Captain of the Hawk Lords

I was going to title this post with a silly quote from Prince Vultan from Flash Gordon, but I just didn't have the heart to do it...

I don't have a name for this chap yet, but he is painted and I'm really, really pleased with the way he's come out.  The purple, yellow and gold are detailed in the two posts here: http://lairofthebreviks.blogspot.co.uk/search/label/Hawk%20Lords, so I won't repeat all that.

GrimKlaw convinced me that I needed to put a little battle damage on him (the miniature, not GrimKlaw), so to start with I added a "Leonidas of 300" style slice down the helmet.  To be honest, the helmet was crying out for it really, I imagine he'll be shouting "This is Preyspire!" at some point...

OK, maybe not.  I can definitely recommend that particular head from Anvil Industry though, and they're developing a really good range of products.

The grey stone of the Crux Terminatus was a base coat of Adeptus Battlegrey, shaded with Nuln Oil.  Then it's a highlight sequence of the base coat, Codex Grey and then a 1:2 mix of Codex Grey and Pallid Wych Flesh.  The Pallid Wych Flesh adds a slightly beige tone in, helping it look a bit more like stone. 

The battle damage was then added afterwards, using really thinned Abaddon Black to begin with, trying to get as thin a line as possible.  Then the mix of Codex Grey and Pallid Wych Flesh was applied "below" the damage, and overlapping it slightly to make the black line even thinner.  After that it was just working back through the highlights, blending them in as I went.  This went much better than I thought it would, it's thinning the paints as much as possible that makes it work.  The shield is far and away my favourite part of the model, I keep looking at it and thinking "Damn, I did that..."

The Axe head was a base of Army Painter Gun Metal (see the latest Ancible article for my grumblings about Leadbelcher, although Jeff at Pirate Viking Painting informs me that they have fixed the lumpiness), washed with Nuln Oil.  I then used a little of the NMM technique and added some Abaddon Black shading, to give the body of the axe a little more depth.  The highlights are blended in Gun Metal, Chainmail and Mithril Silver,  The jewels are the standard GW method, learned back when WFB 4 came out with all those High Elves.  The greens are Castellan Green, Death World Forest and Ogryn Camo.  I used these greens to highlight the back of the cloak:

Before anyone asks, I'm damned if I know whether the axe haft is straight or not.  I've altered it so many damn times and it never looks right, so that's how it's staying. Back to the cloak, I'm still trying to decide if I should have added some freehand or not.  I have a horrible feeling the answer is "Yes, you muppet", but I don't want to mess around with it now, as I'm really happy with the way he looks.  The snow is from Gale Force 9, quite frankly a far superior product to the GW offering, although I think maybe I could have made the snow a bit deeper on the base.

Live and learn, and all that...

So he's done, and I'm happy with him, and it's on to the next project.  I'm on Twitter as @Brevikesq in case anyone has a burning need to read my terribly infrequent tweets - I'm going to try and post some pictures up there too occasionally to keep my motivation up.

As always, comments and criticism welcome!

The Cult Expands...

Not making the best of progress at the moment, I guess it's the time of the year or something...

First up is the next five cultists from the Dark Vengeance box 

They're all painted in the same way as the chap in the background, I went for speed over technique as I just want to get them done and out of the way, so I can do some of the more interesting stuff.

Speaking of which, there's also a little more progress on the Hawk Lords character:

The gold is the usual Dryad Bark base, but with the new Auric Armour Gold mixed in for the highlights.  The colour is a little more brown in colour, which I like a lot.  That's it I'm afraid, not a lot to show for the week or so since my last post, but it's at least some progress.  :-)

As always, comments and criticism welcome!

