What is best in life?
I’m waiting in an airport departure lounge at 06:30 in the morning (but my body still thinks it’s a lot earlier), breathing conditioned air and listening to the clatter and rattle of shoes and trolleys, the hushed murmuring of my fellow passengers, and the occasional chime of an announcement. Later I might buy a bland but overpriced sandwich, or a cup of coffee to wake me up properly. My flight leaves in three hours and I won’t be home before midnight. This is not what’s best in life, so today seems like a good day to post a recently painted barbarian.
Little Green Man
This isn’t my first post of the year. But after finishing my first ‘big’ miniature – the Mierce Blood Maw – I felt a change of pace was in order; something I could start and finish in one sitting. So I took on the smallest mini in my collection, my first project that truly belongs to 2018.
Blood for the Blood Maw
Skulls for the Skull Mountain! This is the first really big miniature I’ve painted, Mierce Miniatures’ Blood Maw, Vore. I had planned to enter this into the 2017 summer painting competition on r/minipainting. The theme was ‘violence’ – or to be more precise:
VIOLENCE! Violence, the theme is violence, violence, violence, violence. Your miniatures should be angry, mad, bloody, gory, violent and ready to fight!
This seemed like the perfect mini for the task, but I overestimated my ability to complete a big project in a short time, and I’ve only just finished this week.
Greenskin Wars
Coming to the end of my Christmas painting projects, here’s small batch of mostly goblinoids from one of my favourite companies, Diego Serrate Pinilla’s Knightmare Miniatures. I got most of them from the first Greenskin Wars Kickstarter – I missed out on the follow-up (of hobgoblins and bugbears) but I hear there’s a third planned for early 2018. Anyway, here’s what I painted:
Warrior Women with Stumpy Sidekicks
Setting expectations high for 2018, following on from my Russian Alternative Troll of Chaos and Oldhammer creatures from Greek mythology, I think there’s time for one more blog entry this weekend. I worked on a few different projects over Christmas, including painting miniatures from two manufacturers I haven’t tried before – Dark Sword and Westfalia Miniatures. In many ways these two companies couldn’t be more different, so the theme of tonight’s post is a bit of a stretch.
Ancient Minis from Greek Mythology
Like London buses, after a six month hiatus I’m posting my second blog entry of this weekend. Today it’s three monsters from Greek mythology – a harpy, Medusa, and the Lernaean Hydra. All of them Citadel Miniatures in the original lead, so I’m not sure whether the myths or the minis are more ancient.
Troll of Chaos
It’s been a while since I updated this blog. Life, school, and work got in the way, and when I found time to paint again the weather was no good for spraying. But even though I couldn’t varnish them, I managed to paint about a dozen minis over the Christmas and new year, finishing with this big guy.
Realms of Chaos
I’ve been painting miniatures on-and-off (admittedly more off than on) since around 1991, and I have fond childhood memories of the AD&D 2nd Edition Monstrous Manual and Fighting Fantasy books. I collect, and play, retro video games – avoiding emulation wherever possible, and with a particular love of old RPGs. But surprisingly, until a couple of years ago I’d never actually played D&D, and until last weekend I’d never played any edition of Warhammer.
Shin High Kobold
I haven’t had much time for painting this week, so I used what time I had on my smallest miniature: an Advanced Dungeons & Dragons Kobold. I picked him up cheaply with some other odds and ends I thought might come in handy during our Shin High Terror campaign. He didn’t, and I don’t know much about him – except that he’s tiny even among other miniatures.
Sea Hag
A few months ago I posted a drawing of Jenny Greenteeth, a river hag from English folklore. At around the same time I started drawing her, I bought a metal Razig the Sea Hag from Reaper Miniatures’ Warlord’ range, which sat untouched except for a roughly applied base of blue paint since then. And a couple of weeks ago, DM Mike introduced a green hag as an NPC into our &D campaign (whether as an ally or an antagonist remains a matter of debate in and out of character – after all, in Gaelic myth the Cailleach are a sort of divine spirit rather than evil). So, this week I finished painting her.
