Tuesday 3 July 2012

Fantasy Miniatures: Golden Demon 1990 Extravaganza





Roll up! Roll up! Roll up! 

Here we have it!

The final 'golden age' Golden Demon celebration book from 1990 and in my opinion, the best of the three published between '88 and '91. 

Flicking through the pages and comparing it to the '88 edition, you can see the influence that Rogue Trader had on miniature painting. Originally, fantasy dominated the painting world but by '90 science fiction games were beginning to dominate the minds of gamers everywhere; which is, for good or ill, pretty much the way things are to this day.

Let us examine the book in closer detail shall we?

Introduction p2-3: Written by Andy Jones, this article misses the 'history of painting/citadel miniatures guff from the previous two books and instead just discusses the decision to split Golden Demon and Games Day into two separate events. 

Golden Demon 1990 Overview p4-5: Steve How describes how the Golden Demon competition was organised and how the day went in this article. 

Studio Staff p6-9: Mike McVey, Ivan Bartlett, Dale Hurst and Tim Prow showcase their work over these inspirational pages.

Previous Winners p10: The three winning Slayer Sword models are compared. Just look at the first ever winning entry and compare it to what came later. Things certainly moved on quickly!

Single Miniatures p12-14: Lots of miniature goodness to be had here and some really amusing little takes on familiar models.

Mounted Miniatures p15-18: Lots of originality going on here. This section is a MUST!

Monsters p19-20: Does what it says on the tin.

Vignettes p21-29: Outstanding work here. This section is another must and certainly one of the greatest collection of painted models ever put to print. Enjoy!

Standard Bearers p31-34: Why did these standards go out of fashion? We have these tiny little plastic things these days! In the '80s it was all about size and the wow factor!

Titans p35-37: Loads of the subtly painted models here. Lots of fine ideas too. I really want a copy of Adeptus Mechanicus now!

Epic Scale Vignettes p38-40: More epic action!

Vehicles p41-46: Wow! What an interesting range of scratch built and converted vehicles from the good old days.

Overseas p47

Dave Soper (Winner) p48-49

Winners p50-58

Marauder p59-63

Regional Finalists p64

Well here is the link to the book. Print it out, download it, whatever... Just enjoy!

Fantasy-Miniatures-1990

So what are my favourite pieces? I'm going to post the fantasy ones here (as is appropriate) and the Rogue Trader and related on the sister blog when I get around to it. http://warhammer40000roguetrader.blogspot.co.uk/

Here's a quick gallery of highlights for Warhammery stuff that I loved!

 Whatever happened to the hand painted banner? Too many plastic sculpts around these days, eh? This banner looks far from 2D though, which is often the complaint of paper banners. One day, I hope to be able to paint up banners to this level!

 Probably my favourite miniature in the book. So original. So simple. I wonder how the dragonflies were constructed?
 Fantastic conversion and brilliant painting of one of the all time great period models. Lovely blending on the nurglings.
How mad is this? Shame GW decided that the infinite variety of chaos and its mutating nature was best represented by skulls and spikes, eh?


 I adore this model. The drool, the autumnal colours, the hatchling and mother looking at one another, the natural tones on the base. Everything good miniature painting is about - don't you think?


Enjoy!

Orlygg.

3 comments:

  1. If I recall, the book "Heroes for Wargames" suggested using the foil from champagne bottles for standards. It would let you paint then "sculpt" the foil into a 3D shape once glued in place. Who'd have thought Blanche et al were big champagne drinkers?

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  2. Heya,

    Thanks for storing all those cool minis in one place.
    Really love oldschool Warhammer and still cannot believe all we can get now is overwhelming plastic and failcast...

    Demi

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  3. Hi, the "Jousting Dragonfly's" was my creation, they were real dragonfly's, dried & reinforced with copper wire. unfortunately they did not survive the journey back from the award show in Derby.

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