pale sepia maybe, with some wyldwood added to make a yellow-brown. I applied this on the bows, then thinned it for the arrows.

So now on my palette I have wyldwood, which is a dark brown, the gryph charger blue-grey, and some skeleton yellow. These can be mixed together to make various browns and can be used to finish all the fiddly bits left on the model - the leather bits, bones, loincloths and the like. I used burnt sienna as an undercoat for the darker leather areas. Some areas I just glazed with the murky browns. Finally, if any bits had become too dark, I applied a thin white highlight, to emphasise the pectorals mainly and tidy up any splashes on the skin. I would say the models are 95% contrast paints. 

Grumpy Gnome

The first painting of the new year. I was aiming to get it done at the start of the new year, but there always seemed to be something else to do instead. Still, at least I managed to get him finished in January so I think technically that qualifies as new year. This is a figure by Blacksmith Miniatures that I bought as part of a Kickstarter a few years back. I thought it was high time to try something different, it’s a display figure at scale 55mm. I painted it as a grumpy little gnome traipsing back from the mine, his coal for the week on his back. Looks like he picked up a stowaway at some point. 

Most of the paint used was Golden artists acrylics, having tried them a few times now I think I will rarely buy hobby paints again, these are just so much more pigmented and better quality. I used a limited palette of black, white, yellow ochre and burnt sienna for the bulk of the model. I did have to mix in a little violet to enhance the red of the cap. I reckon I will be painting more things like this in the future. Enough blabber, here’s more photos.

Twelfth Day of Beardmas

 My original intention in this little series was a finale of a newly painted mini, a type I don’t usually paint. However, it is not yet finished and I don’t want to rush it just for the sake of a blog article, so here’s plan B instead. A little compilation of other beards I painted throughout the year. 

 

It’s not a particularly large selection of beards, because I didn’t actually spend that much time hobby painting this year. The first photo of vikings, about half were completed in 2020, but I like the photo of all the berserkers together so why not show them all off. The trio of adventurers, one is obviously smooth chined, but again I liked the photo of them all together.

Not the finale I had planned, which seems quite fitting for 2020. 

Eleventh day of Beardmas

 On the eleventh day of Beardmas.....

Dwarfs at the movies. Or iMovie, to be precise. Moving dwarfs, sort of.....

https://youtu.be/kNIbVTxd9DQ

And that’s a wrap. The dwarfs of Oakenheim have had their few days blinking in the dim light of midwinter, back underground they go for another year. I might add to their ranks later in the year, but it’s not that likely if I am honest. Too many other things eating my hobby time.

Tenth day of Beardmas

 

On the tenth day of Beardmas.....

Say “cheese”

The Dwarfs of Oakenheim. All of them, in one glorious photo. This is a cheat day, all these dwarfs have appeared in the previous nine days. But, it’s taken me more than five years to get them to this stage, so please indulge me showing them off in this one photo. I love it, I think they look awesome all together like this. And if you like this photo, tomorrow’s post will be an extra treat.