From HerrRobert: Dragons Dancing at the Black and White Ball (40 points)

Deep in the frozen northern wastes, the young white dragon Othimmalaeagkar stood proudly on a hunk of rock staring out over a frozen sea of ice. Whisps of cold escaped her nostrils as she surveyed the domain she would make hers, establishing a lair and asserting dominance, contemplating the treasure soon to be mined by her captive deep gnomes and hordes of succulent caribou to feast on.

Meanwhile, deep in the fetid swamps hundreds of miles to the south, a young black dragon Thriingaulzundae snorts in deep satisfaction over his acquisition of a ruined and flooded chapel, sacred to gods long gone. Having secured the loyalty of a pirate band and the fealty through fear of a tribe of orcs, he contemplates the riches he is sure to amass, the magic to hoard, and ancient knowledge to covet.

For my third entry to Challenge XVI, I take you on a trip back down memory lane, to the Analogue Hobbies Studio of Challenge XIII. While my progress through the studio was extremely limited, I did amass several projects for the various themes throughout the studio. One of these was the "Black and White" section, which seemed eminently suited to digging something out of the pile of shame.

Black & White: Paint something in grey-scale, with black and white being your colours of choice. Reconjure the elegance of the silver screen! 

What could possibly be more suitable than some chromatic dragons?

From D&D Beyond, we have the necessary descriptors:

Black Dragons: Black dragons dwell in swamps on the frayed edges of civilization. A black dragon’s lair is a dismal cave, grotto, or ruin that is at least partially flooded, providing pools where the dragon rests, and where its victims can ferment. The lair is littered with the acid-pitted bones of previous victims and the fly-ridden carcasses of fresh kills, watched over by crumbling statues. Centipedes, scorpions, and snakes infest the lair, which is filled with the stench of death and decay.

Don't you just love that sense of satisfaction sculpted into his face?

White Dragons: White dragons lair in icy caves and deep subterranean chambers far from the sun. They favor high mountain vales accessible only by flying, caverns in cliff faces, and labyrinthine ice caves in glaciers. White dragons love vertical heights in their caverns, flying up to the ceiling to latch on like bats or slithering down icy crevasses.

Fizban's Treasury of Dragons gives even more options for customizing these antagonists, from a dragon naming table, to lair designs, personality traits, dragon goals and even adventure hooks. 

Both dragons are from Reaper. Othimmalaeagkar is a Reaper Bones Young Ice Dragon, while Thriingaulzundae is a much heftier metal Young Swamp Dragon. Both are multi-part kits, with the wings cast and provided separately, which made things a whole lot easier to paint.

Reaper Bones Young Ice Dragon

The metal swamp dragon

I went with a pretty simple paint scheme for both, which doesn't really befit their status as dragons, but which worked really well. Both were primed and painted in parts, wings painted separately, and only assembled after all basing was complete. For Othimmalaeagkar, I primed her black, then completely covered her in white craft paint, followed by Game Color Blue Wash, and then dry brushed with Mondo Llama Snow Flurry, while her claws and teeth were Mondo Llama Winter Clouds. Mondo Llama craft paints are all a satin finish, which worked well for this dragon.

The base is where I took a lot more risks. I used a Reaper lipped base, and filled it with Realistic Water. I was sadly disappointed since I was unable to get the water to fog up or look like ice the way I wanted it to. Despairing a bit, I turned to AK Interactives Snow Sprinkles to cover the base of the miniature, and Ice Sparkles to try and create the ice effect over the realistic water. I was afraid I almost ruined it by putting watered down mod podge on the base to lock everything in, but when it dried it gave a very nice blending. I'm quite pleased.

For Thriingaulzundae, I used Mondo Llama Fresh Pavement over a brown primer. His scales were picked out by drybrushing Folkart Metallic Black over them, while I used Delta Ceramcoat Charcoal Grey for his skin. His claws are Mondo Llama Misty Grove.

I also used this as an opportunity to experiment with swamp bases. I started with my usual drybrush of Mississippi Mud and Teddy Bear Brown fraft paint, followed by a wash of Ghille Dew speedpaint. More realistic water followed, tinted using Woodland Scenics olive drab and brown tints to the realistic water. At first, I was concerned that I'd poured too much in, but it gave a really great effect of wet ground surging up on to shore. I then added Army Painter Swamp tufts, some Woodland Scenics foliage clumps, and lichen cut and torn to size. 

So there we have it, two young dragons ready to establish themselves in their new territories, and some solid celluloid from back in the vault.

Scoring is a bit difficult. Both models are a bit larger than a mounted 28mm figure, and comparable to an armored car I posted in a previous entry. However, a full 20 points seems a bit much, unless I can eke out 5 points per for the bases, so I'm going to claim 15:

Scoring:

• 2x 28mm dragons @ 15 points per = 30 points

That puts me at 70% of my very modest 100 points goal, with most of a month to go. I might just make my goal!

