The Baron D'Angon and his friends

 A fairly quick post here. I did do a longer post about some other miniatures, but I couldn't get a good photo of them and I threw a strop and deleted it.

Anyhow, I've nearly finished my unit of 20 oldhammer foot knights. I have completed a command group for them. These models are painted in the colours of the Baron D'Angon, as featured in White Dwarf 137. Slightly oddly, the knights wear yellow surcoats, but the baron himself and his banner have completely different heraldry. I've copied that look here, and tried to add some yellow to all the models to tie them into the other knights.

The baron himself is exactly the same model as featured in that White Dwarf back in 1991. He's been in a box for about thirty years! The WD 137 unit doesn't have a musician, and I've used a model from the first Bretonnian codex to represent him. By the way, the herald reminds me a lot of the rabbit herald in John Tenniel's illustrations for Alice in Wonderland.

The standard bearer himself is a modern plastic man at arms, with a new shield and a new head. I've copied the baron's colours onto the banner.

As you might have guessed, WD 137 has been a major influence on me. It was one of the first White Dwarfs that I ever saw, and it contained two really striking armies: not just the almost-totally-unshaded Bretonnians, but Andy Chambers' filthy skaven horde. These days, it's quite common to see "impressionistic" models (frankly, some of the Trench Crusade miniatures that pop up on Instagram look like the poo of an animal that needs to see the vet), but Chambers' skaven were really quite unusual. Oh, and it had Bretonnian crossbowmen, but more of that later.

So two of the big blocks of infantry are getting near to completion, which is cool! I reckon I'm about halfway through this project. It's turning into a bigger thing than I'd originally planned, but I'm enjoying it all. We'll get there.

Shock Attack Gun!

 This week, I've painted a few more old space orks. 

First up, we've got a model that I've had for ages and have never quite dared paint: the shock attack gun. (Or shokk atak gun, or shok attak gun - there seem to be a lot of spellings.) To my mind, this thing is one of the holy grails of Oldhammer space orkness. It's a sort of shoulder-mounted heavy weapon, but that  doesn't do it justice. That's like saying that an elephant is shaped like a dog.

The shock attack gun is, in the 40,000 background, a bizarre heavy weapon invented by ork techs in order to fire snotlings (small, goblin-like creatures) at their enemies. The gun teleports the snotlings into position (roughly), with a variety of interesting potential effects. Depending on how you rolled on a table, the gun could cause frenzied snotlings to attack the enemy, or appear inside them, causing a vast explosion, or just blow things up. Alternatively, the gun could malfunction and teleport its wielder to who-knows-where.

In short, it was very random and orky. There have been three miniatures of the shock attack gun, as far as I can tell, and I managed to find the earliest version on ebay, going at a not-too-awful price. I think it looks very silly and is an absolutely superb miniature. The detailing is remarkable, especially when you reflect that it's hand-sculpted. The gun has a very Heath-Robinson look, with all sorts of cogs, belts, tanks, rotors, wires, vents and pipes. It seems to have a tap on the back and an egg-timer on the side - because, if you're an ork, why not?

Anyhow, it was a real pleasure to paint and will be a nice addition to my small force of old-school orks.

I also painted an ork in heavy armour. Someone had removed his original gun, which I replaced with a plastic bolter. He's a nice model. It's always weird to realise how very small these guys are. I do have some more recent plastic black orcs, from Warhammer Fantasy Battle. I reckon they could quite easily be painted and converted as friends for this guy.

And finally, here's a Gorkamorka boy (or maybe a yoof). These plastic miniatures are largely forgotten now, and they occupy an odd niche between the goofy orks of 2nd edition 40k and the hulking monsters of post-2000. Taking that into account, they're quite reasonable plastic miniatures for the time, but I doubt they're loved that much these days. Anyhow, this chap has quite a cool pose.

So that's the orks for now. I've absolutely no idea what I'll paint next. There's quite a queue. 

Painting Skin and a Couple of Scavvies

 Last post, Lasgunpacker asked for any tips on painting skin. To be honest, I find this quite hard, and it's not something I enjoy much, especially where you've got big open expanses of skin, as with ogres or trolls. So, here's what I know about painting Caucasian, ie white, ie pink skin.

