GENERAL: Normal service is resumed

I'm back from The Gauntlet tournament.

I finished 15th out of 32 with one win, one draw and a loss. Congratulations to Francis whose Orks took the top spot and Derek whose Imperial Guard won best painted.

I had hoped to compete in that category but I had a disaster the day before the tournament. I finished all my painting and varnished the models to protect their painstakingly applied paintjobs. Then the f***ing varnish frosted my models.

I now need to look into techniques to try to save them. Binning all my cans of Games Workshop varnish is a good start.

I might pick up some tips from the Imperial Armour Model Masterclass Volume One. I bought this from Warhammer World as it never appeared in my local store (nor did the Lemartes model I had ordered for The Gauntlet tournament, but that's another story). I've just had a quick flick through so far but it looks fantastic, with loads of great photography, modelling and painting tips and the shock of seeing some non-Games Workshop products. I wonder what varnish they recommend?

I'll post up a review of the book once I've read it. Because of the tournament I haven't even read the Space Marine codex yet, so that will also be on the reading stand. As is the Siege of Vraks part 2. It's just as well I'll have a little more time on my hands now.

My blog, and the rest of my hobby related activities, fell by the wayside while I was speed painting for the tournament. With that out of the way I can return to my duties on my blogs. I'm trying to regulate my Blood Angels painting through the Warseer Tale of 40k Painters and the upside to cranking out a couple of new units in a short space of time is that I don't have to paint Space Marines for a couple of months. I'll photograph them, hopefully once I've rescued them from the frosting of doom, and post them as I present them on Warseer.

With my new-found time I can update my Battle Reports blog with my tournament games, review the books I'll read, sort out some technical issues with the blog (the photos and other niggly things I'm not happy with) and maybe even paint some of my Warriors of Chaos models for Fantasy.

Get ready for take off...