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Sylvain: Very nice paint job on these dragons. The work you did on the bases really makes them come alive. The description of your painting method is really instructive. Since I scored 20 points per dragons for my own submission yesterday, it's only fair to grant you the same amount. This will also get you closer to your 100 points target. Bien joué! 

 

From ScottC: The REAL black and white... and more halflings (130 pts)

Time for my REAL Black and White submission.

A 28mm TPGEO 3d printed Nazgul.

and of course... some more halflings! Operation Hobbitton is about... 50% completed now.

The heroes are 3d printed.. printable scenery, RNEstudio, Davale. and medbury miniatures.

Points:

28 x 5 = 140 pts

Next up... Westerns!

From TeemuL: More hobbits, what a wonderful day! I guess the Nazgul will be a bit confused, which hobbit is the Bagginses... I like the clear and colourful hobbits, not too bright, but not dull either, well done!

I'll score the hobbits of course as 28mm models and award 5 points each, but I must count 4 of them as prones and give you only half points from them, so total of 130 points.

From SebastianR: Bustin' (out the) Ghosts [Black and White & Limousine] (85)

It’s about the get spooky up in here, but first, I need to take a quick trip in Lady Sarah’s Limousine. At first I thought that I had no female figures to paint this year, and my mobility around the challenge map was greatly limited. Then I realised that one of the first figures I completed was in fact female.

After my first few passes over my Finns I realised I was going to have to paint something on the side in order to break up the monotony. Thus I embarked on a series of ghosts following a scheme I found on Gardens of Hecate. I found this scheme so chill that I started searching for more ghosts in the lead pile and eventually made a few bids on eBay for Age of Sigmar "chainrasp hordes" (which failed).

Which brings me to the Black and White studio and the miniature that started it all, an Age of Sigmar wraith (I think). In order the achieve this scheme I had to import Secret Weapon Dark Wood from the States at vast expense, the range being effectively unknown in the UK.

I then went onto strip my old Warhammer wraith and banshee in order to repaint them.

I particularly enjoyed the directional rattlecan highlighting.

The original orange hair was a tribute to a high school classmate who was… well… if you know what a wee Glaswegian wifey sounds like… An adolescent jab now consigned to the past.

This lead to the search through the lead pile which unearthed 5 ghostly naginata armed samurai from the Kensei Undead kickstarter I backed years ago. At some point I’ll multibase them for Kings of War/Warhammer.

I’m rather worried about the storage of the miniatures. The weapons are made of extremely soft metal, they bend to the slightest touch; it’s a matter of time ‘til they break.

Finally, if the Typhus Corrosion is too colourful for black and white (I know it isn’t, others have used actual colours!) this sarcophagus was painted using only black and white.

(Ok and some stains on the inside in Seraphim Sepia)

So that’s the whole ghostly gang.

That’s 8 28mm figures at 5 points each for 40 points

One tiny piece of terrain 1" by 1" by 1.5" worth ~1 points

And 2 challenge locations at 20 points each for 40

For a total of 81 points

Seb goes for the hat trick of post with a beautiful set us spooky stuff. You've got black and White nicely covered with these horrors. Well done. THe coffin look smore like an objective marker than terrain so i'm going to score it 5 pts

From ScottC: Black and White (Black Numenorians) & Books (Hobbit Shirriffs) (315pts)

Back again with a 2-for-1.

I decided to paint up my Black Numenorians for my Black and White theme.

Infantry are 3d prints by Quartermaster 3d (28mm) with the exception of my morgul knight captain (TPGEO) and the cavalry are some morgul knights by GW and one 3d print by TPGEO. I was going to say that this completes my mordor model collection, but I have another unassembled nazgul in a box somewhere...

9 Cavalry in total

14 Infantry

Next up for my Books category I painted up my Hobbit Shirriffs lead by non other than Robin Smallburrow and Holfoot Bracegirdle!

23 halflings in total.

The two heroes are davale miniatures

The others are TT Combat halfling shirriffs

(Sorry about forgetting my map last time Teemu!) -PS - Let me know if I pushed the black and white theme a bit, I would be happy to paint up a solo figure in lieu. Let me know!

Total:

37x 28mm infantry = 37 x 5 = 185

9x 28mm cavalry = 9 x 10 = 90

Bonus challenges x2 = 40 points

Total: 315

From TeemuL: Lovely Lotr goodness, Scott! The Black Numenorians make quite a contrast with the colourful hobbits, they won't have a chance against all the clubs and occasional small stones. Black and White theme is bit of a stretch and when you nicely volunteer, I will gladly accept a solo figure to make my conscience. I will award you full points with this post though, since otherwise your journey would be messy. But I do expect to see a black and white mini from you later in the Challenge. Did I say I like those hobbits a lot? And the shields of Numeronians really catch an eye, very nice.