Immortal Brush Year Four

The Immortal Brush is a local painting competition in Vancouver put on by Darren at Strategies.  I actually remembered to drop off some entries this year.  I don’t usually paint for competitions and I didn’t paint anything special this year, I just entered two categories using models from my Chaos 40K army or armies.  My chaos army has gotten so large it is probably better to think o f as three armies.

Into the fantasy squad category I entered five fairly recently painted plaguebearers.  Most of those models have likely been featured on this blog.

My more impressive entry is “The Council of Chaos”.  You have to enter five models on 40mm bases or smaller in the sci-fi category.  It doesn’t have to be a legal squad so I cherry picked some models from my collection.  I chose models that have never been entered into a painting contest, certainly not Darren’s.  I also then chose one representative of each chaos power and one worshiper of chaos undivided.

The models I chose were mostly character models, models that have lead my armies in various tournaments.  I wanted to use Da Kanopena, as it was my newest spiffy model, even though some people like his little buddy better.

To represent Slaneesh I naturally opted for the Phantom of the Rock Opera.

To represent Tzeentch I went with my renegade with lascannon conversion. Which I can’t seem to find a picture of online…

To represent Nurgle I settled on Malefactor the Marred, at least I think that is the model’s name.  He’s on a 40mm base, the same one as the Phantom of the Rock Opera and was painted around the same time.  He was actually used in some games, unlike the Phantom.

Finally for my undivided model I chose my Chosen with Autocannon or Renegade with Autocannon conversion, the one everyone likes.  I was worried it was on too big of base, but Darren has no problem with it.

These five are all visually cool looking and they fit together due to the purple and black motif.  I think the Nurgle guy is well painted but the Phantom and the Khorne guy got the initial glory from people in the store.

I want to try and swing by tomorrow around 4pm to see who wins and to see the other entries.  I also want to check out some of the free concerts and other stuff happening in Vancouver as part of Main Street Drift.

Special shout out to Marlene Lau, lead guitarist of Kill Matilda who was instrumental in ensuring some of these models exist.  Now back to coding PHP…

Basing and movement trays

Movement tray is the Perfect Size

So work has been ongoing on re-basing my old Beasts of Nurgle and creating a custom movement tray for my Horde of 40 Plaguebearer.  These models and a couple Nurgling stands and Slim are set to make their Warhammer 8th Edition debut.  Most of these models have never been used in WFB.  I think Slim hasn’t, the Beasts have and maybe 16 Plaguebearers have.

I didn’t have much luck gaming with them over a decade ago.  Daemons could break and run, they had no ranged attacks and negligible ranged spells.  Beasts moved random distances and not terribly fast, my most reliable unit in the few small games I played was the Nurglings.  Now under the current rules they may be the weak link, of course in bigger points games I can field 10 stands which might make a difference, my proposed 2000 point list had two units of 5 stands, while at 1500 points I have one unit of four stands.

I blackened the edges first

Anyway it isn’t a tactical army or carefully chosen, it is just a bunch of Nurgle demons I painted up for the Diseased Sons.

The bases and movement tray were made of balsa wood, glue, and sand.  I used some plastic and metal bits to decorate the Beast bases, but mainly it is my traditional drybrush order of Scorched Earth, Snakebite Leather, and Bubonic Brown.  After the drybrushing was done I touched up various bits on the Beasts with black.  Then I just plan to do a quick job on the little details I added so I could get everything finished and either take a break from painting tomorrow or get back to working on my Astronomi-con Vancouver army.

The perfect glue application

Of course I got all the Plaguebearers out of the miniature case for the family photo.  I plan to put it on Flickr and post it to a forum or two.  It is a pretty good looking unit of demons, all metal too.  Some think the big banner is dated, so I may spruce that up.  It tips over too much so I’ll either do something major with the banner bearer or just leave it out.  I took with and without banner photos so you can see all the individual highlights and custom colours and what have you on the Plaguebearers.  You’ll have to look a ways to find a well painted unit this big, mine will be at Strategies Games on Sunday…

They do not rank up the best.  Most of them are fine but the DIY standard bearers and even worse the DIY Gong of Despair just won’t rank up.  I think I need to retire that model and paint the musician with the bell that I picked up more recently.  Originally when the rules came out you had to convert your standard bearers, musicians, and unit champions.  You still kinda have to convert your Heralds of Nurgle.  I’m just using the one with the bigger banner.

