Author Archives: Alex

The Leadballoony tribe’s February efforts

28 Sunday Feb 2021

Posted by in Fembruary Challenge

≈ 25 Comments

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Greetings Terrans, how goes it? It has been a while since my last post, but it has been a very busy month in the Leadballoony house, where both my youngest son and I have been both been working hard on our Fembruary offerings. That means that you lucky buggers get to have a double-helping of pics to enjoy, so grab a beverage, strap in & get comfy.

Starting with my stuff & working in chronological order, I kicked off my Fembruary with a trawl through my Bad Squiddo stash & I grabbed ‘Patti’ the Ogre:

I actually converted Patti a bit – the original model is wearing arseless chaps and knickers (I kid you not – go check for yourself), but I sculpted over that little detail to give her a proper pair of troosers. I went for green skin instead of the usual human skintones – no particular reason really, I just fancied painting some different coloured skin, with the face being a particular joy to paint. Finally, I painted the patches of armour in all sorts of different colours & designs, including turquoise & white cheques in the left shoulder – an idea I pinched from krakendoomcool’s Orks, (I never would’ve thought to put those two colours together, so cheers mate!).

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Next up is a Bad Squiddo Alien called ‘Trinity’:

Not much to say about Trin – the mini is quite hard to interpret in places & it took me a while to settle on colours that I was happy with. Not my favourite mini ever, and not even obviously female, but she’s done.

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Next is another Bad Squiddo piece – the B.I.T.C.H. Cyborg:

Again, not too much to say here – she’s a nice mini, very week ankles, nice to paint & was good fun.

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Next up is more Bad Squiddo goodness – the ‘Junkyard Kids’:

I really like these lil’ minis – they kind of remind me on my nieces. I decided to put them on a single base rather than base them individually & painted them nice & bright. The one in blue looks very innocent, until you realise she’s hiding a crowbar behind her back!

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The next three are also Bad Squiddo minis – the ‘Wrenchmouth & Handlers’ set:

I went with a desert raider type scheme for these ladies & I’m really happy with how they turned out. Not sure if the Wrenchmouth itself is female, but I’m guessing so because of the baby one that is being held by one of the handlers.

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Here they all are together, ready to join my all-female gang ‘The Banshees’:

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Next we have a slight change of genre & project. I was looking over my ‘Island of Dr. Moreau’ inspired Ghost Archipelago warband, and I noticed that ‘Niamh Stormcaller’ from the Pantheon of Chaos range was female, so I got her painted up:

She’s is a cracking mini, but there was quite a lot of chopping & sculpting needed to de-chaos her to my satisfaction & then make her more piratical. I’m really pleased with how she came out – more anthropomorphic bird-woman than a ‘because chaos’ Beast(wo)man. A nice tropical colour scheme suits her well I think, and I painted that cool trident dagger with a bit of ‘magic glow’™. She joins my fledgling Ghost Archipelago crew as a Storm Warden… how could I not with a name like Stormcaller!

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Also… while searching my leadpile, I found the 2nd set of Karr-Keel Zombies, and noticed that there are a couple of undead ladies in the set so I painted the set up. I’ll share the whole set in a separate post, but for now, here are the lady-Zombies:

These are lovely minis to paint – Kev Adams at his best if you ask me. I always paint my Zombies the same way – washes only, very messy, loose & free. Now I’ve added Contrast paint to that method & can reliably smash minis like this out really quickly… I’ll never win an award with them, but I just love painting in this way.

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Finally, I managed to squeeze in one last Fembruary piece – this is a special mini I have converted to represent a character in my Spero Secundus campaign – Marog the Sump-Witch:

She is based on the lady-Ghoul from the Warhammer Underworlds Ghoul warband ‘The Grymwatch’. More on the rest of the warband in a later post, but suffice to say that I’m not a fan of the look of GW Ghouls these days – all the bone piercings & skull-bling is just a bit OTT for my taste. I de-cluttered Marog, sculpted some rags on her, and then I painted her in a similar way to my ‘Goblins of Goblin town’ set. One day me & my Droogs are going to play out that bit of the campaign for reals 😊

So that’s it for my Fembruary efforts, but we also have my youngest’s offerings to look at! He’s such a cool guy, so when I explained the concept of Fembruary to him he wanted to take part. We looked through his Mythic Battles: Pantheon minis & picked out 6 female models that caught his eye. First up is a three-fer (a Throuple?) of sisters – Deino, Enyo and Pemphredo, collectively known as the Graeae:

These witches, made famous in the classic ‘Clash of the Titans’, were blind, but they shared one eye and one tooth between them. My Son and I played about with a creepy pallid flesh & after watching the original movie, (where they are portrayed as cannibals) he wanted to add some gore. I’m glad he did, because that brightens these minis up & adds a nice bit of interest.

