Brent's Strictly Average Painting Guide: Amon Ad-Raza

Okay folks, this is it!  The first ever Brent's Strictly Average Painting Guide, featuring Menoth's best 'Jack Caster, Amon Ad-Raza!

Let's spend a moment clarifying the basic premise: I'm not an expert painter, I'm a speed-painting competitive hobbyist.  I love every aspect of this hobby, from the fluffy background of the Warhammer Universes to the slightly-smelly halls of a competitive tournament to the small room in my home where I spend countless pleasurable hours painting tiny toys.

As a blogger, no topic even remotely related to the hobby we all share has escaped my attention, but there are two topics I tend to shy away from.  The first is trying to illustrate my method of painting and the second is trying to teach my brand of aggressive tactics.

While it may not sound like there's much left, that's only because those two things make up the vast majority of topics the average hobby blogger posts about.  Am I wrong?  Isn't it always paint this way or play this way?

There's nothing wrong with that, but I long felt the best way to ply my trade was to write articles which demonstrated my passion for the game, the hobby, and the community... after all, I'm neither the best painter nor the best player out there.  If I've had any success, it's because my love of the whole shebang has shone through.  That's what I think, anyway.  Still I've always thought about tapping into my ideas on painting and playing...

...and this series on The Blood Angels: by Jawaballs is a big part of that: step 1 of 2, you might say.

Anyway, over-long intro notwithstanding, my primary goal is to write an entertaining article.  If you read something that helps, great!  If you want to help me, that's great too - I'm always willing to learn.

The general idea here is to layer up thin coats quickly.  Inside-out is usually the best way, especially here  since it's skin.  This isn't really the first layer as much as it is the foundation for the colors that come later.

The skin layer gets a wash of purple, the rest of the model gets its foundation layer.  I love painting over brown, since the warm colors all live there.

I build up the brown tones - FAST.  Seriously, this is all about getting a decent quality quickly.  I'm literally using a crappy, canvas painter's brush - the ones you get in varying sizes like 10 for 5 bucks.  Don't glop it on though; over-brush it.  In my mind, over-brushing is like a wet dry brush.  It won't always leave a great texture, so it's not appropriate for flat armor like that of a Space Marine, but it's great for cloth and fur - again, like dry brushing.  Then I layered on thin gold... and here's where the foundation helps.  The browns will show up, giving the gold a decent richness...

...but but but..!  It won't look appealing at all.  Don't be discouraged; again, you're building up layers which you'll bring out later with washes and/or controlled layering.  Notice here I'm not painting the chain on the left arm - it can't really be done properly, which means I'd have to clean it up later, which means I'm wasting time.  As I'm painting, I'm enjoying the process... but it doesn't mean I'm not ready to paint the next dude.

This is the same stage (the base metal) but taken from the rear point of view.  Again, I'm trying to be neat so I don't waste time fixing things later, but the problems are glaring.  Resist the urge to fix.  Trust the process.

The washes are probably the best thing GW has ever come up with and they've replaced most of the custom washes I used to use.  As an aside, I think Devlan Mud is overused - don't neglect the others.  I used Sepia on the cloth and gold, green on the gold, and black on the metal and some shadows.  Let it dry completely.  

I never paint one model at a time.  If I'm painting a one-off, like a character, I'll have another project running concurrently.  The reason is obvious - I'm not wasting time twiddling my thumbs while paint is drying.  Avoid downtime.  If you've got only half an hour to paint, make sure your brush is moving for 30 minutes.  You'll make progress.

Here you can see the washes are dry and the model is starting to take shape.  The white is layered carefully.  Now I'm using the good brushes.

It's hard to see, but I'm also applying the base coat for the cloth Amon wears underneath his forearm armor.  I'm using the Foundation Ochre, I believe - whatever the yellow one is!

Here's the skin stage.  I'm carefully layering on different stages.  It becomes obvious when you compare this stage to those at the end.  If you've done your foundation work properly, you won't be applying color on the edges - anywhere color-meets-color should be done; I'm layering mid and high tones.

