WIP Aetherworks Buildings (and a Covered Wagon)

I have to admit, this year I have not had much time or motivation to paint display or competition level miniatures. Instead, I have been doing a lot of work on gaming quality pieces, and in particular, a lot of terrain from Aetherworks (including helping Rob on the town display, and doing the demo buildings for the Warmachine demonstration table at CanCon). Anyway, here are a few work in progress buildings on my table at the moment.

The steak house is just a bit of fun. I got a custom steak house sign done up and my idea was that it would be ideal for zombie apocalypse or crazy theme-park horror games. It's not yet finished, I am debating whether to do a corrugated iron roof to "Australian" it up or continue painting the brown.

 Here is another building, this time a bank. I figured everyone wants to visit the bank, so it was essential there was enough parking (i.e. space to hitch your horse) out the front, hence the two hitching posts. The brick was really easy to paint. I just used burnt sienna craft paint straight onto the MDF without an undercoat, and when it dried, the etched lines all showed through nicely.

 I also have a third building in progress, but I am unsure what it will be at this stage (maybe Applejack's Riding School).

 And a covered wagon. Redwarf did the tissue paper cover, all I've done is cut a line down the back and then added some scoring to the wood with a metal skewer.

Ok that's it for now, maybe next post I'll have some of these painted...

Cool Mini or Not Annual 2010

This is a shameless plug as I got a few of my miniatures featured in the Cool Mini or Not Annual 2010. You can purchase it off their website, or if you are in Australia and want to get it from someone local, you can find at Aetherworks.

Out of the Box: Dust Studios 1:48 "Ryu" Medium Walker

It's been a while but I couldn't resist photographing this one and showing you straight away as I had been anticipating it for a while! This is the 1:48 scale Ryu walker from Dust Studios, and it is the first of the Japanese walkers. The photos are on grid paper with the main lines measuring 10mm if anyone is interested in working out the size.

Anyway, onto the review. I pre-ordered mine and it was shipped to me from Hong Kong, with the rather basic box wrapped in bubble wrap, and then packing paper over that. Unfortunately there was a bit of damage on the box, but the main thing was the contents were fine. I have ordered from Dust Studios before and not had a problem so I am prepared to give them the benefit of the doubt this time around. The painted models are in much sturdier boxes padded with foam, so maybe it is just the kits in these softer boxes.

Inside is a folded sheet with the instructions, and the kit divided up into bags with the full frames, and a box for the other components.

Here is the full contents of the box. You can see the base comes in two pieces, along with a pack of generic decals for the Japanese army, and a card for use in Dust Tactics.

The instruction sheet also comes with sample paint schemes that describe which theatre the walker of that colour scheme is operating in.

Onto the frames themselves, these are the standard frames for the German medium walker. There are two and a half frames, here is the first, consisting of the body:

 The second frame is the leg components.

 And the third half frame is the feet.

 Here is a closeup of the feet with a better shot of the details.

 Next are all the loose components. I am unsure if these are plastic or resin... they have a smell of plastic, but feel like resin, so it could be some kind of mix. These come bagged in the separate box inside the main packaging.

Even though they are separate, there is still spruing present that need to be clipped and cleaned before the pieces can fit together.

I am very impressed with the casting, even these armour plates, which are extremely thin, have no warping or other deformations.

And also included are the cabling, done in a black rubber so they can be flexed into place if necessary, though they are cast with the bends in the appropriate places.

So there you have it, my first Dust model kit, and most likely not my last. I'm very impressed by the details and casting, and so far, it looks like an extremely fun kit to build from the pieces. The only downside was the crushed box, but as I said, nothing was damaged inside.

Ghazghkull Thraka (Part 7)

This is what dawn breaking on the morning of Golden Demons looks like. Unfortunately in the mad rush to get things finished I don't have many photos at this stage but I'll show you what I have (this is also the last Work in Progress update).

So here he is all glued together from different angles - the metal on the claw was the last big area to be finished using Boltgun Metal, Chaos Black and Mithril Silver:

A shot from the top. I added in some brown washes to the joins of the black armour using Mig Rust pigment mixed with water.

Another shot from the front:

And a shot from the back:

And my trusty reference books:

So after this lot of photos, I did a final going over and picked out further highlights on the tubes and some general cleanup and weathering, and then it was off to Golden Demon day!

