Lead Painter's League 2017, Round 10 - D is for Deep Ones

My entry for the Lead Painter League 2017, Round 10 (which I neglected to post).

A collection of small Deep Ones from Grenadier and RAFM and a big guy from the Strange Aeons game. The little girl is from Statuesque and was shown on the blog about a year ago.

Zombie Baluchis

Better late than never, I finished up a few more shamblers for the 'Army Painter' project I started a couple months ago.These six are from Obelisk Miniatures, who have stopped trading, and I'm not sure who has the rights to these. They fit with the style of Foundry Darkest Africa range very well.

Yet More Darkest Africa Baluchis

I'm quite a bit behind on my timeline for finishing up the various Baluchis I had planned for this years 'Army Painter', but I have squeezed in another installment.

Lead Painter's League 11 - Round 6

This entry is one I've been wanting to do for a while, after reading "The Bloody White Baron". The cover has a neat Mongolian demon skull border that I wanted to paint on a flag, as the Baron's actual flag was allegedly pretty boring looking.

I wasn't expecting it to get beat in the LPL but my opponent had a damn fine entry. This is the last time I'm doing a double sided hand-painted flag for an LPL round ;)

Lead Painter's League 11 - Round 4 - Arrival

Quite a while back I encountered a picture of some 28mm Clue miniatures sculpted by Mark Copplestone for the 'Cluedo: Super Sleuth' game (very nicely painted by 'Orctrader'). I managed to shortly thereafter acquire a boxed game on eBay. True to form, it took a couple years to get to them and painted them in time for an LPL entry.

I had already started the 3D Clue board, which is now mostly done except for interior furniture.

 

Lead Painter's League 11 - Round 1 - It Should Not Be

The 'Lead Painter's League', an annual ten-week painting contest hosted on the Lead Adventure Forum, is up and running. I felt I had the time to run with the pack this year.

My first entry was "It Should Not Be".

 I found a fake pulp magazine image a few years ago and had been wanting to re-create the jungle girl on the cover ever since. A friend identified the rifle for me and I was able to acquire a 28mm Mosin-Nagant. The original cave girl figure, from Tin Man Miniatures, had a spear (I also painted that version in an earlier LPL!). Replacing the weapon was a nice little challenge.

  

The warrior women are from Wargames Foundry's 'Darkest Africa' range.   

The creature is from Pure Evil Miniatures. He looks like an even more horrifying version of the Hasslefree 'Maw', so I had to have him.

Lillie Poots (Statuesque Miniatures)

Another figure that was part of the recent primed-figure clear out was 'Lillie Poots' from the manufacturer Statuesque Miniatures. This range of figures, by Andrew Rae, are really top notch and fun to paint. His earlier stuff was hand sculpted and super crisp. He has moved to digital sculpting and in my opinion they are the best digital to metal translations on the market. Perfect resolution of details and fun to paint. 

I'm not a huge fan of painting exaggerated OSL (Object Source Lighting) in miniatures, but she has a lantern, so I thought I might as well try it.

When I set up a more directed, focused light to get a cast shadow and some atmosphere the figure didn't change much, so I'm pretty happy with the light effect.

Oddly, it looks a little more rough when it's not evenly lit with an umbrella setup.

Professor Witchheimer

The Lead Adventure Forum runs periodic painting clubs that revolve around a variety of themes. Currently running is the 'Back of Beyond' club, and I decided to paint a Lead Adventure Miniatures 'Professor Witchheimer' figure for my first entry.

"Back of Beyond" covers the Russian Civil War and all the other shenanigans going on in East Asia during the 1920s. The period saw an explosion in popularity when Mark Copplestone released his range after being inspired by the book "Setting the East Ablaze" by Peter Hopkirk. It's a very good book.

Lead Adventure Miniatures

Setting the East Ablaze

Servants of Ra - Main Characters

At long last the main characters of the Servants of Ra (the Egyptian faction from the game 'In Her Majesty's Name') have arrived.

I'm not quite sure why it took so long for me to finish these last few figures. I started out with the relatively boring robed figures with the idea that it would keep me interested in completing the group- once those were done I let the leaders sit for several months...

