Styrene Corridors

I finished one of the junction box cargo bays with another on the way. The above pictures are of the two rooms connected with one of my prototype doors. The doors are actually styrene clips that hold the rooms together and indicate the position of the door. Later I am going to drill holes at the top of the clip which will hold pegs that indicate whether the door is open, closed or locked. I'm not really happy with the initial door design. I plan on making more doors based off of some interesting packing material that I salvaged from a new printer.

The airlock in the third picture is removable and will have the same peg system as the doors. The figures in the pictures are the GZG "Not Firefly" crew.

More spaceship interiors to come. Next up are the crew quarters and the bridge.

A little Change of Pace

After being sealed in various flying or rolling tin cans, I am finally back on American soil. I did not bring my paints so I'm limited to modeling and painted with limited colors. I was trying to figure out what hobby project i will undertake during my month home, when i had an epiphany in the shower about how to make some really cool 15mm terrain.

I went to Lowes and bought a bunch of plastic junction boxes used for household wiring. After cutting off the external tabs, I embellished the interior with styrene and parts from an old spaceship model that i bought a few months ago. Above is my first attempt at one of these rooms. Its an engine room.

The idea behind using junction boxes for rooms is that they can be butted up against one another to create a whole bunch of different ship and or building interiors. They're also pretty cheap, about 1.50 from Lowes. And since its 15mm, it is reasonably compact and storable.

More ship interior moduals to come. Next up is a larger cargo bay made from two boxes. I also have a cool idea for the doors and bulkheads thats on the list of things to do.

Bald is Beautiful, Part Deux

He did it officer!

I've painted the 15mm gangers that I showed in the green stages in an earlier post. They painted up well, especially the aliens, of which I am particularly pleased. Again the bases are left raw sand for the time being while I figure out a basing scheme that I like. Again these figures are all from GZG and come from the ravengers, alien mercenaries, and crusties packs.

I have one last gang to convert and paint, the Knots. More on that in the coming weeks. I'll be heading home to the states for a month over Christmas, so I will not have the materials to paint anything. However, I do have several projects lined up, including the complete rebasing of my ancient German horde. Stay tuned for more hobby goodness!

Do You Feel Lucky....... Punk!

Here is the second major gang in my 15mm sci-fi city, the Hawks. The Hawks had their origins in a human supremacist movement but expanded into criminal activity shortly after. They are characterized by their distinctive coloured mohawks and intentionally rattly clothing.

The models are all converted from GZG ravagers. I trimmed down the hair with a pair of dikes and sharp knife. I sculpted the mohawks over the resulting bare head. The heavy weapons guy is a GZG alien mercenary "i.e. their not Fifth Element aliens" with a head swap and a greenstuff mohawk. I also added the belt feed over his shoulder with greenstuff. In hindsight I probably should have made the rounds on the ammo belt a little more pronounced. I'm still getting the hang of converting 15mm figures.

That being said I'm having a much easier time converting 15mm than I thought. You just have to "think in scale" and make sure you don't try and add details that are too small to be noticeable. If you look at some of the figures faces, i may have strayed a little with my knife, giving some gangers impressive scars. I kinda liked the effect and decided to go with it whilst painting.

I'm not sure what to do with the bases yet. right now they are just bare GW modelling sand. I may paint them to look like asphalt or just leave them the deserty colour in case i want to do some Post-apocalypse gaming.

I hope you enjoy them. There is more 15mm sci-fi street violence on the way!

It Ain't Easy Being Greens

I usually don't like to post pictures of unpainted figures. However I wanted to show off the conversion work on these figures before they get a lick of paint. Above are one of the three major hair-defined gangs that will inhabit my future city, the Domes. The Domes are known for wearing long coats, shaved heads, and shades that conceal their eyes.

The original figures are all from GZG. The humans (bottom picture)are their ravagers with haircuts and dusters modelled on where appropriate. The centre figure and the one on the far right are from their "not Firefly" pack. You can see where I greenstuffed the shades, long coats and collars where needed.

