Wednesday 30 December 2009

Three deadly female adventurers from my Conan-esque range. The first is a borderer or thief, while the other two could be pirates, or perhaps thieves.
You can click on the image for a bigger picture. It's not the best photograph (I took it with the old camera), but I hope you can make out the details. These ladies are all by reaper, which is a bit surprising, given the obvious difference in scale. Reaper has a vast range of figure on sale, and many of them were sculpted more than a decade ago. It shoes how tastes and styles have changed over the years. It's not a major problem for me, as I will only use them for my Thursday night role-plating, but I know that 'scale-creep' is a real bone of contention for some collectors.

The Executioner likes to think that he is a fearsome super-villain, but he lacks imagination, and in reality is little more that a hired thug. He's strong and tough, but a little on the short side, and sufferers from a near-pathological 'small-man' inferiority complex. Woe betide anyone who jokes that he uses such a large axe to compensate for his lack of stature.
This is another Reaper mini. The moment I saw him on-line I knew he would make an excellent super-villain, but when I got him in the post I realised he was a bit under-scale. I was disappointed at first, but then I thought it would work if I made his lack of stature part of his back ground. I chose the bright colour scheme to make sure he looked 'four colour' and not like one of my Conan-esque range.

Monday 28 December 2009

Reports have been circulating that the arch-villain known as Toymaker has returned from his enforced exile, and has been terrorising shoppers in the January sales by planting his minions amongst the other produce in the department stores across the land. These seemingly innocent looking bargains turn out to be anything but when activated, as can bee seen in this image of his scissor wielding 'toy' jack-in-the-box.This mini is one of a pack of 'evil toys' by Reaper. It was my favorite in the pack, but I was dismayed to discover that part of its arm was missing due to a miss-mold. I did what I could to sculpt a new one out of green stuff, and the results are satisfactory, if not a master piece. Given the fact that the mini is only about 25mm tall, I don't think it will be a problem.
Hello and welcome to the post-Christmas stupor. I am fully recovered from too much Polish Vodka and good food, and have completed my course of cold turkey (groan...bad pun). I was very lucky that Santa brought me a nice new digital camera with a Super Macro function, meaning I should get better pictures for my Blog. I haven't read the manual yet but I had a little play with it and it looks very impressive. I will post some pics later of some of the super-stuff I have been working on alongside the Christmas Madness.
I would like to say 'howdy' to my new follower- seven followers is very exciting, and a great complement. I hope you will spread the word, and that you will like what I have got planed to 2010.
Also I would like to welcome Leonmallett to the Blogosphere (I believe that is the technical term, but I am not very up on the jargon), as he has launched his own blog dedicated to Pulp City, a skirmish level super hero game I reviewed earlier. Leon has been a gaming partner of mine for over twenty years. He is responsible for my interests in all manor super hero games, and has always been an advocate for all things Super heroic. He has an encyclopedic knowledge of comic books, writers, miniature designers and so forth- I usually direct any questions about super hero stuff to him. His blog is called Pulp Citizen, and features some very nicely painted and photographed minis from the Pulp City ranges, as well as some very interesting and useful information about web based scenery makers and so forth. Please check him out. Oh yeah- he's also the same Leon who kindly supplies me with his spare lead so that I can bolster my ever growing pile of unpainted minis.

Wednesday 23 December 2009

This heroic chap is the Lapland-based adventurer, Claus StNicholas, as he intrepidly explores the frozen depths of Hyperboria. He disappeared without trace in the 1920's while on an expedition to the North Pole- and was believed to have been eaten by yetis. Repeated attempts to find of what really happened to him have failed, but many maintain that he is "out there" somewhere, righting wrongs and having adventures.

This lovely model was free from Artizan Designs, and really kicked off my Christmas Madness. He was free with any order over £10, so I got him when I ordered my next batch of cowboys. He's far too heroic to be an Evil Santa.
Merry Christmas everyone, and I hope that you all have a fantastic time.

Sunday 13 December 2009

"I'm walking in the air. La la la Grrr!"
Evil snowmen have arrived at last, dreadful automatons in the service of the wicked Toy Maker, a Semi-mythical entity said to have been exiled from the Hyperborian homeland for his twisted experiments.




These evil monsters are the work of Mark Coppletone, and were a lot of fun to paint- I will have to find a suitable model for the Toy maker (a kind of Anti-Santa). Perhaps I will use these in a Christmas themed game next year (as its too late this year- were in the middle of a Dark Heresy campaign)

Friday 11 December 2009

It's just over a year now I have been maintaining this Blog, and I have really enjoyed it. I am delighted to have picked up six followers, and I hope you have enjoyed reading my blog as much as I have enjoyed making it. Next year you can expect more of the same: i.e. Superheroes, Villains and henchmen, with the odd smattering of Cowboys, SciFi and Conanesque fantasy, plus I am planning to add a zombie apocalypse range to my Supers range (Leon's current supers campaign for Basic Roleplaying seems to feature a lot of the shambling undead)