Adding the beach sand

This was actually quite a lot of work.  I was all proud of my old world handcrafted quality but when I was using a size three brush to paint the tray black, I started thinking that it is worth it to buy pre-made movement trays especially if you can get them magnetized which is my plans for the goblins, I just need to talk to Litko and of course get a job and make the money to afford it.  If I add anymore units to my tenuous Warhammer Daemon army, say a unit of Daemonettes or even just some Flesh Hounds of Khorne I may go all out and get premade bases and matching movement trays, Micro Art Studios and others make really nice resin pieces.  If you’re going to put as much time and effort into your models as I usually do, the extra expense for the resin bases isn’t that much and it does tie the unit together which is doubly important in Warhammer Fantasy Battle.

Now the moment you’ve all been waiting for and another day of mine gone to blogging and painting miniatures, the complete Horde of 40 Plaguebearers, the Netherworldly Mathematicians, the flagship unit of the Diseased Sons Nurgle Daemon Army:

Precision Engineering

My re-based Beasts of Nurgle

So my trip to the doctor didn’t happen.  I was tired, I laid down for a bit, I didn’t get up for quite a while.  I’ll bike to the doctor tomorrow, I just need to get a prescription refilled.  While I was slacking off, glue was drying.  My UHU warped my DIY ‘monster’ bases some, but I think that will gradually go away.  Not only did I put UHU underneath the sand in an attempt to fix the warping I put watered down white glue on top of it.  That sand isn’t going anywhere.

When the glue was dry I reached into my bit box and got some 28mm metal skulls made by Black Cat Bases.  You can get 100 of these for some special price.  Like anything they need a little cleaning, which is a bit awkward working on such a tiny metal piece.  After some filing I tried gluing them to the bases.  I used UHU again, though if my super glue hadn’t dried out… I’ve never tried using UHU to glue metal to plastic and sand, but I have used it to glue a variety of stuff in my trench making project along with Wellbond.  The glue really needs more time to dry, but I gave it the tip upside down test just now and with the exception of a little cat liter it passed.

Bases decorated with bits

So besides skulls and cat liter I raided the Citadel plastic zombie sprues for some guts and a stray arm.  I then found half an old plastic shield and I glued that to Sluggie’s base.  With the Beasts of Nurgle drying it was time to make the Plaguebearers movement tray.

I used the same piece of balsa wood I used to make the ‘monster’ bases, but I used a different exacto knife.  You need the best exacto knife you have to make precision cuts of the wood. I think my grandfather gave me this one, it has a hard plastic handle with a metal attachment.  I also got out my metal square, though I used the wooden ruler for measuring.  After measuring twice I repeatedly drew the exacto knife over the pencil line, using the square as a guide.  It didn’t go perfectly but it went better with this knife.  You don’t have to cut the wood in one pass, ten passes even might not cut through the wood.  When you’re mostly through you can try breaking it, then with a tiny bit of sanding you’re good to go.

Plaguebearers in movement tray test

I got out another piece of balsa I bought for my trenches, this one is about 4mm by 4mm thick.  One side seems wider than the other so I used the larger measurement.  After allowing for the wood lip to overlay the movement tray base, I got out my plaguebearers for a test fit.  I thought I was going to have to glue another piece to the back, but it fits pretty good with only a tiny bit of acceptable overhang.  In a perfect world I’d put a lip on the back, but that was too nice a fit already to mess with.

I cut the ends and got out a whole bunch of little orange clamps I got at Home Depot years ago.  These really saved the day or made the project.  I retired the UHU and used the Wellbond and made sure to use my finger to completely cover the edge pieces.  Then I wiped away excess glue on the side, then finally placed it on the base and clamped it down.  I repeated this two more times with the sides.  Again any slight overhang I just plan to sand off.