The aliens are also from GZG. The far left and right centre are from their new crusties pack. I got the pack for free with my Christmas deal. The figures are great with a lot of character, perfect for district 9 style games in an alien slum. I think I'll clip the guns off of the remaining figures and make them civilians. The far right is one of GZG's alien mercenary "not Fifth Element"aliens. I added the long coat and extended the gun with the muzzle of a plastic Kroot long rifle. The left centre came about as a happy accident. I was trying to remove the hair from a female figure in order to make another type of ganger. After the hair removal was complete, I found that I had made this cool spikey fringe around the models head. I'm not sue if I'll pain the model as a human with a wacky collar or as some funky alien with shoulder spikes. Either way she has descended into a life of crime.

Here are pictures from the originals from the GZG website.

More 15mm sci-fi stuff on the way! I have another gang and civilians painted up. I'm just looking for a better bulb for my light so I can do them justice in photographs.

I'm Baaaaaaaaaaaaaaaack...

After A long hiatus, I have finally gotten back to painting. I've spent the last two months acclimating to Durham and English university life. I haven't had much time for hobby related stuff between coursework and socializing(having the student bar 100 yards away from one's flat dosen't help either).

Since I'm planning to live transatlanticly for a while, I figured that a major move to 15mm would facilitate transporting figures across the pont. Also, on a student budget, 15mm makes more sense. There are some really great 15mm manufactures out there producing figures every bit as characterful as the best 28s out there.

Above are some splintered light Saxons that I have painted for a planned 15mm Dark Age skirmish project. These figures were a joy to paint, i lavished a little bit more detail than I normally would on 15's. The pictures are not my best work. but I'm getting used to photographing miniature in my room.

Stay tuned for some 15mm sci-fi. I took advantage of GZG's Christmas deal. I'm working on a whole gaggle of sci-fi civilians and gang bangers for a 15mm sci-fi city inspired by my friend Scott Pyle's Starport 3030 project.

Durham

Its been while since I last posted. This is partly due to the fact that I am getting aclimated to living in another country, and partly due to the fact that I have not painted a miniature in the last month and a half.

That being said I figured that I would post some pictures of my new home, for the time being. Durham is a beautiful place, an idyllic english town settled into some pristine English countryside. There is apparently a rather large wargames club here that I may check out on Thursday.

Until then, enjoy the pictures.

Some Lazy Sunday Lord of the Rings

Yesterday my extended family came down to see me of to England. It was great to see everybody and I got to play a quick game of Lord of the Rings Strategy Battle game with my cousin. He picked up the rules quickly as we battled over an ancient Dwarven shrine.(You may recognize it as my HOTT army camp.)

We played on a 2' x 2' latex mat made by Zuzzy(link below). I usually use this mat and terrain for Hordes of the Things. It was a littel out of scale but worked in pinch. I really liked playing SBG on the 2' x 2'. It completely changed the dynamic of the game. You really have to plan you moves and pick your fights very carfully. I would like to try another game using a lot more terrain.

Zuzzy Mats. The mat in this post is the 2' x 2' verdant fields.

http://www.zuzzy.com/

Steel Corridors in the Steel City

This weekend I returned to Pittsburgh to visit some friends and game at my favorite purveyor of fine miniatures, Phantom of the Attic in Oakland. My friend Stuart was kind enough to teach me the new edition of Space Hulk. It was a dark day for the Imperium of Man as the emperor's finest were sliced and diced into a fine pate by the alien genestealers. I had a great time, but needless to say, I lost horribly.

I was really impressed by the production values for the new set. The tiles were solid, but did tend to warp. The miniatures are beautiful and the rules fast and furious. I'm a bit regretful that I did not jump on this set when it came out.

Bald is Beautiful

Here are some Sci-fi miniatures that were recently sold in the great lead purge of 2009. They are "Slicks" from ERM miniatures. I really love these figures. I was always a fan of the Delaque miniatures for the game Necromunda. There's just somthing about a gunweilding guy in a trenchcoat that screams Sci-fi to me. The Slicks are really sppoky sculpts that have a variety of gaming uses.

These miniatures were really fun and easy to paint. I tried to make it look as if they had black coats with glowing patterns and trim, and I am really pleased with the result. Above are the ones that I sold. I still have a few of these that I am going to keep for my own collection.

