Saturday, December 27, 2014

Christmas After Action Report

He knows if you've been bad or good, so be good for goodness sake.

Christmas has come and gone. I thought I'd take this opportunity to stick my head up, prove that I'm still capable of producing a post every now and then, and show off some holiday swag.


First up are some Hangar 18 backgrounds; a gift from my brother Bob. Looking forward to putting these to the test. It's probably time to retire my ubiquitous construction paper for everything but WIP shots.


Chinese brushes. That's right... Chinese brushes. Long story short: Kolinsky sable brushes have become difficult to get on this side of the Atlantic due to CITES compliance issues and the unwelcome (and likely unwarranted) attentions of the Department of Fish and Wildlife. I only learned of this when unsuccessfully attempting to replace my tired Windsor & Newton Series Sevens at the local art store.

I have a client, an artist by trade, who, upon learning of my difficulties, kindly set me up with the brushes pictured. The bristles consist of a pliable outer layer overlying a more springy central core. They're larger than what I'm used to but they each come to a very fine point. I'm not sure what to expect but I'm eager to take them out for a test drive.


Lastly, I received my rewards from Fractured Dimensions' Infernal Minions Kickstarter. A whopping, great pile of metal (and a little resin) goodness pictured above.

It just wouldn't feel like Kickstarter without some bad news. In this case it takes the form of two missing miniatures and one set of two multi-part miniatures that arrived lacking heads.


Orcus
Demons
Devils and Miscellaneous

On the plus side of the ledger, these are absolutely brilliant miniatures. The sculptor, Paul Muller, brought his A game and Brett Zeleznik of Fractured dimensions did, and continues to do, a fine job in seeing the campaign through to a successful conclusion.

Fractured Dimensions has been around for a while, but these minis should really put the company on the map when they're released.

Restoring a few toes should fall within my sculpting abilities.

The casting quality is excellent overall. A thorough inspection revealed only one small miscast: some missing toes on one miniature.

Left to right: Heresy, FD, Otherworld, FD, Reaper

Two of the minis caught my attention as having a creepy-obese-clown-ghoul vibe. As I've been amassing a force of Muller sculpted ghouls for some time, they may wind up being re-purposed as undead. As in all things, time will tell. (Did someone say Zomtober 2015?)

Off to the landfill

12 comments:

  1. Merry Christmas Finch and a very nice bundle of goodies you have there. I especially like the look of those demons. Looking forward to Zomtober 2015 already now :-)

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I may be jumping the gun but a little early planning couldn't hurt. The only thing certain is that I hope to participate again next year.

      Delete
  2. Those paper backgrounds look interesting, curious to see how well they work with the minis.

    Brett and Fractured Dimensions are great, very nice demons there.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I had the pleasure of painting the demon you sculpted for FD some time ago : http://minisbyfinch.blogspot.com/2013/01/shine-on-you-crazy-demon.html . A very cool miniature.

      Delete
  3. Those paintbrushes look very cool! I wish I had some, but I don't know what I'd use them for.

    I had to purchase some new brushes the other week, and in the time without my prefered nylon brushes I was forced to use sable brushes. I've got to say that I'm not a fan and prefer the synthetic brushes. I wasn't able to obtain the brush control with the sable, since my brush discipline has been built up using nylon brushes. Anyway, each to their own, as they say.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. As you say, to each their own.

      Were those red sable brushes, perhaps? I'm no fan of those either.

      Delete
    2. I don't know, to be honest.
      My spare brushes as by Wargames Foundry - their very fine detail brush and their drybrushing brushes I'm happy with, but not so much the others. In truth I'm using The Army Painter nylon brushes now and they suite my style fine - the models in my new blog post were painted with the nylon brushes.

      Delete
  4. Thanks, for posting the pictures of the Demons. I'm Jealous because I'm waiting on mine :( as for brushes I keep hearing about issues getting Kolinsky Sable but I haven't had any problems getting them on line here in New England from Dick Blick. Any way have a Happy New Year and look forward to seeing those demons painted;)

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Happy New Year. Thanks for the heads-up on Dick Blick.

      Hopefully your rewards will arrive soon. When they do, I'm sure you'll be pleased. Excellent minis.

      Delete
  5. That's quite a nice haul, sir. Very much looking forward to seeing the fat undead clowns painted up in the New Year- they look like they'd make nice ghasts to me. Those brushes look intriguing, as well. Happy Holidays!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Happy Holidays, VK. Ghouls, ghasts, demons, clowns. Whatever they are, one thing's for sure: they're a couple nasty-looking little buggers.

      Delete
  6. Those figures do look very well sculpted. The kind of horror stories that come out from KickStarter sometimes makes it hard for someone on a tight budget to take a risk. But then again, without risk there is no reward. What to do, what to do.

    ReplyDelete