A Warhammer Bestiary: Coatl

As you will know by now, I am trying to collect and paint a miniature for each of the entries in the Warhammer Third Edition Bestiary. So far, I have painted up an unusual beastman and a centaur and have concentrated on pushing the boundaries of my painting. This time, I had to find and paint a coatl - a magical, flying serpent from the forests of Lustria. These miniatures are quite pricey, I knew that, and a quick check with Steve Casey confirmed that you are looking at about £20 for one of these. I managed to source mine for under £15 though. 

Here's an '80s catalogue extract for the Coatl which answers the question of who sculpted the model: Nick Bibby, the master of the draconian and scaled. The model needed quite a bit of filing and filling to get the wings to attach in a satisfactory way, though this was largely down to the previous owners limited modelling skills. They had packed the groove with loads of epoxy resin and much of it had dribbled down into the detail. 

Here's the model as I received it. I decided that Dettol was the best way to go and mulled over the basing. I am not a fan of the old flying bases as they tend to fall over and not support the miniature properly. The one that was supplied with the model was broken, with its tip embedded inside the coatl, so I decided to use wire instead and mount the coatl on a monster base. 

And here is the finished result! Two areas of this model were new ground to me. The wings and the scales. Having never painted feathers before, I had a quick look through the reference material that can be found online. I chose the colour scheme for a parrot as I liked the bright colours they have and the species kind of fits in with the jungle theme. I base coated the wings with red, yellow and blue, before using ink glazes to add depth to the features. A series of drybrushed highlights followed to bring out the detail on the wings. The scales were done in a similar way; with me basing in green and using loads of ink washes to build up depth before adding a series of final green highlights to each scale. 

The base was a bit of a departure from my usual method as I wanted to match the jungle theme to the base. I found an old base that had been textured by someone at some point. Into this I drilled holes and fixed snipped off pieces of plastic aquatic plants. These were treated with a range of brown, green and yellow ink washes before being wetbrushed in yellow and green. 

Job done!

What do you guys think?

A trio of models next time, as I shall be painting dwarfs.

Orlygg.

Arcane Armorials: Psygnosis inspired owl face

Those of you who frequented the home computer in the late '80s and early '90s will recall the above image with delight. Yes, Psygnosis, creators of Shadow of the Beast, Lemmings and parallax scrolling among a great many other great things. Zhu mentioned the possibility of using this image to create an old school shield design a few posts back and I wondered if such a thing was possible. 

So defying a nasty eye infection, I set to work on the shield. 

Stage One: Using the reverse side of a plastic shield (its best to fill the rim side with greenstuff or just file it off) I undercoated with a mix of light blue and blue ink. A couple of coats and the tone was flat enough to start!

Stage Two: Here I applied the white following some of the structure of the Psygnosis original. I preferred to keep things a little more symmetrical than in the original design. 

Stage Three: Add the black. Create the eyebrows, eyes and the beak.Once I was happy I had the design elements I was after, I tidied up the black line with more white paint.

Stage Four: Using white, I created circles within the eye balls and then painted them yellow. Before the yellow paint could dry, I used a little orange ink to vary the colour slightly. 

Stage Five: Blob on the pupils and tidy up the blue design features. 

Stage Six. Add tiny white dots to the eyes and cut the shield off the sprue.

Stage Seven: Pack the rim of the shield black and do the same to the rear. Oh, and attach it to a suitable model.

And there we have it! Another freehand shield on another new Old School model. I painted this skeleton specifically for the owl design as, for me anyway, these old Citadel skeletons are the perfect hanger for a shield! I think I might have a go at a more traditional owl face design at some point in the future, perhaps for my Warhammer Bestiary Wood Elf??

What not have a go at one of these yourselves? Or even better, can you suggest another design that would make a good old school shield design? If so, please comment below and I will have a go at painting it!

Arcane Armorials: Tiger Face Shield Tutorial

A few posts back I suggested a tutorial about my tiger faced shield, inspired by the old 1970s and 1980s symbol used by the publisher, Paper Tiger. Feedback was positive so here it is. As with previous tutorials, I opted for a large, plastic Citadel shield. I have just bought quite a few new sprues from ebay so I am keen to try out a fair few new designs, including an owl face. They are fairly easy to get hold of if you are patient, but don't even think about forking on some of the more ridiculous prices you will see. Pay no more than a pound or so for a sprue, and less is much better!

I always keep a part of the sprue attached to the shield as it makes handling the surface much easier in the long run. The hole in the centre is quickly filled with greenstuff and smoothed down. Once dry, give the shield a couple of thin coats of white undercoat.

Step One: I mixed Hobgoblin Orange with an orange ink to get a more vibrant colour. This mix was fairly watery, so I gave the shield a couple of good base coats until things were looking pretty even. I made use of a hairdryer to speed up this drying process. 

