Ugly duckling - Completed!

Today is Mini-Rab #2's fourth birthday so I have eaten plenty of cake, soothed tears, built lego, regretted giving him a wooden sword and shield to match his brother's and played "pin the poisonous wart on the Gruffalo". It has been excellent family fun, and I knew it would be... but I hadn't expected to get any daytime painting in. However, Mother-in-Law decided that she would take the boys swimming this afternoon and so I claim completion of this painting and modelling challenge!

I even had a go at following Orlygg's 80s shield tutorial and it was only Very Difficult, rather than Utterly Beyond My Skills. Which was nice...

Mace side...

Ugly duckling - WIP 4

Nearly there! I just need to paint a shield for the rider (this time I really am going to try for an 80s style "eye" shield), glue him in place, and stick some flock and tufty bits on the base and then I shall claim completion of this challenge!

I'm probably blind to any errors, so do mention it if you think there is a small tweak within my apparent skill that would make things better. Photos taken on my phone with variable and uncontrollable white balance!

Checker me out? 

Ugly duckling - WIP 3

Basecoat applied - just for you Asslessman!

Real swan:

Chaos swan:

Ugly duckling - WIP 2

What seems like several months ago now, I undertook the Asslessman's challenge to oldhammerers to convert a knight that would say something about where we lived or where we came from. Now that I've settled in Bedfordshire I chose a giant swan mount to play with (many, many swans congregate on the stretch of river that runs through the town). This also went with my idea of including it in my nascent Tzeentch-themed force - an evil swan ridden by a fallen knight seemed as if it must have been well and truly exposed to the warping power of Change to me, no longer images of purity, loyalty (swans really do mate for life) and steadfast chivalry.

The process was initially straightforward. I found a not-too-spiky chaos knight to use from a joblot I picked up at the usual online auction site, as well as a giant model bird with a bad attitude to press into service as his mount. 

Flashback photo! First used on this blog back in October 2013...

The beak was pretty easy to sculpt, at least to my own satisfaction, but then I hit the Problem. For some reason I just could not get the saddle and its strap to look smooth, let alone like a saddle and strap, so it got pushed to the back of my desk and abandoned.

No more, I tell you, no more! The saddle etc still look more than a bit shoddy, but I shall attempt to paint on the detail and competence that my putty-pushing skills evidently lack. The knight is done (yes, actually painted!) and the bird undercoated grey and inkwashed with Badab Black (my usual starting point). 

Pictures or it didn't happen, you say? Here you go:

Gaah! Some of those dark bits on the reins and saddle are just pools of wash, rather than horrendous lumpy bits, honest!

Hopefully there'll be something interesting but not too taxing on the gogglebox tonight so I can get on with actually painting the bird...

Geek on, my friends,

Rab

Ugly duckling - WIP 1

So, I have a large carnivorous bird model that I want to make into a large swan-like bird for this Knight Project on the Oldhammer forum. I also have greenstuff (which I've used before with some success), procreate (which I've used before with some success) and milliput (which I've never used before). After careful thought, considering this is the first time I've been trying to reproduce a realistic effect... I chose the milliput. Error! Look at the mess I've made:

Fortunately, milliput responds really well to being reshaped when wet, so those horribly jagged edges might yet be salvageable without having to file bits off. I think what I'll do is switch to procreate for the surface detail: saddle shaping, buckles on the strap, nostril things in the swan beak. Oh, and that nobbly bit that mute swans have above their beak:

I'll have one more go at sorting the joints with milliput, just to get some practice.

Hopefully your sculpting is proving more successful,

Rab

There once was an ugly duckling...

...who was the terrifying giant servant of a vengeful chaos god!

Welcome to post 150, dear readers (cue cheering, balloons, party poppers, cake and fizzy pop!), in which I once again try to persuade you that I have been doing some geeking, honest and truly. Specifically, I've been organising my workbench to undertake not one, not two, but three painting challenges. Now, you might think from recent months that the greatest challenge would be me actually picking up a paint brush (and you'd be right), but all of these tie in with my intended projects.

Challenge the first: The army muster

This is from over on the Oldhammer website and is meant to produce, by October 2014, a playable army. You are supposed to paint a tenth of your army each month, with two wild cards to allow for things like Christmas and going on holiday which rudely interrupts one's painting ambitions. This is my starting point:

There's a bunch of peasants back left, a unit of foot knights and the start of a second at the front, a cannon and crew, and, at the back, my mercenary dwarf contingent. Still in packets, or undercoated but elsewhere, I have a unit and a half of mounted knights, another cannon, more peasants etc. I plan to order more cavalry to complete the second unit of knights, crossbowmen, archers, spearmen and a third cannon. We'll see how far I get...


Challenge the second: The group Knight challenge

Another Oldhammer project, but just a single figure and one that I can shoehorn into challenge 3 to boot! Started by Asslessman on this thread, the basic idea is to choose a creature representative of your home region and to make a knight from it. Living near Bedford, the swan seemed an obvious choice, especially as I've always liked the idea of knights riding giant birds (I blame that old arcade game, Joust). This is why there was the slightly random opening to this post; behold the chaos swan!

He's behind you!

That classic chaos warrior will be the rider of the beasty

Now, obviously I need to add a putty swan beak, saddle, reins etc. but I don't think that making him/it should take more than an evening. Painting it? We'll see...


Challenge the third: Chaos narrative campaign

Up on that first picture, you might just be able to make out a chaos knight and a lovely old beastman. They are the first two members of the Tzeentch warband I rolled up for a little narrative campaign that Chris, Malc and I hope to start playing over Christmas. I have a chaos warrior and four beastmen to paint up. Surely I can manage that?

Play nicely, children.
Rab