Back to the Christmas Madness, I have two more minis for your delight. The first is the snowman I sculpted from green stuff, while the second is a little bit special.
One Christmas Snowman, sculpted by me (sadly a one off, unavailable to buy. Ho Ho). I was wondering if I could find some way to fit this figure into my Supers range, perhaps as a piece of scenery, but now it's painted my son Charlie has 'baggsied' it for in his bedroom.
Behold, Santa the Barbarian!
"...Hither came Santa, the Northpoleian, white-haired, sullen eyed, sword in hand, a thief, a reaver, a slayer, with gigantic melancholies and gigantic mirth, to thread the jeweled thrones of the Earth under his booted feet."
This mini is a Reaper figure, kindly donated to my Conanesque range by Leon. I wasn't going to use him, as he was a bit over scaled compared to the rest, but when I saw this picture (below) on Deviant Art, I new I had to paint a barbarian Father Christmas. I sculpted on the sack and extended his beard to give him more of a festive look.
I might re-base him in the new year to add him to my Conan range.

Thursday 10 December 2009

I found this image of an ancient ninja master Father Christmas on Deviant Art, and though It deserved a special place in my Christmas Madness. I love the character and concept- genius! I wish someone would sculpt him in 28mm. Sadly, my talents don't extend beyond snowmen. On the subject of snowmen, my own little sculpt is finished- stay frosty, and I'll be posting pictures soon.
A few more of my Conan inspired adventurers, painted a few weeks ago, but freshly based for photography. Please forgive the fact they are not four colour- I have more heroes and Christmas madness in the pipelines (teaser- Evil Snowmen, Wicked Penguins and Heroic Father Christmas Adventurer, to name a few)

Three Shemite (or Iranistanian?) adventurers. The man in the middle is a noble (or perhaps a successful pirate or thief) by Reaper, and his companions are his burly henchmen, by Hell Dorado.
Just because you can't only have good guys, some demonic snakemen, no doubt conjured by some evil sorcerer dabbling in dark-things-man-was-not-meant-to-know. These ones are by Reaper. They could also, conceivably, make it as super villain henchmen.


Monday 7 December 2009

Here are some pictures of some of the models I have been working on or the last few months- they are a side project for a Conan Role Playing Game campaign I am planning. My plan is to have at least one male and one female model for each character class, but obviously some will be suitable for more than one class.
The Idea was to try to capture some of the classic Conan imagery as portrayed in the wonderful art of Frank Frazetta and in the Dark Horse comics.

A barbarian (or soldier) by Heresy and a thief (or pirate) by Hasslefree. I kind of envisage these guys as brothers.
A Vanir barbarian girl by Reaper, a short, portly scholar by Crusader Miniatures and a Stygian thief (or perhaps a scholar) by Crocodile Games.

Another Vanir Barbarian, by Crusader Miniatures, a beautiful Aquilonian noble (or perhaps a rare female scholar) by Games Workshop, and a Asgard Soldier (no doubt serving as a mercenary in one of the more 'civilised' lands) by Artizan Designs



Friday 4 December 2009

Rumor has it that Mistress Apocalypse used to be a worker in a nuclear repressing plant when an accident, caused by carelessness and cost cutting, lead to be being exposed by lethal radiation. She did not die, however, and mutated into one of the most dangerous people in the country. She has only nominal control over the raw Atomic energy coursing through her body, and she doesn't care. She can be as lethal to those desperate or foolish enough to work with her as she is to those who try to stop her nefarious plans.

I thought I should to post a four colour mini, as the last few posts have been a bit off-topic. This mini is one of a big batch of Superfigs I bought when the Internet retailer stopped stocking them. The Superfigs range is great, but is now quite hard to get hold of in the UK. The cast wasn't great, as she had some sort of air pocket in her abdomen which I had to fill with green stuff.
I has a stab as directional lighting on this mini, to give the impression she was glowing, but it wasn't very successful. I will try again.
Inspired by the Christmas Madness, I made a snow man, roughly 28mm high (to the top of his hat). I am not sure how I will use him in the game; Perhaps he can be scenery, or else the initial component in making an Evil Snowman? I don't profess to be an expert sculptor, but I think he turned out OK.


This is the first of my Christmas Madness Figures. This is The Very Bad Santa. Be warned kids, be good, for goodness sake!


I was inspired to do this figure by one of the amazing pictures of Deviant Art, shown below. This miniature is by EM4, and is one of the Mark Coppletone sculpts. I have had it in my bits box for a few months now, and when I saw this painting, I immediately knew I had to paint him as a bad-ass biker Santa. At the moment, he's just a bit of fun, but perhaps eventually Very Bad Santa will make it into my Supers campaign, especially when I paint up some Evil Snowmen, from Copplestone Castings- the perfect henchmen for a rogue Father Christmas.

Wednesday 2 December 2009

Its December, and so it's CHRISTMAS! Well it is in our household any way; We keep Christmas in a big way. I found this picture by Gilme C on Deviant Art. I love the idea of a spandex-clad muscle-bound four-colour-Santa! You better be good, or he will use his naughtiness detecting powers, then kick your butt. Now we just need someone to sculpted it.



Stay glued for some more cool Santa pics courtesy of the masters at Deviant Art throughout December.