Step Two: Mix up a watery white and splodge on the two shapes shown above. There is really no need to be particularly accurate at this stage.

Step Three: Add a mid yellow to your orange mix, and use this to highlight up the shape of the tiger's face. Try and suggest the brows and the muzzle as well as the cheeks. You can use this as an opportunity to tidy up your white. Leave the basecoat orange where the eye holes are going to be. 

Step Four: Add a further blob of yellow to you orange and continue to work up the highlights. You may want to also include more white on the brow and around the tiger's mouth here, as it is a good opportunity to tidy things up a little. Ensure that the basecolour still shows in the the sockets. 

Step Five: Start adding the black detailing. I use black ink, though you need to be aware that the mix is far more fluid than paint. Make good use of test strokes with your brush before working on the shield, this will reduce the risk of pooling the ink and spoiling your work. Fill in the eyes in a suitably feline shape and define the nostrils and mouth. 

Step Six: Add the black detailing to the eyes and nose. Good reference material is vital here (such as a picture of a real tiger or the Paper Tiger design shown above) and make sure that whatever you do on one side of the face is mirrored on the other. These lines need to be added quickly. Be confident and move your brush with speed. You may want to practice this on paper first.  

Step Seven: Tidy up the brows and then continue to add the detail on the animal's forehead. Once you are happy with the way things are looking, block in the shield with black. 

Step Eight: Using the black in once more, create little dots around the tiger's mouth and add two white dots for the eyes. Be careful here. Practice making dots with your brush if you haven't done this before as too much ink will cause pooling and too little with produce nasty marks that are not circular enough. 

Step Nine: Dot the centre of your white eyes with a smaller black dot. Once this is dry add a smaller white dot on top of the black one. This should cause your eyes to 'pop' and the design to suddenly become alive. I added a few dots of silver to the nail details on the shield rim too!

Job done!

Happy painting!

Orlygg.

A Warhammer Bestiary: Centaur

Despite a bit of a eye infection, I managed a few hours this weekend at the painting station and have completed the second miniature in my new Warhammer Bestiary painting project. This week, I was working on a centaur. I was feeling rather eager to get this model started and in my enthusiasm I forgot to take a 'before' picture. So sorry, I only have the completed model to show off! Not that I doubt you will mind much. So off to the Stuff of Legends for a catalogue breakdown. 

A quick peruse of the catalogue page tells us that the model was sculpted by the Perrys with help from Aly Morrison at some point back in the 1980s. Now, I have written about centaurs before as part of my infrequent 'Acceptable in the '80s' series of articles that tells the story of Warhammer Third Edition. A quick click here will take you there, where you can see these models in their mid '80s painted glory. 

I used the components Body 1 and Two Handed Axe to complete my model, and I realised the potential these models have for conversions. Cut an old thug in half, stick a centaur top on and you are away. Or vice versa. After a quick clean up with a file, I built up the base with green stuff and used the left over pieces to make three little toadstools. A different type of fungus for this creature and a new little feature that I can make with the putty. 

Here's the finished model. I chose this particular example because I wanted to work of three areas that I felt I was weak in. Painting horses, painting flesh and painting hair. In truth, I have only ever painted a couple of horses for my chaos chariot and they were grey with flaming manes. Hardly realistic. One thing I wanted to explore was the way you can create naturalistic animal patterns with paint, so I downloaded a fair few images from Google as reference and got painting.

I used a creamy white as a base for the horse part of the body. This I shaded with a darker grey mix, focusing underneath the body and the hoof area. Once dry I flicked a darker mixture of this over the body using a stippling brush. I then proceeded to highlight the body up to white once more (starting with my cream base) using a dappling effect. I covered most of the blobs of flicked paint but kept just enough to give the impression of a mottled coat. 

I painted the leather and armour in my usual way. I wanted the miniature to fit in with my Khorne army somewhere and needed a connection to it. I imagine in the feature, unless more centaurs are built, that this model will serve as a future character - even a champion himself now that Ulthur Deathfist's whereabouts are unknown since his defeat by Mum-Ho-Trep! 

For the hair, I started with a black undercoat over which I very quickly painted streaks of dark grey. One thing that I have learnt about painting many things in the wargaming world is the need to be quick with your brushstrokes. A fluid hand creates far more accomplished results I feel. Then I simply layered up the streaks of grey until I reached white. Initially, I wanted the white beard and hairdo to match with the body of the miniature but in hindsight I wish I had opted for a different colour, yellow perhaps, as now that the model is completed I feel it looks a little too washed out with all the white. 

The skin was a flesh and red base mix with a little added chestnut ink. This is highlighted up by adding more flesh and later white. I made subtle use of purple inks for the face and eyes and this seemed to give the model a more rabid, chaotic look without him being too extreme. Once the main model was dry, I painted up the mushrooms to resemble the toadstools of fairy tales, complete with little white spots. I toyed with the idea of adding a shield and having a go at at Zhu's recent suggestion for an 'Owl Face' shield but I felt that such an addition wouldn't fit with the model. Why, afterall, would this centaur need a shield when he is armed with that fearsome looking daneaxe?