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Next up is Medea – the love-interest in the classic ‘Jason and the Argonauts’ film:

In the film she is portrayed as the sultry daughter of King Aeetes & high priestess of Colchis. Spoiler alert – she falls in love with Jason & helps him steal the Golden Fleece (too soon?). That’s a nice image to hold on to, but it’s a good job they never made a sequel! There are a few versions of the story in the mythology, but in all of them she is a sorceress, a woman scorned, and generally quite killy, (including killing off her own children with Jason when he buggers off & marries another lady!). The mini itself is a weird one… I had to go look at the original artwork to see what the heck she was supposed to be holding – the picture shows something like a flower disintegrating into soot, so we just painted a kind of black smoke effect. Not the greatest mini ever tbh, but a fun bit of research & worth painting.

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Next up, we went big… like Goddess big, with Athena and her owl:

We had great fun with this mini, and painting at a bigger scale is really nice to do. It’s also pretty useful as a teaching tool, so we took our time & talked through the shading & highlighting process at some length. As a result, there is probably a bit more of my time been put into painting the flesh here, but still mostly my Son’s work.

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Finally, the one mini that my Son was most excited about – the undisputed star of Clash of the Titans & Ray Harryhausen’s finest creation in my opinion – Medusa:

My Son was determined to paint this one by himself as much as possible, so of all the minis, this one has the least parental assistance. We watched Clash of the Titans together for inspiration, we talked about colour schemes, and we planned out how best to approach the mini. I am so proud of what he achieved here – using all the techniques that we had practised together, he worked independently to produce a fine paintjob that is far better than anything I was doing at twice his age… he has just turned 11 btw, so you can see why I’m so impressed! Here’s a final pic of all his efforts this month:

Well, that’s the Fembruary offerings from the Leadballoony clan – I hope you’ve enjoyed seeing what we’ve achieved – I reckon that’s 17 female minis painted between us, (or 20 depending on the gender of the Wrenchmouth, Wrenchmouth pup, and Athena’s Owl)… Not too shabby!

Next post will be a round-up of all the Fembruary efforts from folks that contributed from all over the world. I’ll curate the lot as best I can & present them all as a celebration of the event – hopefully this will coincide with International Women’s Day! (wish me luck because we have a record number of entrants, so it’s a big job this year 😊)

Mythic Battles: Pantheon continued AND a new project!

28 Thursday Jan 2021

Posted by in Ghost Archipelago, Mythic Battles: Pantheon

≈ 17 Comments

Greetings Terrans, I hope this finds you all well. I have two lil’ updates for you today, starting with some reinforcements for my Son’s Mythic Army:

On the left we have King Eurytus of Oechalia… I think! The Mythic Battles folks had him down as ‘Eurystus’, but I can’t find any reference to that name anywhere… Eurytus on the other hand, is a renowned archer who, depending on the author, might’ve challenged Apollo to a shooting contest & got killed for his hubris, (a common theme in Greek Mythology), or possibly he was killed by Heracles as part of a feud over his daughter’s hand, (another common theme).

Next, we have Marsyas – a Satyr who rocked it on the double oboe… (that is an actual instrument, and not a fantastic innuendo by the way). He is famous for challenging Apollo to a music-off, and guess what, he lost & got killed for his hubris… by being flayed alive… I’m getting the feeling that Apollo was a bit of a bell-end, and that the ancient Greeks disapproved of hubris!

Finally, we have a trio of Satyrs – ‘Lustful, drunken woodland gods’… (Wudugast?). Interestingly, in Greek mythology, Satyrs were depicted as men with horse ears & tails, and it was actually the Romans who went with the whole goat vibe… who knew!

All were painted mostly with contrast paints by my Son, (with a little help from me on the most fiddly bits)

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Ok, so now for something of mine – not much to show, just a single model, but he’s a proof-of-concept for a whole new warband and a long-overdue exploration of Frostgrave: Ghost Archipelago.

