Mortarion WIP

My largest commission piece to date.

Quick Prep for DnD Festivities

Some unbased but painted minis to the left and the Festive DnD session to the right.

Autocannon Marine

1/10 Autocannon Marines Painted.

Centaur

Some of my figures arrived from @ragingheroes today. I had to build and paint the beautiful centaur before doing anything else. What a wonderfully demented sculpt. The details are fantastic. Top work guys, well worth the wait!

Earth Elemental

Can the village guard beat the lava fuelled earth elemental? Finished these tonight. The knights are sculpted by Perry Miniatures and the elemental is from Arcadia Quest.

DnD Torture Chamber

Torture Chamber complete! Rack, iron maiden, acid pool and various accessories painted. All ready for DnD in the week.

Scratch Built DnD Bits

All the DnD features that I made for tonight's session today. From left to right: three animated weapons, an ogre-faced fountain, a fish pond and three oozes.

Crates!

Tonight I got carried away. I thought I'd base my new crates. I painted one, then just one more, before I knew it they were all done!

Scenery

Commission work for a client.

Mechanicus Scenery

Work for a client.

The Valance Duo and Bitey

I finished my trio of characters ready for next week. Bitey ate an alchemist and his potions at an early age. Having spent years transforming into everything that he encountered, he lost track of his original form. Now the goblin mainly adopts the form of Cadim Valance (A talented translator for nobles and merchants) and his "sister" Casance.

Little Scenery for DnD

On Monday I managed to get some little scenery bits painted up for DnD. I've been a DM for 13-14 years and it is something I've never actually achieved or used before. Always on the up!

Standing Stones

Tonight's painting progress. The standing stones. Perfect for our rpg games or even as objective markers for 40k.

Canis Aureus Makeover

My Canis Aureus Chapter are getting a new makeover for 8th edition. As if I haven't got enough models to paint... My intention is to repaint all of my marines before the new editions release.

First Free Hand

I decided to have a go at a bit of free hand today with Karael my first dreadnought. I'm happy with how he has turned out. He has the right mix of absent minded and terrifying.

Fruitkin

Fruitkin for DnD converted from fantasy miniatures.

Dwarven Pirate

Wraith Blades

Painted for a Client

Nolzur’s Marvelous Miniatures: Mind Flayers

Nolzur’s Marvelous Miniatures / Pathfinder Deep Cuts

Pathfinder Deep Cuts and Nolzur’s Marvelous Miniatures are a relatively new range of unpainted, pre-primed miniatures available to buy for the small price of £3.99.

Perfect for anyone starting out in the hobby and ideal to anyone that fancies trying their hand at painting.

My girlfriend picked up two packets for me and I started painting them right away.  The paint goes on smoothly and they are lovingly detailed.  They are a vast improvement in material when compared to the Pathfinder Bones range, which have a tendency to be warped and need a thorough wash before priming.

When painting the hell hounds I used a purple wash as I needed something spectral on the table top for the next upcoming campaign session.  

By far my favourite was painting these little blighters.  No goblin in my eyes has ever stood up to the cuteness of the Pathfinder goblins and now I have three that live up to the illustrations.

eBay Cultists

Last week I purchased 20 cultists on eBay for a bargain price.  They came today and I painted 11 and one custom genestealer cultists/daemonette (Back left)

Trying to keep to my rule of when it turns up paint it, otherwise it will just become part of the never ending pile...

Creating Chaos Spawn

Illustration from the Chaos Space Marine codex

"A Chaos Spawn is a mindless mutant creature who once belonged to one of the intelligent races of the galaxy and who has become so mutated through his or her servitude to Chaos that he or she has devolved into a twisted and insane abomination. Those seeking immortality and power through the ultimate attainment of daemonhood in service to the Ruinous Powers face the constant possibility of being reduced to Chaos Spawn, either by accumulating too many mutations or being cast aside by their Chaos patrons as unworthy of further advancement because of their consistent failure to serve the will of the Chaos Gods. More simply, they may lack the inherent qualities required for successful leadership of other Chaotic servants and thus be of no further use to their patrons. Chaos warband members who are transformed into Chaos Spawn will either be abandoned by their former comrades or kept as pets or as cannon fodder, to be herded into battle along with the rest of the Lost and the Damned." - Warhammer Wiki

Stepping into the world of Chaos with my Space Marine army I was expecting Chaos Spawn to look like a mix of the Thing and Tetsuo in Akira. Instead we are faced with this:

Rather than investing in these PG certificate daemons, I decided to make my own out of spare bits and greenstuff. this is the result.

In making this chaos spawn I wanted to get across the hopelessness of the champion that has been corrupted.  Cursed for being unworthy of the power that they could not comprehend.  I intend to make another five in time, but for now this little chap should do.

Obliterators

In my pursuit of making a Chaos army on the cheap I have decided to make obliterators and maulers from bits of old marines that I had lying around. These are my first big conversions that I have attempted.

So far I have finished three obliterators and started on one mauler.  I remembered to take some progress shots this time. They have not only performed incredibly well on the table but also received a lot of compliments during games.

Developing the Tau

A week ago my girlfriend Marisa decided that she did not want her tyranid army anymore.  Despite their sparkly exterior, she felt she would play Warhammer 40k more if she had an army she enjoyed playing.  After some consideration she dispensed with her army on ebay and we swiftly purchased a new one with the money (Also double the size!)

In order to fully support her decision I wanted to come up with a paint scheme that was quick to complete but effective.  Once she had decided on a scheme I got to work on a stealth suit and a kroot.