So what do you guys think? Honest opinions and fair criticism please!

Nest, the fabled Coatl!

Orlygg.

OLDHAMMER WEEKEND 2014 CONFIRMED!

Realm of Chaos 80s is very proud to announce that the Foundry have agreed to a second 'Oldhammer Weekend' next summer on the 9th and 10th of August!

With a date on the calendar, the next challenge is to decide what to actually do at the event. I am absolutely certain that I want to design, produce the scenery and figures for, play test and present a narrative scenario for players. I would imagine that this would be a one day battle, that may or may not be possible to run twice on a single day. I have a few ideas knocking around in my mind but we will just have to see. 

Marcus Ansell was very keen to repeat the painting competition. Last time, it was something that got mentioned early on and then kind of trailed off into nothing. Despite this, we had a few fantastic entries (and it was wonderful to see them in their own cabinet)! This time, I feel we should make much more of the competition. I see no need of reams and reams of restrictions and rules about what can, or cannot, be entered. I think applicants can judge for themselves what is appropriate. We are, after all, after a miniature that reflects the old school vibes that Oldhammer is all about. 

As for a prize, I seriously feel that I can create, or commission someone else to create, an Oldhammer Sword to present to the victor. It will be a real sword, hopefully engraved, but I will not make the investment in such a prize if only a handful of people are interested in entering the event. 

So, what next? Well I hope this post will start off a discussion about a number of points. 1) Do you think a painting competition is a good idea/are you interested in entering? 2) If you are able to come what would you like to see going on? 3)Have you got anything in mind that you would personally like to do during the weekend?

I await your comments and ideas with trepidation!

Orlygg

A Warhammer Bestiary: Beastman

Those of you with short memories, or coming to this post at a much later date, will need reminding about my current project. I intend to paint one miniature for every entry in the Warhammer Third Edition's Bestiary. For more information about the 'whys' and the 'what fors', have a look at this entry. What follows is the first painted example in the sequence, the humble BEASTMAN. Or BEESTMAN as this one is tagged.

As discussed previously, this is the miniature I selected to paint first. I am sure that many of you will recognise this model from the 1987 (?) range of beastmen, as published in the famous 1988 catalogue. At this time, the nature of what a 'beastman' was not really defined and all kinds of wacky combinations left the studio over the later part of the '80s. Hence the rhino head in this example. However, I am not sure who sculpted this particular example, so if you know, please drop me a line in the comment box below. 

A here is the finished result. What do you think? The miniature didn't take me long as I was highly motivated and, as with other things, work seems to fly by when you feel this way. I opted for a grey skin, which related to the rhino head, and a brown loin cloth dangling around his beastly bits. I used gold to pick out the metallic objects scattered about his body, as it had a distinct 'African' feel to the model. Perhaps this beastman lurks in some steamy jungle somewhere, scavenging among the ruins of ancient civilizations? It was fairly obvious to use a bone shade on the horns and claws and a nice pink for the unpleasant tail that sprouts from the model's back. Finally, the cleaver was treated to a new rusty metal painting I am trialing, and seemed fairly successful I am pleased to say. 

The base was handled my usual way, only this time I add a few 'chaos fungi' with a colour scheme inspired by that Realm of Chaos scenery Jamie Sims made and Evo has safe in his collection. These were made very simply for greenstuff and are one of the first things I have actually 'sculpted' if such a word could be used to describe them. nice time, I will try and be a little more creative and make proper 'chaos toadstools' for the base. But for now, I felt that this was enough to keep the model consistent with the others I have painted for my Retro-Collection. 

I always paint the inside of the shield black (as do I the rims) to match with the black bases. I took this from the Arcane Armorials packaging as it suggested this was the best way to showcase a freehand design on a small shield. 

For the shield, I opted to continue the 'Jungle' theme. Inspired by an old Dave Andrews miniature in White Dwarf, I took the 'Paper Tiger' symbol from inside 'Heroes for Wargames' and developed it into a painted freehand design. I borrowed heavily from the source material and learnt a huge deal about painting different freehand designs with inks and acrylic paints. Small silver dots were added to the studs to compliment the back shield rim. 

The shield didn't take that long to paint, perhaps thirty minutes, and most of that was faffing around with the orange background. I used Old School Hobgoblin Orange as a base, and blended in yellow around the tiger's forehead, nose and mouth. Once I was happy, which took a while, I blended in a little white to create the 'eyebrows' and 'lips' - I am sorry, I do not know the terms to describe these parts of a big cat's face, can anyone help me out?

