WOOHOO!

Once again... WOOHOO!!!

After more than three years, closure has been achieved in the CSM Tome of Horrors I & II Kickstarter/Ponzi -Scheme boondoggle. I got a box of miniatures yesterday.

In fact, I got a box of outstanding miniatures and took many pictures of same. Worth the wait? Let's not get crazy, folks. Three years is three years, after all.

Still.. some great sculpts, unusual subjects,  & quality casting. Behold:

Babbler

Basidirond

Blindheim

Boneneedle

Bullywugs ( AKA Tsathar)

Cassomolar, President of Hell

Catterwaul

Dire Corbies

Disenchanter

Flumphs

Gorbel

Iron Cobra

Jaculi

Kamadan

Splinterdrake

Overall, casting quality is excellent. The only exception being the flanks of the Disenchanter, just below the hump, on both sides. Here the mini's surface is deeply pitted. A picture on Pacesetter's Facebook page shows an example with the same issue so mine's likely typical in this regard.

Cassomolar may be the best sculpt of the bunch. Fine work by Patrick Keith. Its small size was a big surprise, however, in view of its price ($16.95). I can't complain though, technically it was one of my free selections.

The Dire Corbies, on the other hand, are larger than expected... absolute brutes.

In making my selections I focused on certain sculptors (Keith, Kline, Williams, Prow) and subjects tied to the old Fiend Folio (11 of 15).

Very seussian

Finally, a word of gratitude to Bill of Pacesetter Games. He really pulled the fat out of the fire here. Well done, sir.

PS - Love the flumphs.

PPS - WOOHOO!!!

Low-Tech Cephalopod

Being a re-visitation of Naval November with feeble excuses offered as to the author's failure to fulfill his ongoing obligations...

Cut to the chase... Roy over at RoyW's Hobby Blog came up with Naval November last year. I liked the idea and put together a wizard/familiar combo in line with the theme.

So far, so good. The sticking point was that NN came right after Zomtober and participating in those two events back-to-back badly impacted my previous commitment to The Helping Hand Challenge. (The fact that I'm a slow painter and a general loss of interest stemming from my costly involvement in the Center Stage Kickstarter debacle only made matters worse.)

It felt wrong to produce a LOOK WHAT I PAINTED!! post featuring the pair while The Helping Hand Challenge sat neglected. Consequently, only the fish familiar saw the light of day back in November while his boss was allowed to cool his heels (or tentacles in this case) until The HHC was caught up.

As I'm nearly caught up, it seemed a good time to finally unveil the pair as originally intended.

The wizard began as Bombshell Miniature's Edo Underling #1. In keeping with the pulp sci-fi theme of Bombshell's Counterblast line, the mini holds an enormous ray gun. Nothing against pulp sci-fi or ray guns, but that needed to go. After much filing, carving, and pinning, it was replaced with a suitable staff from a Reaper mind flayer (a staff with tentacles, no less).

There are some awfully cool minis in the Edo faction. As there's always a little more room in the lead pile, I picked up a couple other items at the same time as this one.

The markings were cribbed from the mimic octopus... an amazing animal optimized for deception and a fitting inspiration for a wizard specializing in illusion.

Beyond that, he's still something of a work in progress on a conceptual level. If nothing else, I see him and his kin as foes of the aquatic undead from Zomtober.

Good or evil? The jury's still out.

Crunch Time

I have pledged on the Otherworld Miniatures forums to paint at least one OW miniature per month throughout 2013. I haven't missed a month yet but my on-time performance has been nothing to write home about.

Punctuality is not one of my virtues it seems (at least within the realm of miniature painting).

Pictured above are some minis intended for May & June (hoping to get a jump on next month). From left to right they are: a cleric/monk from Gamezone, a gnome from Center Stage, A medusa from OW, a demon from OW, and a cyclops from Heresy. The cleric/monk & demon will be paired up for May while the medusa and cyclops are meant for June. 

The gnome is the odd-man-out. (or is that odd-gnome-out?)

A great little Patrick Keith sculpt from the recently concluded Torn World Kickstarter. I removed his integral base and sculpted a replacement. A lot of detail in a confined space on this one. Should be fun.

Center Stage's current Tome of Horrors Complete campaign is picking up steam as it nears its end. The work of sculptor Drew Williams has been especially impressive. Check out these WIPs.

Nice. They may call them tsathars but they look like bullywugs to me. Hopefully CSM gives Mr Williams as much work as he can handle.

Shadow Demon Blues

The shadow demon is complete and The FF Project has gained another member:

(L to R) Blindheim, Shadow Demon, Forlarren

The mini allows a nice contrast between the very simple scheme on the actual demon and the abundance of color on the base. The colors used on the demon were Reaper Military Blue, P3 Frostbite, and GW Chaos Black.

The three-part WIP photo below shows the base in various stages of completion: A) black wash and grey/white drybrushing over grey primer,  B) the basic colors glazed on followed by some selectively applied washes, and C) highlights and some stronger shadows where needed.

Revisiting the construction of the base for a moment, the Reaper treasure mound was too large for the base until I reduced its size with my trusty motor tool. I had a pretty good idea of where the demon should be mounted and tried to work things out so that point wound up at the base's center. This required the removal of everything behind the chest. The resultant void was filled in with green stuff.

The coin-pile was extended to the front edge of the base with some stretched plastic sprue cut into disks and embedded in more green stuff. 

And finally a few more pics of the end result:

Monkey See, Monkey Do

Many blogs that I enjoy feature ongoing projects bound together by a common theme. Prehistoric Pulp at Laughing Ferret, Folk Horror at An Evil Giraffe, and Secret Project at 28mm Victorian Warfare are prime examples of this sort of thing. Not wanting to be left out in the cold, I'm initiating The Fiend Folio Project; miniatures inspired by the first edition's Fiend Folio.

Some will be direct representations of entries from the book, others may wind up using those entries as a starting point only. I won't pursue this to the exclusion of all else but will instead revisit the project as the mood strikes me.

I actually got the ball rolling last year with a forlarren and a blindheim. This year's first work in progress is a shadow demon.

This uses the body of a Wyrd sorrow, the head from a RAFM night-gaunt, and the wings from a Reaper succubus. I made a base using a Reaper treasure pile and attached the mini; concealing the pin with some green stuff.

 

Hopefully a fair representation of the subject as rendered in the original (plus horns).

Now for some paint...