The interior wrist straps are blue - it's hard to see until the final picture or two.  Anyway, the skin on the back is easier to see.  Use water in your paint and layer it on in thin coats.  Don't over paint it or over think it - the process is the thing, right?

In my army the contrasting color is the turquoise.  I've had some criticism about it, but I really like it... and you're the one who has to live with the model, right?  Anyway I only mention it because I had a composition problem at this stage.

Part of painting is solving a puzzle; at its core, the puzzle is what color fits where?  Look at the model above; I knew I was using white and red.  So where?  Well, white draws the eye in, so it made sense for the head scarf... especially since the eye has to look past the huge wrecking ball before it can see the core of the model.  Since the head scarf is white, I decide I don't want to overuse it on the model, so I'll settle for constraining the model with white on the trim.

That said, red would have made sense on the trim, too.  Triangles are another shape that draws the eye inward, and for some reason red works great with triangles... it's why the 3-spot technique works so well.  Anyway, the trim points up, yes?  It would have worked.  Funny, I worked all this out before actually seeing the company's version of the model.  I was pretty gratified when I did!

Don't worry, no model looks that great magnified this much, certainly not mine!  Still, it's important to see the layering; you're not meant to see the model this way, so don't obsess over it too much.  I'll admit, the eyes bothered me no end, but I realized two things, 1) the eyes are actually hard to see on this model because of the cowl, and 2) I probably would only screw it up further since the shape of the headdress made it so difficult to paint.  I left it alone.

The red goes on in thin layers.  The foundation shows through, providing instant depth - and it was light enough a color that the red is vibrant, not muted.  I applied a few washes of a deep red in the creases...

...both front and back.  Here you can see the final layers of skin, as well as my answer to another composition problem I didn't go into.  Note the greens in the gold work with the reds on the kilt - ignore the Christmas curse, it's a myth: green and red are fine together most of the time.

I paint the gem and the crosses.  I highlight the metals.  I layer the metal chain and fix the chain on the left arm.  A big problem at this stage was fixing the individual fingers on both gauntlets - for some reason, they'd ended up appearing washed out and flat, so I quickly toned it down then built it up.  I flocked the base.

And here it is.  There are some minor imperfections, but truth be told they're only really noticeable in picture.  Also, keep in mind the point here is to get an effect you're happy with without spending a stupid amount of time at the painting table - if you fix every nit picky error you'll never be done... primarily because there will always be something else you're unhappy with.  That's the definition of obsession.

So there you have it, my Amon Ad-Raza.  I actually don't know how much time I spent on this model because, like I mentioned, I don't work on one thing at at time.  It was somewhere between 2 and 3 hours - and probably much closer to 2.  He is a character model, so he was worth investing a bit more.

What's more important is that I enjoyed spending the time doing it.

Okay, I'll admit something here, at the end... I'm not sure what to do with the morningstar... giant ball... thing.  Right now its metal.  It's dull and uninspiring.  It's a composition problem that I've not quite sorted out - primarily because I was saving it for this article!

(That's a lie.  I have no idea.)

Help me out!

Your thoughts and comments are much appreciated, ladies, gentleman, and Unicorns.

Feast of blades banner update

Finally I got some time to work on the Feast of Blades banner!  The wings are mostly done as are the scrolls. I started going in and adding black outlines to make elements stand out in space, such as the lines around the scrolling. This is a painting trick to make certain spots appear closer in space. Notice how I emphasized the black line on the end of the up flowing tassel on the right, to the right of the sword. I really made a hard edge black on the end of the tassle, but the rest of it sort of gets thinner. That enhances the effect of the tassle flowing in front of the wings. 

I played a bit with the bone fingers to make them look like they are popping out, and the red on the flowing sleeve around the bone hand.  That will end up being brighter and lighter than the rest of the robes since it is closer to you in space.  The shield represents a different challenge in that it is a domed shape, that is closer to you in the center but receedes at the edges.  Plus it is done with two different colors.  I have still left the colors of the shield intentionally muted because what is more important will be the things I paint on it's surface. With so much going on in this design, I am trying to minimize the effect of elements in the painting competing with each other.  With some luck, I will be done this week. Then I can start on my next one, the Space Wolves Chapter banner!  I can't wait. :)  

Jawaballs

There's a storm on the horizon!