Why hobbists need clamps

I took some pictures, then I got out the ruler and too another picture.  It appears to have 25 cm of interior space.  I’m not sure if the Plaguebearer bases are supposed to be one inch or 25mm, I believe because the game originated in England, 25mm is the official measurement, but even then there might be a mm of space.  With 25cm of interior width my Neatherworldly Mathematicians should ride comfortably in their new movement tray.

It’s gotten hot again, possibly good for drying the glue.  Later tonight or tomorrow I will sand as necessary and paint black the bases and movement trays, likely using the Delta Ceramcoat.  Then I’ll do some drybrushing…  I was going to glue sand to the edges of the movement tray but now I’m undecided…  I probably will. That means more drying time but I have until noon on Sunday the 25th to complete this stuff for the Warhammer 8th Edition Mighty Empires campaign at Strategies.

25 cm wide custom movement tray

3 Finished Plaguebearers

Three painted Plaguebearers

Today was actually the best day for painting we’ve had in a long time in Vancouver.  There is a breeze, my hands don’t sweat, I don’t have to OD on water.  Too bad my sleep schedule is so messed up I slept away most of the day.  I’m up now and paint is drying as I’m almost done Fleshy, Drabby, and Knarly.  I’ve finished the eyes which are oranges and yellows.  I think I need a bit more yellow but yellow notoriously doesn’t cover well, even over orange and white…

I did the handles of the swords brown even using my Reaper Master Series Terracotta on them.  I did the champs tongue purple.  I did my new dark purple system of GW’s Liche Purple then the Foundry Royal Purple Triad.  For fun I blended on the Wet Palette, which is behaving more today in the milder weather, the inbetween shades.  Alas I still haven’t gotten the handle on the wet palette and may have rushed things too much.  I did a very thinned down old GW Purple Wash too.  Now like a lot of other things it is drying.

My Putrid Green Paint Pot

I’m painting the glob on Knarly’s sword an old GW Jade Green which I plan to highlight with an old GW Putrid Green.

I painted the nipple ring on Fleshy a P3 Blighted Gold colour which is a great Nurgle colour even if it does suffer from some separation issues, it is still workable.

The bases will be drybrushed with three GW browns: Scorched Earth, Snakebite Leather, and Bubonic.  They already got a fresh coat of Delta Ceramcoat black which is nice and flat and covers well.  I reach for it a lot to save my Chaos Black for finer detail work, now.

That’s about it, when everything is reasonably dry I snapped the pics then they are off to the box to get Matte Varnished.  I plan to go with Purity Seal even though I hear horror stories about it frosting models every now and then.  When I get a job and lessen my debt load I’ll hopefully have used it up and switch to Testors.

I think after all these years I’ve finally gotten good at drybrushing.  I come from the old school where we drybrushed with old brushes.  This can be really hit and miss which is a way to describe drybrushing itself.  Over the years I’ve acquired some makeup style brushes and on my last trip to Deserres I bought the smallest one yet.  This is much superior to the old worn out Tamiya brush I was using.  It was actually a joy to drybrush up the dirt with my new brush.  Maybe I’ll have to try drybrushing something else besides dirt and skulls…  Of course you still need to get just the right amount of paint on your brush, this is more important than the kind of brush you use.

In case you didn’t notice the Putrid Green turned out to be a boulder.  Shows you how often I use it.  So the green glob on Knarly’s sword is GW Jade Green and one of the oldest pots in my collection, GW Bilious Green from the Monster Paint Set I believe.  I blended the colours together, oh yeah the midtone was, a not quite as old, GW Striking Scorpion Green.  Anyway I mixed various midtones over a very solid two or three coats of Jade Green base.  I then put too much old GW Green Glaze on the model, but it worked out fine, I built back up my highlights even better using the wet palette and then I put some pure Bilious Green on and modicum of GW Yellow Glaze and voila slime! I may use some other tricks to keep it nice and slimy.

So which is your favourite one?  All three are great sculpts which is probably why Nurgle lesser daemons are the only metal ones left in GW’s catalog.  Drabby was the least work, but he has the nice exposed bones.  Fleshy I like though his skintone could have had a lot more depth to it, but it is a unique colour.  And Knarly I really gave the P3 Wet Palette a bit of a workout blending various mid-shades and I also used four different new GW Washes as well as some of my own custom thinned washes, so basically 15 years worth of Nurgle painting experience went into these models, hopefully they’ll result in a glorious victory on Sunday, now I just need to re-base the Beasts of Nurgle and make a 40 strong movement tray to replace my old puny 16 one.