The leader of the Servants of Ra is none other than the resurrected pharaoh Akhenaten. I stuck with the 'official' paint scheme, I liked it quite a bit. I may touch up the inlaid colors on the weapon, they look a little rough.

The second in command is the Egyptophile Professor Abir, making an appearance here with his daughter Sairah, the group's premiere assassin.

The remaining figure from the Ra faction is a mummy priest. I didn't really like this figure, but by the time he was painted up I changed my mind.

I hope to get a photograph of the whole faction shortly. I ended up with way more figures than I could possible use in a game of IHMN, but I tend to overdo things when it comes to miniature games...

Servants of Ra Second Wave

I've been slowly working on a commission and haven't taken much time to work on my own stuff. Here's a photo of some Servants of Ra I did several weeks ago and just now got around to photographing.

The group is a mix of Eureka, Northstar, and Pulp Figures cultists.

Lead Adventure League Round 9 - Phantom Ace

Here's my Round 9 LPL entry, 'Phantom Ace'.

 

Phantom Ace is from Pulp Alley or Statuesque Miniatures, the cultists are a mix of Northstar 'In Her Majesties Name' Servants of Ra, Foundry arabs, and a Pulp Figures cultist.

A gigantic cobra I didn't end up using, unknown manufacturer.

The regular snake charmer (Eureka Miniatures)

I also bought a couple Mashrabiya screens from Ironheart Artisans, here they are with figures.

Lead Adventure League Round 8 - Pulp Girl and the Jade Skull

This is my Round 8 entry for the Lead Painter's league on the Lead Adventure Forum.

 

The full scene had to be cropped quite a bit to get a good 800 x 800 pixel image. 

This was one of my favorite entries this season. Pulp Girl is an excellent figure, available from Pulp Alley and Statuesque Miniatures. She's one of the main protagonists of the Pulp Alley game, which I've not played yet, but looks cool upon a read-through. 

 This shady fellow is from the old Grenadier Miniatures 'Nightmare' range, from a pack called Vile Villains. He may still be available from Mirliton Miniatures.

These bats are also from the Nightmares range. 

 

This entry allowed me to finish up the last of the Amazon Indians that I had stashed away. Here's a possibly culturally insensitive mix of Tupi and Botocudo, from Copplestone Castings.

Lead Adventure League Round 4 - Ambush in Algiers

This is my Lead Painter's League round 4 entry, 'Ambush in Algiers'. The scene includes a mixture of figures, from Wargames Foundry (baggage carriers), Eureka (woman in burkha, market stall), Pulp Figures (nefarious Arab and monkey) , and Hinterland Miniatures (Camel and boy guide). The building is by Modelbau Najewitz.

North African Buildings Part 4

Two weeks ago my wife broke an ankle at Roller Derby practice. Naturally this reduced my free time to almost zero, which explains my recent lack of posts.

I have however managed to complete phase two of the North African terrain, as well as the mud walls. The latter took a lot more time than I expected, considering that I intended them to be a side project.

I decided that I wanted doors that could open or be removed, so I imbedded a magnet in the wall and the base, and drilled a hole to accept a nail  in the door.

I used a thick plastic-like cardstock material for the bases. 

After painting the walls with a thin coat of wood filler, I painted them a dark brown gray. 

The bases were painted with another gritty wood filler, then painted brown. I drybrushed them with a mud color, then stained them with a MinWax wood stain. The walls were painted/drybrushed with a layer of Martha Stewart crackle specialty finish ("Sandbar") I bought years ago.

I also started a chapel for the African village. The roof has been very problematic so it isn't finished yet. 

Walls, planters, and the chapel after staining, but before the final whitewash.

Finished walls and planters.

After all the planters were complete I glued in the trees and cycads. These are eBay palms with some airbrushing to give them a more natural color and a little depth. The fountain received some clear resin to mimic water after it was painted and the decorative tile (a printed border) glued in place.

Next up for this project is a market, which will be a few buildings with 'storefronts' and some free standing stalls.