Behold!

Bullet Holes, and Hand Painted Raven! (I got inspired)

Close up of raven

Yes some of the Dragon Red prime is thick, it was late 

and I was getting stoned from the fumes. :)

Weathering straight from this months issue of White Dwarf

featuring ME of all people! :)

It's here!  I wrote a Blood Angels Storm Raven into the list I plan on playing in the Templecon singles tournament tomorrow. This was entirely contingent upon me getting one of these babies in my hands! But unfortunately the model was not to be sold until the day of the tournament, and there was no way I could get one assembled, painted and ready to go.  But of course, JawaNation came through! My first Storm Raven arrived last night, probably right around when GW preorder models were showing up on people's door steps.  That gave me the evening to assemble and prime it. I used Army Painter black primer, and then Dragon Red for the base color. It already looked amazing!  The picture shows the results after priming.  Primed and assembled the engines separately so as not to have to hand paint the metalic.  I used Army Painter Platemail.  In this pic I quickly did the pilot and gunner and the compartments and just glued on the canopies.  Also you can see the magnets attached to the turret, I magnetized the options.  

So there it is so far. Now I am working on highlighting and blending, and I am doing lots of battle damage on this one.  This being my first, I don't really care how it comes out so this gives me the freedom to experiment. 

Will Storm Ravens make it into competitive lists?  Well I am trying. I won't let the cat out of the bag yet on my new list, but it is a drastic divergence from what I won Mechanicon with.  After the tournament I will post up the list and results/tactics.  Look for that next week!  Time to get back to work.

I am doing bullet holes in the side where I put a big fat finger print in the primer because I was rushing.  wish me luck!

If you are looking to get Storm Ravens at 20% off GW Retail, OR if you want Storm Raven Bits, visit Spikey Bits!  Clicking the link will take you straight to the site where you can find Storm Raven Bits, or call Rob and tell him to send you the box sets!  Make sure you tell him I sent you.

Jawaballs

Blog Changes!

I'm sure you guys have noticed new faces around the blog.  As most of you know, I decided to bring in some other writers to join me here.  What does that mean?  First of all, I am not posting any less than I already did.  I was averaging 2 or 3 posts a week, and still get that many up now.  I am still doing the same Blood Angels and hobby tips, tactics and fun stuff, mixed in with occasional gripes, movie reviews, and other oddities. What I have added though is more stuff that supports what I already do.  I added two weekly writers, one of them being Xaereth who's impact is obvious. His redefining Blood Angels articles have been hugely popular.  I brought in every one's favorite blogger whore Brent for his different take on life.  In my opinion any thing he writes is just gold.  I have brought in one or two guys to focus on battle reports and list building to give you guys more of what you want the most.  So be looking for some good weekly articles, with other great occasional content filled in, all wrapped around what brought you here in the first place, Jawaballs... stuff.  Giving you more of what you want! Good gaming content.

Jawaballs

Space Hulk Terminator Commission DONE!

Finally!  I finished my first Blood Angels, Space Hulk Terminator commission. Well I never claimed to be fast. I want to thank John for his patience on this commission.  Each of these models took me well over 6 hours to paint.  The crappy photography does not do much for the layering and detailing, but it's there!  I started with Army Painter Black Primer, then used Army Painter Dragon Red.  Then I layered up from DR to Blood Red at the edges. Then I used blazing orange highlights, then a light wash with Baal red, then a 50/50 blazing orange and vomit brown.   I filled in the lines with a mix of Black and Blood Red, and some of the details black.  Then I used the standard parchment, bone, wing techniques.  

Before I send them out, I will give each a finish with Valejo Satin Varnish. This will add a final sheen to the armor. I wanted to photograph them before because my lighting sucks and I use flash, and flash with the Valejo Sheen makes them look glossy.  

