Friday 29 April 2016

Citadel Judge Dredd Perps Part 2


Borag Thungg, Earthlet,
I finally got around to completing the the Angel Gang from citadel Judge Dredd miniatures range and thus finishing my own Judge Child Quest, this story to me has to be in my top ten of all Judge Dredd stories and many others believe that too. I am still putting more time into my faces and moving away from the previous comic book style I used on 2000AD miniatures, please enjoy my latest efforts.


The Angel Gang united once more


Up first we have Elmer 'Pa' Angelpatriarch of the family, this is a man who hasn't softened with old age, he taught his boys how to be darn mean and spends his time planning heinous crimes for his family to commit.


Pa Angel

Next up we have Junior AngelPa's favourite son and the youngest, most evil of the Angel gang, he loves to torture his victims before killing them. 

Junior Angel

Lastly we have that horrible evil little s**t the Judge Child, this monstrous freak used his psi powers to manipulate the Angel gang to do his bidding with his end goal being.... Ha! not telling you have to read the Judge Child Quest you will not be disappointed.


The Judge Child


 Another shot of the Angel Gang together again.
The Angel Gang


And for all you purists how are shouting where is the Fink, who is also a member of the Angel family although he was not part of the Judge Child storyline, well here he is I painted this one in the early 1990's and now can't decide whether to strip and repaint or just spruce him up a bit.

The Fink

I hope you enjoyed, Florix Grabundae
J

Friday 15 April 2016

Space Marine 30th Anniversary Tribute - LE2 Imperial Space Marine


Hello,
I am sure you are all well aware that it's the 30th anniversary of the (Citadel) Space Marine on 16th April and that Games Workshop will be selling their new celebratory updated version of the LE2 Imperial Space Marine on the weekend of 16th/17th April.  The world seemed to have gone beakie mad since the leak of the Imperial Space Marine miniature and many have dusted off their old Space Marine armies and posted photos of them for our enjoyment across the internet, so when I saw the rumour of this event over on a well known rumours website there was only one thing I could do, dive into the box of heavenly delights and pull out LE2 for a painting session in tribute to my old friend.

LE2 Imperial Space Marine

I painted him up in the colours of the Blood Drinkers chapter although in the Rogue Trader rulebook they do not have black shoulder pad but I thought black suited the gold studs better. Readers who don't remember these original Space Marines before the grimdark will notice that he has a sculpted on power plant on his back that was meant to be a flight pack back then, a large laser rifle with scope and blade and weird looking laser pistol both weapons are far from the weapons of Warhammer 40,000 today.  The real detail I love about this miniature is all the vent holes and computer devices attached to his armour and If you don't keep your paint thin there is a danger of filling in all these lovely details so beware.  
Here's some photos of my efforts.
LE2 Imperial Space Marine - front

LE2 Imperial Space Marine - front

LE2 Imperial Space Marine - side

LE2 Imperial Space Marine - back

Here's the new Games Workshop version for comparison, you see see they have been quite faithful to the original although the laser rifle and pistol now appear more like a bolter and bolt pistol, I like that the helmet studs are still present, I almost filed them off as flash :D 

I will probably buy one but it is a big shame that it's plastic. £18 price tag is extremely steep for a standard miniature, I think you could pick up LE2  Imperial Space Marine on eBay for about £4-5 and I advise you pay no more and just wait for hype to die off.
Games Workshops reimagining of the Imperial Space Marine


LE2 Imperial Space Marines appearing in the Rogue Trader rulebook on page 111 with the proto Land Raider.



And some gorgeous photos of LE2 Imperial Space Marines labelled as Deep Space Mercenaries from the legendary publication Heroes for Wargames (which own 3 copies of :S)


Blade removed from the marine on the right


A head swap on the Marine on the left makes him an excellent officer.  I think the origin of the head is still a mystery.

Last Note, LE10 Power Armoured Marine was really the first Citadel Space Marine for me, it was available in my Games Workshop for ages before we got our hands on a LE2 blister but I don't recall LE10 having a blister or LE code but that's how things were back then just crazy chaos, I may have got it via the mail order trolls which just adds to the confusion as some of my memories are a bit clouded.  (I will take a photo of my LE10 for you another time)

Anyway enough rambling on, I hope you enjoy your Space Marine 30th birthday weekend it's certainly been a trip down memory lane for me, 

Q. Now dare I paint the rest of the C100 Space Marines?

A. No! far too many projects on.

thanks now get following
J

Saturday 19 March 2016

Citadel Judge Dredd Perps Part 1

Borag Thungg, Earthlet,
The 2000AD comic has always been close it my heart and most nights I wind down in bed reading one of the collected works books from the likes of Titan or Rebellion books, so this week I went through the myriad of undercoated miniatures I have queued up and dug out some citadel Judge Dredd miniatures. I tried to keep to my  previous cartoony style of painting these miniatures trying to emulate the colour and feel of the comic strips although I did take a little more time on the faces.

Firstly we have Link Angel, a member of the Angel Gang described by Mean as "too dumb to know how bad he is".

