PAINTING: Thunderbolt assembly line

I spent a couple of hours painting my AI Navy squadron last night.

As soon as I began I realised that this was going to be a big job, not the twenty hour blast I had previously assumed. The problem is that the kits are heavily detailed despite their small size and I couldn't bring myself to just slap the paint on and call them done. I want to do the best paint job on these models as I can.

I started with the four Thunderbolts. I am painting them in a desert theme to match the desert terrain I will probably play most of my games on. I thinned down some Iyanden Darksun foundation paint to use as the initial base layer, going on over the black undercoat. Next I mixed in some Bleached Bone and went over the planes again, this time concentrating on the raised areas. The Thunderbolt front left is at this stage while the others are one stage behind.

Once I'd added the Bleached Bone/Iyanden Darksun mix to all the Thunderbolts I washed them all with good old Devlan Wash. It did exactly what I wanted it to do, turning the parchment yellow basecoat into a deeper, warmer yellow-brown. It has also picked out all of the lines between the plating.

I had originally thought I'd go back over the planes again to tidy up the edges but I'm loathe to start mucking about with wash as I really like the finish it has given. I might start working on the other colours first while I'm pondering my options.

SPACE HULK: Space Hulk unboxed

It's a wet and windy day up here in North East England, so much so that a ridge tile blew off the roof and hit the windscreen of my car earlier. Once I'd moved the car - the windscreen was miraculously unmarked - and took a look at the weather I decided I'd spend the rest of the day indoors, earning brownie points with my girlfriend by not hiding out in my games room painting my AI models (I plan to paint them on Tuesday night and possibly take a day off work next week). We curled up on the sofa and watch some telly but it wasn't long before I felt the urge to scratch my gaming itch. But what to do?

I sneaked off to my games room and brought Space Hulk back into the living room. For an hour or two while I watched Life and In Treatment I clipped the models from their sprues and popped the card components out.

The game is every bit as impressive as I've heard. The card corridors and rooms are the thickest I've ever seen in a board game and the graphics are superb and very atmospheric. The models are excellent, dripping with detail. I'd heard a few complaints that some of the Genestealer models were fragile and broke easily when removed from their sprue so I was extra careful. They all came free in one piece.

I timed my egg timer to check how close it was to three minutes. It came out at 2:47 which puts a bit more pressure on the Marines!

I plan to paint all of the models for Space Hulk at some point in the future - the Terminators slotting into my Blood Angels army and the Tyranids into a Cities of Death themed 40k force. I'll have to check out other blogs and forum message boards to see if anyone has successfully managed to incorporate the non standard bases onto 40k sized ones.

So I'll pack Space Hulk away for now and watch a bit more telly, perhaps leafing through a copy of the latest White Dwarf magazine.

Lazy Sunday afternoon indeed...

GENERAL: Tracking my progress

If you scroll down the blog a bit you'll notice I've added another widget to the right column. It's called my unfinished project list and it is a visual representation of where I'm at with my various painting and modelling projects.

I've felt a bit overwhelmed in the past few weeks with the number of different projects I've been juggling so I hope that this will help me a) see what plates I have spinning at any one time, and b) let me see I'm making progress, however slowly.

I've just put the most obvious projects on there at the moment but I plan to add to the list over time as I rediscover my various plans and schemes. Of course other projects will drop off the list as I complete them.

MODELLING: Ork air Waaagh

It's taken me six hours today to put together my Ork air Waaagh for Aeronautica Imperialis. Some of the models went together just fine but others were badly cast and/or twisted and bent. I had to soak many pieces in hot water to straighten them up. I'm not convinced I've got everything perfect but hey, they are Orks so I think I'll get away with it.

I have six fightas, three with rokkits or bombs, four fighta-bommers, two with bombs and one with grot bombs, and a big bommer.

I also put together two flying grot bombs. They were the most frustrating models to construct because they were so fragile; they just couldn't stand up to cleaning up the flash and mould lines. I threw two in the bin and have shelved the broken bits of others in my bits box.

I've just undercoated both my Imperial Navy wing and the Orks with Chaos Black spray and I'll be painting up my Orks first.

MODELLING: Take to the skies!

As any of you who follow my Twitter feed already know, I decided to put together my Aeronautica Imperialis models rather than my Planetstrike terrain. I'm hoping to build and paint both my Imperial Navy and Ork wings within one week.

The first models I put together were my Navy Lightnings. This was because they had the least number of parts and I thought they would be a 'quick win.'

Wrong!

The models were very poorly cast and took an age to complete. I had similar problems with the Marauder Destroyer which looked like the mould hadn't filled with resin fully and thus had jagged mismatched lines a good millimetre or so proud around the fuselage.

And bloody hell are those under wing missiles/bombs difficult to attach!

I eventually glued eight to the Marauder and then had two spare which I stuck on a Thunderbolt. They will count as Skystrikes,Hellstrikes or bombs depending on my mood.

Here is a photo of my Navy wing assembled:


I reckon I have about twenty hours spare this week to dedicate to this project and so far I have spent six hours constructing my IN wing. I hope the Ork planes will go together a bit quicker, now that I've had some practice playing with resin, and I can then spend the remaining time painting the models.

GENERAL: Plans and schemes

My seven year old nephew came by today to have a look at his uncle's models and terrain. He was absolutely blown away by the stuff I now take for granted, and some of his boyish enthusiasm rubbed off on me. Going through my drawers of finished models and terrain, some of which I haven't looked at for years, made me itch to get stuck back into this fabulous hobby with gusto.

Fortunately my new resolve coincides with a window of opportunity. My better half is out on Monday, Tuesday and Friday night, while I also have a day off work on Friday. That means I can probably throw about 18 to 20 hours at my various projects this week versus the 5 or 6 I usually have. But which projects to concentrate upon?

With my Ork army built, the obvious choice is my Planetstrike terrain. I'd like to build all of the plastic kits I have first, just so that I can see it all together in one place. I'm sure that would inspire me to paint everything too.

The other wildcard option I have is Aeronautica Imperialis. I have an Imperial Navy wing and an Ork wing unbuilt at the moment and just seeing my desert terrain earlier today made me want to use it as an AI battlefield. I think the Navy planes would look so cool with a desert theme and I could potentially complete the building and painting of all of the models in the time I have available this week. The Orks would be easy too, and by the end of the week I could have a new games system to play!

Whichever I choose I also plan to paint some Orks for my Warseer Tale of 40k Painting pledge. I've jokered the first two months already so technically I only have a week to paint 150 points of models or I'll be thrown out of the tale. With the deadline tight I think I'll paint the Killa Kans or Deff Dread rather than a twenty Ork mob.

So what do you think? Should I start my Planetstrike terrain or should I finish my Aeronautica Imperialis wings?

NEW MODEL FUND: Stick AND carrot

Just a quick update today.

I counted up some coins from my penny jar and managed to rustle up £10 toward my New Model Fund.

Of course, I should be selling some more stuff on eBay; indeed I have a handful of stuff ready and waiting to be listed but I just don't seem to be getting around to it. I need to knuckle down in the next few weeks if I want to hit my revised target of £750 by the end of the year.

I got a few comments reminding me that my NMF is there to allow me to buy new models and not to make me accumulate the maximum amount of money. This is true, but it was easy for me to forget as I am skint most of the time and in theory models should be low on my list of priorities. What I have to remember is that this is essentially free money, to be spent as I please, goddammit!

So thank you to Rogue Pom, Col. Corbane, Chris and Gamers World.

With that in mind I'm sure I'll be adding to my Orks when I get round to painting them...