Epoxy + end of the night project =

Well, it wasn't nearly as bad as it could have been.  I was slow in getting together all the things I wanted to epoxy so it set up before I was done.  That meant mixing another micro-batch.

Paint night went very well.  I had one new painter who already has good brush control so he's going to be a fun addition if he keeps showing up.  As with all new painters he's a little hesitant but once he gets some confidence he'll be slappin' paint like the rest of us.

I was able to get the lesser earth elemental painted and sealed with time to spare.  He's one of the epoxy items from above.  Time was taken as I confirmed what size base he needed, since I somehow misplaced the one that should have been in his package.  I know I'll find it now that I replaced it.

Due to circumstances I didn't have nearly as much time to paint as I normally would but I actually expected that.  I did a nice amount in the time I had.  But I did have to do something that I prefer not to do - leave a color unfinished.  Typically I'll try to finish up a color so that when I pick up the figure again I can move forward.  In this case I got the base coat done and that was it.  There won't be that much highlighting (and a colored wash on one thing) but it irks me that it's unfinished.   I just don't have the time to do it tonight.

The lesser earth elemental actually isn't for my tournament army.  It's for my optional 1,500 point army used for pickup games.  But it was assembled and easy enough that I could work on it at paint night so I decided to get it out of the way.  And I did.  Yay me.

Contemplating the amount of time before I leave and what I need to do has been a painful experience.  My goal right now is to get all the figures painted and the base material glued in place.  Priming it would be a bonus.  Then I can take the paints and static grass with me and finish them in the hotel when I'm visiting my dad.  Yes, I take time out for myself when I visit him.  I suppose I could take them to his house when I visit but it doesn't seem right.  I would have to take a few paints with me but they're legit to take on the plane and I don't mind taking half a dozen little paint bottles.  I'll already have the brushes.

I just checked on the last dwarf with epoxy and it looks like his hand/weapon are going to stay attached at the angle I wanted.  I'll leave him braced overnight just to be sure.  One nice thing about the epoxy is that it also works as filler for the joints.

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Paint .. Paint .. Pay Bills .. Paint .. Prep .. Post

I think I'll grow tired of these subject lines in the near future but no promises.

Errands and other things kept me from painting until a bit later in the evening but I made very good progress on the piercers (archers).  Even though they're all in the same pose I have to take the time to make the hair/beards different colors.  It's a quirk of mine and I like the way it breaks up the army.  So all the beards are done and the belt pouches except for the detail since that's a color I'm using later in the paint job.  I also touched up the primer (again) on the bits where it rubbed off.

I can see these getting done by the end of the week,easily.  I'm pushing it out because tomorrow is paint night and I'm not sure how much time I'll get to paint after all that.  I will be working on the lesser earth elemental so with any luck that additional figure will be done.  That would be spiffy.

I did take the time to prime up the next figure so I can move on quickly.  She really needs to be painted in 2 parts so the pieces are set up separately.  I was pondering colors as I was priming her.  I see a lot of white on this one for some reason.

I also started assembly on the last figure.  He's going to need epoxy to hold his appendages in place.  There's no pegs of any kind so it's all face-to-face assembly.  That doesn't hold well with superglue and I'm just not up to pinning them.  I'll mix a little epoxy and get that done quickly enough.  The odd thing tho is that this figure is very much like the mancatchers in how he's designed so I can use the same color scheme and painting order to get him done.  The hard work is already completed (decided what colors go where) so I can just fill in the pieces.

I keep all my colors on notecards for the army figures.  That way if I need to paint more later I know what colors I used where.  The unique figures don't get cards since if I ever do paint them again they'll be different.  Why would I paint a unique figure again?  Some special army sub-lists remove the 'unique' flag from figures.

I'm actually quite pleased with how these are looking but I'm getting darn sick of painting them.  I don't think I'll be choosing dwarf figures for paint-and-take at ReaperCon this year.

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Paint .. Paint .. Paint .. Post .. Paint

I think you get the idea.

To tell the truth I'm getting heartily sick of painting dwarves.  I know I'm on the home stretch and there really weren't that many and I should have been painting them much earlier but none of that really matters when I'm sitting at the paint table and painting more dwarves.

The piercers (archers) are actually coming along nicely.  They're mostly armor and that paints up fast.  As always there's some fiddly bits that will take a little more attention but that's to be expected.

I hoped to be farther along tonight than I am (going to do a bit more painting yet after posting this) but I also thought that the armor was complete after last night.  It wasn't.  Oh well.  It is now.

At paint night this week I hope to paint up the lesser earth elemental.  I'm not using him in this army build but I have my reasons for choosing him.