Ghazghkull Thraka (Part 6)

Time to paint the top of Ghazghkull. I removed the stick launchers from the top of his armour as I wanted to paint an interesting glyph to give the large flat surfaces a bit of interest.

I ended up picking the grim glyph as it represented ruthlessness and danger. Something very suitable for anyone who plans to jump-pack on top of Ghazghkull. They have been warned!

The glyph was painted in the same colours as the other white bits - i.e. not actually white, but Ghoul Grey and Menoth White Highlight.

The horns were painted using the same technique as my Orc Warboss - Snakebite Leather, Bestial Brown and Chaos Black tips.

And finally after all that, it was time to glue him to the base and see him come together.

I tried to make sure that he was imposing but wouldn't fall over under his own weight - a 40mm base is way too small for this model so it was an interesting challenge to make him balance!

Gluing the head on. Now the end is in sight!

And a top view, trying to make sure the viewer is drawn to his face by following the lines on the horns.

Here's the finished jaw piece with the weathering on the teeth.

And the stikk launchers I removed, painted in the same black and red scheme.

Here you can see the grill piece glued on. I was quite worried that it would cover up all the interesting visual elements of the face at first but in the end it worked out ok.

And from another angle.

With the banner glued on - I wanted to ensure the tones of the horns were different but had enough similarity to indicate they were bone. Using the same patterns on the horns achieved this, even though I used quite different colour palattes.

And finally, the right arm is glued on.

Now there's still the matter of finishing the left arm...

Ghazghkull Thraka (Part 5)

I thought I'd better take some photos of the base as I hadn't done that in a while! Not much changed, other than some deeper shading in the metail of the shovel, and some more highlights of the grenade and the wooden blanks.

Oh yeah, and there are grass tufts added. I actually only have one pack of grass tufts, so all my minis have the same one. They are the Silflor 737-23S two-tone early fall grass tufts.

They also come in a larger pack which I'll probably pick up next once this one runs out. But usually I am pretty sparing with them as I don't think you need to flood a base with too many tufts.

Here is a shot from a different angle:

Here's Ghazghkull from the back - the machinery on his back is a nightmare! All that guitar-wire style tubing is only fun to paint if it is cleanly cast, but usually on metal models there is some unevenness or soft detail due to the casting.

A side shot where you can see the cabling being slowly picked out.

I started on the gun itself with a base-coat of Boltgun Metal followed by a wash of Badab Black (the usual).

And the left arm with the weathering on the red finished. I have also picked out most of the cables, though I know the metal claws and brass bits will be a nightmare to paint due to the fiddly angles.

Ghazghkull Thraka (Part 4)

Now we're getting down to the business end of things. The 10% of the miniature that takes up the 90% of the time! I knew this would be a massive exercise in weathering, but I was resolved to do all the chips and scratches using a paint brush rather than resorting to sponges and salt masks.

On the back-banner I finished off the red skull glyph by highlighting with Menoth White Highlight around the edges, and then applying weathering on top.

I started weathering the main plates on the claw arm using the same technique. It was a bit more difficult on the arm as the plates weren't as nicely defined in the cast as I would have liked, and a lot of the deeper areas ended up just being blocked and lined with a brown-black wash.

The back of the left arm.

The right arm was similar, except there was just the one shoulder pad to weather up with red paint.

And then slowly working my way around the body - the red is weathered the same as the other red bits, and the black is edged and chipped using Boltgun Metal.

A back shot:

Here's what the red looks like on the metal teeth before weathering is applied. I try to go for a smooth transition on the highlights and push the level up an extra step or two as the weathering will really bring it back to a darker tone once applied.

The head had the gums and tongue highlighted more, and though you can't see it here, a coat of Tamiya gloss over the top to give it some shine.

A dry fit of Ghazghkull - yeah it looks like the left arm is about to fall off as there's no glue.

Another shot of Ghazghkull. You can see most of the unfinished detail is on the top of him. I like leaving this till last so I can get a better visualisation of how he'll come together with all the different colours and parts.

And for those who have been asking, he's mounted temporarily on some wooden bases I had lying around - these are a nice alternative to cork for large models where their size and weight gets a bit unwieldy.

And I can reuse them again once I pop Ghazghkull off as he is just pinned in with a small drop of superglue.