Hawk Lord and Broom Lady

Not much to report this week, a little purple on the head and right shoulder, but the main thing is the crest, which I think has come out pretty well:

As I'm slowly migrating to the new GW paint range, so Breviccus Flavus is evolving.  The yellows are the same (Tausept Ochre and Iyanden Darksun), but now the shade is Seraphim Sepia, and the top highlights include Rakarth Flesh, and then some white to finish off.  While I've found Nuln Oil, and to a lesser extent Agrax Earthshade, to be a regression from Badab Black and Devlan Mud, Seraphim Sepia is a definite improvement.  It covers better, and it's a stronger colour in my opinion.

The purple is coming on nicely, it's a base coat of the new Xereus Purple, shaded with Druchii Violet, then highlighted up through Xereus Purple and Genestealer Purple, with the final highlight a 1:1 mix of Genestealer Purple and the old Astronomican Grey.  It's not the Hawk Lords purple of the Codex, but it's a colour I'm happy with.  Since these pictures, I've started to work on the gold on the "started" shoulder pad.

Another miniature in my "to be finished" group has been completed:

This lady was a present for one of my best friends, someone who through her hard work, experience and knowledge literally keeps the department she works for going.  There's a bit of an "in joke" between us about brooms, so this miniature seemed very appropriate.  :)

She'd actually had a bit of a mishap (mantelpieces are dangerous places), so I was repairing her, and decided that re-basing would be a good idea too.  She's a very old miniature, made by Marauder (remember them?) way back in the late 80s - I finally found her on Stuff of Legends.  To give her a bit more stability, she's pinned and glued to one of Dark Templar's Malcontent bases.  Painting wise, the yellow and red are my usual way of doing things, but I can't remember how I did the green, so it was just as well I didn't have to repair the skirt at all...

She's now back with her owner, who is very happy to have her back and has a safer place to display her!

In other news, several of the Ancible team got together at Firestorm Games in Cardiff - we had a very pleasant day, and Firestorm is a great place.  Unfortunately, my Crimson Fists got their arses handed to them on a plate...twice.  After a lengthy period of reflection (I was a little grumpy with myself I'll confess) I have a reasonable idea why, so steps are in place to get them a bit more competitive.

I hope.

As always comments and criticism welcome - I've been out of the loop a bit recently, but hopefully will be back in the loop over the next few weeks.

Alas, poor Yarrick! I knew him Horatio...

The next of my backlog of unfinished miniatures is done.  Like the dragon in the last post, I had to get myself over the ridiculous mental block I had over finishing him and yet again I'm glad I did, as he's come out really well.

Still not totally happy with the red on the claw, but I figured that as an old Ork weapon, it's likely to look a little patchy.  The yellow is my normal method, which I really need to get away from as my pot of Tausept Ochre is on its way out, and my stocks of Gryphonne Sepia are running low.

I went for a paler skin tone, using a base coat of P3 Beast Hide, shaded with GW Ogryn Flesh, and then highlighted with the base coat and increasing amounts of P3 Ryn Flesh, until it was pure Ryn Flesh as an edge/point highlight.  The gold is a base of GW Dryad Bark, which is then highlighted with increasing amounts of GW Burnished Gold mixed into the base, then some GW Mithril Silver added in for a final highlight.  I'll admit now, I'm damned if I can remember how I painted the green leaves...

The black areas are a base of plain black, with the highlights built up using Vallejo German Grey, the old GW Adeptus Battlegrey, and old GW Codex Grey.  If you recognise the miniature, you'll have noticed I clipped off the back banner from the skull ammo hopper.  I'm not a big fan of back banners on Sci Fi miniatures anyway, but on this chap it really didn't work for me. 

I love this old miniature, it brings back memories of my childhood, when I first really got in to the hobby, it's a typical, static posed, one piece(ish) miniature, that really typifies that period at GW

So with two miniatures finished in the last week or so, I've got a few new projects to start (along with future articles, Cultists, Nurgle Marines, etc, etc).  The Commissar theme continues with Kapitan Ivanka Kurganova from Raging Heroes.