1. He's not very futzy so I can paint him reasonably well at paint night
2. I can use him in the 1,500 point pickup games, if I play
3. He'll be done

I think those are all very good reasons to paint him.

Back to the table.

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Progress on dwarfy goodness

The dwarf army is progressing!  The mancatchers are done and the bear rider captain is done except for the darklining.  I painted her up today.  She wasn't a 2 hour paint job, unfortunately.

The missing figures came in today's mail so now I have all the models I need to complete my army list.   Next on the block will be 4 archers (piercers).  They're the last of the multiple figures, which is true army painting.  It's assembly line work but in a way it's fun.

Then I have 2 unique models.  One is pretty simple, one has a lot of detail.  I'm going to work on the detailed one next and save the simple one as a treat for finishing all of these up.  I'm rather proud of myself for getting these done to my painting standards.  I probably could have been a lot farther had I not decided that I wasn't going to rush them just to get them done.  I'm never happy with the result when I do that.

I've been playing with doing colored washes over the metallics.  I started on the mancatchers with a blue wash over the gold to bring out the details and tone it down a little.  The bear rider captain (Ursula) got the blue wash over all of her armor and a red wash over the gold on some of her weapons.  It adds a nice variety to the metals and I'm looking forward to experimenting with this more.

I've got some time left tonight so I'll probably take that last piercer out of the package and get him ready for priming.  I have to glue his arms on and I like them to set for a while before I start painting.

As I've been painting these I've found quite a few mold lines that I missed when cleaning them up.  I was tempted to clean them some more and prime those spots again but I know where that leads.  There's always mold lines unless you're completely obsessive about it.  These aren't for a painting competition.  They're tabletop army figures.  A few mold lines won't matter.  I try to clean them up nicely and if I miss something really obvious I'll go back and get it but I won't worry if I find one here or there.

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And back to the paint table I go

My sojourn into sewing completed, I hit the paint table again.  Well, not literally "hit" because that would have made a mess.

Of course I've had a few delays that put me about 2 hours behind my designated paint schedule over the last 2 days.  And guess what, I'm about 2 hours away from completing these guys.  Funny that.  And I mean complete up to the lining.  I always let the figures sit for at least a day after the last paint before I put on the varnish.  I like to make sure the paint is completely dry.

3 mancatchers, 3 different eye colors, 3 different beard colors and just for fun 3 slightly different bedroll colors.  The bedroll color differences are so slight I really should have just painted them all the same.  I'm going to file that away for future reference.

What's left?  The highlighting on the grip bands on the polearms, the blades of the polearms, some metallic accents like rivets, and the darklining.  Not a lot, not a lot of work, but enough to keep me amused.  I don't think we have plans for tomorrow night so Spaghetti willing and the creek don't rise these guys will be painted by the end of Friday night.

I got word that 5 of the 9 minis I sent off to be painted are going to be coming home soon enough that I can use them at ReaperCon as I hoped.  I only need 4 in my army so I'm very happy that I'll have enough.  The problem is going to be choosing the ones I want to use.  Actually, that isn't my problem.  I told Mr. Rastl he gets to choose the minis when I have more painted than I need.  He said it's just so I can blame him if I lose.  He's right.

No gaming this weekend so that gives me large blocks of time when I can paint.  Hopefully.  I'm sort of scheduled to go to a gem and jewelry show on Sunday but that's looking iffy on my companion's part and I won't be all that disappointed if we don't go.  I will miss the used book store we were also going to visit but there's a good chance I need to head up that way with Mr. Rastl for a project I just handed him.

Mr. Rastl and I had a franker-than-normal discussion about my birthday present.  Yes, it's coming up.  We're at the point in our lives when we really don't need anything and if we want it, we buy it.  So presents are difficult.  After some thought I said I would really like and use one of the portable light boxes so that I could actually take pictures without a lot of setup.  I found one I liked, sent him the link, and I believe he ordered it.  Not a lot of surprise there but something that I will truly appreciate and enjoy.  Sometimes getting old isn't that bad.

And finally, I handed off a project to Mr. Rastl as noted above.  One thing that's really cool when showing miniatures is the 360 degree view, like I did for the exchange piece.  That was a lot of work:  moving the turntable, taking pictures, editing, making a video file.  So I'm asking for a turntable that turns at about 1 revolution per minute, perfectly smooth.  I have to send him the details but he's already got ideas.

If anyone can make this, it's Mr. Rastl.  Seriously.

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Dwarf army update

This is pretty much my main project right now.  I've tweaked the army list some more but luckily that didn't remove any figures I already had painted or I probably would have gotten very annoyed at myself.

