Distractions

…that one can ill afford!

But first, Happy New Year to one and all (one, if I’m lucky). Hope the New Year sees you full of enthusiasm for fresh projects or a determination to finish old ones. I’ve certainly got a bunch of the latter, and I could rattle off a list of ideas of things I want to start. Trouble is, if I do that I’ll look back at the end of the year and depress myself with the few, if any, I’ll be able to strike off that list! Hey, it’s a hobby – what’ll get done will get done.

That being said, unexpected distractions can be a pleasant diversion, and it takes an iron will much stronger than mine to resist them and get on with the task in hand. Such was the recent case of the Swamp Slugs of Jargono.

These slimy chaps were a happy find in a local comic shop that I also happened upon for the first time. Duncanville Comics is the place, nice selection of games in addition to the comics. I hadn’t seen the Shadows of Brimstone game and miniatures up close and personal before, and while the game system does not appeal an awful lot some of the miniatures look rather useful and just … cool.

I came away with the Swamp Slugs with the idea that I could incorporate them into the D&D campaign I’m running for my boys.

 

The Gastropoda Giganta in question

There are 3 slugs in the box, each consisting of 2 halves, super easy to assemble. My initial thought was to slap these together and be done with it. No interruption to other tasks whatsoever. However, as lovely as they are, I figured a little variation in pose would make the trio a tad more interesting. They are a nice soft plastic so hacking them up a bit wasn’t too difficult, then they just needed some putty to fill the scars. I didn’t like the joins between the 2 parts, they are indented a bit, so I filled them in too.

Okay, they had taken up a little more time than anticipated so far but not enough to make me feel guilty as I glanced towards the commissions, unceremoniously brushed aside.

But, but, they cried out for one more thing … a victim. What could be more disgusting than the hapless adventurer that gets a wee bit too close?

 

One slug sprue and a bit of green stuff later

If he’d hung onto that sword he might have cut his way out…

 

Right, now, um, back to the tricorns.

Howdah ya do?

In the continuing expansion of Khurasan Miniatures 15mm Timurid army I’ve just finished something very cool. The crew of a war elephant! Okay, so I didn’t get to sculpt the actual nellie itself which was a bit of a shame, just some armor and the crew.

 

stompy…

The crew included a naphtha thrower and an archer. The fit is a bit snug in the howdah but they can be arranged in different positions. One of the things I need to work on is the chunkiness of my smaller figures. While these guys are kitted out in armor, I need to get my layers a little thinner.

An interesting feature of the  Timurid elephant armor is the protective shield for the handler. I’ve often occasionally, whenever the thought has occurred to me, wondered why the offensive chaps were protected up in their howdah while the guy who actually controlled the elephant was stuck out front just asking to be peppered with arrows.

Next up for the Timurids: some unfortunate hostages being driven before them. Now, where’s my festive Christmas music?

An End to Waste…and a New Army

A new army? Like I need to start another project like I need a hole in the head. Never fear, this project is for no one but myself so I can work on it slowly with a clear conscience.

For a while I have dreamed of a Hobbit army. Lots of Hobbit militia, heroes, adventurers, cavalry, chariots (bit too warlike maybe?), anyway, you get the idea. Enough for an exclusive army. For a bit of punch I thought they could be allied to giants. Not the vicious, violent variety (that just wouldn’t fit with the theme of the army), rather the slightly dopey, bemused type. A bit like that one in the Harry Potter movie. Maybe it can have pannier-like things, carrying a few hobbits that are throwing rocks, firing a catapult, or something.

Regarding the ‘waste’ thing. I always, always, seem to overestimate the amount of greenstuff I’m going to use when I start a sculpting session. Add to that the constant interruptions when I’m working, or just the irresistible urge to get up and make a cup of tea, and the end result is a bunch of unworkable blobs of hardening greenstuff, They’re everywhere – goodness knows how many tubes of the stuff I’ve wasted in this way. So the genius solution I’ve come up with (ok, ok, its pretty darn obvious …) is to have a long-term, large project on the go, to which I can plop bits of the gs onto that I know I won’t use. Hence the giant!

