Friday, May 29, 2009

Stuff Done So Far

These are the models I have completely done so far. I didn't take in-progress pictures on these as I didn't plan on doing a blog back then.

I'll start with the skellies I guess. These are the first warhammer models I painted. I didn't really research much and just kind of dove right into it (though I have to thank Shawn O for some newbie tips). I also did these models individually from start to finish, which I realize now isn't the greatest way to paint a unit. You also may notice that there are only eight of them. When I first painted them I thought I was going to include a banner and musician, however now that my list has changed I'm remodelling those models with sword and shield.

Next up are my dire wolves. I had a little bit of experience before I began these guys, and also some good tips from Ben and Driver. I'll be sporting 2 units of 5 at the Hillbilly, but shown below are just one unit. They actually didn't take nearly as long as I thought they would, especially once I got a routine down. This unit was also painted 'correctly' in that I did the base coat on all the models before I began drybrushing them all, then highlighting, etc.

The last model I have completely done (I find that I jump around between units a lot when I paint, that's why this list is so short) is my corpse cart. This was a pretty big awakening to how hard these kits can be. Even though it was only plastic, it took a lot of doing to get all the pieces to fit together properly. Painting was also a little bit of a nightmare. I did the skin by doing a basecoat of bleached bone, followed by a flesh color, and a final wash of brown. It was pretty simple, but turned out well. I'm still not quite satisfied with the basing, as the back seems to be needing something (maybe a zombie coming out of the ground or something).

So that's it for stuff totally done. My wife is moving to her internship this weekend, so I won't have time until next week to take pics of my many works in progress.

Intro

Right, just an introduction to begin with. I suppose I should explain how I got started on the hobby of spending large amounts of money on plastic and metal miniatures in order to play an over-complicated chess game.

I guess I would call myself a PC-gamer. I really began back in 2002 (wow...) when Warcraft III came out. I probably played too much for my own good, but I got pretty good at the game. I managed to get on a decent amateur league team in 2003, and did some tournaments and such (we even won one). Anyway, that led me to really like Blizzard games, and so I started playing World of Warcraft after WC3 cooled down. I met some guys who eventually invited me to The Hillbilly in 2008 (really sweet WHFB tournament in Memphis, TN; this year the name was changed to Battle on Beale - http://battleonbeale.com). I really liked the idea of the game, and was amazed at how balanced it was considering all of the rulings and army variations. On the way back from the tourney, the ND Wargaming Crew convinced me to start an army for next year, which in turn created the beginning of this blog.

I started purchasing minis for my Vampire Counts army in late Fall 2008. The motivation to paint them, however, did not begin then. My wife and I had just moved to NC that summer, so we were still getting settled in, and I was trying to find a job. I also was still playing a little WoW, so that hampered things. I finally started painting in early 2009 and have kept at it pretty regularly since.

So that's the intro to me and the beginnings of my wargaming. I have quite a few models that I've purchased now, and most of them are painted, but I am still a ways off from having everything completed by mid-July (my goal, as that's the dates for this year's Memphis tourney). Hopefully this blog will also help me to stay motivated and get everything painted by then.

Cheers.