A whole bunch of 'Munda

I haven't posted for a few weeks, but don't worry. I haven't fallen off the blogging wagon already, I've just not had a whole lot of energy to paint, so I've had nothing to show off.

Then I hit a huge productive streak in the last couple of days, so I suddenly have enough to show off out of basically nowhere. It's weird how the hobby motivation ebbs and flows sometimes!

As I predicted last time, after the slog of finishing up my Orks, I turned my attention to Necromunda for some low effort wins.

I got the set of Malstrain Genestealers from my Secundus box done over a couple of evenings, despite not having any particular use for them in my immediate future:

I think they turned out brilliantly tbh, far beyond my wildest expectations! So much so that I'm actually tempted to get some more of them, as I'm a little sad the project is over already!

They were mostly done using watered down washes, then picking out a few few interest points like eyes and blisters, then adding some Tesseract Glow to their bases. I probably spent longer waiting for washes to dry than actually painting them!

I was on a bit of a roll after those, with my creative juices flowing nicely. I decided to use that to finally get my Orrus Spyrers from the same box knocked out too, meaning that I can cross off everything from a boxed set from my backlog. A bit of a rarity!

Anyway, I got those done pretty quickly too. Here's the results:

I don't think they turned out quite as well as the 'Stealers, but i think that's more an issue with the models having no clear focal point than anything else.

I went for a metallic scheme with them, based loosely on Iron Man's colours. I've had the idea knocking about since I bought them to have each Spyrer type be based on a different Marvel super hero, so this is the start of that. I'll buy the others later, but I think this makes a pretty good start to that plan.

So that's a good chunk knocked off my backlog, netting me 21 points towards my total. I'm not sure where I'm going to turn my attention next, but I should actually get some decent free time over the next few weeks, so I'm expecting to getting a good chunk of hobby done. We'll see if that actually happens though.

Until next time, happy hobbying!

Off to a decent start

The great de-backlogging is off to a pretty good start. I managed to get the last of my Speed Freaks units for my Orks done over the last week, with a Shokkjump Dragster and trio of Deffkoptas ticked off my To Do list!

The Shokkjump in particular I'm really glad turned out well. I converted it basically from scratch using a kids toy i found in a charity shop as as base. It fits in pretty well I reckon.

The Boomdakka I showed off in my last post, but decided to photograph it again, as I love it so much.

The Koptas are the last of a batch of 15 I've been painting recently for the summer tournament at my local club. I ended in 4th Place, which really wasn't bad considering I'd hardly played 40k for the better part of two years! I originally joined as a way to boost numbers and have an excuse to paint some Orks, but it turns out there's a lot of armies out there which can't cope with massed whirly death machines being slammed down the field turn 1!

As I said, these are the last of my 'Need to do' Ork stuff. There's still plenty of Ork stuff in my backlog, but they're less of a priority. Im going to take a break from painting green for a while and probably turn my attention towards some Necromunda stuff. There's a few bits I want to get done for the local campaign I've started running and most of it should be relatively low effort pallete cleansers. 

I'm definitely finding it easier to focus now i have a goal to aim for and a place to document it all here on the blog, so I'm hoping my productive streak continues.

Until next time, happy hobbying!

Back from the dead!

I haven't posted on here for over a year. Most of the reason for that was the dwindling or non existent interactions on my posts over the last few years. Compared to how active and vibrant the hobby blogosphere was 10-15 years ago, it just felt like i was shouting into the void. As you can imagine, it kind of killed my enthusiasm for posting.

But now in a fitting move for Halloween, I'm bringing it lurching back to life!

I'm still under no illusions as to how dead a medium blogs are in this age of social media, but I figure that posting on here regularly again is the best way to document the big self-imposed hobby challenge I'm about to embark on. If there's anyone here reading this, then you can come along for the ride. Say hi if you are!

 I mentioned a hobby challenge, so you might be wondering what I'm up to? Well, if you've read this blog over the years, you'll know that I've been locked in a never-ending war with my massive pile of shame, tracked using my points system.

Well that backlog's gotten a bit out of hand again and it's driving me completely insane, especially after finding a ton of half-finished projects when clearing out the shed the other week. As a result, I've put myself on another model purchase ban for a little while, but with a bit of a twist this time. Rather than just doing damage control and barely pulling my head above water like I normally do, I want to build up a bit of headroom with it this time and make a meaningful dent in my ridiculous pile of unfinished stuff.

With that in mind, I've set an end goal to work towards, rather than just stopping once I'm in positive figures. I want to reach +300 painting points by next summer, from my current total of -115. Its a bit of arbitrary goal, but my thinking is that it should put a hell of a dent in my 'to do' list, whilst not being so impossible to reach that i get discouraged.