The bear riders are done.  I might put one more highlight on the gold metallic but that's in the 'nice to have' category.  I'll have the color out in the next day or so and I'll make my decision then.  I did try something new to do black hair and I'd rate it 6 out of 10.  It will do for now.

The mancatchers are pretty darn close to done.  Faces and hair, the polearms, and a few miscellaneous metallic buckles and such.  I had a bit of a mental block less than halfway through but once I got past that things really moved along nicely.

The only remaining multiple figures are the archers and I don't have all of them yet.  I need 4, I have 3.  So the last one is on order.  Since it isn't efficient to paint the other 3 I'll turn my attention to the unique figures that need painting.  Given that I'm missing 2 of the 4 uniques (on order) that gives me a very small painting selection.  Hopefully the missing figures will show up soon.

Now, why did I tweak my army list again?  I realized that I was confusing 2 model types again and I could collapse some of the troops.  Letting me use the leader points on other figures.  It's a gamble.  I have fewer troops so I have fewer opportunities to use them and react to my opponent.  On the other hand these are some pretty darn solid troops so they can take a lot of abuse.  And once they hit something, it stays hit.  With the changes my point level is exactly 1,000, which is the point limit for the tournament.  Nary a wasted point.

I'm making the assumption that I'll have the 'special dwarf figures' that other people are painting back in my sweaty little hands so I can use them in the tournament.  I need 4 of them and I'm using them as a proxy for the actual figures.  So if I have time I'll paint up the actual figures as well.  Especially if it looks like I might not get them back in time.

The circumstances haven't been right for me to take pictures of anything.  Lighting, time, etc.  And the longer I wait the more pictures I have to take, edit, post, etc.  It's a vicious cycle.

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I'm debating a hobby blog split

I seem to have two entirely separate hobby interests - gaming/terrain/miniatures and sewing/handwork/dolls.  And while they're interesting to me I'm not sure how my few followers feel about mixing them in my posts.

So I've been considering starting another blog with the sewing/handwork/doll stuff since most of my friends here are part of the other hobby.  And of course the personal commentary would stay here since, well, this is where my friends are.

So chime in and let me know if you feel that separating the blogs is a good idea or if you're fine with the variety of things that show up in my blog posts.

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I promise, pictures this weekend

The undead pirates all have the sand on their bases.  That still means primer, paint and vegetation but it's better than nothing.  I know the last post had 'everyone except the monster' but now it's just everyone.  Yay everyone!

The bear riders have the bears finished and varnished and the riders are primed.  So I can work on painting the riders without as much worry about scraping/wearing the paint off the bears.  When I get them done the entire figure will get a coat of varnish so the bears get a double helping.

This weekend was supposed to be very, very busy but now it's just very busy.  It looks like the only time I'll have for hobbies is Sunday night.  And I'll try to be good and finish up the base coat on the arena pieces then so that project is ready for finishing.

I will try to get pictures this weekend so you can see how things look.  I've been talking about them a lot but it's really cool to actually see them.

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Yeah, yeah

A quick update on various and sundry things.

The hankie/lace issue hasn't been resolved.  I need some time on the couch without too many distractions and that hasn't happened in the last few days.  It's on the list.

The undead pirates are painted, varnished, and have the sand on the bases.  The monster is one step behind because he needed to be attached using epoxy and I was waiting for another project to get to the epoxy state as well.  That has been achieved.

I'm also painting one of my personal armies to bring to ReaperCon so I've been working on those as well.  5 dwarf bear riders are well underway.  The bears are painted except for a couple of touchups where they were lying down and are currently letting their epoxy set as well.  See above for 'another project'.  This was it.

The bear riders need to be painted yet but now that I will be able to handle the model without fear of damaging the paint it will go much easier.

I also have 3 mancatcher models (nasty models with reach) that I started at paint night so those are the next ones up to be done.  I'd say they're close to 1/4 done already.  I'm such an optimist.

Terrain-wise I did get the final arena-in-trade pieces base coated but they need the touchups.  I'm hoping to get those done over the weekend even though it's a busy one.  That's looking for the holes and seams where the paint didn't get so it's kind of a finishing thing.  The drybrushing goes really quickly and his decorative painting is easy.

Also regarding terrain I'm stealing a really good idea from a friend and making mold masters for village houses.  The masters are completed walls with knuckle joints so I can pour an entire house in just a few pieces and assemble them quickly.  It's an easy way to build a village.  I'm currently making pieces in 4, 5 and 6 inch wall lengths so I can make some real variety.  I'm out of the 30 degree blocks that are great for the roof angles so I'll need to cast some of those to make the roof sections.  Gee, me having to cast more blocks to complete a project.  Who would have thought it?

Maybe pictures this weekend, maybe not.