I was honoured to be invited to join a collaborative Ghost Archipelago project a few weeks back, and have been kicking around ideas since. I knew I wanted to use minis that I already own, and also that I wanted the warband to be unusual and cool, with an oldhammer vibe and a strong pirate theme. I had a good look through my lead pile, and a promising line of possibility involved a load of Pantheon of Chaos minis that I have been sitting on for far too long. I really like the Beastmen in the range – they are proper Realm of Chaos Beast-Men rather than the Broo that modern GW peddle, and I started thinking about the H.G. Wells classic ‘The Island of Dr. Moreau’… In that book, the eponymous doctor experimented with stitching together beasts and elevating them to near-humanity. It’s a cool story but is quite a different kind of sci-fi to the Pantheon of Chaos range, so the PoC minis didn’t really fit the theme very well…

Until, for laughs, I sculpted a Tricorn hat on one of them – a particularly imposing chap that Knightmare Miniatures call ‘C’Chak the Silent’. I got some good feedback on the Facey group, and while the hat helped to prove that they could look more anthropomorphic, I didn’t think it went far enough to ‘humanise’ the mini – it still looked too Chaotic (with a capital ‘C’)… After thinking it over, I decided to go all in and over-sculpted proper clothes onto the chap. I then applied a weathered & ‘sensible’ paint job, and I ended up with this:

Now, I may be biased, but this guy doesn’t scream ‘Realm of Chaos!!’ to me any more… instead he has a humanity about him, despite his bestial form, and he has a nautical flavour to boot! In short, I’m very happy with the result, and as with all good warbands, we have fluff… with apologies to H.G. Wells:

“The noble Heritor Edward Prendick & his crew were en route to the Lost Isles – like all Heritors, Edward felt the inexorable pull of the Crystal Fountain, the source of all his powers. During the journey, their ship got caught in an incredible storm & they were wrecked on a lonely and mysterious island, where they were subdued and captured by bestial men loyal to the nefarious scientist Dr. Moreau. The Doctor was obsessed with animal/human hybridisation, and he proceeded to experiment on Prendick and his crew, keeping them drugged while he surgically altered them into parodies of humanity, before conditioning them to obedience in ‘the House of Pain’…

However, the Doctor had not reckoned on the superhuman fortitude of the Heritor taint, and was thus unprepared when an enraged Prendick managed to regain enough awareness to break his bonds & take his revenge. Now inhabiting a huge reptilian frame & with Heritor strength, Prendick made short work of the Doctor, crushing the man’s skull before tearing off the hand that had caused him so much pain… Prendick wears that same hand on his belt as a reminder of how he became the creature he is today, for the cruel truth is that, along with his crew, his humanity is slipping away piece by piece. Every day it gets harder for them to remember their lives as men and women, and every day they grow closer to the beasts they resemble. Now, accompanied by those of the Doctor’s former experiments that retain enough awareness, Prendick and his crew continue their search for the Crystal Pool. Their quest is simple – they seek the pool in the desperate hope that it can restore their stolen humanity…”

So that’s all folks – there will be plenty more on this warband, but first – Fembruary!! I’ll be adding some serious muscle to my all-girl Banshee gang, while my Son will be adding some fab females from the Mythic Battles: Pantheon range… I’m looking forward to seeing what you guys do!!

Mythic Battles: Pantheon – introducing the Amazons

13 Wednesday Jan 2021

Posted by in Dragon Rampant, Fembruary Challenge

≈ 81 Comments

Greetings Terrans, quick post today – hot on the heels of his excellent skirmish force from Mythic Battles: Pantheon, my youngest has just finished up a quartet of Amazons. They were fiddly little buggers, so I helped with some of the trickier areas, but most of the work & all of the design choices are his. Check it out:

My son really wants these to be an elite option in combat and at range, so in Dragon Rampant we’ll be fielding them as Elite Foot with the addition of a fantasy rule called ‘Wizardling’. This gives them a reduced access to some spells, one of which is a suitably shooty spell, this we can simulate their deadliness with bow, sword and spear. Here they are with their fellow mortals:

These ladies form a nice segue into another topic – that of my now-annual ‘Fembruary Challenge’!  It’s a simple affair, just paint & post one or more female miniatures from your piles-of-shame, in the name of fair representation within the hobby. Just link back to this post, or ping me directly & I’ll grab a pic and include your entry in the final round-up in early March (usually by International Women’s Day, 8th of March)

Given that this is intended as an encouragement to think about inclusion in the hobby then it makes sense if your entries are kick-ass ladies, and not the product of some socially awkward mini-sculptor’s sexy fantasies… Anything dodgy & I’ll omit it from the round-up, otherwise, have at it! I usually pick my favourite of the bunch – no prizes I’m afraid, but a boatload of kudos to you as an official Fembruary Winner!!! 😊