Next summer as an end date is a good and (in my mind at least!) well-reasoned goal though. All rumours and logic place 11th edition 40k as coming out then. I'm not going to fool myself into thinking that I'm not going to buy anything when that drops, so that seems a good point to have a healthy, much-reduced backlog ready for!

I'm also not going full cold turkey on my hobby purchases. I'm going to treat myself every now and then, again mostly so I don't get discouraged. I've been cataloguing everything I need to paint, dividing it by army and game system, then further sub-dividing it, listing the stuff which I most want or need to get done. Once everything on one of those sub-lists is finished, I'm going to treat myself to something I want, with the caveat that it's got to match that category. 

For example, for my Necromunda stuff, I've got the following on my 'Need to do' list:

- Secundus Genestealers

- Spyrers

- Necromunda Weirdos 

- Arbites 

- Escher cats

Once those are done, I can treat myself to a Forgeworld character pack I've had my eye on for a while. Likewise, once I've cleared my Saturnine box from my list, I can can buy something for my Thousand Sons.

This might seem like I'm making this far too complicated, but ive learned over the years that my Autistic brain needs structure to stuff like this to keep me focused. This is basically a very long-winded way for saying I'm going to hopefully have a very productive 9 months or so of hobby ahead of me!

To start me off, I've been working on my Orks the past few weeks. They're by far the shortest category on my list and the ones I've been lost engaged with, having been playing a summer league and tourney at my local club. I've painted most of a Speed Freaks army over that time, with just a few things left to finish up.

Most recently I've gotten a Boomdakka Snazzwagon, converted from a Taurox done:

That's been sitting unfinished in various forms since 2017, so its good to get it finished at last! It was originally bought for my Inquisition, but I haven't done anything with that army since 8th Edition, so it got a new home my Deathskulls. Reckon it turned out pretty well. It was hard to get a good photo as it doesnt fit in my light box, but hopefully it looks good anyway!

The other thing I finished was some Rogue Trader Boyz i bought off a mate on a whim a few months back:

I didn't really have a use for them, I just have a fondness for old sculpts and poor impulse control. That probably goes a way to explaining my need to do this backlog-busting challenge! These were great fun to work on though and will probably end up finding a home in my Kommandos, which need a few extra bodies.

Next up will probably be a converted Shokkjump Dragster and some Deffkoptas to finish off the Ork part of my 'Need to do' list. I'll keep you updated on how I do.

Its good to be back!

Happy Hobbying!

A short break

I decided to take the a little break from painting Trolls this week. I may be on a deadline but I'm chugging along nicely with the army as a whole and I needed a bit of a pallete cleanser.

I'm also waiting on a few more models to arrive before my final push on the army, so it's all good.

Anyway I finally managed to get my Masque painted. I've had the model knocking around for a few years now and she was the only model I had unpainted in.my AoS 4 test game the other week, so it made sense to get her done.

She turned put very nicely I think. A lovely change of pace. I'm still getting used to the fact that my new phone camera picks up more than my eye can when I'm painting. Some of the highlights and layers are looking a little rough when I post the pics on here, but I have to keep reminding myself that it'll look fine when on the table!

If nothing else it's a nice little push for me to improve my skills!

The other thing I've been doing is cracking on with the terrain I've been meaning to do for my local club for a few months now, but kept getting distracted from:

It's a much simpler paint job than the Masque. I've just been drybrushing whilst watch stuff on YouTube. Strangely relaxing in an almost zen way.

It turned out pretty nice considering how simple the scheme is. Just Skavenblight Dinge over a white spray, then drybrushed up with white.

Got a few more bits I need to get done too, but it won't take too long now I've started.

All in all it's been a pretty productive week. My next batch of Trolls should arrive in the next few days, then it'll be back to the ground ready for October. It's been nice taking a little break though, plus having my hobby mojo properly returning has been wonderful. I'm going to ride it while I still can!

Trolls!

Despite being busy at work and the frankly ridiculous heat in the last couple of days, I've managed to get a little bit of hobby done.

I now have a solid goal to be working towards, which has really helped my focus. I signed up for a local Old World event at the start of October, so I need a fully painted army done by then. Deadlines focus my hobby ADD brilliantly, which is why I've got so many fully painted Middle Earth armies!

I decided to cheat on this one a little though and run Troll Horde. I only need to paint about 20 models for that! On the other hand, I get to paint a bunch of cool Trolls, so it's all good.

Forgive the cluttered hobby desk in the background. I didn't have the time to set up my light box for them:

They turned put alright I reckon. The poor light doesn't show them off as well as it could, but I'll get a better picture when I've got this full batch of 13 done.

I even managed to sneak in a little freehand to taint one of our local dwarf players, in the form of a pilfered banner!

Not bad I'd say, although I could definitely do better. It's been a while since I attempted anything like that.