I've gone for the big crazy gun-sword thing rather than the delicate alternative, partly because it looks cool, and partly because the scabbard doesn't fit the smaller sword at all and would have looked weird.  I also left off the gas mask option, because I wanted to paint the face.  As her feet are spread wider apart than a 25mm base can comfortably fit, I used a piece of etched brass from the old GW WH40K basing kit to give her something to stand on, then added a couple of pieces of chopped up sprue with metal in the ends to look like steel reinforced concrete pillars that had been broken off.

Next up is one of the Space Marine Chapter Masters (minus his shiled which I'm painting seperately).  I'm not entirely sure about the chapter yet, but I'm veering towards Hawk Lords.

I bought the boxed set with all four in a long while back.  I got motivated to paint him when I picked up an alternative head from Anvil Industry's head range - I've got to say these are pretty damn good, they're sharp, with minimal flash or mould lines, and I think it really works well with this miniature.  Their hooded and grill ranges of heads would be good for converted guard/cultists too.

Last, but most definitely not least is a Griffin Inquisitor from Confrontation:

Si and Jez (who very generously gave me this miniature) from the Ancible team wax lyrical about Rackham miniatures, and it's not hard to see why.  This chap is fantastic, a beautiful sculpt, hardly any flash or mould lines, and in bone coloured armour, with dark clothing and a dark metal sword, I think he's going to look pretty damn good.  I have some other Rackham stuff to paint too, Si (also very generously) has given me possibly one of the best miniatures I have ever seen, but that's for another time...

As always, comments and criticism welcome!

Dark Vengeance Chosen and Other Animals

The bulkhead door crumples with the first impact, the second blow sends the door flying across the room and it clatters against the back wall.  The monstrosity that fills the doorway terrifies the guardsmen manning the hastily constructed barricade.  It is huge, bigger than any normal man, armour plates of putrid green and bleached bone, foul symbols hanging on chains from its armour.  The corrupted warrior screeches, a high pitched wail of static, and the face in its left shoulder pad starts to gibber uncontrollably.

"You will all die tonight little fleshlings, more souls for the great father, more souls!"

The unnatural voice stuns the guardsmen into action and they open fire.  Las rounds burn the air  between them and their enemy, but nothing breaks through the corrupted armour.  It raises a bolt pistol and fires, and a guardsman's chest explodes, spattering gore over his comrades.  The invader strides forward. and a second shot removes another man's head.  It is at the barricade now, and a blow from its glowing left fist punches a hole through the flimsy piles of furniture.  As it forces its way through, one of the defenders is backhanded across the room, his skull and ribcage smashed.

There are only two defenders left.

"Run!" Shouts one.  "Get everyone out, we cannot hold!"

His shouts attract the attention of their enemy, and the guardsman is face to face with this vision of hell.  Too close to fire, he swings his las-rifle like a club, but it is futile, and the powerful left hand envelopes his helmeted head and crushes his skull.

The last remaining guardsman runs...

The first of my Dark Vengeance Chosen is finished, and finally spray varnished to a finish I'm actually happy with!

The first colour I put on the miniature was the bone - I figured it was easier to do this than do the green first, as there was so much fiddly detail, that base-coating the bone, would end up with some slippage into the green areas.  It started with a base of Zandri Dust, washed with Agrax Earthshade.  The highlights were then more of the base coat, Karak Stone and finally some Dheneb Stone (I really need to find a replacement for this).  I could have added some white to this, but I didn't want to go too light - it's probably a little too bright  for Nurgle as it is, but it looks good so I'm sticking with it.

The green was based with P3 Cryx Base, which was dark enough not to need a wash.  Originally I highlighted this with Catachan Green, Deathworld Forest and Ogryn Camo - but the green was too dull in comparison to the Bikers, so I went back and added in Camo Green to brighten things up a bit.  The brown is done the same way as on the Cultists.  The pipes, eyes and details are based with the new Balor Brown (which is a poor replacement for Tausept Ochre in my opinion), washed with Sepia and highlighted with the base and Iyanden Darksun.