Laters potaters

Happy Commencement of New Arbitrary Terran Orbital Cycle

04 Monday Jan 2021

Posted by in Dragon Rampant, Side projects

≈ 22 Comments

Greeting Terrans, and if you are reading this, congratulations on getting to 2021 with your sanity intact. What a year eh? I’m a firm believer that pushing one’s comfort zone is good for your growth & wellbeing, but last year really did stress that outlook to a whole new level. It seems that every single assumed ‘truth’ that I understood about myself and my life in 2019 was deeply flawed… Things I thought were unconditional had conditions. Stuff I believed could never happen happened. Things that I took for granted were taken away, or were very nearly lost. The shock of these events was disorientating and deeply unpleasant, but I’ve certainly learned a lot & grown along the way. Here is a summary of my key takeaways:

  • People (and by extension, societies) are not always rational – get over it
  • A life is precious to those it affects, otherwise it is an abstract – get over it
  • Even the most secure workplace can be forced to make cuts – get over it
  • Fair-weather friends are just that – get over it
  • Some people can’t disagree without being disagreeable – get over it
  • I am not the Covid police – get over it
  • Never miss an opportunity to show someone you love that you love them
  • I wouldn’t want to swap my issues for anyone else’s issues
  • Get rid of shit that doesn’t enhance your life (and don’t replace it with other shit)
  • Don’t make your happiness & self-worth contingent on anyone or anything
  • Staying fit is hard… Being unfit is also hard… chose your hard!
  • Take a moment to be grateful for what you have every single day

I have cleared up my life & ditched a whole bunch of crap I didn’t need, both literal and metaphorical. I have refocused my energies into areas that deserve my attention and efforts, and I have pulled back from those areas that don’t. I feel a little older & maybe a bit more cynical, but I’m a hell of a lot wiser in terms of understanding those things that are most important to me. I honestly think that one day I’ll look back on 2020 as a defining year that led to some positive personal outcomes despite the trials and tribulations along the way.

Anyway, I know you came here to see painted minis rather than listen to my bollocks, (ok, not literally – that would be weird), so let’s get to it. During my mass-clear-out I found a whole load of minis that came with two kickstarters from Monolith Games, (Mythic Battles: Pantheon and Conan) and Rising Sun from CMON. I went through a phase of backing shit like this, but with no idea how I was going to paint all the stuff, learn the game, play, etc…  Pretty wasteful really, and definitely not in keeping with my drive to clear out crap.

I decided that the games per se didn’t do it for me & so I got rid of all the associated guff, but I thought that the minis were ideal for having some Father/Son time with my youngest during Christmas lockdown – if he fancied it. We had a chat, and he was pretty positive about it, so he helped me to sort the minis by type & selected those he most wanted to paint. A short time later & we had cranked out Ares, a trio of Argonauts, five Hoplites and Leonidas – I helped by painting in parallel with him to speed the process up, but not by doing it all for him. Here’s what we ended up with:

Nice!!

As we were painting, we naturally got to talking about having a game with them, so I got out my copy of Dragon Rampant & worked out a list for his Ancient Greeks, and another using my Greek-themed Dark Elves. DR is a cracking little rule set, very easy to pick up & understand, and is totally agnostic when it comes to minis… Perfect for a simple throw-down with a youngling! We played a couple of games over the weekend, winning one each for a very satisfactory outcome:

So, in a roundabout way, 2020 has led me up to this. Having a good clear-out unearthed these minis, and lockdown gave me ample opportunity to spend quality time with my youngest. This surplus of time meant that the slow art of painting and gaming managed to get a look-in against the many & various forms of electronic entertainment – no mean feat these days!

Most of all, 2020 taught me to be grateful for that quality time with him, and I am looking forward to more of the same – he’s already plotting what units he needs to add to make his first army even more formidable 😊

Anyway, that’s all for now. Keep buggering on ya buggers & I’ll catch you next time.

Last Post of 2020

23 Wednesday Dec 2020

Posted by in Daemon Ink

≈ 21 Comments

Greetings Terrans, this will be my last post this year – a few new minis to share as I round out my Warband for Heresyofus’ Daemon Ink event. I completed the rest of the Elucidian Starstriders to round out the warband to 14 (Marines count as 2), so in the interests of rounding out the numbers, I also added Sergeant ‘Ripper’ Jackson to the party. Stylistically she restores a bit of balance to the party, as it was starting to look a bit too heavy on the Steampunk aesthetic.

So from the top, let’s go through the warband – all names are TBC but some light background fluff is starting to take shape in my thoughts:

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Inquisitor xxxxxxxx – Vigilantia, the watch-fire in the dark – Ordo Chronos (because timey-wimey stuff is cool). Agenda is unknown, but whatever it is, it is sufficiently grave to warrant a slow shift towards the radical end of the Inquisitorial spectrum.