Just another 8 Trolls to go and then I've got the Hag and Wyvern Boss to do. I'm chugging along nicely I'd say!

That's all for today though. I'll bring you more soon.

It's time to beat my backlog!

It's a bit of a grandiose title, but I'm determined to finally do something about the massive backlog of projects I've got building up.

It's probably no exaggeration to say that if I never bought another model again, I could go my entire life without running out of things to paint!

 

Honestly it's a bit ridiculous. Problem is, I get massive hobby ADD far more often than I see projects through to the end. Made worse by the fact I play so many game systems.

 

So I've decided to put in a bit more effort over the next few months to try and clear out some of the hobby clutter.

It's not really going to be a hobby purchase ban like I've done in the past, more like just being a bit more conscious about what I'm spending and trying not buy stuff I want for my armies until I've finished a chunk of stuff related to them first.

A good example are the Trolls I got done this week:

Not the best of pictures I'm afraid. Still working on how to get the best from my new phone camera. My point is though that I've got another 7 of these to get finished. I want to get a Troll Hag to go with them, but I'm not going to do that until all 12 are finished.

Sounds pretty simple and obvious when I put it like that, but I'm hoping it's a good way to try and tame the chaos and poor impulse control which tends to prevail in my hobby decisions.

I'm also going to try and post on here again more often as I've let this go to hell a bit recently. I've reached the stage where I'm pretty sure I'm the only seeing it on here, but it is nice to have a hobby log like this. I've been running this blog for 15 years, I can't stop now!

Anyway there's the update of what I'm up to. Apologies for the big gap between posts and I'll hopefully be back soon.

 Happy hobbying!

I'm back!! (hopefully)

So as usual, I've been utterly terrible at keeping up with this blog. I've been in a bit of a hobby funk recently that I've just gotten over, so hopefully I'll be getting a bit more to show you guys soon.

I did manage to get these guys done for my AoS Slaanesh though:

These Blissbarb Archers have been sitting unfinished on my desk for about a year now. There was so much detail on them that i was a little daunted so i kept putting off painting them.

I recently saw a YouTube video though that made them look a lot simpler than I thought, so i decided to give it a go. It certainly wasn't as easy as they made it look! I'm glad i gave it a try though, as in my opinion they're some of the nicest results I've achieved on anything for ages!

Posting them up here has actually made me realise I could probably do with going over the base trims with another layer, but that's easily fixed. 

I particularly love the skin tone I achieved for them. It really gives a nice, unnaturally pale look to the whole unit which I'll definitely be transferring to other projects.

All in all these guys have really given my hobby mojo the kick up the arse it needed and I'm pretty psyched to get working on other bits. I definitely want to see if i can get more of my Hedonites churned out whilst I'm in the right mood for it, but I've also got some Old World bits to be working on too. I'll post more once ive decided what it'll be.

Until next time, happy hobbying!

Savage things

So after my last post I was raring to go with hobby and get a load done. My body had other ideas though and I spent the next week and a half feeling extremely ill. Bloody typical!

Now I'm in the mend though, I've not only been able to get a couple more games of Old World in, but I've managed to sit down and do some hobby for the first time in a couple of weeks. 

Despite their absolutely abysmal performance in the game last night, I decided that my Boar Boyz were next up on my hobby desk. 

I'm actually really quite happy with how they turned out, considering it was just a few hours work.

 Weirdly, despite appearances, the Boars took longer than the Boys to do, needing several layers of drybrushing and washes, whereas the riders were mostly Contrast, with a few strategic highlights. I'm clearly starting to get get the method locked down for the army scheme, as it was a breeze to work through.

I think the purple really does make the whole thing pop. I'll definitely be integrating it more into the rest of the army as I go along.

That's it for today though. Hopefully this burst of progress will propel me forward and I'll be have more to show soon. I'm definitely riding this Old World kick right now, so no doubt it'll be something of that ilk, but only time will tell what specifically that might be. 

Until next time though, happy hobbying! 

Old World Shenanigans

Despite my best of intentions, I've been pretty lazy with posting so far this year. 

January is usually quite a productive month for me, as I normally work a bit less as things calm down from the Christmas rush, but it turned out to be an unexpectedly busy month this time round, between work and Pokemon Regionals. Then in February I just haven't found the time to sit down and post anything.

Luckily I actually got a ton of stuff done, albeit more at the start of January than past couple of week. I got the entire core of my Orcs and Goblins done for Old World.

 Turns out that a looming game release after three years of procrastinating was a fantastic motivator to get shit done!

I still need to finish up the Squigs, Chariot and a few extra dudes, but I still got a huge chunk done. It was mostly done using Contrast and speed painting techniques, but they look pretty great when ranked up, so I'm pretty happy with them. 

