Tackling the 'Unfinishables': The Miniature Painter's Struggle

Years ago, I wrote about the concept of a Miniature Moriarty. Those miniatures that somehow or other turn against their owners in a kind of Frankensteinesque moment that often results in a long period of apathy. At the time I jumbled together some ideas to help me express how certain models made me feel. It went a little like this:

"So if you blessed by not having a shameful secret (or think you are) how can you recognise a Miniature Moriarty? To help you decide I have created a little checklist that you can run through if you are unsure.

Here we go...

1) No matter how hard you try your paint always 'does its own thing' and blobs and runs in places you don't want it to go.

2) The colour scheme always looks awful, not matter what you try. Either too flat and lacking depth or cartoony.

3) Base looks awful, even though you have used the very same technique that you always use.

4) You start to despise the figure you are working on.

5) This feeling of dislike spreads to other models and you become reluctant to paint anything else in case the 'contagion' spreads to other models.

6) The 'contagion' spreads, you become disinterested in painting, your miniatures stand idle and the jar full of models you just bought from eBay float in their dettol bath unloved for weeks. Your table becomes a dumping ground for random objects placed their by your wife, dust breeds, the table becomes an embarrassment that you just cannot face tidying up

7) You blame it all on that one miniature that started the whole downward spiral.

And now, the most important aspect of a Moriarty Miniature! Number 8 in the list. Remember, that we are talking about a nemesis here, an archenemy. Its a personal thing, between you and the lead.

So...

8)Only YOU can see the faults. Only YOU care about the flaws. So only YOU can make the change... Everyone else will just look at the model and say... "I like the way to did the...'

So...

Just paint."

Thankfully, none of the models I am sharing with you today are true Moriarty. They are what I like to call the 'Unfinishables'. Models that you want to paint, start working on but ultimately abandon for some reason (initially for a short time). However, they just remain on your painting table, or even worse tucked safely away somewhere (often for years) and never, ever get completed. Years can go by, as indeed did for a couple of the models I am showing off today, without any further work being carried out. 

With a long holiday underway, I was keen to get some serious painting done and hope to get a least one miniature painted each day. Currently, its Day 6 and six models stand completed before me (though today, Thursday, I haven't completed anything as of yet) so I have done well. What better to get working on than some of those unfinished projects I have started over the years and never got around to finishing off. As I write, I still have three unfinished projects for next time I have a clear through but I am ready to move on to another project really. 

So lets have a look at what I have managed to paint over the last few days

This undead rider model is a bit special. Not because there is some sort of Warhammery legend attached to it but due to the fact it is one of the few original models I owned back in the 1980s. I must have at some point picked up a blister with these in as there was once a second rider and steed, but both were far to badly damaged survive one of my culls and went in the bin. Yet, this model has survived and I have been keen to paint it over the years but as described, I'd start it, grow unhappy or bored with where I was going and plop the figure in the Dettol. Repeating the process several times. 

He was undercoated and based on my painting table but I wasn't sure where to go with the colour scheme. I have a hefty collection of old school undead and always intended to do a white (bone) back and brown scheme for the lot of them, using red as a spot colour. The colours of death ultimately. So I opted to go for a brown robe for the rider, he did after all look like some kind of monk, and highlighted up with my new best friend of painting, Foundry Boneyard 9A. A truly versatile colour indeed. 

The rider's face and hands were completed using the Boneyard shade I just mentioned, followed up with a chestnut ink glaze. The cleaver was very easy. Just a dark metal basecoat, washed over with first a brown ink and then a orange/brown wash. A slight silver highlight was added to the edges. The shoes proved a bit of a problem as I didn't want to just paint them another shade of brown. In the end, I went for a green into which I mixed a little of the brown to create a little colour harmony.

It was the horse that took the time. I wanted to go for black to contrast against the brown of the robe. Now, as many a painter will tell you, black, like white, can be a real challenge to get right so I highlighted up with dark greys until it reached a point I was happy with. I used the same grey to drybrush up the mane and tail. It was fairly simple to basecoat the missing chunks on the mount's body with a scarlet before washing over with a chestnut ink. I highlighted the gore with red and then a pink. 

An enjoyable figure to paint and a finish I am really pleased with. 