No, I didn't follow the Space Hulk illustrations and give them the squad markings etc.  And yes, I have seen Space Hulk models painted better.  I admit I am not the best. But I must say that I am not bad! What these models represent is my love for painting and the passion I put into my work.  I charge a lot, but I believe that what I give my customers is more than worth the price.  

Feel free to blast away! But please keep it constructive, and if you have a criticism, offer a way to improve it! :)  But at this point these models are finished and in the mail.  Hope you like them John!  

Jawaballs

Blood Angels in Action: IG Incoming!

It's time of course for another battle report, brought to you by none other than the Capt of the 8th. I'm sure you all missed me terribly (or not at all) since my last post, but I'm back today with a doozy of a write up.

I got in a fantastic game this past week against IG. It had been awhile since I had been able to play a game, but I found a friendly dude on a local gaming forum to go up against. We met up at the designated time and got straight down to business. I have to say I lucked out this time. The guy was a great gamer. He knew the rules and he was way cool the whole game. He played for the kill and this was one of my favortite games to date.

We rolled up standard deployment and capture and control for mission. Neither of us wanted to do the 2 objective thing, so we just went for annihilation. Points was 1750.

I brought my Descent of Angels list, true to my promise to stick with it and work out the kinks. I modified it from last game to add in some more combat punch. I wanted a hard hitting unit to get into assault fast. Enter Vanguard Vets!

Librarian - JP, Lance and Shield
Honor Guard - JP, 4x melta

Techmarine - JP, combi-melta, PW
Techmarine - JP, combi-melta, PW
Sanguinary Priestx3 - 2x JP and Infernus pistols, 1x on foot

Assault Squad - JP, 2x melta, PW and IP on sergeant
Assault Squad - JP, 2x melta, PW and IP on sergeant

Vangaurd Veterans - 6x models, JP, Glaive on sergeant, Pfist, 3x storm shields

Devastators x2 - 4x missile launchers

My opponent brought:

Company Command Squad with full command and sniper rifles

4x Vet squads - 10x models, 2x plasma and meltagun
4x Chimera

2x Vendettas

Leman Russ
Leman Russ Demolisher

3x Stormtroopers - 5x models, 2x melta

I won the die roll to go first, and chose to do so. I wanted my Devastators to have a shot at knocking out some tanks/skimmers before they got blasted off the table. I loaded them up in a ruin in my right corner to benefit from the Techmarine enhanced cover save.

Here are my Devs hunkered down in a nice ruin.

And as a side note, I am a terrible photographer for some reason. I can perform minor surgery on and around the eye, but I just can't take an in focus picture.
Go figure. So just don't look too close at the images, you might get seasick or dizzy.

He then deployed right across the board from me, ready to get into my face. He uses the chaos shrine to get cover for most of his tanks, and the AV 14 LRs covering the rest.



He also scouts his Vendettas to generate a cover save for round one. Wonderful I think, I have no good shots to take. Everything has cover or is a wasted shot into AV14.


So I do the best thing I can and fire all my missiles into his Vendettas. Nothing at all. He saves every glance or penetrating hit. This doesn't look to good. On his turn he repositions some of his Chimeras. Lucky for me 2 of them get immobilized on the terrain. Serves him right for hiding behind Chaos. But then he starts blasting me with that famous IG firepower. He wipes the lower squad off the face of the earth and the attached priest. He also knocks one of the ML devs from the top tier. It could have been worse I suppose, but he is already 2 KPs up on me after my bad round of shooting. I debated back and forth whether to send my troops to ground for the 2+, but I just couldn't do it. Seemed like I would never recover the loss of the Devs shooting. Oh well, next time I think I will be more apt to do it, and try to save the shooting for future turns.


