Preparing for 40k campaign

After a long break, my interest got sparked again when Antti kicked off a fluffy, relaxed 40k campaign in my club.
This is ideal for me as I have stuff allready, so less painting, and there are no obligations or competitive games.

 Loyal to my style, I started painting something that has absolutely no effect on the games. I made a base to my chaos spawn (probably).
The technique is the same as allways, but with some new elements.
First was really long stalked lichen I found 3 years back at Sarek national park. It has been soaked in glycerin, so it retains it's flexibility.

 The second are the leaves. I bought a leaf punching device from Greenstuffworld. I then painted a regular paper with random autumn colours and punched the hell out of it. The result is good, and I will get the other version of this in future. So five chaos stars *****!

 Third new thing was a texture roller, also from greenstuffworld. There are several, but I got the "evil rune" -version.
It is also great, and saves time it you have to texture something. I have to take a look at the other versions, and probably get couple more.
Four stars ****!

 

I´m Alive!! ..and chidits are too..

After changing jobs I have been learning the ropes in my new occupation. That has taken helluva lot time and effort, so painting has been in the background for few months.
I have been fiddling with brushes however, and managed to paint my chindit army to a point where it is pointwise ready for reasonably sized battles.
They actually already faced a jap force and scored their first victory against emperor Teemuhito in the jungles of Espoo!

Latest addition has been the HQ. Windgate Fergusson and Cairns are exactly the officers needed to clean the jap infestation from the jungle.

Last of the pirates for now

Here is the last batch of pirates. Finally some titties!

A bit more progress on the pirate front.

I got few more pirates painted and bases sculpted.

1st demo base ready

So, here's the first base of the series I mean to make for these guys.

And finally the base for spawn.

So, a demon needs a base. I scavenged my hellbrute's base and gave it a shot. Some of you might recognize the influence of James Wappel in it. Influence might be a bit of an understatement, as it is pretty much copycat work :)

Tip for basing your toy soldiers

Sometimes speed is essential in both painting and basing.
A while ago I managed to create a method that speeds up the process somewhat, and gives me ok look compared to my previous PVA glue + sand type basing.
This is also applicable to terrain making where you need to cover large surfaces fast.

Basing for desert

I suddenly remembered that I had one sample mini from Foundry that could be used in my upcoming posse of Wild West Show for In Her Majesty's Name. I slapped in some paint, but started working on creating a basing theme for the posse. As their numbers stay lowish, I thought I'd go on and do a bit extra, and try new stuff out.

Onwards christian soldiers!

I bought wargames factory apocalypse survivors pack just for the heck of it, expecting really nothing. But boy, was I suprised.

The package is filled with armed civilian men parts, the conversion possibilities are endless with so many really nice improvised and conventional weapons.

2 weeks off from painting

1 week at Kos, then other at Bodrum, Turkey. Pretty damn refreshing!

As far as miniatures go, the nature here is a treasure chest. Small dry plants and plenty of clean uniform sand. Got to buy minigrip bags to hold everything.

Jarl's runestone base

Well, here it is. The stone got grey basecoat, nuln oil wash, red wash for runes, and couple quick drybrushes of grey.

The magnet is somewhat off, I gotta move it to the center of the hole.

Saga, and how to avoid painting an army.

I bought Saga rules, northern fury armybook and jomsviking / viking dice set. The rules are fun and fast to learn, and filled with testosterone. Jomsvikings are the biggest reason I got the set though. Viking mercenaries . There is two words that somehow just rhyme :)

Well, as it happens, jomsvikings do not get levies and archers, so my recently bought 30ish viking archers are useless.. So instead of doing anything useful for my warband I thought I'd pimp up my warlord. He'll be standing on a larger base, but be detachable, so I can change him if I get more intimidating model. The base will have a runestone that I sculpted from baked sculpey. Sculpey is perfect, it bends, but with sufficient force, will break like stone (more or less). After baking it is easily carveable and cuts easily.



I looked few pictures to get some idea how they looked in real life. I went with a dragon with random runes .

I drew the image with a pencil and carved it with hobby knife, brushed it clean, glued it to the base, and washed it with nuln oil to see how it turned out.

Nuln oil brings out the pattern nicely, ready for painting.

Warlord in his place

Next up is basing and painting. I'll go with grey stone and red image, it seems to be the prevalent combination. I really hope I can keep up the intrest for few days to finnish it..

Home made Static Grass Applicator

After reading about Static Grass Applicators, I decided it was a time I try making my own. As a discalimer, I have never worked with electricity before, besides changing lightbulbs.

So, I bought McEnroe electric flyswatter for 6.50 euros, and opened the screws at the handle. 

The insides consists of some sort of thingie from which 2 wires come out. These wires lead to the swatting part of the swatter. 

I broke the swatting pad apart carefully, trying to preserve the wires as good as I could. I took a short piece of rubber covered wire that ended in clamp, and attached it to the other wire. I then made a basket from metal spike and metal net I had laying around, taped it to the handle, and attached the other wire to that construction.

To my suprise, the thing actually works! 

McGyver couldn't have done better!

Using the thing.

You have to apply glue to the part of the base you want the grass to stick to. Normally, I use PVA glue as it is quite sticky and fluid enough when mixed with a small amount of water.

Then put some static grass to the metal basket of the applicator, and take the free hanging wire, and electrify the general area of the PVA glue spot.  I have clamped on a metal spike to make it easier to target the glue.

While keeping the electricity on, gently shake the static grass through the metal net to the glue, while keeping 1-2cm distance between the metal net and the clamp/spike -part. If the distance is longer, the static electricity is not enough to raise the grass, if it is shorter, the clamp and net will touch, resulting in sparks. 

The static electricity will keep the grass upright while it is falling to the glue, so the end result is neater than without the applicator, it also helps to shake the grass through the strainer.

It is not very powerful as it is powered with 2xAA batteries, but it'll get the job done, and it was a fun project to build :)