McDeath is a favourite range of mine, though few of the models are exclusive to it. The Knight of Harkness above is one such figure. Sadly, he has gathered dust for some months on the paint station because there was always something a bit more exciting to work on. He was very straight forwards to paint up, though I had to change the base colour of his 'skirt' bit to red after reading through the background materials. I was unhappy with how the armour had originally turned out, so I mixed up a blue glaze and ran it over all of the steel on the model. It gave the metal a bright, noble hue that helped bring out the details. Well, I thought so anyway.

Only the shield took me any great time. The design is lifted from the McDeath background material though the colour choices are mine. A real test of my freehand. 

Over the years I have raved about the Citadel plastic skeletons many times and I am sure you will forgive me if I rave once again. They are, quite simply, the best plastic skeletons ever produced and GW really did go backwards with their second (and much inferior) set of plastic skellies. Thankfully, the originals are very easy to get hold of and I probably own more than I will ever need. If indeed you can actually own too many of them in the first place! 

I cannot recall why this model was abandoned. But he has sat there for some time feeling lonely so after the paint had dried on the Knight of Harkness I started work. I was keen to try out the Foundry Boneyard triad on a whole model and ended up washing over my original paint work with a dark brown wash. Once dry, I used a mixture of layering and drybrushing to work up the model to the highlight. This probably took no longer than 15 minutes to achieve. The axe needed just a moment or two to highlight with suitable colours. Easy and effective I thought. Another positive advert for triads. 

Of course, being a plastic skeleton he needed a freehand painted shield. As I have done in the past, I Googled skull designs and copied one onto the shield. To add interest, I decided to add a single, blood-shot eye inside one of the sockets. If you are trying similar things, always do your research first. Have an explore through as much reference as you can and always keep you paint fluid with plenty of water. My top tips!

With the skeleton based and finished, it was time to move on to a figure that I started last spring. Originally part of my Chaos army but unfinished due to me having grown tired of painting Khorne stuff - this classic chaos dwarf is a brilliant example of the insane ideas behind the original chaos release. 

He painted up quickly. I loved working on the face and chose purple as a skin tone. Dwarf faces are so full of character that they are a joy to highlight and I just kept on adding Boneyard 6C to the mix until I was happy with the result. The red hair was also easy to achieve. A dark red base, highlighted with orange and yellow. I used the same yellow to pick out the two spots on his face. To add further contrast, I used bone for the horns sprouting from his head and a vibrant green for his tongue. 

Not a chap to bump into on St Valentine's Day, eh? 

Though hard to see in the image - I used browns and creams for his clothing. After all, with such a shocking colourful face, I didn't want to over-egg the pudding and spoil the look of the model. The boots were black, drybrushed with grey and highlighted with a lighter shade. I used Foundry's steel triad for the blade and GW's new gold paints for the hilt and guard. 

The model gave me another chance to paint on one of the 'ogre faces' I have been using on my chaos stuff. It was a little more challenging this time, as I usually use the larger round shields, but instead opted for one of the spiky undead ones. As I have done previously, I kept the rim of the shield black to help frame the painting on the face itself. Its what they did in the GW Studio back in the day so its good enough for me! 

It was then an easy job to base the model. In retrospect, this is my favourite model in this little project. I have already added him to my chaos dwarf unit. 

Now this 'unfinishable' must be my oldest. I started this back in 2012 when Realm of Chaos 80s was just a few months old. I gave up on it because I just didn't get on with the sculpt. I am still not a great fan of this particular orc, but I persisted and am fairly happy with the result. I still think that my recipe for orc flesh is too pale - but there you go... That is a problem for a future painting session. 

And finally, this chap. He was a quick paint and is destined to bulk up a unit of Slanneshi Chaos warriors in my other chaos army. I cannot say I am a big fan of this model either, but he is finished and I am now free to try other things. I don't feel that the colour scheme works particularly well. I think its the lack of depth in the pink armour. But its finished and ready for the table top. 

To conclude, there is something deeply satisfying in completing a model at the best of times. Its even more satisfying when they are annoying figures that have just sat there gathering dust for some time. As I said at the head of this article, I have a few other models out there which can be classed as 'unfinishables' and one day, perhaps half-term, I shall return to them and endeavour to get them completed too. 

Until then, I off to start work on my next project. More McDeath stuff if you want to know. But before I pop off, why not get thinking (like so many of you did with my speed painting challenge) about YOUR 'unfinishables'. And the next time you lift a brush to paint, why no reach for one of those models instead, and lay an overdue project to rest.

Happy painting.