The powerfist is one of my favourite parts of the miniature - I used the same colours as for the rest of the green, but added a lot more Ogryn Camo to the top "edges" of the crazy paving effect.  I'm thinking about having a little bit of this pattern on all of the Chosen, just to tie them all together.

I'm a big fan of the faces sculpted into the armour too - I like the thought of this one gibbering away, hurling insults and expletives at the enemy.  The tongue is highlighted with the old Scab Red and the new Screamer Pink, which works quite nicely over a dark brown base.

With Chosen number one finished, it's back to the Cultists.  I'm working on a group of 5 of the close combat squad, but before I start batch painting them (if I can bear it), I thought I'd do a test model first to make sure I like the colour scheme.  I wanted to do something to distinguish them from the rifle armed squad, but still keep them tied together.

Although red isn't strictly a Nurgle colour, it does feature quite heavily on one of the covers of the Realm of Chaos books (obviously the one with Nurgle in it), so I thought I'd give it a try. It's just dark brown, with a layer or two of Scab Red, then Scab Red and Snakebite Leather.  One plus point is that he didn't take too long to paint - just as well, as there's one chap who's 50% skin, who probably will take a while to paint...

He works alongside our new Chosen Marine too:

More of these ugly scum soon hopefully.

In other news, I still have a few of the "half-finished" on the go - I've actually made some good progress on Commissar Yarrick, with only a couple of colours left to do:

He's coming along nicely, although I still have some work to do on the red of the power claw.  I'm particularly pleased with the Ork skeleton on the gun and the sash.  I'm also working on another of the Imperial advisors:

The metal work is pretty much done, I just need to decide on a uniform colour.  Last but not least I'm still struggling with the Bushido Dragon:

No idea what the problem with this miniature is, as it's a lovely looking creature, I just can't stand painting it.  There is a lot of yellow to do, but that's not usually been a problem.  Hopefully posting it up here will give me the incentive to crack on with it...

...and that's all folks!  I've started my next article for the Ancible, so that will be taking up some time too.  I also solemnly promise to comment on other people's blogs more - I really appreciate all the comments you guys make, and I have been very rude in not extending to you all the same courtesy - I am going to make this right.

As always comments and criticism welcome!

Lords of the Flies

After buying the Dark Vengeance boxed set I did a fair bit of ummming and ahhhing about the colour scheme for the Chaos force.  In an earlier post I had settled on making them Word Bearers, with the Cultists following different gods, the autogun armed bunch being Nurgle worshippers, and the close combat ones slaughtering for Khorne.

Then I looked at my 500 points worth of Lords of the Flies marines I did for a GW store painting competition a few years back and thought "Why don't I just expand this army instead?".  So we're back to Nurgle colours, which to be honest are my favourite colours to paint anyway.  The original force consisted of:

• Chaos Sorceror
• 7 Chaos Space Marines, 1 x Flamer, Aspiring Champion with Chainsword
• 7 Chaos Space Marines, 1 x Meltagun, Aspiring Champion with Power sword
• 3 Bikers

I have no idea how much this costs out as now, I'll pick up the new Codex this week hopefully and work out a new army list using the original force bulked out with the new Dark Vengeance stuff.  The Bikers have never made an appearance on the net, so they deserve a little of the spotlight:

From what I remember these bad boys were an absolute pain in the posterior to paint, they just weren't much fun (which doesn't bode well for the Ravenwing).

The green I think was Catachan Green washed with Devlan Mud and highlighted with Catachan and Camo Green.  The bone colour was Khemri Brown, shaded with Devlan Mud, highlighted with Khemri Brown and Dheneb Stone.  The brown was Scorched Brown, again washed with Devlan Mud and highlighted with Scorched Brown, Bestial Brown and Snakebite Leather.

