“Seven from Blake’s” (Paint what you got challenge)

And so we come to the end of another year of “Covid confusion”, I think we all need a little normality to cling to in these dark and uncertain days, the “hobby” as we who do, call it has been a life line I think for many of us over the last couple of years, and a pastime that we don’t have to “play outside” to perform and this has given us an advantage in the “keeping sane” stakes, especially as we have been able to communicate and encourage (along with being a bit of a mental crutch) with each other via our respective blogs and other “net” related forms of communication. So as we set sail upon the (hopefully) calmer waters of 2022, I’d like to welcome you all back aboard my little corner of the internet, please keep all chairs in the upright position, don’t use the facilities 🚽 while we’re sitting in the station, the safety exits are situated there 👈 and there 👉, and I hope you enjoy the ride. Delores will be around a little later to take your food orders. But I hear you say what have I got in store for the coming year? Don’t ask me! I don’t even know what I writing at this point!

Oh, I do have a NEW challenge for this year, in the “Advent Challenge!”, yes I spent most of the last month risking paper cuts and arduously opening little cardboard doors (and some of them were a bugger’ I’ll tell you!), and I now have twenty four new plastic (Bones) figures to paint, but I’m getting ahead of myself as we already have a challenge underway in Dave Stone’s “Paint what you’ve got challenge” (you can tell I didn’t come up with that name!). Basically this is an excuse to paint all that stuff you’ve bought and put to one side for far too long (and if you can do that in two month’s you aren’t a proper wargamer!!!), I say two months as this actually started in December but I’m just jumping in now, as it’s better late than never as they say, but enough pre-amble what have I actually painted, well I thought I’d start simple so I’ve dug out a few spaceships I bought from Dave (coincidentally) toward the back of last year based loosely on the seventies BBC science fiction show “Blakes 7”, now I do also have two “Liberator” style ships that also need paint, but I have started with the “evil” federation ships (I should really have done the lot, but I was feeling lazy), so it is what it is.

First job was to clean up the castings, not too arduous as they were pretty good to be honest, the fun really started when I set about drilling holes in them to attach the “flying stands”, the smaller “pursuit” ships were okay, if a little awkward due to their curved shape, but the bigger ships with their four “wing” design meant I had to drill out a space into the lower wing and with them being made from resin I did of course “chip” away more than I wanted too, so out came the “greenstuff” and repairs had to be made. Also being the “cack” handed oaf that I am I did also knock off a few of the “spiked” protuberances at the edge of the wings, luckily as these were all from the vertical wings, therefore I thought it easier and prudent to just remove the rest of these and just leave the ones on the horizontal wings in place. I based the flying stands on two layers of card, this is for two reasons, 1) It increases the footprint of the bases slightly making them more stable, and 2) I usually add ship names onto the “tab” at the front, I haven’t done that here simply because we’ve run out of ink for the printer!

Painting wise they were pretty straightforward, once they had been completely undercoated in matt black, the ships were painted ruby red, then heavily dry-brushed in terracotta. Next I dotted in some “running lights” in light (day-glow) green, and the odd bit I repainted black before dry-brushing these with chainmail. They were then given a coat of “Strong tone” Quickshade, and the engine ports at the rear of the ships were painted with a ring of pale blue and while this was still wet I added white to the centre here and wet-blended then together to simulate the engine exhausts. I then tidied up the bases where the Quickshade had run down the shafts, and they were finished off with a “blow over” of matt varnish. Simple, simple stuff to be honest, but at least we are up and running again. Next I think I’ll tackle the first two of my “Advent Challenge” figures.

So till next week, stay safe, happy New Year, and cheers Roger.