(after he blasted my Devs to bits)

Turn 2 things should get better I felt. Until he tells me he has a Master of the Fleet. Uggh, +1 to my reserve rolls is bad news. After all my rolling, all I manage is my VV and a Techmarine. Good or bad, I don't know yet. It is pretty piecemeal. I land my VV next to his two Vendettas hoping to down them with my Pfist on the assault. I had no better options really. My Techmarine (all pewter model to the left with no arms, I call him David) landed spot on behind his LR Demolisher, and it was my turn to shoot.


(here is the first drop)


My devs target the Vendetta with 3 missiles and they manage to down one of the buggers! First blood for the Angels! The Techmarine then blows up the LR with his combi-melta. Alright, we are back on track now and tied 2-2 on KPs. The VV only manage to take a gun off and immobilize the vendetta. Not what I was expecting. I needed that last Vendetta dead, and my powerfist underperformed.

On his turn, he started blasting me again after his 3 squads of Stormtroopers dropped in to surround my VV. I really couldn't stand up to the onslaught. A multi-laser downed the Techmarine (so much for that 2+), and all the melta and hell-guns from the stormtroopers downed my Vets. The Vendettas with the remaining LR killed the rest of my Devs. He is up 3 more KP now, and I am down morally. I just am not standing up to all the firepower he can bring and things are not looking good for the Angels.

Turn 3 all the rest of my stuff drops in. I land my Techmarine by his remaining LR. One squad of melta toting marines and an attached priest land right near his Stormtrooper squads.


(second drop)

The Honor Guard with attached Librarian land near his outermost Chimera on the left flank, and two assault squads land behind them and within range of the Shield of Sanguinius.


(Libby with HG and vanilla assault marine combat squads)

The last melta toting squad landed in the back right corner, right behind all his tanks. They scatter a bit out of position which makes things a bit more difficult for me. Time to shoot some crap up now. My techmarine goes first and misses with his combi-melta. That sucked. Although the two of them together killed his one LR Demolisher, which was more points than they cost together. The melta squad in the middle of the Stormtroopers tries to vaporize a squad but fail to do so as he saved all the pistol shots. The other melta squad fails as well to do anything of value beside taking a multi-laser off an immobilized chimera. Now it is time for my Librarian to get in some action. He fired off his Blood Lance hitting both of the Chimeras in his path. The first one exploded spectacularly, but the next one was left unharmed, although it was already immobilized. I don't have any assaults to go with so it is time to take another beating from all his guns.

His 1.5 squads of stormtroopers near the Vendetta target my assault squad with the attached priest and start to do some damage. After some poor roles on his side he managed to kill only 3 of the marines. The other squad had moved up to corner my half-blind Techmarine, and they subsequently downed him with melta fire. In the corner the two Chimeras unload all they can into the combat squad with attached priest. Only the sergeant and the Priest survived. On the other side of the Chaos shrine one of his Vet squads had already ditched their immobilized Chimera, and the other Chimera had just disgorged its vet squad its burning hull. Combined with the reaming Leman Russ and the Command Squad they unleashed hell on my Librarian and his Honor Guard. Shield of Sanguinius went up and I started making saves like I had no business doing. Sanguinius himself must have been there deflecting round after round for his sons. After the AP3 pie plate from the tank, a pie plate from the Master of Ordinance, a few sniper rifles, 4 rapid firing plasma guns, a couple of melta shots and loads of lasguns, my Librarian ( with one wound remaining), his Sanguinary Novitiate, and another veteran stood up from the malestrom with blood in their eyes. The IG had not brought enough guns to the fight and it was time to pay.

Top of turn four my squad breaks up to get maximum carnage in near the Vendetta. The priest moves towards the shrine to get one Stormtrooper squad, while the remaining marines move the opposite direction for the other squad. The combat squad in the back corner did not have any good targets so they went after an immobilized Chimera with their melta pistols. The Librarian and company moved up on the poor Guardsman who had exited their transports; the Angels would exact their revenge. Little shooting went on, except for the Chimera getting wrecked from the infernus pistols. It was time for the assault. One combat squad assaulted the closest IG squad and moved it out of the way with the pile in move so my Librarian and HG could get at the second squad behind them. It worked like a charm as the second combat squad piled into the melee to support the other assault marines. The priest charged a Stormtrooper squad solo, and the other marines charge the remains of the second STs. The priest gets killed as he flails around helplessly amid the STs. The assault marines fare no better against the toughened armor of the Stormtroopers, and they in fact lose one of the marines while inflicting no casualties at all. What a bad start for my assaulting this round. Luckily, my Librarian pulls his weight admirably. He and the HG wipe their squad on combat resolution, while the other 10 marines do the same to the remaining squad.