They fit in reasonably well with the new cultists I've done, although I think it does go to show that I've progressed technique wise a fair bit in these few years.  I'm not sure whether to go back and do the classic brown base trim on the cultists, or redo the old stuff with a black trim - the brown is Graveyard Earth, which I very much doubt I'll be able to get any more of.  

The first of the Chosen marines is 60% done, so hopefully should have some pictures of him, and 5 more cultists up soon.

As always comments and criticism welcome!

Warning shot in the head sir?

It's been a while since my last post, so to get back in the swing of things I'll introduce to you a certain Balthazar Weiss, the Arch-Militant of the good (bad) ship "Siegfried and Roy", last seen stood atop a transport vehicle, blasting away at another Rogue Trader's foot soldiers with his hellgun, while the rest of his merry band were busy falling over each other trying to pick up a "relic".

Balthazar likes to fade into the background, follows orders, prefers others to do the talking, and quietly and efficiently cleans up when others make a mess.  Due to a rather good characteristic roll at character generation time, plus weapon specialisation and some helpful equipment, Mr Weiss has an insanely high Ballistic Skill, which makes him very effective in a firefight.  Our glorious leader is a decadent, spontaneous nut job, who jumps in first and thinks afterwards, so this skill is going to come in very handy...

Miniature wise, he's not the best paint job in the world, but I wanted him done quickly and went for neat and tidy.  Unfortunately the model is quite a bad cast with plenty of rough areas that needed cleaning up, and in some cases, make the best of a bad job.  There's very little in the way of conversion, save for removing the Imperial eagles from his armour and equipment.  While he's a loyal citizen of the Imperium, he'll frequently have to go where Imperial Law is not welcome, so the eagles had to go.  The base is from Model Display Products, and he's positioned on it to look like he's going up a step

 

The dark grey of the armour was Vallejo German Grey, Highlighted with Adeptus Battlegrey and Codex Grey, washed with very watered down black paint, and then re-highlighted in places with the Battlegrey.  I think this works OK, although it does look a little flat, but it fits in with the stay-in-the-shadows, no-nonsense character that he is.  The green cables are a base of P3 Cryx Base, washed with Agrax Earthshade, then highlighted with Catachan Green and Deathworld Forest.

The leather is a base of Dryad Bark, washed again with the Earthshade and highlighted with the the base colour and increasing amounts of Graveyard Earth.  The metal is equally simple, Leabelcher, shaded with Nuln Oil, and then highlighted with Chainmail.

In this picture you can see one of the casting issues that I couldn't fix, on the top of the hellgun - I didn't want to damage the rest of the model trying to fix that, so it had to stay as it is.  To be fair it's more noticeable in this picture than it is when seeing the model with the naked eye.

The off-white of the trousers and shirt is painted using the House-guards method.  I started with a base of Khemri Brown, highlighted with increasing amounts of Karak Stone and then white - it's a bit patchy in places on the trousers, and suffers from me breaking my own rule about laying down a solid base coat, but the sleeves turned out nicely.  The base is done in the same way as I did for the Seneschal, with the addition of a glaze of Gryphonne Sepia to tone everything down, as I thought the Seneschal's base was a bit too in-your-face and drew attention away from the miniature.

So the Siegfried and Roy has its second character painted, and another of my half finished collection on my painting desk is completed.  Like I said at the start, it's not the best paint job in the world, but it's effective and it was quick to do, and he does look the part.  Just in case you were wondering about the post title, it's kind of become Balthazar's catchphrase...

As always, comments and criticism welcome!

Dark Vengeance: Cultists Set 1

So having finished off a couple of miniatures that I've had on the go for a while, I rewarded myself with some miniatures from the Dark Vengeance box set.  The temptation was to start with one of the character models, but that would have been spoiling myself, so I went for five of the cultist/traitor guard models.  This might amaze you to read, but I actually batch painted them!  Well not quite, I base coated and shaded them all at the same time, but when it came to highlighting and detailing, I did them one at a time - so not quite batch painting, but nearly...