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It's hard to let go of things

As hard as it can be to believe at times I really do like helping people.  Some people.  Sometimes.  With some things.  OK - I like helping people when it suits me.  That sums it up better.

One thing I really like doing is finding things for people.  I shop in all kinds of odd places and when people need and/or want unusual or hard to find items it's really fun to be able to either tell them where it is or pick it up for them, depending on the situation.

I worked out at the local renaissance faire for 12 years.  For 3 of those years I was the camp cook for the military guilde.  That was hard work but also lots of fun.  I accumulated a really interesting collection of vintage and odd cooking items.  When I stopped I gave a lot of them to the person running the faire's 'food kitchen' for the performers but I kept a few of my favorite things.  At the time he asked me to stay on the lookout for more of the items.

He left a couple of years later.  I don't know who is running it now so there's no reason for me to look for the stuff any more.  But I'll see a bowl or a set of mugs at a thrift store or a yard sale and still think to myself that they would be perfect for them.  It's hard to let go of the situation.

What brings this up is that there's going to be a new camp cook for the military guilde this year and he's someone I know slightly.  I know him more through friends than directly but that's nothing new.  And he did suggest that we get in contact about cooking and sewing, since he does that too.  I've sent him a couple of general "Hey, let's chat" e-mails but haven't gotten any replies.  If I don't hear back by the end of the month (I just sent the second one a week or so ago) then I'll take the answer as implied.  I can deal with that.

Back to what brought this up.  I was driving home for lunch yesterday and one of the houses on the route seems to be doing a lot of spring cleaning.  In the pile on the curb was a great woven basket - a nice big one in good shape.  I used to use those for storing my cooking supplies when I was still doing that.  Had I been in contact with the new camp cook I would have picked it up for him and let him know.  If he didn't want it I could have given it to someone else or tossed it.  But since I haven't heard from him one way or another I won't assume anything.

The basket is gone now so the opportunity is lost.  I just used it as an example of how I can't let things go even when I really should.  Even if I hadn't known about the camp cook I still would have looked at that basket and thought that it would be really useful out there and had the same thought about picking it up for .. someone.

The last of my cooking items I'll be giving to my good friends who do reenactments and love to cook.  They'll use them happily and I'll know they're being appreciated.  There's a couple of things that have special meaning and I'll keep those for the memories but the rest of it has to go and I want it to go to the right people and not just someone who is in a certain situation.

And I know that for pretty much as long as I have my memories I'll see a mug at a sale and think that someone could use it.  Is this a bad thing?

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So much for self-imposed deadlines

I did not complete any of my March goals regarding minis and terrain.  I'm a terrible person.

One reason for that is realizing that I need an army if I'm going to compete in the ReaperCon Warlord tournament so I needed something besides my demo armies.  I do have 5 complete armies on the shelf.  None of them are painted, of course.

I know I have elves started but decided not to go with them.  I have my reasons.

Two friends are painting up some dwarf minis for me so I decided to field them with my army.  The decision went to dwarves.  I then used the online data card search to find my troop composition.

I blatantly imposed on a friend to review my list and make sure I hadn't done anything grossly stupid and he agreed it was a pretty solid list.  I'm actually 8 points over the limit but I can adjust spells and such to make it fit.

Then I had to bring out the models and see what I had.  Given the list I'm good on all but the 2 sergeants I picked.  I don't have those models.  Of course.  But the proxy rules are good and I can use some solo figures I'm not fielding to fill in for them.  I do have the real ones on my 'to acquire' list (or will when I get around to it) so I can put the solos back into play.  There's no reason why I have to play the same army all the time.  A good part of the fun is trying new things.

I'm also in the process of painting up the Razig monster.  He's got his base coat on him and I'm running into the same issue someone else so astutely noted.  How can you paint something as undead that looks dead when it's alive?  I'm trying to paint an undead crab.  Not quite the easiest thing I've ever done but I think I have the colors worked out so it should turn out decently enough.

Once I apply myself he should be completed in an evening.  There's a few fiddly bits but nothing that requires a lot of painstaking detail.  So I can work faster without having to go back and spend all the time I tried to save doing cleanup.  I already painted the inner details and assembled the shell so that's done.  Now it's just externals and then attaching him to the base.  That's going to be interesting since there's no good connection points.

I think I'm going to mark where his legs touch the base, carve out some holes, then use the 2 ton epoxy to put him in place.  That seems like the most effective way of keeping him attached.

Everyone's bases will be a mix of driftwood, sand and seaweed.  That's going to be fun.  Undead pirates, remember?

And I'm going to try to enlist help in getting the arena base coated.  I'm kind of a control freak when it comes to my painting but I don't think they can screw up a base coat too badly.  Hopefully.

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