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Xenos companion & psyker – mysterious Harlequin Shadowseer xxxxxxxx who accompanies the Inquisitor at all times, but to what end?

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Brother-Tutor Marine xxxxxxxxx from the 888th Mentor Legion, assigned to the group at the request of the Inquisitor… Whether the motivation is to observe and learn, or to be vigilant and constrain is unknown.

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Astra Millitarum Veteran xxxxxxxxx, a tough, no-nonsense individual, completely loyal to Inquisitor xxxxxxx & friendly rival to Brother-Tutor xxxxxxxxxx

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Rogue Trader xxxxxxxxx, attached to the Inquisitor by mutual agreement – the Inquisitor benefits from her resources and discretion, while she benefits from the Inquisitor’s access to highly classified intelligence and artefacts.

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Rejuvenat Adept xxxxxxxxx, Chief Medical Officer to Rogue Trader xxxxxxxxxx, responsible for xxxxxxx’s longevity treatments.

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Tech-Adept Explorator xxxxxxxxx, Chief Engineer & techno-historian, part of Rogue Trader xxxxxxxxxx’s crew, but as with all priests of Mars, his true motivation is his own.

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Death Cult Assassin xxxxxxxxx, a superlative bladeswoman, xxxxxxxx is loyal only to Rogue Trader xxxxxxxxxx, and guards her fiercely.

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Voidmaster xxxxxxxxxxxx, leads an elite cadre of Void Guild soldiery, and is contracted to Rogue Trader xxxxxxxx. He is an experienced leader & tactician, and he expects the best from himself and his team in discharging their contract. He is staunchly loyal to his Voidsmen in return.

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Voidswoman xxxxxxxxxxx, second in command to xxxxxxxxxxxx, she exemplifies the duty & honour expected of the Void Guild.

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Voidsman xxxxxxxxxx – Void Guild veteran

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Voidsman xxxxxxxxxx – Void Guild veteran

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Voidsman xxxxxxxxxx – Void Guild veteran & heavy weapon operator

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‘Voidsman’ xxxxxxxxxx – Void Guild mascot, guard & scout

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Here’s a few pics of different groups within the warband:

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And a final team photo:

So that’s it from me for 2020 folks – I wish you all a safe & happy Christmas, enjoy it however you can. Fingers crossed that 2021 is less of a shit-show!

Found Daemons

14 Monday Dec 2020

Posted by in Daemon Ink

≈ 22 Comments

Greetings Terrans, a slightly bizarre little post from me today, I’ve been a bit of a hobby butterfly & got side-tracked… Not my fault though – I had an interesting challenge from Mark over at Hereseyofus – ‘do you think you could make a few lesser Daemons’ (for his Daemon Ink campaign) … well, what could I say? Of course, I agreed, but didn’t have any actual Daemons to hand, just a ridiculous pile of bits, a shit load of glue, some Greenstuff and a head full of dreams.

First things first, with any challenge like this, I like to set some parameters and guidelines to frame the project, and after a bit of mulling, I came up with the following:

1: No money to be spent – if it ain’t in the bits-crate (it’s too big to be a bits-box) then it ain’t happening

2: A proper unit of 10, with Leader, Musician & Standard (old-school), and with a solid look to unite them, but…

3: Proper mixed up Daemons from no particular Chaos power – not too uniform, I wanted influences from across the animal kingdom and beyond

4: Disturbing rather than cheesy

5: Quick and easy to finish with contrast paints and a relaxed & messy style

Wading through the bits-crate produced a goodly amount of Sylvaneth bits, and some random Dark Elf cavalry (as you do – some half-arsed project idea from a while back no doubt). Hmmm… 5 horses… that’s 10 pairs of legs right there! A quick bit of tree, a Genestealer skull and a DE cavalry weapon arm, and I had this in hand:

Promising!

I quickly got to work and assembled 9 more, fiddled & fettled them, and then broke out the putty… A few days later the paint went on, and I ended up here:

Chaotic AF!!

I roughly painted them in 5 pairs, with each pair getting a different contrast paint as the start point. I then went back in with washes, drybrushing, gunk, blood, technical, etc… minimum effort really, just fart-arsing about until it looked ok. Here they are in fives & with angles:

I must admit that I’m pretty pleased with this effort from essentially a disparate pile of bits, and I hope you like ‘em too! I wish I’d done them all with the paler skin tone, but fuck it – chaos is as chaos does  😊