I'm actually really proud of how my Great Shaman/Wurrzag came out. It was only about three hours work, but I absolutely loved the result!

I wasn't originally planning to use a big Orc Shaman, preferring Gobbos when it comes to magic. He was just part of the big lot I bought ages ago, but I like the paint job on him so much I'm definitely going to try to squeeze him into a few lists.

On top of my Orcs, I also dug out my old Dark Elves and gave them some fancy new spaced movement trays to get them compatible with the new edition:

They still need a lot of work to bring them up to a good standard, plus I built/rebuilt a load of monsters to go with them, but I'll cover that in a later post. This is already getting pretty long already and I also wanted to show off a few pics from the games I've had already. 

I've been having an absolutely fantastic time in just the three games I've played so far. It's not just the nostalgia talking, there's just something about it which revs me up far more than anything has recently, especially compared to the latest incarnation of 40k.

Heresy and Middle Earth have come close, but honestly I can see this becoming the main game I'll be playing for a while, even more so than it did back in the day. It's incredibly good fun.

Anyway I'm going end this post here and try and be back soon with another, now I've gotten caught up. I'm actually off work this week, so hopefully I'll be able to get some stuff done which I can show off. It is nice to finally get a post out though. I do enjoy posting here, it's just not as easy to keep up as it used to be. 

Anyway, until next time, happy hobbyingl

Goodbye 2023, hello 2024

Happy New Year to you all!

Im a little later than usual with my end of year hobby review post, but at least I'm here now. Welcome to my annual hobby ramble! 

I actually had a really good hobby year in 2023. I joined a new gaming group at the start of the year, so I've been gaming a lot more than I normally do.

They're a great bunch of guys and I've had some really fun games, including participating in a 40k League and trying to introduce them to smaller games like Middle Earth and Heresy. 

On the whole it's been pretty successful and I've had a blast. It's also given me a huge boost to my mental health and a good excuse to get out and be more sociable, so I consider that a win all round. 

I'm honestly little shocked at just how much I've been playing. I've always been far more of a hobbyist than a gamer, but it's been rather excellent getting out and getting some serious gaming in. In previous years I was able to get one game a month if I was lucky. 2023 saw me play 55 games. That's an average of more than one a week! 

It did feel like I'd gotten less stuff painted as a result though, as I've been playing instead of painting on my main night off every week. Turns out though that when I gathered everything together for a photo, I was very wrong:

That's a pretty massive chunk of hobby progress!

 I still thought it was a bit less than previous years, but it turns out I'd pulled out 454 points of hobby progress, which was actually a few points up on last year. I guess I'm just really crap at judging these things! 

I guess I was a little fooled by the fact I've been working on a lot of points-heavy big things, but I certainly won't complain. All hobby progress is good progress! 

It has helped that I've been trying to only game with fully painted models whenever possible. There's nothing like wanting to try something new to give me the push to crank out some fresh models! 

So moving on, where am I going in 2024? Well I've decided to keep it simple this year. At least to begin with I want to get a few existing projects finished, like my 30k Emperor's Children and Imperial Fists, as well as keep working on my Old World armies. 

That latter one is likely to occupy most of my immediate attention, especially with pre orders having been announced. I'm just so excited to have Warhammer Fantasy back! 

I reckon most of January will be consumed with mass production of Orcs and Gobbos. I've got a good method down for them now, so I should be able to zoom through a ton of them, it's just a matter of putting in the time. 

I'm kicking myself a little at having let my Old World projects slip so much, even though I've known the game is coming for four years. I was hoping to have a couple fully playable armies ready to go for launch, but now I'm running out of time, especially as I know a lot of the local players are chomping at the bit to dive in with it. 

I've just got to try and play catch up as best I can. At least it'll keep me busy and motivated! 

Apart from that, i just want to generally focus on getting stuff done for a while. I'm quite comfortably in positive painting points now, but my backlog is still pretty ridiculous, so a bit of a pause on model buying outside of Old World makes a lot of sense for a few months. Quite honestly, I could probably not buy a single model for the next few years and still not run out of stuff to be working on! 

The first few months of the year is normally a good time for me to focus on my backlog anyway, as the hours at work go way down, so I don't have a huge amount of disposable income. It also gives me more free time for hobby, so it just makes sense to focus that for a little while. 

Whatever I end up doing, I do want to try and post on here more regularly. I'm fully aware that in 2024, hobby blogs are a pretty dead form of media. Social media is definitely where it's at for online hobby. There's something very satisfying about maintaining this blog though, so I want to keep it going as long as I can, even if noone's really paying attention to it.

So that's it for this year's round up. It's a little less structured and wandering than usual, but you don't come here for concise thoughts anyway, so it's all good.

Have a fantastic 2024 and I'll catch you all soon!