(after the rout, the Angels try to take some cover from the incoming STs, the CCS and the last LR)

The remaining assault marines after the ST squad that claimed the priest jumped into the fight. The last ST squad is behind the LR getting ready to come at the Librarian and friends.

Next round the LR takes aim on the Librarian and HG and manages to down the last two Vets, but the Libby still stands. The charging stormtroopers don't do anything with their weapons, and the CCS also fails to do any damage. The last Priest and sergeant in the corner behind the ruins also weather the fire to come out unscathed. The melee continues with the Stormtroopers near the Vendetta with neither side buckling.

Top of turn four, things begin to turn my way completely. My Librarian makes a suicide run for the incoming STs, while all my other available marines converge on the CCS in the Chaos Shrine. The Librarians righteous rage fills him as he unleashes the Blood Lance on the ST and the LR behind them. One of the ST is pierced through by the lance, which then penetrates the heavy armor of the tank and cooks off its ammunition store. Another ST is lost in the conflagration and the Librarian then charges into them headlong and slaughters them in combat.


(here is the Libby after blasting the tank and mangling the STs)

The CCS can not withstand the rage of the assault marines and the last Priest. They butcher them all to a man amid the Chaos suffused ruins.


(what remains of the CCS is too small to be seen here)

The drawn out combat near the immobilized Vendetta is slowly coming around in my favor as well. I have finally taken out one of the squads and begin to attrition the other.

At this point the game is about tied in KPs, 10-9 in my favor I believe. His remaining Guardsmen are completely unable to handle what I have left and I end up killing the remaining two squads of Vets and one of the Chimeras. At the end of the game he has only an immobilized Chimera and an immobilized Vendetta. I had lost my Librarian to a Perils of the Warp roll right in the middle of the Chaos Shrine, bitter irony, I know.

The final tally was 13-10 with a victory for the Blood Angels!

It was such a fun game and I learned some good lessons. Again, my opponent was top notch. He was way cool when he was beating my pants off the first few rounds, and he was just as cool when I pulled victory from the jaws of defeat. He was laid back and more than helpful in explaining all the new IG stuff to me. Kudos to him, hopefully I get the chance to play him again soon. He apparently runs a 7 Valk/Vendetta list that I would like to go up against sometime.

I finally used squads in support of each other this time and it really paid off. I normally feel like my marines are invincible (which they are not of course) and I hang them out to dry without the necessary support, especially on the DoA drops. This time I tried to keep things more centralized, except for a few instances, but it paid off. I applied massive force on one of his flanks and it crumbled. I was then able to sweep in for the win.

It was a hard fought game, and but for a few dice rolls it could have gone either way. It was a blast of a game though.

I need to get another game in soon, and maybe post up some of my Dark Eldar that I got for Christmas. I decided on a scheme and got some work done on them. Pics to follow.

Until next time!

Michael, Capt of the 8th

Brent's Strictly Average Painting Guide

My name is Brent and I'm a Blogger.  (Hi, Brent.)  I also have a problem.  (Do tell.)  I've been Stalking Jawaballs Since 2009.  (...what?)

Yes, I'm a confirmed Net Stalker.tm - so what am I doing here?

Feast of Blades banner progress.

Hey folks!