Some Steampunk Inspriation

http://www.clockworkquartet.com/

Here is some inspiration for you steampunk wargamers and RPGers out there. This group performs what I would call "Steampunk Ballads". They only have two songs, but their production values are good and the performers are talented. These songs get me in the mood to do some Gothic Horror miniature gaming.

Steampunk Ipod Work in Progress

Here are some scans of the finished woodwork. I think the carving on the back is a little crude. However, I'm very please with how the clockwork in the back turned out. I'm debating on how finish the wood work. I'll probably end up staining it and topping it off with urethane to give it that classic wood finish.

The final brass work has been a bit problematic. I can't find brass that's thin enough to work with. I'll probably have to wait until I visit Pittsburgh later this month and buy some at the art store.

I'm also not exactly sure how to finish the top edge. I would like to fashion it after the top of a pocket watch, with a metal loop and a winding knob. I'll have to go back to Michael's to look for suitable beads.

Short Hairy and Naked

Today I present one of my 10mm HOTT(Hordes of The Things) armies, Feral Dwarves(or pre-hold Dwarves 1200B.C.E - 900B.C.E. if I'm feeling snooty). I wanted some Dwarves, but not the standard Tolkienesque Dwarves that everyone fields. I began to wonder what Dwarven civilization would be like before the formation of complex states(i.e. Dwarf holds). I imagined it would be something between ancient Celts and Polynesian natives. Essentially, a warrior technocracy that was heavily into ancestor worship.

I built an army using 10mm Warmaster miniatures from GW, The giant yak is a mage knight miniature with a scratch built howdah. The giant heads on the stronghold were carved out of polystyrene foam.

Hi germani barbari sunt

I figured that I would post a few pictures of my main wargaming project, 28mm barbarians. I have a fascination of all things savage. I did my undergrad thesis on barbarians and I own Conan the Barbarian in at least three media.

Last summer, I began painting 28mm barbarians. I wasn't sure why I was painting them, other than I liked barbarians. Over the year it became an almost meditative exercise. It was always a good standby when I didn't know what to paint. In one year I have managed to paint a collection of about 200+ barbarians.

Those pictured are not the whole collection. I only photographed what I could fit into my 15 War of the Ring bases, which is about 120. I also traded away about 80 painted barbarians during a purge of sculpts that I didn't like. The unpainted barbarian horde remains uncounted, but it weighs about 12 pounds. This will be my main painting project in grad school. Just about every manufacturer that makes barbarians is represented in the horde. See if you can name all the manufacturers.

More Stuff From My Photo Archive

Here are some pictures of an Ork Speed Freek army that I built I while a ago. I have since sold the army. These photos were taken during my yellow phase of photography.

Some Notes and Sketches

I was working on the steampunk Ipod today and I figured that I would post some of my concept sketches. Sorry for the crude scan. These sketches were completed a few weeks ago and have been traveling at the bottom of various boxes ever since.

I wanted the final case to have a lot of Victorian scroll work along with the other, more traditional steampunk elements. Since I am a very poor artist, I had to play around with the scroll work untill I got some patterns that I liked.

The wood carving is nearly done. Next comes all the brass work.

We're all just a cog in the machine....

This is for all of you steampunk aficionados out there. I picked these up at Michael's craft store yesterday to put into my steampunk Ipod(more on that later). They retail for $4.99 and come with an assortment of gears, cogs, and flywheels that are all about 1 - 3/4 inches in diameter. These would be great for steampunk vehicles or scenery. I think they were in the scrapbooking section, of all places.

Goblins

There I go, breaking a promise that day after I start the blog. I'll make up for it with two miniature posts today. First are some pictures of a 15mm goblin horde I painted a few months back. The figures are all from Splintered Light Miniatures and are sculpted by the venerable Bob Olley. I really like the Splintered Light fantasy range. They get some top quality talent to sculpt their figures and they charge a reasonable price. If Splintered light keeps it up, they may be able to replace the now discontinued Demonworld line, of which I was big fan. I have since sold these figures, but I still love them. Splintered Light has since come out with other really great 15mm fantasy figures, including Orcs and Dark Elves.