A Luna Wolf, a Beastman and three conversions

This week was again not as productive as I wish my weeks to be. Nevertheless I finished the paintjob on two models. The first one I want to show of today is the first Space Marine for one of my 30k projects.

Pict 38: Luna Wolves Tactical Marine

Pict 39: Luna Wolves Tactical Marine

Pict 040: Luna Wolves Tactical Marine

It's only a simple Mk IV Tactical from the Betrayel At Calth box, I painted up to be a Luna Wolf. The main visual inspiration was the cover art for False Gods. The Legion's symbol on the left shoulder is a deacal printed from the amazing sheets available on the Boler and Chainsword forum. Once the other 19 marines of the squad are painted up to this standart, I want to add sqaud markings on the right shoulder pad and maybe some of those red slashes the Luna Wolves show on the art work. I hope this will add some contrast since the white of the armour is a bit boring right now. If that wont help, I might add a bit of static grass to the base to get a splash of colour on the model.

Pict 041: Beastmen Gor

Pict 042: Beastmen Gor

Pict 043: Beastmen Gor

The next three pictures show jet an other little project. Since I really like Woodelves I also have a linking towards the Beastmen of the Warhammer universe. I think this is the third time I had some of them lying about ready for painting. The other two times I sold them off, but now I don't have the goal of painting a whole Warhammer army. This time there are only the ten that come in one box and I want to use them in my DnD game, to add some support to the goblin clan my players are fighting right now.

Pict 044: Thousand Sons Consul (Conversion)

Pict 045: Luna Wolves Praetor (Conversion)

Pict 046: Thousand Sons Contemtor Drednought (Conversion)

With the last three pitures of today I want to show of some more of my Betrayel at Calth box. With only a litte chopping you get some unique poses out of the characters. I'm not quite sure yet if the will stay the way they are now or if I will add or subtract some details. But I'm quite happy with them right now. What I will change though is the basing for the thousand sons. Insted of my usual coffee grounds I will use GW's Agrellan Badland. I bought a pot of the stuff last year for the base of a Dreadmaw and there is still quite a bit left.

A little bit of painting and quite a lot of new stuff

So this week was again a slow one for getting painting projects done. Only the three Dwarfs from last week have been finished. The dreadnougght saw the washes and a new big project has been started (Ah! Yes. So begins the flapping of the butterfly.) Anyhow, here is a picture of my Iron Hills Warriors up to this point.

Pict 015: Iron Hills Dwarfs (Mid January)

And now for the pictures I promised of the first purchased miniatures that will get added to my tally. It's quite a nice lot of Citadel Miniatures from the mid to late nineties; mainly Woodelfs and Bretonnians but with some Vampires and other stuff such as swarms and an Archers command group from Harlequin Miniatures sprinkled in.

Pict 016: Orion, King of the Woods (4. ed.)

Pict 017: Wood Elf General on horse (4. ed.)

Pict 018: Skaw the Falconer

Pict 019: Wychwethyl the Wild

Pict 020: Wood Elf War Dancers (4. ed.)

Pict 021: Wood Elf Scouts

Pict 022: Wood Elf Waywatchers (4. ed.)

Pict 023: Dryads (Harlequin Entlings)

Pict 024: Wood Elf Archers (4. ed.)

The Wood Elfs were my first Warhammer Fantasy Army and I always had a liking even for the older miniatures. I esspecially look forward to paint Orion and the War Dancers. But they will have to wait for some time, because I have some of their respective 6th edition versions started in my project box.

Pict 025: The Green Knight

Pict 026: Morgiana le Fey (5. ed.)

Pict 027: Suliman le Saracen

Pict 028: Bertrand le Brigand, Hugo le Petit, Gui le Gros

Pict 029: Knights of the Realm Command (5. ed.)

Pict 030: Knights of the Realm (5. ed.)

Pict 031: Knights of the Realm (6. ed.)

Pict 032: Bretonnian Archers

And that's the Bretonnians. I have started basing Bertrand, Hugo and Gui - I just love the models and hope to get to them soon, but we'll see. The plastic miniatures will all need a bit of fixing up. Some broken and bent bows, lances and headdresses will have to be glued, but I quite enjoy this part of the hobby. I will see what I will do about the missing backbanners that are missing from the Green Knight. I'll either raid my bitsbox or I'll keep a look out on Ebay.

Pict 033: Harlequin Miniatures Archer Command Group

Pict 034: Vampire Skeletons (5. ed.)

Pict 035: Vampire Skeleton Bits (5. ed.)

Pict 036: Manfred van Carstein (6. ed.)

Pict 037: Warhammer Swarms (Snakes, Spiders, Rats)

And that's it: Manfred van Carstein with some sekeletons and some animal swarms. The skeletons and animals will most likely be used in my Dungeons and Dragons Campaign to pepper my player. The skeletons wll have to be fixed as well - but I might leave some as they are now or convert them. I always liked the skeletons that are crawling out of the dirt.

