DRUZE!

Hey folks,

This started because of the contest in early 2018 (I'm trying to back-fill all the things I didn't post!)

An entire Druze force, and I tried to make it not look like any force that already exists. Green is already taken by Ariadna (and to a lesser extent by Haqqislam).

I thought about what colour is not taken by any army, and brown came to mind. Supported by Red, because that'd look cool. Hilariously I later realized that also makes it look like the Browncoats from Firefly!

The labeled picture! A link team of 5 to the left with a few proxies (notably the brawler doctor from Bipandra, and Valeria Gromoz as played by the Druze limited hacker. On the right is the Brawler Haris, with a Heavy Rocket Launcher, the Haris leader, and the spec ops as Doctor.

Back view. The bases are custom-made by me on a laser etcher: I wanted to get a different feel than my typical transparent bases, and especially with how many of the models have very thin connection points, it would make it easier to lock the models in place!

A cluster-shot of the group, dynamically posed, and finally:

The glamour shot!

Hope you like it, next time I try to find more of my "oh yeah, I did take photos of this" stuff!

Long Hiatus and the Critical Conversion

Hey folks, I know it's been a long time... I started a new job, and ended up where my painting was more industrial than fanciful.

That said, recently the wonderful folks at the Mayacast Podcast did a conversion contest rather than a painting contest. I decided there was one absolutely critical conversion that needed to happen. One model whose conversion wasn't a case of personal challenge or what-if, but an absolutely, only-way-I'd-play-him necessity.

I give you, Saito Togan:

He's supposed to be a master ninja, ghost in combat. Not a sumo wrestler.

Thank God for jewellers saws and greenstuff, because it let me 'fix' him. Underneath that weird pose is an actually good model design, and I hope I have more conveyed his awesome ninja-ness with my conversion.

Two cuts, just above both knees, let me notice that just with his lower legs removed, you can get a very good pose going. It was great for me, as I originally thought I might have to resculpt the entire upper leg bit. Instead, I ground away at the 'fabric' until I had slots for the calf muscles/armour, pinned the limbs in place where I wanted, and refilled the gaps with putty, imitating the fabric that was there. For the most part, the head is just slightly repositioned, and the arm is pushed out wider (and greenstuffed in the gap) to fit.

On his back you can see I've moved the scabbard to a more shinobi-logical back draw, as opposed to the default model's samurai hip draw location.

And finally, for a nice ridiculous shot of him bisecting a guijia in full anime style!

I'm going to try to post more frequently now. I've been working these last few months on a Skaven army, and while much of it isn't especially fascinating from a paint exploration standpoint, there are a few things that I can draw attention to.

After that, ghosts!