“Old Red Eye & Friends”

Well it’s been a couple of weeks since I last posted (sorry), and I’ve been casting about a bit over this time as to what to paint next, you see it’s “Keith’s, Monster May(hem)” next month (or this month depending on when you’re reading this of course, either way go check it out here and take part if possible!) and as my excitement builds over this it’s hard to get enthused on anything else (How sad is that!!). Anyway luckily Simon came to the rescue here as I remembered he’d sent me some old “Nexus Miniatures” (not) Cylons from original “Battlestar Galactica”, and as they have just re-started showing this on “Legend” (the “Horror channel” as was in the UK), I thought it was an opportune time to pigment these perpetrators of the “Cylon” tyranny!

Well the first job (or jobs) were to attach the one figures separate hand and weapon, I decided to drill and pin this with a little florists wire partially to strengthen the joint but also because I already had the drill and wire out. Why did I have these out already? Because all tree figures have the familiar “Centurion sword” (which I don’t think I ever saw them actually use in the series once) scabbarded on their left hand side, but on a couple of the figures these were moulded short where the metal hadn’t flowed into the end of the mould. So cutting away the “stumps” I drilled into the hilts slotted in a bit of wire and built them back up using “greenstuff”, and used a little more of this miraculous stuff to fill round the wrist joint I mentioned earlier. Then it was a case of sticking on their heads and basing them onto two pence pieces away from their hateful “slotta’s”🤮 . A blow over with the matt black and we were good to go.

I decided to start by adding there eyes, so after painting the slots in sanguine scarlet, I first added a dot in orange followed by another smaller dot of bright red. After a quick look on “Google” I discovered that the BSG aficionados and cos-players know that the under suits are in fact purple! (Well there you go learning all the time!), I however had (and still do) a hard time seeing this on the series so in the end I just mixed a little black into some royal purple and highlighted the under suits in this. The armour that looks so shiny and chrome in the series, I went with a basecoat of chainmail that I followed with highlights of sir coats silver, not quite as “bling” as the originals sadly but as good as I was going to get. Next I highlighted all the other black pieces of armour along with the guns and boots with dark grey and finally I used two different versions of mid grey on their newly restored scabbards, miniature paints for the undercoat and colour parties’ slightly lighter version for the highlights and they were pretty much painted.

I say pretty much as I now had to “Quickshade” them of course, and though I could have gone with the lighter soft tone, I thought as they weren’t bright chrome I’d go for a more battle worn look to them and to this end decided on the strong tone instead, I actually rather like the result. Basing was next as my usual recipe was used here followed by a coat of matt varnish. I have got three of the Colonial warriors (again gifted by Simon) here as well but they’ll have to wait a while now as we are coming into “Challenge Season”, starting with one of my favourites, the aforementioned “Monster May(hem)” run by the “Angry Piper” himself, so expect something a little more “monstrous” over the coming weeks.

Oh and talking of monsters just before I go Dave has now got the “Ogre” for the “Paint what we’ve all got Challenge” into production. So if you are taking part in this later in the year don’t forget get your order in.

Till next time, cheers Roger.

“Oh Hello!” (Advent Challenge)

Well it’s that time again, Aprils “Advent challenge” figures are a couple of spies from the legend that is Mark Copplestone (I was defiantly on a bit of a “spy” kick when I did my Advent Calendar list for my wife 🤔), so without further ado and preamble I give you…

18. Trainee Agent (Charles Hawtrey) from pack KKBB102 (Copplestone Castings)

23. Freelance Agent (Coat) from KKBB105 (Copplestone Castings)

Two smashing figures as usual from one of the best sculptors out there, my only complaint (if I have one) is that the trainee agent isn’t really a dead ringer for the “Carry on spying” actor whose catch phrase forms the title of this post. But anyway enough talk, after they were re-based away from the (spit spit) “slotta” bases onto two pence pieces and given a spray coat of matt black their painting was as follows (please memorise the following as your computer will self-destruct in thirty seconds!)…

Mr Hawtrey, was begun by me giving his revolver a dry-brushing with Sir Coats silver (another of the really rather good Duncan Rhodes paints gifted to me by Simon the other week). Then his “Mackintosh” raincoat was first undercoated in Eurasian flesh mixed with coffee before being highlighted in just coffee, lastly here I added his belt buckle and buttons in saddle. The little bit of his shirt that can just be seen at the collar I did in coffee and cream as usual and his bow tie was then added in sanguine red, highlighted in bright red and then given dots of white. Trousers next and I wanted a very dark blue on these, so I mixed some navy blue with a little black and used this as the undercoat, then when it came to the highlights I first used just navy blue, but this was a little too similar to really give any definition to my eye so I ended up redoing the highlights with a mix of navy blue and “Marine blue” (guess what sort of “Marines” this refers too!) much better. That just left his flesh and hair, Now I wanted him to look rather pale (and interesting, as my nan used to say 😉), so I mixed a little European flesh with some pale flesh, now I usually use this as the highlight colour but this time I undercoated in this and went with just the pale flesh for the highlights, I think it works. I’d been careful to go around his glasses that I’d left black so I just had to “dot” in the lenses with more of the sir coats silver, in contrast to his flesh I wanted very dark hair so yet more black was mixed this time with chocolate brown and I used this to highlight over the original black undercoat.