And with that my Hobby Tally stands 7 miniatures painted against 156 miniatures bought (I counted the swarms as one miniature per base).

Second Week of 2017 - not much done, so here's some work in progress shots

Just a quik one today. The week was quite hectic and I did't get much painting done until today. Thus I haven't finished any new miniatures this week. But I still want to post some pictures to report on my progress.

The first work in progess only shows more Iron Hills Dwarfs. The main base colours are down, only the leather is missing. I'll try and do that and put a wash on them today. I know they look sloppy rigth now but once washed and highlighted that shouldn't be a problem. If they were heros, I'd touch up the base but since they are only warriors that step won't be necessary.

Pict 013: Iron Hills Warriors (WIP)

The next picture shows the project I've been workin on whenever I had to wait for the paint on the dwarfes to dry: my Chaplain Dreadnought. I just had to have the model, even if my Flesh Tearers can't use them without allying. If I ever get to use it in game I might use him as a Death Company Dreadnought or even as my stand in for Cassor the Dammned.
The base colours are down here as well, but since he's a bigger miniature I think I get go the extra step and tidy up a bit before I get to the washes. Anyway, here it is:

Pict 014: Flesh Tearers Chaplain Dreadnought (WIP)

Also: Besides a box of Betrayel at Calth, today I shot quite the lot on Ebay. Once it arrives I'll put up a post to show it off. Suffice it to say, I'll have some painting to do to catch up with my tally. (And it looked so good for a while...)

A First Update to my Iron Hills Army

The first week of the year was quite a good onr for painting. I finished the first few miniatures and started work on some more. The main focus was the Iron Hills army with the ballista and some warriors completed.

So here's what I got done this week:

Pict 003: Iron Hills Ballista

Pict 004: Iron Hills Ballista

Pict 005: Iron Hills Ballista

Pict 006: Iron Hills Ballista

The first completed model of the year was the ballista. The main part was almost completed on new year's day as seen in the WIP picture of the last post. I added highlights to the metals to reduce the rust effect. The wooden parts got a similar treatment - some highlighting - after that I added some more brown wash to deepen the shadows where the wood meets the metal parts. The crew was easy enough to paint since I decided that the gold stripes Forge World put on their Dwarfs where to ostentatios for mine.
With the miniature finished, I appreciate the amount of detail Forge World maged to produce even more. I'm really happy how it came out and am considering buying an other one with my next order. I'd really like to try and convert it so that the Dwarfs are loading the bolt into the machine.

Pict 007: Iron Hills Warrior

Pict 008: Iron Hills Warrior

Pict 009: Iron Hills Warrior

Pict 010: Iron Hills Warrior

Pict 011: Iron Hills Warrior

When I was done with the siege engine I wanted to start on the army to accompany it. This was the first dwarfen warrior I painted for the force. As with the ballista crew the eyes where difficult; here even more so, because the spear and the shield where in the way. Since the completion of the first Dwarf I got two more done, so here's a group shot of my Iron Hills warriors so far.

Pict 12: Iron Hills Warriors

Introduction to 'A Butterfly's Hobby Tally'

A new year always seems to bring with it some good resolutions. In the past two years I vowed to paint more miniatures then I buy. Well, it takes less time to buy than it takes to paint a miniature, so naturally I did not succeed. But in both 2015 and 2016 I did keep an exact tally of the miniatures I painted and the miniatures I bought. In 2015 I bought 253 models and painted 152, whereas in 2016 I bought 494 models and painted a total of 228.
So the tally for 2016 is even worse than the year before, but this year I will change that!

My resolution for 2017 will be this blog. I want to use it for a similar purpose as my lists in the previous years (hence the name...). But I want to keep my record on this blog to a) add pictures of my miniatures and b) to add some urgency to my pledge.
The plan is to post pictures of finished models and work in progress shots of the projects I take on during the year. I'm not sure yet how I'll show off my new purchases, maybe a little write up, a picuture or even an unboxing.
To keep track of the numbers there will be a tally on the right hand side of the blog.


As far as the painting-projects for 2017 are concerned I am as of yet undecided. As always I want to decrease the amount of primed models I have lying around in boxes, but I am shoure there will be shiny new things to come out. My main project right now is a army of Iron Hills Dwarfs for the LotR / Hobbit / Middle-Earth Strategy Battle Game. Right now the army consists of Dain on foot and riding his warboar, twelve normal warriors and a Ballista. And to reward anyone reading, here is a picture of the pointing Ironhills Dwarf that comes with the Ballista as well as a WIP shot of the Ballista itself.

Pict 001: Iron Hills Captain (Ballista)

Pict 002: Iron Hills Ballista (WIP)

The Ballista is almost done; there will be some more highlighting done on the metals and maybe a little on the wood. Other than that what's obviously missing are the three crewmen. I will glue them onto the Ballista or the base of the model and not have them on seperate Bases. Not quite sure where to put them yet - the back where the two crew are operating the loading mechnism seems rather crowded...