Here it is so far. The basic shape has actually been done with some very old greenstuff I have (it’s dirty, won’t mix very well and doesn’t get pliable enough). I’ve stuck onto it any old bits lying around, and will add to it as I go from now on. When the shape is good then I’ll actively work on the final detail.

It’s going to be big…

As for the Hobbits themselves, I would like them to be similar in size to the LOTR ones by GW, but perhaps a little more jolly and humorous, similar in that respect to their earlier range.

Not a Hobbit

Toys

Toy soldiers that is.

This has been an ongoing project for a while. It’s basically just for a good friend who wants a comprehensive collection of Napoleonic toy soldiers in 54mm. The idea was that there would be a couple of simple poses, but clothed in accurate and detailed uniforms.

It’s definitely an organic project, as they say (which essentially just means we’ve been modifying them constantly as things have gone awry or didn’t look right, or whatever). For instance, the next batch will have separate packs, arms and other bits that can attach to the body by a peg. Originally there was more in the way of creases and folds but that didn’t look right with the blobby heads and hands.

Good news though, apparently the owner of a miniatures store in Gettysburg saw them and said we should do Civil War versions, and if we did he would stock them. We’ll see how that pans out.

They are kind of a fun to do between other things. More of a mechanical process than the more naturalistic stuff.

Yikes, things look crap all blown up huge!

Tracks? Say what?

Well this was something different to say the least!

I was asked to sculpt a quasi-historical Holt tractor. The type of thing crawling around towards the beginning of the twentieth century. Originally these were for agricultural use but were pressing into military service, at least the slightly larger variants were.

This one is to be used to haul around artillery in it’s unarmored state, but has an optional armored cab with small-calibre gun. It’s a bit of a hybrid actually, I don’t believe the smaller versions had a front wheel to aid with steering, but it was asked for so there it is.

It was a challenge to sculpt. I had certainly never done anything like this before, and to be honest I don’t think greenstuff lends its self very well to hard-edged things like this. Precise, sharp angles are required and the only way to get them with this medium (at least for me) was to do a lot of sanding. To make it a little more interesting I wanted to do it with an exposed engine. Do I know anything about engines? Nah. Pretty much just made it up. I definitely was not going to do two sets of tracks so I just did one that could be duplicated on both sides. That meant simplifying the actual track so there was no ‘direction’ to it.

 

And all those rivets! Ugh! I wondered how best to do them (actually, how quickest to do them…) and decided upon drilling holes, inserting wire and filing them down. Bit of a pain, and not always very straight!

I don’t think the end result was entirely satisfactory as I never heard back from the client after I sent it off. Oh well. It did take longer than expected, but it was a fun learning experience. I’ll leave vehicles to others in the future, at least for now.

 

 

Return of the Blog!

What a dismal year. Well, as far as sculpting is concerned anyway! Goodness alone knows what happened. Actually a lot, but precious little of it involved the green stuff sadly.

The most recent project was a very quick one. Unfortunately the company who invented and published “All Quiet on the Martian Front” went bust, but luckily the game and miniatures were picked up by Ironclad Games. They are based in St.Louis, and as a promo item to help with the rerelease they needed a 15mm replica of the St. Louis statue. Post battle!

Definitely a fun project, and rather different from previous things. They needed it quickly so it’s rather simplified and done hastily over a weekend.

The Shape of Things to Come

When I can fit the stuff in between commissions, here are the ranges I have planned for Silurian Games. A fair number, admittedly, and goodness alone knows how long it’ll take for me to get to them to be honest. But I will, I will! 🙂

My top priority is something very unoriginal to be sure. WWII in 1/72 scale. Yep, there are tons of ranges out there, but this scale, and this period is my first wargaming love. The details and history fascinate me, and more than anything this is what I’d like to sculpt for myself. Commercially viable? Haha, probably not given all the great stuff out there, but that’s ok!

What I do plan to do is make it precisely 1/72 scale, so they’ll go with all the plastic kits out there (and by ‘out there’ I mean, of course, in my own huge stash!) I’ll also start with some slightly less well known theatres, I’m thinking Iraq, Syria, Ethiopia at the moment.