Link Angel
Link Angel - front
Link Angel - back

Next up we have his brother crazed cyborg Mean ‘Machine’ Angel, another of the Angel Gang and arch enemy of Judge Dredd, for such a simple character with only one real gimmick the head butt, he has entertained us for years in 2000AD stories. This miniature is based Mean’s first outing in the ‘The Judge Child Quest’ where is left arm is blasted off by Judge Dredd in prog 178.

Mean Machine Angel
Mean Machine Angel - front
Mean Machine Angel - Back

Drew is a NPC from the Judge Dredd RPG adventure supplementSlaughter Margin’, the miniature is a variant of the Perp Rizlo Butty, variant miniatures were a common feature of the Judge Dredd range and many of the miniatures were used as base models for the Rogue Trader Imperial Army range as well as citadel other ranges.

Drew (Slaughter Margin NPC)
Drew - front
Drew - back

Mek, another character from the ‘Slaughter Margin’ adventure, this miniature eventually made it's way into the Rogue Trader Imperial Army blisters and appeared on the second Rogue Trader flyer as an Imperial Assault trooper accompanied by a Robodog another Slaughter Margin NPC.  This one is a real ugly resculpt and it appears to be based on an old C100 Rogue Trader marine which one is still yet to be identified.

Rogue Trader Imperial Assault Trooper (Mek) & Robo-Dog (Mega-Hound)

Mek (Slaughter Margin NPC)

Mek - front
Mek - back

Judge Pike, a variant of the Spit Gun Suzi Perp miniature, She wields a Lawgiver mark 1 which any Dredd fan knows for a Perp that is very unwise so I assume she is a member of the Wally squad, whacky dressed to fit in with the futsies of Mega-city one 

Judge Pike


If anyone has a PDF copy of the Slaughter Margin adventure I would be very happy to hear from you, I don’t fancy tearing the loft apart looking for it.


Florix Grabundae for visiting, enjoy
J



Wednesday 16 March 2016

PARA3 Bots - Paranoia Robots

++ The Computer is your friend, all hail The Computer! Zzzzt! ++

I recently started some work on my recently Dettol and acetone stripped Paranoia Robots, many of you may remember during Golden Age of Citadel miniatures 1979-92, around 1986 Games Workshop held the licence to produce the Paranoia RPG game and accompanying miniatures, well I am lucky enough to own nearly all of these miniatures stashed well away with my citadel Judge Dredd miniatures.  Apart from the High Programmer the robots were the highlight of the range and it’s fair to say all the miniatures were perfect for the Games Workshop Judge Dredd RPG and could supplement other Sci-Fi games that swamped the oversubscribed market at the time.

Game wise If you were lucky enough to stay alive for more than 15 minutes and make it through the briefing, passed R&D pickup and out into a corridor you were likely to encounter one of the insane marauding robots that populated Alpha Complex attacking any unexpecting troubleshooter coming into sensory range. (my clones would rarely make it passed the briefing and during one campaign the GM had to increase our clones from 5 to 10, I was not grovelling to The Computer enough apparently)

There are 8 robots in the Citadel Paranoia range, these were supplied as two part models with an upper torso and lower section, the latter being the mode of transport, Hover Base, Robot Legs, Tracked Base and a Wheeled Base.  Adding one of the upper torso sections to your lower mode of transport gave you many configurations.

Jackobot
Scrubot
Docbot
Securobot
Funbot Sm-i-ly
Combot RR-7
Docbot 674-9
Mechbot

Here are the first 3 I have completed and there will be more following soon, Jackobot with wheeled base, Scrubot with robot legs and Docbot with robot leg, the are not the greatest of sculpts but they do have a lot of character.

Over the years I have picked up many robot miniatures for games like Paranoia from SFD/Slocombe warbots to Robo Rally board game robots, hoping that one day I would be able to play a robot rebellion game of Rogue Trader.

I am thinking of digging out my metal and plastic citadel Dr Who range Daleks, K9 and Davros for the legendary Rogue Trader vs Paranoia crossover scenario that appeared in White Dwarf 112 entitled "Vulture Warriors from Dimension X Meet Plenty of Cheerful Orks with Plasma Cannon" (VWDXMPCOPC).

Well enough rambling on, please enjoy my painting efforts, the miniatures with the white background are new test shots using my new portable photo studio, any feedback is welcome :)

Docbot
Docbot - front
Docbot - back
Scrubot
Scrubot - front
Scrubot - back
Jackobot
Jackobot - front
Jackobot - back

I hope you enjoyed this post, plenty more to come so get following :)

Tuesday 8 March 2016

Chainsword Warrior

Hello Friends, I dropped by my local Games Workshop Birmingham UK the other day to take a look at the new Deathwatch Overkill miniatures as I found the Chaos Cultists sculpts in the Warhammer 40K Dark Vengeance were a bit of a let down so once bitten twice shy, I am happy to say that although not perfect they are much better, I then asked the duty manager of the shop to indulge me and  take a photo of yours truly holding the gigantic Chainsword displayed in the shop window, I was surprised that he said he had never handled the Chainsword before as if I worked there I would be swinging it around all the time. You cannot knock the customer service you get at Games Workshop stores and this post is a thumbs up to those people (although they have no clue about the Oldhammer miniatures I talk about when asked what I am working on). It is a great shame the footfall is falling but I blame the product, super overpriced and well out of pocket money range, sadly miniature collecting is no longer where the teenage paperboy can afford to spend his hard earned money.