I start with a layer or two of Army Painter Tanned Flesh, which is a dark flesh, not-quite-terracotta colour. Then I'd put a wash of shade of (usually) Strong Tone, or much-thinned chestnut ink. I think the chestnut looks slightly more wholesome, but both are basically suitable for healthy flesh. For iller flesh, or big expanses, I might also wash with a bit of very thinned down purple. Occasionally, I might even put little washes of a thinned-down drab military green on raised points of the flesh, partly to "calm down" the highlights and partly to suggest unhealthiness. I'd use something like Model Color Russian Uniform Green for this. As with all these things, approach cautiously and don't go nuts. 

Then, as per standard with these things, I'd re-paint Tanned Flesh over the bits of the skin that aren't especially shadowed. I would then add increasing amounts of Model Color Rosa Salmon for highlights.  You could use a bone colour to highlight, but I don't think it works quite as well. Obviously, you have to be more careful with large, smooth areas than you would with small faces with a lot of ridges, so that the change in colours remains fairly smooth. Eventually, you're working up to a pretty light pink (but not an electric one, obviously). You can use this to represent knuckles and joints on the model's hands as well as lines on the face.

I never used to paint lips on male models, and used to see it as a sort of stylised way of showing that a model was female. These days I think it depends on the miniature. I would mix a tiny bit of red into a 50/50 mixture of Tanned Flesh and Rosa Salmon, and put it on the lower lip (but not the upper) of the miniature. Occasionally, I've used a similar mix to suggest age and/or drunkenness on models' noses and cheeks. You can also use a very thin glaze of watered-down Carroburg Crimson for this. 

Anyhow, I painted a couple more weirdos for my gang of horrible Necromunda scavvies. I thought it would be fun to make one of each of the mutations in the Outlanders army list. 

The tall guy on his own represents the "spikes" mutation, which makes sense as he's got a lot of spikes. He is a Mantic plague zombie model, with a Mantic zombie head. The body was made out of that awful plastic-resin stuff that Mantic have used in the past, which somehow manages to hold sharp detail but not look very good. It took a while to scrape off the mold lines, and I'm sure I missed some bits.

The second model represents the "three arms" mutation, or possibly "two heads". I find some of the old metal scavvy miniatures a bit too cartoony, and thought that it would be better to split this model into two guys. I went for the classic combo of a small devious guy being carried by a big dim one.

The lower chap is a Mantic ork, with 40k ork arms and a Stargrave head. The upper chap is a Perry Miniatures Afghan, still on his little plastic base, with a Stargrave head and Frostgrave arms. I think they work quite well together, although it was hard to get a picture that actually shows what they are.

So, there we go. I've not painted much, but I'm working on a few things. Hopefully I'll have some full Bretonnian knights soon. 

Random Space Weirdos

 Just a few weird space randos this week.

The crocodile man is a Mantic orc body with Frostgrave demon arms and a Stargrave head. The base model isn't great and I'm not sure why I've got it, but as ever, removing the head helps a lot.

The thug next to him is based on a Wargames Atlantic Boxer Rebellion body, with Games Workshop arms and a Ghost Archipelago head. Getting the arms and head to sit properly with the body was quite difficult. 

Then we've got a lady and robot, vaguely inspired by Jayne Cobb from Firefly and K2SO from Star Wars. "James" has a Bolt Action US marine body, with arms and head from Stargrave.

The robot is based on a model from the Warlord Games Terminator Genysis game. I know nothing about this game, except that the film was apparently awful, and that Warlord were virtually giving the game away. I've got a few sprues of these T-100 models, and they're pretty darn ropey. I gave it new arms, including one from a Perry armoured knight, and a GW Skitarri head. It's come out alright, really.

Nothing much else to report for now. I've got a couple of smaller projects on the go, and progress continues on the Bretonnians. They're looking quite decent so far!

Peasant Progress:

Men at Arms: 20

Archers: 18

Foot Knights: 15

Squirty Bottle Moon Buggy Conversion

 So, new year, new picture, or something like that. The photo at the top of the blog is actually the Stanley knife (or box cutter, if you're in the US) that I use for most of my cutting and conversion work. I gather that you're meant to use a craft knife, and maybe I'd get better results if I did, but I've found the Stanley knife to be very reliable and robust over the years. And I've wiped my brush on it so many times that it's starting to look like a work of abstract art in itself. I'm sure the Tate Gallery would love it...

When converting (and writing, for that matter) I often find that I have an idea kicking around in my head for ages, and it just takes the right moment for it to come out and take form. To be more precise, you know those trigger-activated, squirty bottles that you get for shower cleaner, disinfectant spray and the like? Ages back I thought that the head of one of those would make a good cockpit and I've been trying to work out how to do it ever since. 