Orlygg

The Deathfist's Chaos Dwarf Re-enforcements

I haven't published much of my painting recently and the reason for that is I have been hard at work finishing off these Chaos Dwarf re-enforcements for Ulthar Deathfist's Khorne army. After his drubbing at the hands of the undead, it became obvious that he would need a little long range power. Hence, the purchasing of the Bazooka I posted last month and these crossbow dwarfs. To protect them from any annoying enemies I have a small unit of heavily armoured chaos dwarf fighters.

I haven't decided on any background for them yet, I will wait until the next game to create that. I have a few ideas about who the champion is but I will save them for a future post. The standard bearer is a rare conversion from me and was built from the crewman of the swivel gun. I chopped off and re-positioned the hand and added a shield to give him a different kind of feel from the regular model. The banner is much smaller than my other efforts as I learnt how easy the massive show stopper flags can get battered when you travel the length and breadth of England playing games. 

I had fun painting up these four little stunties. As I attempted with many of my Khornate chaos warriors, I tried to vary the colours of their armour to avoid the 'sea of red' that some Blood God armies can become. Of note, is the dwarf third from the left with th emetallic green plate armour. This model was another of my attempts at painting in the mid '80s chaos warrior colour. 

The models you can see here were already painted for other projects and were swallowed up by the larger unit with a few minor touches. Oldhammer die-hards may well recognise the chaos dwarf I entered in the first Golden Gobbo painting competition all those days ago. 

And finally, a close up of my Khorne crossbows. I love these models and I now have a few more of them. The crossbows are not Citadel ones but more moderns sculpts via Marcus Ansell at the Foundry.

Well, I have a few more Khorne pieces to finish off on the painting desk. Another chaos dwarf (so I can build the unit up to 10 models if I want) and a swivel gun. After that, Slaanesh will be seeing some re-enforcements too!

Orlygg.

Acceptable in the '80s: Marauder Miniatures' Chaos Dwarfs and Dwarf Regiment

White Dwarf 117 contains little that would interest the hardcore Warhammer Fantasy battler. Rogue Trader and the big box games dominate the proceedings entirely. Then two pages of brightly coloured miniatures draw the eye and reveal two ranges of miniatures that would become some of the most collectible from any period before or since. 

The Marauder chaos dwarfs and the dwarf regiment!

Now what makes the chaos dwarfs even more remarkable is the fact that they are little tributes to the earlier chaos warrior range from about 1985, the one with the Slambo miniature in. Can you spot the model that apes his design in the photograph above? These models are great fun and fit in very closely with the scale and themes of previous Citadel stunties. Beware if you want to set about collecting these as I have seen one or two of them reach quite high prices for chaos dwarfs, though they are all pretty readily available on online auction sites. It is also worthy of noting the colour schemes given here as I feel the tones chosen are top notch and there is a great deal of inspiration here for any enthusiast attempting to paint up any heavily armed chaos warriors, thugs or dwarfs. 

I have yet to begin collecting Marauder in any great amount but a set of these lovely models will be at the top of my list when I begin doing so. 

Oh, how I remember this regiment! I can recall loving these for the moment I flicked through the pages of this WD and planned how I could possibly afford them on £5 a month pocket money. I can recall searching under the beds and behind the sofa to amass enough to get my hands on these. The pitiful collection of copper pennies I unearthed wouldn't even have paid the postage and to this day I still haven't managed to get hold of any of these. Probably because everyone else is after them too!

I am happy to go out on a limb and say that this collection is probably the best range of dwarfs ever produced, with the command models worthy of particular praise. So full of character and little detail, these models seem to breathe life to the paint that is adhered upon them. They are just excellent, excellent, excellent! The two ranges at the bottom of the page, in the glory days of ordering whatever you could, allowed you to create whole regiments of greatswords, halbardiers and musketeers. A very well thought out range this. Which just goes to show why they are still so popular twenty-five years later. 

I am envious of anyone of you fellow enthusiasts who owns a collection of these! Do these wonderful models have any more fans out there? If so, please share you thoughts on them in the usual way! 

Orlygg

Chico's Chaos Challenge: Chaos Dwarf Bazooka Team

Here is my entry in the latest Chico's Challenge. A Realm of Chaos era Chaos dwarf Bazooka team. Now, if you are not aware of who (or, indeed, what Chico is) then I heartily recommend that you pop over to his website here. Oldhammer on a Budget says exactly what it says on the tin. It documents one man's quest to collect as much old school themed miniature goodness for next to nothing - or preferably, bugger all. 