Please enjoy this photo of me before I go about shredding the heresy littering the walls, I came out with some new brushes at an extortionate cost so it works out about even. :D



enjoy 
J

Friday 4 March 2016

New Chaos Beastman Gallery

Hello again,
I am on a bit of a roll and have added a new Chaos Beastman Gallery a showcase and reference for all my painted Oldhammer era Chaos Beastman Miniatures, more miniatures will be uploaded and added soon.

I am really getting the hang of this so expect more galleries to appear when I get some spare time.







Thursday 3 March 2016

New Rogue Trader Gallery

Hi Folks,
Please enjoy my new Rogue Trader Gallery a one stop page for all my painted Rogue Trader Miniatures, more miniatures will be uploaded and added soon :)





Thursday 18 February 2016

Paint Pot Restoration - Citadel Colour & Wargames Foundry Paints

Hi Friends, while I am still finishing off a whole bunch of miniatures for this blog and I thought I should share this easy paint pot restoration technique with you.

Now If you been painting Citadel miniatures like I have since the early 1980's you may have amassed quite a number of paints, I myself am probably nearing the 200 mark and although I mainly use Vallejo Model Color nowadays but on occasions I still go back to my Golden Age (pre 1992) Citadel Colour ranges and much has been blogged about these superb paints

I still own all the Citadel Colour paints sets and 95% of the paints are still close to full and in good working order the only problem is the many of the lids are broken and on ones that I have not opened for 20 years the plastic can be a bit brittle and snap forcing me to then prise the lid open with a screwdriver.

All the abuse during painting can lead to the ugly pots of beloved paint and the possibly of air drying your paints up so I went looking for a solution.

Now everybody knows that the original Citadel Colour range is still available now as the Coat D'Arms colour range but I didn't want to replace my original paints I wanted to revive them so I went looking for replacement pots, originally I wanted to transfer all my Citadel Colour into pipette type bottle like Vallejo paints but this was going to a lot of hard work and I am limited to about 4 hours a week painting time at the moment.

Anyway did a bit of Googling for a replacement pot solution and first came across these...

Coat D'Arms Empty Paint Pot Deal for £6.00 for 10

Coat D'Arms Paint Pot Lid for 0.15p each

Now the above solution looked a bit expensive once I had added the £3.50 P&P and when I have about 100 Citadel Colour paints with the white lids and then I came across these on eBay from a craft supplies seller...

Ebay 20 Empty Paint Pots for £7.55 (Buy it now) with Free P&P

I ordered 20 and tested them and they were perfect, in most cases I only have only needed to rip the old battered lid of and firmly push new lid on then I was left with a fully restored citadel colour pot.

Big bag of empty pots arrives at my workstation

Classic Citadel Hawk Turquoise was the first to get a make over as the lid shattered on me the other night and it was in danger of drying out.
Some of my Citadel Colour in retirement
And a few more waiting for a make over
This technique also works great with Wargames Foundry paints which surprisingly all the lids on mine were terribly broken and cracked now these are great paints which I use often so it probably just wear and tear rather than a fault with the product.


Wargames Foundry paints really did need saving and are now restored good as new

thanks for visiting now get painting... and following this blog 
cheers
J




Thursday 14 January 2016

Rogue Trader - Space Dark Elf Trooper


Hello Friends,
My latest painted miniature is the Space Dark Elf Trooper who was released on the Warhammer 40,00 Rogue Trader March 1987 mail order flyer along with other famous rarities like the Piscean (Saharduin) warrior and the Imperial Bodyguard. A good example of the original miniature can be seen here.

It was an enjoyable miniature to paint and I went with a purple/violet scheme as I done with previous Dark Eldar projects, I think it brings out their malevolence, it is certainly an interesting miniature covered in intricate pipes, tubes and bands which required lots of concentration to paint neatly. His weapon resembles a Flamer but could also be some sort of Shuriken Catapult if that's what you like, his armour is mesh (chainmail) and carapace plates and he is equipped with a power pack for his armour/weapon or some sort of flight pack.

I would probably say the detailing on the sculpt was probably the reason the Space Dark Eldar did not get it's own range, all that tubing must have been tough to cast and must off lead to lots of failed miniatures, I think all examples of miniature I have seen the tubing has small breaks and missing bits in random areas.

Space Dark Elf Trooper - sideview
Space Dark Elf Trooper - front
Space Dark Elf Trooper - sideview
Space Dark Elf Trooper - back

More random miniatures in the pipeline so stay tuned

WIP my current projects

I hope you enjoyed this post so get following
thanks
J