I wanted to do these quickly (for me), so the paint jobs are a little more rough and ready than my usual work, but I'm still really pleased with the way they came out.  They are a bit drab looking, but as they're meant to be Nurgle cultists, it didn't didn't feel right painting them bright colours.

I'm a big fan of these models, loads of character and all quite nasty looking - when reading the Gaunts Ghosts novels, this is what I imagined the "Enemy" looked like.  The quality of the models is really impressive for snap-fit pieces, and there's not too much "stretching" of elements to make it work as a two piece miniature.  I've gone for a Nurgle style scheme, to fit in with my Lords of the Flies Chaos Marines that I painted years ago, so plenty of greens and browns.

My favourite model so far is this chap:

He looks like some some heavy built Forge worker or mechanic, I love the apron, the tools hanging off the back pack and the enormous Heavy Stubber.  The leather is my new favourite method - Dryad Bark, shaded with Agrax EarthShade and highlighted with Dryad Bark and Snakebite leather.  Highlighting was only a 2-3 stage process, keeping it quick and simple.  The skin was a base of P3 Beast Hide, washed with Earthshade, and highlighted with Beast Hide and then Rakarth Flesh.

The rest of the guys aren't quite as great as "Heavy Stubber Mechanic Man" but they're still nice sculpts and were a breeze to paint:

The green was a basecoat of P3 Cryx Base, shaded with the Earthshade, and dry-brushed with Catachan Green and Death World Forest, with a little Ogryn Camo in places.  The guns were Stormvermin Fur, washed with Nuln Oil, dry-brushed with Leadbelcher and Chainmail.  The wrappings were even quicker, Zandri Dust washed with EarthShade and highlighted with Zandri Dust again.

The bottom two cultists had Chaos stars branded on their shoulders, I washed these with Catachan Green, and then painted them in with Death World Forest and highlighted with Ogryn Camo.  I used the same effect to do a little OSL around eyepieces - not strictly "realistic", but it looks cool - especially on the odd bird like mask:

The great thing about this colour scheme, was that I could base coat everything and then wash it all at the same time - certainly cut down on the painting time!  I don't usually enjoy batch painting at all, but these were really fun to paint, and as long as I vary it up a bit, I reckon I can get all the cultists done in a couple of weeks - which is pretty damn quick for me...

So with these 5 done, it's on to some more half-finished stuff before I do 5 of the close-combat weapon armed cultists.

As always, comments and criticism welcome!

Let there be light

As longer term readers will know, I've always had issues with taking photographs of my miniatures, particularly with the amount of light I could get on the subject.  In recent months I've managed to ease this problem by taking pictures outside (starting with the Juggernaut ).  Unfortunately the British summer has got back in to its usual pattern, and has started throwing it down every so often, making picture taking outside a risky and soggy experience (I haven't tried it by the way, just imagining).

A few weeks back, a "quick" trip to IKEA (just some oak and some pine and a handful of norsemen...) yielded three of these bad boys: 

Photo from IKEA

I'm a big fan, only £8.16 for something that clamps to a desk/work surface and fully adjustable, and can take a 20W energy saving daylight bulb (effectively 100W).  Speaking of which, I managed to pick up some bulbs from my local art store - Craft Factory PureLite 20W.  Unfortunately they only had two, so I'll have to pick a third up from Amazon or somewhere.

So the current photography set up looks like this (these pictures are a little ropey due to using my phone camera):

The top lamp is my trusty painting lamp with an 11W daylight bulb in it, obviously this will be replaced by the third Tertial when I get the bulb for it.  The light box is my own self made affair that I've been using for a while now.  I think I'm going to have to replace the top and side panels, which are currently tissue paper, with something a little more transparent (tracing paper maybe?  I'll need to do some research).

The early results aren't bad but required a little editing in Picassa to bring the light levels up:

This is Huron "post-droppage", which I don't think I've photographed before, I'm still really chuffed with this paint job, even though I've learned a lot since finishing him, and would possibly have done things differently.

