Wednesday, September 29, 2010

Orc Boyz...Fight Scene #3 & The Oh No Orc




Well...they don't always fight each other. Since this unit is supposed to be fighting zombies, I need to play that up. What better way to do that than have an orc throwing a zombie. Afterall there is a size difference.




And yes the guy in front in the above pic is another of my homage to Victoria's models.



These guys were just pinned to the bases, so that the painter could take them apart and paint them separately and then reassemble to the filler base. It is a jigsaw puzzle in a way.....
Hopefully, after tonight my workspace will be starting to return to normal, amazing how a little bit a damage can throw such a huge monkey wrench into my hobby time.



Saturday, September 25, 2010

Orc boyz....Fight Scene #2



Here's the next fight scene. Have at it boyz.



I wanted this one to be a bit more dynamic than the previous.


And since I'm not painting or basing these, I decided early on that I would need to make some adjustments to heights and such on the basing. The white stuff you are seeing is not poster putty, but actually rock hard Aves apoxie sculp.






As always, much more to follow....but first I need to repair some damages received recently by all of this rain that we have been receiving. My work area has been compromised by stormwater, so now most all of my stuff is spread all over the place in other rooms. We'll get back to normal when the Contractor re-does the flooring, hopefully this coming week.



Wednesday, September 22, 2010

Orc boyz....Fight Scene #1


When you do the rank and file boys, I think its a must to have some fights in the back ranks. Its over-the-top fun if you ask me. It makes for good character in the unit and keeps the rank and file interesting especially in the back ranks.


For the first fight scene, I wanted to essentially keep it simple. Here I am just starting to work with these models for the first time and I've just built a few of the boyz to get the general hang of the pieces. It takes me a bit to get into the flow of them, to see what works, what doesn't, what joints can be manipulated, etc.


This type of fights scene has been done a lot, but I have always liked it. I knew that I had to do one. The next scene we will push it a bit further and that next one will lead into the next and the next and so on.


Its just the beginning.







Orc BOYZ!!....It Begins....


I've been converting lots of fantasy orcs lately, as I'm doing a bit of commission converting work and also building my own army. These are a few of the commission orcs, I'll have more pics of them and the unit in the next few posts.
Every single orc has been converted in some sort of way, not a single one looks the same or will be repeated throughout the units.

Wish these boyz had a few more weapons that might be the most displeasing thing about these models, is the lack in variety so. Weapon and head conversions are very needed.







The one pictured above is sort of my homage to Victoria's wonderful orcs that she did years ago, I think you can still find them on coolminiornot.com

I've got two units of 25 to build and also a unit of goblin wolf riders. Also started building the black orcs for my personal army.
I think the ork 40k bike icon looks pretty cool as a banner icon. I'll be using that idea when I build my army.

You'll note the undead parts strewn about the figures. The commission was for the orcs to essentially beat up some undead for a bit of eyecandy. So I have incorporated zombies in this unit and skeletons in the other unit.


You'll also see some converted 40k Nobs, these will mostly be used in the front ranks. The big boyz are the toughest and up front. And they barely fit on the 25 mm bases, and barely rank up.

I'll also be doing the typical orc fighting orc in the back ranks for more eyecandy. This is just the beginning.

Tuesday, September 14, 2010

Its a Chaos Spawn Thing...Part 3

Yes it is. This is one of the models that got me really into converting.
Lots of pieces and such coming together to make a cool model. It dates back to 2002 or 2003, can't quite remember, and was part of Khorne beastmen army.


Head is from the beastmen standard, lower jaw from the ogre head on the base, not sure what I was thinking at the time with the orc mouth. A tyranid limb and some plasti-card on the other limb for sharp pointy things. And the big hand can't remember where that came from. The metal body was left over from one of my old minotaurs.



The spikes on the back were some rolled Super Sculpey, something I rare use any more.



One of the older possessed heads, licking up the leftovers, you simply must recycle.






Friday, September 10, 2010

Chaos Spawning Season...Part 2: Blue Spawn

This time its Blue Spawn. I really like the look of the model, but in hindsight I wish I would have changed how the troll body leans so far forward. I also attempted to subdue my normal approach to painting blue, making it pop less and also more flat in appearance.
Use of the ogre head and giving it tusks I think worked out quite well. I also think the color selection helped with a nice contrast.

In hindsight though, I kind of wish I would have done the tusks and such in the orange colors that I used on Brown Spawn. I am going to have to remember in my future spawn making to do conversion of the lacerated skin like what this former chaos troll model has. I think that is a cool effect.

All in all, I'm happy with the two spawn and look forward to doing more of them in the future.

While thinking of spawn, it leads me back to the one I built for my beastmen army, back a few years ago. It appeared in the U.S. White Dwarf #323 and was on GW US's website for awhile. Its still one of my favorite models. So in the next post I'll go back in time, dust him off and post some pics of him.