The “freelancer” though started in the same manner with some sir coats silver over his pistol, then had his coat undercoated in mix of saddle, chocolate brown and leather brown as I was hoping to achieve as “sheepskin” effect, to this end it was then highlighted with another mix this time leather brown, Eurasian flesh and a tiny bit of orange the amounts tinkered with till it looked about right to me. The fur collar on this was then added in dungeon stone grey (you can tell which are the Duncan Rhodes paints can’t you 😁) then highlighted first in mid grey, then again in cream, and the buttons were added in chocolate brown. More of the dungeon stone grey this time mixed with a little mid grey was used to undercoat his trousers and more of the same mix but with more of the mid grey added this time was used to form the highlights here too. Really embracing the “retro” feel on this chap I thought I’d have a go at giving him suede shoes, so after these were painted chocolate brown I highlighted them in Eurasian flesh. Talking of flesh that was all that was left to do on him by then, so trying out yet another of my new paints I went with dwarven skin (not to be confused with “dwarf skin” which is a completely different Vallejo colour I also have, confused? I am!), anyway as I was saying I went with dwarven skin for the undercoat then after I’d added his eyes I highlighted in European flesh, done.

As usual both were then “Quickshaded” with “Soft tone”, and once this was dry next morning (the light tone seems to dry a lot quicker than the Strong for some reason?), they were finished in my usual way. So that’s two more done, I’m still on course and more importantly still enjoying this challenge, don’t be surprised if a couple of other “carry on” regulars turn up at some point over the coming months.

So till next time, cheers Roger.

“Channelling My Inner IRO”

Regular readers will probably be aware that every so often I have been known to push the old “greenstuff” about, what I don’t really do a lot of is “kitbashing”, now this is a skill I have great admiration for and there are some wonderful exponents’ of the craft about including our own “King of the Kitbash” Luke “IRO”, but it’s not a skill I have a lot of experience of, However as I have had a bit of a hankering for a leader for my “Forge Fathers” and as I have this rather large box of  Games Workshop sprue spares, that was donated to me by my mate Graham a while back I thought why not have a bit of a go.

So I started by assembling a pretty standard Forge Father Steel Warrior torso and legs, though I did use the fancier breastplate, this would give me a base to “hang” all the other stuff onto. First off I thought he needed a cape as nothing say’s “I’m important” like a cape, so after a root about in the “Box of crap” I came across a nice fur topped one with a skull hanging down at the back (well it is Games Workshop stuff after all!), problem was it was a bit too long for the “dwarfish” stature of my figure so I had to cut away the bottom, this had the advantage of removing the ragged bottom of the cape (I imagine it was for some chaos what-not or other originally), This hung very nicely with the rings at its top matching perfectly with the backs of his fancy (mantic) shoulder pads. Then I added a “quiver made of skulls” as a tabard hanging from his belt buckle, found a sword that had a couple of hand grenades already attached (?), a fantasy dwarf’s head that I cut the original beard away from and added a new one in greenstuff (well I had to use some of it now didn’t I!), repositioned his helmet into his left hand instead, and probably the thing I’m most pleased with, carefully cut away his right hand, leaving the armoured flap across its back, then trimmed away an arm from a hand holding a spear and fitted this in place before cutting down the spear shaft and adding the large hammer head.

Painting was very similar to my regular “Forge Fathers” with a few additions, As with all my other “Forge Fathers” I began by dry-brushing the shaft on his hammer, and one of the grenades  with chainmail, then I painted all his amour in bronze before highlighting this with copper. Then the inner sections of his armour was painted in German field grey, and highlighted with dark turquoise. The bits of under clothing that can be seen were then undercoated with dark grey, and mid grey was used to highlight these areas. The gloves, belts and the odd other area were then painted in chocolate brown before being highlighted with leather. Now Simon recently sent my some samples of “Duncan Rhodes painting Academy” paints so I thought I’d try a couple of these out, so taking my usual European flesh, I mixed in a small amount of “Mr Rhodes” Dwarven Flesh (seemed apt 😉), and used this as the undercoat on his bare head, I then also used “White star” and “Doom Death black “instead of my usual black and white, and I have to say I was pretty impressed by the high pigment level in the paints (if not so much by the daft GW style names they have!), in fact I also used the “Doom Death Black” to do a little tidying up and lining here and there where I’d been a “messy pup!”. More of my “new toy” paint was used on the fur atop his cape, this time “Dungeon Stone Grey” (see what I mean, what’s wrong with dark-grey?), and anyway this was then highlighted with mid-grey. The rest of his cape along with his swords scabbard were first undercoated in a mix of aquamarine and cyan, before being highlighted in the same but with a lot more of the cyan in the mix. I used a little “Sanguine scarlet” 🙄) and bright red on the other grenade, and chestnut and orange took care of his beard. The “eyes” on his helm, along with the ones on his hammers head (I can see this as a heavier version of the “Forge hammers” the regulars use) and a couple of other lights dotted about his personage, were undercoated in matt lime, then as usual I used some “Fluorescent” light green to add the dotted highlights. Lastly I added the tassel on his “cape skull”, coffee and cream taking care of this.