I have had this team sitting on my desk for almost a year. They were originally to be part of the warband I took to BOYL 2013, and then later part of the Deathfist's army at Blog-Con. Sadly, they never got finished and they gathered dust. Hence the value of little competitions and challenges like Chico's, the encourage you to focus your painting and get stuff done. 

The colour scheme is based on the chaos warrior who resided on the cover of the Realm of Chaos packaging on the blister walls of yesteryear. The base colour for the crimson is Go Faster Red, a rather rare colour from the Ork and Eldar paintset. I added a bright yellow to the base and simply worked up the edges and bends in the armour. The green's base is Woodland Green, highlighted with the addition of white to the mix. The gold was a mix of Shining Gold, yellow and chestnut ink, highlighted witha little silver. 

All and all, a quick colour scheme and one that saw these miniatures completed in about two and half hours. Not bad for two little dwarfs. Chico can tell you a story a bout two little dwarfs, but it takes quite a strong stomach to listen to it. 

Enjoy, oh and you still have a couple of days to get something finished or photographed for his competition. there is talk of a prize to boot, but whether that involves the two dwarfs is anyone's guess. 

Orlygg.

A Warhammer Bestiary: Chaos Dwarf

Welcome back to A Warhammer Bestiary, my painting project in which I attempt to collect and paint a miniature for each entry in the WFB3 rulebook. So far so good, I have enjoyed every moment of all the miniatures I have painted thus far, and I am just about to start work on elves as they are next in the bestiary. This update concerns the Chaos, or Black, Dwarfs. 

Instead of choosing one of the many heavily armoured examples in the Citadel archives from the 1980s, I opted for this mutated chap. I love this sculpt as the model represents a dwarf who has travelled someway down the path of chaos and has been mutated beyond all recognition of his former self. He has a tentacle arm, a face on his chest and a long winding tail. You can no doubt imagine that this chap's mind has also been duly affected being one step up from ravenous chaos spawn!

The model allowed me to work on flesh tones once more, only this time I was dealing with the warping powers of chaos. With no particular plan in mind the flesh ended up a sickly green to suggest his long descent into damnation and I had a go at blending this green flesh with the malign purple/red I opted to paint the tentacle. Having lost much of his personality, this Chaos Dwarf has lost his sense of pride and how roams the Old World stark naked, with only his matted orange beard preserving his modesty. A lovely comic touch by whichever of the Perrys sculpted this model in the mid 1980s. 

Though hard to see in this photograph, I offset the orange with a purple lip and red tongue. The dwarf is no doubt droolling over the next kill his can make in the name of whatever dark god he worships. When painting him, I didn't really have a god in mind, though with his colouring Nurgle may well have been his benefactor. What do you think?

Orlygg.

Acceptable in the '80s: Chaos Dwarf Ballistics

Last post I discussed, in my rambling way, my view about the 'Golden Age' of White Dwarf. That issue 107 of White Dwarf is the beginning of a very special period of the magazine. A highly creative period where we learnt about the background of the Imperium, The Horus Heresy, Titans to name just a few wonderful ideas. So here's one of them!

Today's post concerns Chaos Dwarfs. 

Now while we are discussing the evil stunty ones, it is important to remember the was no concept of a Chaos Dwarf army in the early versions of Warhammer. They were part of the armylist in Warhammer Armies, and using this as a basis it is fairly straight forwards to build a chaos dwarf force. Its not really that interesting though, just a few units and there were certainly no big hats or comical beards. Slaves to Darkness also included chaos dwarfs in their armylists, but again no actual army. Chaos dwarfs were just another unit at this time, but of course with the flexibility of 3rd edition it was, and still is, very easy to create your own. Even so, Chaos Dwarf forces lacked something.

This was remedied in White Dwarf 108 with a range of new models, namely crossbows and a swivel gun. As you would expect at this release was accompanied with narrative, background and rules. Shall we have a look at them?

The story above is typical of WD at this time. Jokes abound but with a subtle slice of darkness. I for one would not want to face a defended position supported by a cannon. Nice artwork too, though i don't know who the artist is.

On with the background and the rules. I really like the idea of a portable piece of artillery like this, especially on a vast battlefield with many targets. I also like the fact that this weapon only inflicts hits on the first rank. Makes those big units rather tempting. I am glad I have a couple of these models in my collection ( somewhere ) and I plan to add them to my Khornate army some point in the future.