Progress wise, things are on track.  The painting for next article of the Ancible is progressing well, although the whole process is slowed down somewhat by the need to take pictures at every stage, but it's still enjoyable.  The Ashkasa is going slowly, but steadily, and I'm making good progress on Boris:

I bought this chap because of the armour, I love the look of the scales and the skull breastplate, and the horned head sword hilt is nice too. It would have been too easy to paint the scales of his armour red, and invite the Khorne/Skorne comparisons, so I opted for blue instead.  This makes him a little less evil than the red would have, but the scales have come out nicely and work well with the gold.  The more I painted the Boris, the more "World of Warcraft" he looked, particularly the face, so I went full on for that look when I did the beard orange.  I'm now looking at ways I can accentuate that look with the rest of the miniature.  

Like a lot of Reaper models, Boris is stuck to a chunk of metal sculpted as ground that acts as a base.  I prefer my miniatures to have a stable base, so picked up some 30mm round lipped bases from Orc's Nest when I bought Boris and pinned him to it, filling in with basing sand to neaten up.  I've got a couple of other Reaper miniatures (one also called Boris for some reason - is Boris the name of choice for Evil fighters?) that I will be doing the same with.

So very much onwards and upwards at the moment - as always, comments and criticism welcome!

Damned Legionnaire OSL Fail

You know when you thought you got something right and then you look at the pictures and you realise you haven't?  

I've been looking for a decent and different way to paint Legion of the Damned marines.  My previous attempts, including a browned aged look to the armour, and the standard GW paint job didn't feel right, so this time I tried to do something a little different again.  

What I tried to do was go for a standard-ish paint scheme, an aged look to the metal and some OSL effect around the flames and eyepieces.  I also wanted this to be a quick (well for me anyway) paint job, so I can knock one or two of these out every so often so I have something to show for my efforts.  Just from looking at this picture, the OSL effect around the flames has come out reasonably well.  Unfortunately I dropped a boo-boo when it came to the eyepieces - particularly  that there is a clear line where the OSL stops and unlit bone coloured face mask begins, where that should have been graduated.

Damn.

I am pleased with the black.  I've been looking for a dark grey to purchase - I know it's lazy but I don't want to mess about mixing up a colour if I can get it ready made.  So I found Tamiya's NATO Black in my local HobbyCraft and thought I'd give it a go.  The coverage isn't great, but it does the job.  My biggest bugbear however, is the pot - bearing in mind it's a screw lid, it was a royal pain in the backside to get open the first time.  To be honest, it's such a pain that it's put me off Tamiya paints altogether - I shouldn't be in fear of shattering the pot while trying to open the damn thing (yes it was that bad when I first opened it).

So my new, all-conquering (when I can get the damn pot open) black scheme:

• Basecoat - Chaos Black
• First Highlight - NATO Black
• Second Highlight - Adeptus Battlegrey
• Final Highlight - Codex Grey
• Glaze - Diluted Badab Black

The metal follows my usual method for steel these days, working off a Charadon Granite basecoat, but I also added a wash of Gryphonne Sepia at the end to give it a more aged look.  I also drybrushed the highlights in places to give it a more worn, rough look.

I went for a rougher look on the bone too (these guys are meant to have gone through the wringer) - drybrushing with a few painted on highlights.  All-in-all (OSL aside) he's come out pretty well for a quick and dirty paint job, at some point I'm going to make the other 3 I've done so far match this chap.

Elsewhere on the workbench, Boris is about half done, and I've made some progress on Ashkasa (the Rackham miniature), while working on my next article for the Ancible.  I've opened the packaging on my Finecast Harlequin Shadowseer, and I'm pleased to report I'm one of the lucky ones, I can't find anything more serious than a couple of mold lines and some flash!  While I'm not overly happy about the price increases, based on my solitary experience with Finecast so far, I'm happy with the quality of the new material.