The rest of the detailing of the tiger's face was carried out with black ink straight from the pot. I learnt quickly to avoid pooling the ink by brushing the tip of my brush across the back of my hand before placing the tip on the shield. This gave me a great deal more control about where the ink went and stopped the stuff spreading across the shield. I played very close attention to my source material and tried to capture every line that I saw on the 'Paper Tiger' design. I was extremely impressed by the realism this promoted and I shall be using source material a lot more in the future. 

All in all, I have got my first miniature completed and I am keen to start the next. In fact, as I type that model is already sitting on my desk ready to be cleaned up and based. As I have already said, I am going to play around with the greenstuff as I am prepping this model to see if I cannot make some little toadstools or something similar. In case you are wondering what the next model is, its going to be a Chaos Centaur.

I'll post it up as soon as I complete it!

Orlygg

A Warhammer Bestiary: One Man's Painting Challenge

I have been inspired by the comments made by many of you on my previous post. There I was, with my tongue squarely in my cheek of course, making fun of the fact that, sometimes, we spend a little too much time on eBay buying lovely lead models that perhaps we don't really need.

Still, there is noting quite like the buzz of getting something cheap. Or waiting for the victorious purchase to arrive in the post. Or even the quiet satisfaction of restoring the miniature to its virgin glory with a mixture of antiseptic solution and washing up liquid. 

So an outright ban would be unproductive and, probably, unenforcible anyway. So what to do? I have been feeling somewhat dissatisfied of late with my painting. This is most likely due to painting up rank and file miniatures to a time limit. For me, I love to have no restrictions on how long it takes a miniature. They should take as long as they take. But going at a perfectionist's snail pace is unlikely got get many models finished. I wanted the chance to paint lots of varied Citadel Old School models and practice my skills a little in the process. Forget army building or unit construction.

Just paint. Oh, and explore a little of Third Edition's background. 

So I had the idea of painting a model for each entry in the Warhammer Fantasy battle Third Edition Bestiary. This would allow me to explore my collection a little, inject variety into the painting schedule and allow a little choice eBaying all at the same time! But like all challenges, there need to be a few rules to keep things on track and interesting.

After a little bit of thought, I decided on a few guidelines to get myself going. Here is what I am suggesting. If you can think of anything that I have forgotten or have improvements and suggestions, please do make them!

1) Models need to follow the alphabetically published Bestiary as seen in WFB3. 

2) Entries with variants need a separate model for each variant e.g. dwarfs or elves. 

3) Miniatures chosen need to be Old School Citadel, or from an appropriate manufacturer if a model is unobtainable through rarity, expense or the fact that none were made. 

4) Where ever possible, the selected model needs to have a shield, banner or opportunity for freehand painting as this is a skill I am keen to develop. 

5) Each model needs a distinctive base, with a theme linked to the race depicted, that will still fit in with my style of basing.

Once the guidelines were clear in my mind, I pulled my copy of WFB3 down off the shelf and flicked through the sections until I reached the Bestiary. I cast my eyes down the entries to soak in the first handful of models that I would need to source, prep and pant: beastmen, centaurs, coatl, dwarfs (Imperial, Norse and Chaos) Elves (Wood, High, Sea and Dark) and Fimir. So the first batch would amount to eleven models, from which I own examples for all but two; the Fimir and the Coatl. 

So I am 'officially' allowed to keep my eyes open for Fimir and Coatl models! So if you spot anything likely, please do let me know in the comments section of this article!

I had a look at the entry for beastmen in WFB3 and it was illustrated with the neat little pencil sketch seen above. I have painted loads of models in the vein of this picture before as the beastman has become associated with the goat headed half man for some years. Though, there was a time when the beastmen where a lot less defined and Citadel produced some truly wacky models for the range. I decided to select a model between the two extremes, and chose the Rhino headed model below. I have always felt that there has been a group missing from RoC and WFB - and that group are mutants. They exist in WFRP and there are plenty of mutant models out there but they are not true beastmen. Rhinoman reminded me of this gap and brought fond memories of Steve Jackson's Citadel of Chaos back as well. 

Here is the model pre-clean up. Something that struck me when I was sorting through my models were the amusing tag names. BEEFMAN, BAESTMAN and (as was on my model) BEESTMAN being just three of the different spellings I uncovered. 

The model was different to the beastmen that I had painted before. Shorter and squatter with a real animal connection. He looks like he is snorting and ready to charge forwards with that meat cleaver brandished above his head! Crucially, the miniature also had a shield tag so attaching one should be simple. I will just need a little thought to consider what design I would paint on this chap's shield. 

Anyway, I am off to clean and prime this little rhinoman. He needs gluing to a base, the base sanding and a good dry undercoat before I can begin the process of painting him. The night is fairly young, and I hope to get him finished as soon as possible. 

Speak to you all when he is done.

Orlygg.