Are you en'thralled' ?

You have seen all the big, bigger, and friggin' HUGE stuff from the Mechanicus army thus far.

Now it's time for the little guys.  That is, thralls!

This was the first color test mini.  You will be seeing lots more of these very soon, as I have been hammering away at those too.

It is definitely one of the more unusual infantry troop types I have ever done for 40/30k.

A lighter shade...

The next few Rhinos, like this one, are going to have some lighter fur.  It was fun to paint this lighter color...

I got a chance to make use of Secret Weapon Concrete wash on the fur.  I love the Concrete wash, since it is one of those semi opaque washes that works so well in the mid tones.

While it was a darker wash on the fur, it had a very nice effect in the shadow areas.

The darker faces on these guys are a nice contrast from the dark fur/ light faces of the first two rhinos!

Rust and dust... EZ PZ

Next stage arrives for our Flames of War Easy Eight.  A bit of weathering.

As some of you already know, I like to use paints for rust effects that have a "sedimentation" property.

That is, when you mix them with a decent amount of water, the pigment begins to break down.  You also know that I have discovered a few in the correct shade which do this... such as the GW Calthan Brown, and some of the P3 paints.

These were also mixed with a Sepia Wash to thin them down, instead of water.  This helps to create other interesting random effects within the various placements of the rust.

It also means that it will sink down into those crevices, which rust tends to do.  It follows the water!

It's always best to choose those sunken nooks and crannies for the rust.

Once I have gone all around the vehicle with the darker rust color, I pick out fewer areas to lighten...

I really want to get down here into the treads and tracks!

The selected areas of rust get lighter.

This will be the final rust color... fairly bright, as you can see, so I don't want to get too crazy with it.

That's about all I want to do with the rust, so now it's time for some dust!

I kept things simple this time with the application of a little Secret Weapon dry pigment.  You can mix it with rubbing alcohol if you want to paint it on like regular paint, or mix in the Secret Weapon sealer.

This time, I chose to simply spray it with dullcoate to fix the powders.

An old favorite

OK, here's where we stand thus far on some Grey Knight terminator bases.  Still another ten or fifteen percent to go yet...

I always loved this design.  This time around, I have added a few more twists...

The taller bases are always for special characters.

But I could not resist adding a servo skull!

I didn't have Secret Weapon skulls the last time I made bases such as these. Nice to have now!

Here's another look at the shallower bases...

Lights, camera, ACTION!

Bolt Action, that is.

In 2014, I was introduced to Memoir '44.  As you know, it quickly became my favorite game!  You have also witnessed many paint sessions on vehicles, infantry, and terrain.  The idea was to slowly work my way into historical miniatures, which was the one remaining genre I had not tried.

I had always worried about the limitations of historical minis... assuming that I would be locked into repeating the same color schemes over and over again, forced to follow strict Osprey publishing guidelines.  As it turns out, it has not really been the case.

The more Memoir '44 items that appeared on the blog, the more the hue and cry arose for Bolt Action figures.

I had not heard of that system before (Flames of War was the game that I had first seen years ago), but it kept popping up in my Facebook feeds.  More messages on the blog continued to call for them... since folks were getting very curious to see what I would do with a tank that is actually larger than a nickel!!

So, Marty kindly introduced me to the world of Bolt Action.  This is the standard German Starter Army.  Let's see what's inside!

I was very surprised to see that almost everything was plastic.  For some reason, I thought that it was all metal and resin.  I believe the switch was made a few years ago...

Here's six sprues of various infantry.

And the half track sprues.

Some handy instructions, and the bases, which are essentially 25mm rounds.

The PZ IV is resin, with a few metal pieces.

Here's a shot of one of the infantry sprues.

You also get a mortar crew, and an artillery piece.

Both of these crews are in metal, as you can see.

Well, I guess you know what is lurking for 2015!  I am looking forward to trying out these 28mm scale WWII figures.

Speaking of Flames of War... I will be playing that as well!  It's gonna be quite a year. :-)

It ain't 'easy' being green

Back to the late war Easy Eight.

When we last left our intrepid tank crew, the final touches of the Shaded Basecoat phase were being added.  As usual, the idea behind this is to set up subsequent glazing, shading and tinting.

To do the glazing phase, the usual suspects made their appearance.

Lots of washes from Secret Weapon, augmented by a few Vallejo glazes.

You can see the various glazes set up on the palette, ready for action.

Just as I did with the Shaded Basecoat, I want to be very aware of color temperature... that is, vary the greens from warmer to cooler.  That's why there are so many glaze color options out here.

This view shows the difference some of the warmer glazes on the wheel assemblies.  The cooler glaze colors will be placed on upward facing surfaces.

The turret is another key area for that warm/cool balance.  The vertical walls will have more warmth to them... but the opposite on the top.

You can see the basic glazes starting to take shape.

Also, keep in mind that you can do a number of glazes in one area to make it darker if needed.  It's far better to do this gradual approach, as you get some nice smooth shading that way!

Once the primary glazes and shading are complete, I get to do the next fun part.  That will involve mixing the glaze colors with the regular paints and working in the middle tones.

Once I am done with that, I will do the weathering effects.  I have added a few cursory paint chips for now.  Much more to come, so stay tuned!

Brookfield Zoo

OK kids!  Time for a trip to the zoo!!!

This is a batch of those Mierce Miniatures Monsters... all on 60mm bases.

Lots of fur to deal with on these guys. :-)

And some big honkin' weapons too!

Not as much armor though...

More to come!