I’m rather pleased with the results, a nice character figure (that will probably never see the table top to be honest 😕) to lead my “Forge Fathers”, pretty basic stuff but I guess we all have to start somewhere. Now before I go I have to let anyone who doesn’t frequent Dave Stones blog (and why not! You’re missing out mate!), and is either taking part of thinking of taking part in the “Paint what we’ve all got challenge” later in the year, that Dave has now incredibly, already finished the wonderful “green” of the “Ogre” we all hope to paint come September. Here’s a pic of the front of the figure but check out the full 360% views of him here. The man must never sleep! 😁

Cheers Roger.

“Not Danger Girl & Not Danger Girl”

Well I was at a bit of a loss as to what to paint this week, so it was out for a root around in my draws (ooer misses!), to see if anything tickled my fancy (OOER!), looking in the draw marked “Copplestone Babes” I came across these two figures. Now as I’m sure most of you are aware by now, I’m a big fan of Marks stuff so these looked like being a fun weeks painting (yes I really am that slow at painting!). Now looking at these two figures a little story started playing out in my mind, this is something I do sometimes when painting, creating little back stories for them, it just seems to make painting then easier if I can picture them as people in my mind (sad I know), but I saw the girl with the two hand guns as a late seventies heroine of TV show, a voice over saying…“The CIA’s secret weapon, Casey Duggan is Danger Girl!” popped into my head. That left the other one to be her nemesis, the psychotic assassin known only as…well “Nemesis” sort of stuck. Now you may or may not know but there is a comic book series called “Danger Girl” and though this figure bears no resemblance to that one I thought I just go over and check, the spooky thing is though my “Casey” character is completely different, it turns out that the hair and clothing Mark has sculpted on the figure I was calling “Nemesis” is very similar to the character “Abbey Chase” from the comic books, pure coincidence I assure you but weird one. Anyway as now I had a clear idea of where I was going with these it was on with the painting. It was just a case of basing them up in my usual manner and giving them a spray coat of matt black.

Starting with “Casey” I started by giving her a dry-brushing with chainmail on her weapons, then as I wanted a no nonsense look to her clothing I went with Eurasian flesh undercoat, with a mix of more of the same combined with a little coffee forming the highlights, this gave a nice beige colour very suitable for what I was after. I paired this with denim jeans that were my usual recipe of royal blue with dry-brushed highlights of more royal blue mixed with blue grey. Her belt and boots came next and chocolate brown with leather highlights was used here, and her buckles were chainmail, with a ring of bronze added to her belt one. I decide to tackle her flesh next and in a moment of inspiration that would have never occurred to a TV producer in the seventies I thought I’d make her black, first though I would have to change the colour of her pistol grips as my usual brown ones wouldn’t really “pop” against her hands, so I went with coffee and cream on these, I also added two rectangles of chainmail to the bases of these to represent the cartridge clips (damn my OCD!). The flesh I then undercoated with chocolate brown and after her eyes were added and a little pink burgundy was drawn across her lips, I highlighted her flesh with a mix of chocolate brown and pale flesh. That just left her hair that I just recoated with more black and then highlighted it with a mix of black, chocolate brown and a little dark grey.

“Nemesis” on the other hand had such an “over the top” look to her costume that I thought I’d go for a simple colour palette to compliment it, so once I’d dry-brushed her weapons in chainmail I left her shirt and pants black and added the skull to her chest (in a homage’ to Frank Castle “The Punisher”) in Eurasian flesh with coffee and cream highlighted over this. I then added her boots, gloves, and belt in coffee with cream highlights. For her flesh I went with European flesh and after her eyes were added and her lips swiped in with dark red, I highlighted her flesh in a mix of European flesh and pale flesh. Her hair was next chocolate brown forming the base here with chestnut highlights and a couple of “Rogue” stripes added at the front in cream. That just left tidying up the black areas and highlighting them with dark grey.

Both were them coated in Quickshade light tone, and once dry had their bases finished in my usual manner. A spray coat of matt varnish was then put over then both to take off the shine the “Quickshade” had given them and they were done. A nice simple and fun weeks painting as I’d hoped. “This was not a Quin Martin production!”

Finally before I go I’ll share with you all the final results for the “Paint what we’ve all got challenge”, Dave Stone gave you a choice of four Fantasy Monsters, and he will be sculpting the winner for us all to paint in September. So without further ado the results were…..

Dragonkin, 12.5%   Snake Man, 25%   Ogre, 37.5%   Troll, 25%

So this means we should expect an,  “Savage, armoured fantasy Ogre with a hand weapon”, appearing sometime soon’ish (hopefully with plenty of time for you overseas lads to purchase and receive the mini, before we get under way in September).

Cheers Roger.