The stealth suit came out far better than I had expected. Edging miniatures is not my strength as I have really shaky hands, but considering my handicap I was pretty happy with the final result.  It took me around 20 mins to do from start to finish.

This kroot took me around ten minutes.  I wanted to come up with a scheme that was really quick and easy as she has 34 of them. A base of purple, with two lighter purples as a highlight. A dark green for the clothing and weapons, a wash of black and then an edging of light mint green to finish.

Neither are properly based as we will do them all at once.  I am hoping I get the chance to paint one or two more because it was great fun.

A Knight Approaches

A friend acquired two imperial knights for a mere £80.  He didn't need both so I bought one.  Even though the pink had some appeal, I wanted to match it to my army.  Before painting this the Deredeo was the largest miniature I had painted.  

Sticking to my policy of trying to paint miniatures the day I get them, I painted this the same day I received it and finished the highlights the next morning. Despite my apprehension I am very happy with him.

Gottfried the Imperial Knight

Arcadia Quest Inferno

It finally arrived and as soon as the box was open I started painting.

The first was this burly gentleman and today I completed an entire team and a pet for our Arcadia Quest Pets Campaign Session. They came out on top too :D

A Heretic and the Loyalists

With my games expanding I am allying with different factions.  this means that my heretical Canis Aureus cannot hack it anymore, I need some loyalists to ally with Imperial factions.

The Loyalists

Today I painted some loyalist marines and also one of my head heretics: Ferenus Gothchannius Biobelis

Ferenus Gothchannius Biobelis

The Deredeo

After a fair bit of swearing, some greenstuff and assistance from Marisa I finally built my Deredeo Pattern Dreadnought. My first Forge World Vehicle that I have purchased. Hopefully he will live up to expectations.

Eros

Eros of the Half-Pint Heartthrobs 

Deest

Deest is my converted daemon to be used as a proxy for a certain Catachan hero in my heretical guard army.

A Mentor in a Friend

One of my paintings from 2014

While I am a self-taught artist and have had moderate success in earning out of my hobby/addiction, painting miniatures was completely new to me. The skills were transferable to a degree but there was a learning curve. Painting something 3D is very different to painting a 2D picture. 

My dear friend Ben, a passionate miniature painter, taught me everything he knew and even lent me the DVDs that he had used to skill up over the years.

Now, in life I have not received this kind of passing down of knowledge often. People tend to be guarded or keep their skills close to their chest.  Much to my frustration when I had questions early on in the hobby, no one would give me straight answers.  I didn't know that I had to wash some plastics and resins or how to properly maintain tiny brushes.  Ben gave me all the knowledge I needed and taught me all the basics and beyond.

In April 2016 I started this journey in order to improve and through this knowledge I have ended up getting some commission work and it has made my tabletop experiences look a lot better.

The painting DVDs Ben lent me were the Dark Sword painting series.  I would highly recommend them to any novice or seasoned painter wanting to up their skill set.

After watching the first DVD I attempted to put my skills into practice and painted a Reaper Bones series miniature. My DnD character was a goliath rogue, so I wanted to make her look good for the session.  I used a 2p coin for the base and mixed my colours to create highlights.

With a hint of Blood for the Blood God texture paint I was thrilled with how she came out.  After this I embarked on painting my Zombicide base set, which took a few months to finish.

Since then I haven't looked back and have painted well over four hundred miniatures in under a year, mainly sticking to fantasy or 40k miniatures but I have branched out a little bit since.

In regards to Ben and his mentoring.  I am thankful to have such a generous and enthusiastic teacher to start me off in the hobby.  If it wasn't for him my transfer into miniature painting would have taken a lot longer.

A New Hobby

Last year I started out on a new hobby.  A combination of starting to play DnD with miniatures and being re-introduced to Warhammer 40,000 led to me picking up a paintbrush and applying my skills to miniature painting.

What started out as just putting a fresh coat of paint onto minis turned into a full scale hobby and addiction, and even some commissions as my technique improved.

I actually painted my first two figures back on the 30th of December 2015.

The two at the front are my work and the one skulking at the back is Marisa's

In early January I focused on painting a handful of cheap miniatures I picked up for free at our local Games shop, Marquee Models.  On the 9th January 2016 I moved onto my Space Marines.

They were all re-based a month ago but the paint jobs remain unchanged.

After this I took it upon myself to paint a base sets worth of Zombicide Black Plague.  This was in an effort to improve my skills so that I was ready for Blood Rage.  From the 23rd of June to the 31st of August 2015, I managed to paint the entire set of zombies and a bunch of heroes (None of the starting 6).

I started with a freshly dead look. Pasty fleshy and angry.  After some time this got pretty old so I moved on to...

The carnival crew!  Day of the Deadish zombies/NPCs for DnD. I enjoyed the colour scheme but felt painting anymore would make them less special.

Deciding to go for a more zombie theme I went for the rotting green. Slightly less realistic but effective. 

On Instagram I saw some great two colour zombies. I decided to try two individuals to see how they turned out.  I was pretty happy and when I get back to painting the extra kickstarter zombies, I shall paint a few more like this.

Once I only had a few zombies left I realised that none of the zombies were particularly horrible. I decided to make a handful look like they had been feasted upon.

These two fellas were customised with spare parts from a Bolt Action unit. the miner's pick and the backpack make them stand out from the norm a little.

Finally I needed some ghosts for DnD so I came up with this ghost colour scheme using a green wash on white.  Possibly the quickest painting process but it looks pretty effective. 

Once the characters and zombies were complete I took an indefinite break from Zombicide and moved onto the huge host of other projects that I had piling up.  They taught me a lot of different techniques and I feel that my skills progressed leaps and bounds.