So I was commissioned by fellow blogger Duke to create a banner for The Feast of Blades, a large "tournament of champions" style event that he is planning.  Look at the bottom of this article for some copy about the event off his blog.The short of it is that out in the great state of Colorado, a dozen or so gaming stores are holding tournaments. The winner of said tournaments will be invited to participate in The Feast of Blades,  Tournament of Champions to find the ultimate winner.  How awesome is this?? The Throne of Skulls is a national thing going on now along the same vein, but it would be cool if more local areas did the same thing. Perhaps this is something I can organize... Hmm..  If I lived in Colorado, I would be all over this. I hope if you are in that area you take the chance to get involved and have some fun! If I was not already flying all over the country this year, and bringing my new marriage to the brink, I would try to wrangle myself an honorary spot in the finals. :)

Check out these trophies:

Any way, on with the reason why I am writing today. In a previous article CLICK HERE FOR THE ARTICLE:   I spoke about my contribution to this event. Duke had initially commissioned one of my hand painted banners and I quoted my standard price, but once we spoke on the phone I realized how cool an opportunity this was, and I decided to do it for cost.  How can I not take this opportunity to help out the community!  It is an honor to create this banner for the event. I am not sure, but I think the winner will get to bring it home, or it will go to the hobby store where he hailed from.  You will have to ask Duke about his plans for it but whatever he does, I'm sure it will go to a good place.

In the picture above, I started painting the base colors.  This was a feat in itself. First of all, over the past 10 days we have had 2 or 3 snow days, and an equal number of early release and delayed openings. (I teach art and do the bulk of my work in my class room.)  This is great because I have lots of room to spread out and get work done, but at the same time, if school is out, my shop is closed.  :(  Add to that, I misplaced my box of paints... I use very high quality Liquitex, Windsor and Newton and Grumbacher acrylic paints for these banners, (among others) and keep them under lock and key.  Stuff tends to walk away because my room is sometimes used in the evenings for night school.  But I forgot where I locked them up! It turned out that the box was buried under some construction paper in the first closet I looked in.

This design is a pretty close reproduction of the sketch I created in the my PREVIOUS POST. I decided to extend the wings off the edge of the painting area, and I off set the figure and shield a bit to the left, because on the right I will paint a scroll on which the inaugural date of the event will be painted, and room will be left for winners etc.  (Originally this was going to go on the bottom, but there will be little space there now.)  This was a last minute addition so does not appear in the sketch.

I painted the scroll work Burnt Sienna, and layed down some Alisarin Crimson for the base reds of the robes. I used the Burnt Sienna on the fingers aswell, and then a layer of Bleached White.  I decided to go with Blue an Green on the shield, so I laid in some fading colors to make it look rounded.  Once the shield is done, I will go over it with black to outline the designs, then paint them normally. I did the wings with a dark grey, then a couple of lighter shades of grey. I will add more and more lighter shades all the way up to white.

The top scroll ended up a bit short, so I will be elongating it on both ends, and the bottom one did not curve enough, so I will be using black to correct it.  Both scrolls have long flowing ends that will twist around the wings and other objects in the design.  I painted the wings over them for now and will work them in again later.

So far, in case you are interested, this has been about three hours of work with sketching and painting.  I estimate about 10 hours of work time on these banners, and I suspect I will blow way past that on this one.  (That is how I come up with my quote for those who are wondering.)

Ok, back to work for me.  Check back for more updates!

Jawaballs

Posted by Duke on his blog: I wanted to take a quick moment to talk about my recent project: The Feast of Blades.  A few months ago I was working with some friends on a 40k tournament project that had the floor fall through the bottom of it after thinking about it for a little while I still felt like I wanted to organize something to help bring my community of 40k players together. 

 I live in Colorado and there are actually a lot of really good 40k players along the front range.  I noticed this when I would go to events like Wargames con (BoLScon) and noticed about a dozen or more people from Colorado were playing at the event.  The sad thing is that though a few individuals knew each other, there was absolutely no sense of community as a group.  This only made me want to do an event even more.

what is the event?

Essentially it is an invitational to a tournament of champions and this is how it works.

Currently I have 12 stores participating who will have around 10-15 people attending at each location.  On the 5th of march they will all host a 2000 pt tournament at their store.  The top players will then advance onto the final round which will be held at a central location two weeks later.  The winner of this second tournament will be crowned Champion of the Feast of Blades.