It seems they can be grouped into units of four if you so wish. Here are the stats cards for Warhammer Armies and Slaves to Darkness. Below is the ad for the Chaos Dwarf crossbows from WD 107 and these are lovely models. I got hold of 5 of these recently though they lack the plastic crossbows. I have one or two of the crossbows in my collection and am wondering if it is possible to create a mould to copy them and arm the whole unit.

There is enough here to make most gamers happy. Two new units, intetesting models and fluff in WD. 

Do you own these models? What are your opinions on them? What about their effectiveness? Have you a recount about how they performed on a battlefield near you? If so,  please share the details.

Orlygg

Acceptable in the '80s: White Dwarf 103: Chaos Dwarf Whirlwind and Tenderiser

White_Dwarf__103 by Ryan Radgoski

Hey, here's a first! An article in my series about the history of Warhammer Third Edition when we have the actual issue available online to read through. I found this copy on Scribd, and thanks must go to Ryan for publishing this on the site. Well, issue 103 continued the Dark Future theme of imposing vehicle hurtling down a post-apocalyptic highway, only this time the painting was by Jim Burns. The issue continued the tradition of printing extracts from Realm of Chaos (extracts that I have not included in this history, as there are largely identical to those published later in Slaves to Darkness and The Lost and the Damned), more detail for Bloodbowl and Dark Future and a wealth of other stuff. Feel free to have a browse through the issue before reading my commentary about the Warhammer releases. 

One of the Warhammer highlights of the issue is this advert for the forthcoming Warhammer Armies (see my next post for my retro-review of this controversial book) that uses Chris Collingwood's classic cover painting as its basis. The advert contains a little detail about what to expect in the new supplement; namely new rules for daemonic summoning, new creatures and war machines a plenty. As a little related taster, one of the Warhammer releases that month were the Chaos Dwarf War Machines - the Tenderiser and the Whirlwind. 

As is typical during this period of White Dwarf, the article about the war machines begins with a little piece of narrative fluff related the the models. Sadly, this piece of throwaway fiction if far superior to the writing published in today's WD, or indeed many of the Black Library 'novels'. But as Rick Priestley has told us here at Realm of Chaos 80s, the studio staff were a fairly literate bunch back in the day and amusing little background pieces like this were knocked out with regular aplomb. As you'd expect, the tone of the piece is more light-hearted and self aware than the po-faced GrImDaRkTM of more recent times. 

Kev Walker provides a rather evocative, if simplistic, illustration of the Tenderiser in action which helps the viewer imagine just what one of these war machines would do to a packed rank or two of chaos thugs. Underneath, we have a detailed diagram of the different pieces to the war machines, just in case, I suppose, you had difficulty putting them together.

The article goes on to provide full rules and a Warhammer Armies list box detailing all you need to know to field these bizarre machines. And, as far as I know, this issue is the only place that these rules were ever published. Now I won't critique the rules here, I leave that to you. Read them, indulge them (maybe even try them out if you own the models - which I don't sadly, but I would very much like too, so if you have any rolling around I love to hear from you) but don't expect balance or fairness with what is published here. In the '80s, that was up to you and your opponent and it wasn't necessary to attempt to hardwire it into rules mechanic. 

Above we have the colour examples of the Tenderiser and the Whirlwind. I love these paint jobs! The green and orange faces really give the models a daemonic edge. And even today, with all the range and versatility of wargames figures, especially those in the fantasy genre, I have yet to see something this bizarre. After all, these machines are handcarts loaded up with whips, chains and massive hammers pushed along by a cross between a dwarf and a bull. Still, you could be looking at a fair price to pay for these classic models. I've seen individuals go for £30 on a good day (if you are a seller) and less than a tenner if its a bad day (again, if you are a seller) so they are obviously 'miniature marmite' to some people. 

And I thought the '60s were inspired by #ahem# natural substances!

Tacked on the end, we have nine 'proper' orcs sculpted by the Goblin Master himself, Kevin Adams. These ones were designed to fit the then new plastic crossbows (and they are a bugger to find on eBay now) rather than being part of the model. Perhaps a forerunner to what came later, true multi-part metal/plastic figures, for Kevin Adams' early '90s RT orks were the first in a long line of miniatures with plastic arms and weapons. I haven't seen many of these models on-line these days, nor do they turn up much on painted forums or blogs, or at least not seen by me, so I cannot state how rare these greenskins are today.

Perhaps you, dear reader, can tell me?

Orlygg.