I saved one, cut it down a lot, and wondered how to make it work as some kind of vehicle. My first thought was as the front of a flyer, but I lacked parts to really make that work. I also had a bit of plastic tube that had probably been to top of a pot of glue, which fitted nicely behind the "cockpit" and could be some sort of engine...

After that, I rubbed the whole thing down with fine sandpaper, so that glue and paint would take to it more easily, and added wheels. Two were old Ramshackle tyres, and I've no idea where the smaller pair came from. It began to have a smooth, slightly retro moon-buggy look.

I added lots of details from thin plasticard bent to shape, and leftover model tank bits. GW provided an aerial for the roof, from a Tau part. 

Then it was time for painting. I went with a basic off-white, with red panels and a black front canopy that is presumably made of some kind of two-way glass. This helped break up the shape of the squirter a bit more. I don't often wish that I had an airbrush, but getting a half-even coverage and some kind of shading was really hard. I ended up using a mixture of glazing, conventional painting and sponging, and it's still far from perfect.

That said, I do rather like the end result. I kept the weathering fairly minor, but added a few chips to suggest use. Here is the end product.

And here's a picture with a couple of space adventurers for scale. Broom!

A Champion for the Knights

When I stated the Bretonnian project, I thought that painting knights would be much like painting harlequins or space marines: doing one would prepare me for the other. Actually, that's not the case. The Bretonnian knights are bigger, of course, and use large blocks of colour (and, supposedly, transfers, which I've not got and have never used). My own feeling is that Bretonnian knights look better when they are painted in very bright, simple colours. I've used red, blue, green, black and the two "metals", white and yellow. Blue/white and red/yellow make for very strong contrasts.

The newer plastic knights have shield-shapes on their horses' barding, which break up the models but do add a new level of fiddly details (likewise the strips of chainmail sticking out from under the cloth). Personally, I like the cleanliness of the older models. In fact, I feel that when painting knights, the less grimdark, the better. No wonder that GW didn't know what to do with the Bretonnians for so long.

A further point about painting knights: once they're in a unit, and because they'll be viewed from above, generally, the colour on the back of the horse's head and its upper body is the colour that they'll be seen to be by an observer. So, if you want a varied unit, that's worth considering. 

Anyhow, I painted a leader for the Battlemasters unit. He's also a Battlemasters model, although he's from a slightly different knightly unit than the other knights. I had quite a job getting him to sit on his horse and some trimming and bending of his legs was required.

The "weaved" pattern on his barding is done by first painting a grid, as I would do for harlequins, then painting in the blue diamonds. Then I delete some of the lines to give an "over and under" look before painting yellow. The shading strengthens the effect that some of the lines are going underneath others.

And here is the whole unit. Charge!

Two More Knights and a Lot of Men at Arms

 Well, it's nearly the new year, so I guess this is probably going to be my final post of 2025. I know it's customary to do a yearly round-up of the things I've made, and from a purely painting point of view it's been a very good year, but I can't really be bothered right now. So instead, here are some more Bretonnians. For some reason, I associate knights with Christmas. I think it's because King Arthur met his knights then, as seen in the very weird recent film of The Green Knight. 

First up, two more plastic knights from the Battlemasters game. Pretty!

I bought a few more men at arms to round off my unit, including some musicians from the 1996 army book. One model, a halberdier, had a broken weapon that was going to be difficult to mend. I carefully cut away what was left of it and replaced it with a pole, made from the ramrod of an Empire cannon crew. It has a nice bobble at one end.

I'm not really a fan of paper banners. They seem to look very tatty very quickly, and I prefer the sculpted plastic ones that you get with modern boxed sets. So I made this guy a banner out of plasticard and green stuff. It's rather small, but I reckon that (a) men at arms aren't important enough to get big banners; (ii) this guy is tired out and is holding it lower down instead of waving it around; and (3) I want to be able to fit him into my miniatures case.

I also painted some friends for him, including a drummer. They take up the front row of the picture below. And that's the unit finished, painted in the colours of Les Hommes de Renault from White Dwarf 137 all those years ago (May 1991, to be precise). They're a bit grottier-looking than I'd first intended, and I'll need to get a movement tray for them, but overall I'm really pleased with the results.

On to the next models, and the next year! Happy New Year everyone!

EDIT: Wow, my men at arms are on the front of the Oldhammer Facebook group (for now)! Cool!