The Drabby photo is a bit soft, I took four or five and this was the best one I got with my iPhone today.  Oh well you get the idea.

Make Mine Nurgle

Almost Finished Plaguebearers

So since my sleep schedule is totally screwed up due to loud neighbours and being unemployed, I put quite a lot of work into these Nurgle daemons today, probably should have gone to the gym or something.  Tomorrow I will go to the gym and of course look for a job.  I also will likely finish these three plaguebearers tomorrow which when varnished will give me 40 painted, enough for my full rank bonus horde for the Warhammer 8th Edition Mighty Empires Campaign at Strategies starting Sunday.

Highlighted Knarloc Green Skin

The first thing I did after taking water out of my wet palette was finish the Knarloc Green Plaguebearer and his little Nurgling buddy.  I used GW’s Knarloc Green, and three Vallejo greens: Sick, Goblin, and Green Grey.  I blended the paint on the wet palette and highlighted.  I had a problem with Sick being too much of a step but with some blending and fighting the constant tendency of the model to go ‘minty’ I eventually put enough little dibs and dabs so that he looked like someone whom extra time had been taken painting.  I also used a little tiny bit of Gryphonne Sepia wash at the very end to blend it to dark again.

With that complete I decided to do the bones next.  I decided on the bones as if some red gets on the bones it is OK, but if some bone gets on the guts you have to repaint it.  There are a couple of exposed bones on one plaguebearer and of course the one big horn on each model.  I change it up now and again, but basically I paint bones Snakebite Leather.  Bleached Bone or Vallejo Beige doesn’t cover black that great unless you gob it on, and you don’t want to do that.  So after painting the bones and skulls and horns Snakebite Leather I reached for the Vallejo Beige and put some of that on the wet palette.  I also got some GW Scorched Brown out too.  I used the dark brown to darken and to add little stripes or striations to the horns.  Then I put a very thin amount of beige on the horns.

Painting bone colour

Next I got out my newly discovered Reaper Master Series Clotted Red.  This was added to the wet palette.  I’d started a new piece of parchment and with considerably less water in the container, basically just a damp sponge.  I had all types of problems in Vancouver’s heat with the parchment drying out.  I still have a long way to go until I get the wet palette just right.  Anyway I put a fairly think layer of Clotted Red on all the things I wanted red.  Then I mixed up a bone wash, this is a fairly standard recipe for me of water and old GW Rust Brown Ink.  Some times I add a dab of red ink into the mix.  I paint this pretty much all over the bone color, though obviously you can leave some of the bone unwashed.

When that was all dry I painted more Vallejo Beige onto the bones in something of a drybrush but not totally, kinda half and half.  I did drybrush white onto the bones, but I also painted white on the tips and in thin lines.  I don’t like to drybrush but one thing that looks good and if you’re careful, drybrushing bones, horns, and skulls yields nice results.  Sometimes I don’t use white on my bones at all, this time since I’d invested so much time in the models I did.

Beginning Guts and Gore

Next I got out my new pot of GW Blood Red and painted it on the ‘guts’ as a highlight.  I’d used Beige and White to get reasonable exposed bones going.  Then I mixed up another custom wash, this one is two drops of water, two brushes of old GW Shadow Black Ink and two brushes worth of old GW Plasma Red Ink.  These like the Rust Brown Ink are in round pots with Citadel logos and black lids.

This takes a bit to dry so I likely took a break or touched up things.  Eventually I touched up some of the unpainted bits black and painted one eyeball white.  I fixed up the skull on the medallion with a little black ink at some point.  I had to touch up the green skin too as it rubbed off in one or two raised points.  They’re looking pretty good and my hands are sweating from typing all this out on my MacBook Pro.  Tomorrow they should get finished, I’ve dubbed them: Fleshy, Drabby, and Knarly.

3 Mostly painted Plaguebearers