Gone to Ground…

Hello folks, just a quick note to confirm that a) I’m not dead, incarcerated, abducted, ill or awol, and b) I haven’t burned my brushes in some spectacular artistic rage-quit tantrum. No, I’m afraid that my recent lull has a far more mundane explanation – my house is a building site at the moment, and 40% of it is out of action so I have nowhere practical to paint or model. That, and a sudden influx of OU work has effectively seen me cease any meaningful hobby time. Is it fun? Hell no, but it isn’t permanent either, and all things pass with time.

I’m really looking forward to the building work finishing soonish and picking up where I left off – assuming I can remember which end of the brush to hold! Meanwhile, I continue to follow those blogs that I enjoy & so get my hobby kicks vicariously for a while, (and boy, is there some great stuff going on out there!). Keep on trucking peeps, I’ll catch you on the flip-side.

Techno-barbarian village completed

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Happy Friday folks, it has taken longer than anticipated, but my Barbarian village from Scotia Grendel is finally finished! They are pretty much stock apart from the addition of a few 40k bits and bobs here and there – I’m pretty chuffed with how they came out. Here’s a photo dump of the whole lot, plus a few bods to give you an idea of scale:

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^ 2 sets of ‘Chieftain’s hut with storage tent’, plus the previously completed Elephant skull temple thing in the top photo

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^ 2 sets of Barbarian Huts

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^ The whole village together

That is quite a set of themed scenery there! I’ve got a ton of ideas on how to tie this lot in with scenarios – I think they work really well with my techno-barbarians as the occupants, but they also lend themselves nicely to Orks (of which I have many awaiting paint!). They would work well for the Book of the Astronomican campaign ‘Wolftime’, as well, don’t you think? Hmmm…. Now that would be a good one to tick off the gaming bucket list! I might even get some 28mm scale dinosaurs to complement the set, get a bit of a pulpy game organised…  Many many options :-)

Anyway, I’m glad to have these off the painting desk – I’m aiming to tackle my version of Mean-Machine over the bank holiday weekend, plus I have the start of a new Frostgrave campaign booked in for Saturday night. Hopefully I’ll have an update early next week! Peace out dudes :-)

A most barbarous village!

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Happy Monday chaps, I hope you are all well! Just a quick post from me this week – it has been a bit of a funny one on the hobby front… Firstly, and probably most significantly, I didn’t make it to Salute this year. A prior (and distinctly underwhelming) commitment prevented my attendance. Secondly, the same commitment kept me away from a GW store until late in the day, so I missed out on all the ‘happy birthday dear Space Marine’ goodies… I really, really wanted the book and the mini… I was extremely lucky, and was able to pick up the Marine from a friend, but no chance on the book :-/

It has also been a bit funny on the painting front… funny as in ‘I haven’t painted any minis this week’! I did finish off the sculpting for this guy (really going for the Mean Machine look here), and got him undercoated:

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The undercoat looks a bit weird because I’m trying a technique I have read about – he got a black undercoat with a white zenith undercoat sprayed on top of the wet black spray… He’s ready for some paint to go on, but he’ll have to wait a bit because I’ve got this lot to finish up:

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This is a set of ‘Barbarian Huts’ from Scotia Grendel Productions, and is a bit of an indulgence if I am honest… I wanted some scenery for my Techno-barbarians, but didn’t want to go all ash-waste/mad max with it. The buildings are solid blocks of resin, and they took some cleaning up and a bit of repair here and there, but the overall quality and detail is pretty darn good! I’ve embellished the huts with a scattering of 40K bits and bobs, made repairs where needed, and applied the base coat thus far. I also pushed ahead and finish up the ‘Barbarian King’s Longhouse’ to nail down the look. It is the biggest and most complex piece, and I’m pretty chuffed with how it came out. I had great fun with the lichen and moss on the stonework, and I shamelessly stole the ‘bloody handprint’ idea from Krautscientist and his excellent Chaos Knight, the Warrior King ‘Gilgamesh’. I imagine the warriors of the Azmaa ritually cutting their hands and adding their prints for luck as they head off to battle… “Witness Me!!!”   Anyhow, here it is, along with some minis for scale:

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I’ll be cracking on with the rest of the village this week – the aim is to have them done by Sunday. After that, things are going to get a bit weird because we’ve got the builders in and the bulk of the house will be unusable for quite some time… Not sure how it is all going to pan out as yet, but I suspect that life, (and therefore hobby), is going to be a bit disjointed for a while. We’ll see how it goes :-)