I’ve made a start in the form of a generic dolly, so that I can sculpt some weapons and equipment accurately and to scale to get cast up first. Here it is (um, ok not terribly exciting):

 

Other things planned are all in 15mm scale, and include:

Colonial/darkest Africa

Dinosaurs (that would also fit in with the above. A ‘lost world’ kind of thing)

Retro, 50’s and 60’s sci-fi range

English Civil War

War of 1812 (I’m debating whether to do this in 28mm as it lends itself nicely to skirmishing)

Catching Up…

Ooops! Went off the rails for a bit there. A combination of going on vacation (always fun Disney World – and a lot of inspiration for detailed terrain building), and an end to the Spring semester that seemed a little more hectic and busy than normal. I’ve also come to end of my first year as Cubmaster of our local pack. That’s involved quite a bit of preparation, and not to mention a number of weekends taken up with camping (which is great fun but I get absolutely nothing else done those days!)

Anyway, time to pick up where I left off. Busy work has meant not as much time as I would like for sculpting of course, let alone any other hobby related activities. The 15mm Timurids for Khurasan have been completed and are on their merry way. On a more disappointing note, the Judge Dredd sculpt is still ongoing.

Two of the 15mm Timurids. Officer and standard bearer (with open hand for separate standard).

 

Bit more progress on the Judge.

 

OK, that’s it for now. Now the summer hols are here it’s time to transform into a sculpting machine!

I’ll outline my long and short-term plans in the next post, including what I hope to sculpt as my first range for Silurian Games by the end of the summer.

Stuff I’m working on

The main thing I need to get finished right now is the Judge Dredd test sculpt (see other posts).

Next on the list of priorities is a project for Khurasan Miniatures. These are some mounted Timurids. I love doing stuff for Khurasan. Firstly Jon is such a nice guy (and tolerates my less than lightning speed!) and the projects he gives me are interesting and diverse. They usually require extra research and broaden my knowledge of the ancient world. The latest batch are nearly done, just need to knuckle down.

I’ve done an Aurelian range of Romans for Khurasan and I think, as a thanks for tolerating my slowness, the beginning-to-end tutorial I’ll do on this blog will be a 15mm version of a certain Roman general (destined to become a gladiator, but perhaps not 100% historically accurate), and I’ll offer it to Jon as a freebie.

For Legends in Time I’m doing a 15mm range of Apaches to compliment his existing range of U.S. cavalry. Finished with the foot, now onto the mounted.

I’m collaborating with this crazy Amish dude up in Pennsylvania, under the name of B&D Miniatures, to do this very comprehensive range of 15mm American Revolution figures. Some basic British and Continentals have been done and are up for sale, and now non-uniformed militia are in the works. This is fun, and who knows, maybe I’ll get a penny or two out of it some day! The bigger the range, the more chance people will buy into it I realize (well hopefully anyway). Only trouble is, these have to take a back seat to paying commissions, so I have to fit them in when I can.

Also for B&D, though strictly for Jacob and not the both of us, I’m doing a 54mm range of Napoleonics. These are toy soldiers so have exaggerated features, featureless faces, and mitten-like hands. Fun stuff.

Silurian Games?

So why the funny name? Even before deciding to write a blog this was the name I had decided upon for my future miniatures company. Lets just hope that’s not too long in coming!

Being a geologist, it’s certainly a fascinating period of time. The continents are being to converge, to ultimately form Pangea. Trilobites and early fish are thriving in the oceans, not to mention the extinct deadly sea scorpions. And there’s something about that name – Silurian rolls off the tongue. There’s something evocative, and perhaps slightly sinister about it.

It also fits nicely with being a huge Dr. Who fan also. Need I say more?

To cap it all, the name is derived from the Silures tribe. Warlike celts from South Wales, from where my father’s side of the family originate.

“Games” just sounded more fun than “miniatures”, or “studios”, and hopefully someday the website will have more to offer than just miniatures. I have a set of rules for mass fantasy battles written, called “Rank and Rabble”. Once it’s typed up neatly, with a few piccies, I’ll offer it up as a free set.

 

The world in the Silurian

Sea scorpion of the Silurian

Original style Dr. Who Silurian

Some, lets call them Silures, about to knock the snot out of some Romans

A far more realistic Silures warrior!