Gremlins are fun!

Not only on the board but also to paint. I got to try out painting one of my brother's gremlins. Speedpainting from the start with some detailing at the end. Maybe 2-2,5 hours' work total. Loved it.

Sternguard veterans, rescued

So it's finally time. Here is the result of my eBay rescue mission - before and after. It was really a quite arduous task to get them all done, and I had to shift in other projects to keep me motivated. But that's just how I work when it comes to painting I guess.

Before

After

The photo is a bit fuzzy and it's too late in the evening for me to fiddle with the settings on my SLR, but I hope it gets the results through anyway.

Should I get the new plastic ones and make it a full ten man squad? Maybe next year... :)

Tyranid Warrior Prime from Hydracast

Hey folks!

My friend Fredrik really wanted this cool custom cast of a Warrior Prime and to push him over the edge and actually buy it ($45) I promised to paint it up. The Russian guy who makes them is really talented and it was a joy to assemble. Almost non-existent flash and good joints. Anyway, here is the result from a few different angles. I am still struggling with the photography (much too saturated and not sharp enough) but at least it's not iPhone pics.

So that's it - a really good sculpt as I said. Support this guy and go buy some of his stuff! :)

Op Sternguard rescue, part 3

Well, it's been a while! I will not whine about not having time... the only excuse is that I find these guys a bit tedious to paint up. Or maybe I'm just sick of Ultramarines. Who knows. The result is ok though! Here are the first three, all done.

Op Sternguard rescue, part 2

Finally done with the cleaning phase. It took some tedious scraping with a fine needle to get all the brown goop out of the armor recesses. I discovered some blue primer in the very bottom of the layers, interesting! Anyways, the next step is basing after the greenstuff and superglue has completely set. I will leave some of the arms off as you see in the picture, to be able to paint the chests properly. Two arm fittings are the worst, but I will help it along by doing some greenstuff pre-fitting at this stage. That will make it so much easier to just pop the arms in place after the parts have been painted.

Operation Sternguard rescue

It's time again. I know I know, I promised myself not to buy any more second hand models on eBay. It's just not worth it with all the cleaning and the horrible horrible epoxy glue and ruined bits. But this had to be an exception. Since GW rolled out new models for the Sternguard Veterans, I knew I wanted a set of the old ones before they become hopelessly hard to get hold of. And I knew I wanted the metal ones, so there was at least a shimmer of hope of getting them clean. After only a couple of days of browsing the Swedish version of eBay, Tradera, I found these beauties for the bargain price of $14 plus shipping.

Mmmm that's a gorgeous paint job right there. I have to admire the brush control here. How in the name of Jebus himself did this guy manage to get such a thick coat of paint on so neatly? I also like the ambitions. "Three colours to play in the tournament? Ok, you got it! Blue-black-red-DONE."

Nevermind though, I'm sure he (or she) is very nice IRL. And I love Crimson Fists, I wish I had done my army in their theme. Now, on to my project. Time to see what these suckers have under their coat(s) of paint.

Emperor, I am melting!

After the first dunk in the acetone free nail polish remover (thank you, darling!) he is looking very surprised and a bit soggy. The top coat basically falls off, and the black plastic in the slotta base melts and gets stuck to the skin of my fingers. A hot tip is to break off all plastic parts if you can.

You used WHAT as a primer?

This is after a good scrubbing with an old toothbrush. That brown stuff is really awful and just won't come off. It's not regular primer because it sits quite thick in places. Two or three dunks in the bath of horror later, and they look like this:

Almost there now.

Good thing that these guys use regular space marine backpacks, because the original ones are ruined...

Stay tuned for part two - reassembly and priming!

Tau Cadre Fireblade

A model I actually bought just because wanted to paint it. I don't even own the Tau codex (yet). I'm glad I did though, the new plastic single characters from GW are really fantastic quality and makes me feel even more hesitant when it comes to Finecast.