Moving forward in the next few posts...I've placed the marauders and warriors of chaos army on hold for a bit. I've fallen way behind in getting ready for the tournament season this fall and none of my armies are very playable in 8th edition. So with that in mind, I'm going to attempt to get the Khorne Demon Army serviceable, it is the closest to being playable in large point games. To do that I'll be bolstering its roster with some old school metal bloodletters, and with some new style bloodletters to act as Khorne heralds on foot all armored up, as well as some banners. And I'll also be returning to fantasy orcs, and have some more random 40k models in the works.

And for you newer readers of my blog, I finally got around to figuring out how to go back and do labels, so it should be easier for people to find things.

NFL Debut...

As I watched only the first half of last nights NFL season opener, a couple of things popped into mind. One of things deals with the whole Reggie Bush, Heismen Trophy confiscation bid by the national media, NCAA, and USC. Last I checked O.J. Simpson was sitting in a jail cell and was a former USC running back. For those wanting to confiscate Reggie Bush’s trophy, they ought to be clamoring for the Trust to confiscate / vacate the one that was given to O.J. Simpson also, wasn’t what O.J. did in the not so recent past with the robbery and kidnapping charges a more despicable act than Reggie Bush and his family accepting money agents/boosters while he was playing at USC. I wonder if USC still displays O.J. memorabilia. Ah…on second thought what do I care…go Big Ten err….or is it Big Twelve of Ten….

As I watched the pregame, I saw all of these players from both sides come out on the field and hold one finger in the air. Okay what was that about? Then the announcers said something about it being a player solidarity statement about the upcoming CBA. Really? That’s smells like the word “strike” to me, meaning no NFL football next season. Are both sides stupid enough to do this, in my opinion the answer is: YES. And oh players this is just one fan’s perspective, I DON’T CARE ABOUT THE DEMANDS OF MILLIONAIRES. All I as a fan care about is come Sunday in the fall is that I turn on the TV around noon and see pro football being played. You are all overpaid, just as much as the Owner’s overcharge for ticket prices, the in stadium food, the parking, the seat licenses. Next up will be pay-per-view and the end of my time watching pro football.

Brat Farve, looked like the QB that I had to endure while with the Pack, except with more gray hair.

The Saints opening drive, looked sharp, but after that was not so good.

The referee threw a flag for illegal procedure on Drew Brees in the shotgun formation for a gesture to set up the snap of the football. Wha….? The plays before that he did basically the same thing, hell Brat Farve did the same thing. The play after that he did the same thing. Where were the flags for that? Strange.

Then this morning I watched Milk Toast – Mike & Mike on the four letter with a numeral network. Marcelus Wiley was applauding the actions of the players solidarity. I normally like listening to the big guy, but I as a fan cannot understand his perspective and completely agree with Golic. It was funny, the nerdy Mike looked like he was appalled and also scared by Golic’s outburst and that the two former players were yelling at each other. Then they kept playing that clip of the players from both teams coming out on the field, and I kept focusing on the same thing, where was the diva Bret Favre while this was going on? Oh….there he is… turning his back to the whole thing on the sidelines, interesting.

Bottomline is, if both sides cannot agree on a new CBA and there are no NFL games or even a shortened season next year, they both deserve to lose the fan support that they now take for granted. Last I checked college football is just as exciting to watch if not more-so.

And thinking about football, if you like it like I do, you need to goto Czabe's blog, you'll find the link over on the righthand side of my blog, and play the audio/video clip of him with Bob & Brian out of Milwaukee discussing robot football and concussions. Its a short but funny clip.

Monday, September 6, 2010

Go-Karting Incident...No Pumpkins Hurt



So, with the holiday weekend and the nice weather , it was determined, that we would get out the go-karts and run on the 1/8 mile dirt oval. Now we do this quite often, and we're all pretty good and pretty competitive, or at least I was until this happened. Not all my fault I was primarily attempting to avoid someone that spun out in the corner, hit their kart just slightly but hard enough to damage my kart, bending the control arm and tie rod, which caused the lose of control and then I'm along for the ride straight off the banking of turn 2, and into the pumpkin patch.

And yes no pumpkins were harmed by this accident.


So now I have some repair work.

Friday, September 3, 2010

It's Chaos Spawning Season...Brown Spawn!

Well here is the first of the pair of spawn that I have been working on for my Warriors of Chaos army....I introduce you to Brown Spawn.

I think it turned out pretty good, painted up fast and easily. The spines coming out of the back I was going to paint in the bone and claw colors, but as I went I decided the model needed a bit of color.


I'm glad I did that, as that bit of color I think makes it pop.

The spawn kit is definitely one of my favorite kits to work with.





Wednesday, September 1, 2010

Warriors of Chaos...army update 1st Chaos Knight

Very much like the exalted on foot, I wanted to have a test knight for paint scheme, prior to building the others. So here he is....

I sculpted the Slaanesh symbols on the shoulder pads. And did a bit of freehand on the cape, which I made out of brownstuff.


That shield is absolutely grizzly and so I think it fit well with what I'm doing. As did the head from the Khorne warrior that rides the jugger.


Also sculpted the jewels on the horse.


I'm pretty happy with how it turned out. Can't wait to get the others done. They'll be of the Khorne and probably Tzeentch variety, maybe nurgle.