There will be prize support at both levels and if everything goes as planned everyone will get something for just coming to the finals.  In addition to all the prizes Jawaballs is making a full size hand painted banner for the overall winner to take back to his store.  His name will then be embroidered onto the banner. (pretty awesome if you ask me.)

I will provide every qualifier store with the missions to be used and the grading rubric for painting. This helps make sure that everyone who qualifies will be qualifying on the same criteria.  

All in all I am very excited about this and can't wait for march to come along.  I know there will be some speed bumps along the way, but if you knew me personally you would know that I prepare way ahead of time to help mitigate those things.

If you have any ideas or tips please throw them my way.  I didn't go into great detail simply because I didn't want to bore everyone.  

Perhaps if this year goes well I will talk about expanding.  I would love to see feast of blades qualifiers all over the country with regional semi-finals and then a finals in Denver.  Now that would be a hard core competitive/awesome  tournament.

Duke

Rediscovering Angels #6: An Argument for Attack Bikes

Hey there boys and girls!  Xaereth here again from Delusions of Grandeur, hoping to help give you ideas for your Blood Angels army.  Today I want to talk about Attack Bikes, with the hope that you won't immediately dismiss them in favor of the other fan favorites (Baal Predators and Vanguard Veterans).  I think there's a lot they can offer to a lot of different armies out there, including all kinds of Blood Angels.  Read on to find out why :)

Editorial: The Diverse World of Wargaming

Hey All, Kevin from baals-2-the-waals here to talk about something I've noticed as I trudge my way around the FLGS' across our country, no one is my age.

It is part of a fact that I've noticed since I got back into the hobby....but before we go into that topic lets start at the begining. Even though I am only a college student and fairly young compared to a lot of the wargamers I know I more than likely have been playing this game longer than atleast 75% of the readers. I started at this game about 11 years ago in the dim twilight of 3rd edition at about the young age of 8. While at the shore (I'm from Jersey, only we can drop the Jersey part legally I think) my cousin introduced my brother and I to this amazing new game he played called Warhammer 40k where the stalwart few super warriors of mankind stood against the evils of the universe. Immediatly I wanted tog et into the game. Notably a lot of this generations Elite players started all in the same store called the Dragon's Den. I've noticed that recently.... but back on topic I started my pretty big Guard army filled with Tanks and lots of foot sloggers. For me all I wanted to was have as many different units as possible and not focus on spamming or how to defeat other armies. I was an off and on gamer casually for about 8 years...I still play with those guard, regardless of the crappy childish Michaels craft paints I used or the shotty models I still love them, and Im gonna use them at TempleCon. so if you see 3rd edition Catachan models looking like they were painted by a 9 year old then smile my friend, because they were and Im proud of them....

Anyway back on topic. the above was to show the wargamer I became. Im one of the few breed thats been exposed to this genre for a long time yet I still never meet anyone like me. Its a testament to the wargamer. I know gamers that are older and younger, stronger and weaker. We are a pretty diverse group. In very few places can you see a small 12 year old playing a 40 year old in a game they both love.

The closest person I've ever met that was like me is my bud Marcus and even he is 2 years apart from me. Now he is coming up to game with me for a weekend at a event Im helping to run. We wargamers start these cliques of people we like to travel with and play with but are any of us very similar? I know Division 1 college athletes that played 40k and some guys who looks like they never lifted a wight in thier life but we are all bonded by the love of very little plastic space dudemens (quote the Goat) pwning some Xeno scum across our kitchen tables and basement ping pong tables everywhere.

Now whether your a jock, a not, a player, or a hater, smelly or clean cut, even a unicorn you have to respect our community for its diversity. I'm happy to think that theres not many other gamers like me, people that I know are generally shocked by this hobby. But I usually smile and tell them its important. Now I really should get to my Bakeshop class, I have a final today.....more on this later...... =)

So tell me wargamers, when did you start? How? Who got you into the game? Tell us about your experiences in the comments, and happy wargaming!