A very quick #wipwednesday post, just to log what is currently on the desk at the moment.   Hasslefree miniatures for a mid-sized commission - all modern/futuristic characters - and finishing off a group of Old West women gunslingers from Great Escape Games (these will eventually go on the Etsy shop).   Although not pictured, I'm going to try and get a set of Colonial Marines from CP Models sorted too.    

  Mostly an image-dump rather than a fully-fledged post, but an update on some of the completed figures and what's next and left to do. All the individual models are now finished, so now I'm in the process of priming the last of the cars - the sports and limo and the Maelstrom gang. This leaves only the MaxTac squad.

  Currently working on two futuristic military-style vehicles at the moment. Little and large, but both pretty smart ...   This natty little desert runner is all but finished apart from some wheels. I ordered a set and, as you can see, the scale/sizing was a little off. So, as of writing this post, I'm waiting on a more suitable set! But I do intend to try scratch-building a chassis for those wrong wheels.     The other is an impressive-looking transporter. At this point I'm cleaning up the body and making some repairs and removals. One of the gun-barrels on the front had broken off, so that's been pinned and guled back in place. Two others to each side of the body were also missing, so will replace them with some beefier ones. Colour-wise, the outside will be a standard olive drab, but I'm going for a cream/off-white for parts of the interior. Obviously this will be suitably weathered to show its heavy use, but will, hopefully, add a little contrast to the OD of the...

  In the past few years of painting models for both commissions and to sell on the shop, I've been slowly taking more time over the photography of the finished models. Originally it was just so I'd have a decent picture for my own portfolio, and use a plain white background. But over time I made some basic quick-n-dirty bases and backgrounds to show the model in a setting . I kept them pretty generic at first; a simple grassy base and rock backdrop and a road surface with a grey concrete backdrop. Not great, but as a start, I was encouraged by the results. It set the model off nicely and, especially for the shop, offered an impression of the model in a game setting.     After these very basic versions, I made two more, both with much more detail to them. In each case they were a little rushed, but again, showed promise and did (in my own opinion) look a step up from the previous ones. So far they've been okay, but I've noticed that they could be with having more area of...

Firstly, a start has been made on a commission of vehicles and figures all with a cyberpunk/neo-noir theme to them. The blog will be seeing more of those in future posts, as well as some beautiful old figures from Ral-Partha. Starting out with the smaller cars first, with one down and two to go. I aiming to make each a little different, not just going for plain colours. I broke the red bodywork up with some off-white panels and went for a two-tone blend on the purple, the green may get some racing stripes(?). One slight snag I hit was the chrome detailing. I had a couple of options in mind: standard acrylic silver metalics, which wouldn't have looked too bad, but, ideally, a closer-to-chrome look was the aim. So I ordered a bottle of AK Extreme Metalics Chrome, and while it looked better I thought I'd try a chrome marker by Molow. It's seen it used by Adam Savage on one of his projects and it looked impressive. Anyway, long story short, it (for me) was the best of the lot. ...

A partial progress report on some commission models as well as a few bits of shop-stock painting. I know, crazy, right!? Let me start with the first few models from a bundle I'm currently painting from Black Scorpion Miniatures. I've painted a range of their stuff before, from pirates to cowboys, and for starters I'm on a set of grim-faced mercenaries and a Knight riding a giant chameleon (why not?). Next - although I forgot to get some photos of them - are eight beautiful cannons; seven solo and one that has a crew to go with it, but I'll upload some pics of that on a future post. Other figures I've been painting come from Bad Squiddo. One pack is a semi-regular purchase, the Action Heroines and the others are new for me, mercenaries Gwen and Evie. I've only painted one of each at the moment, but pretty pleased with the way they turned out. With the Action Heroines I usually go for an 80s style to the paintjob, but thought I'd keep it a little more subtle t...