SS120 Winged Demon

 

Having realised that this figure wasn't on Lost Minis Wiki I thought I'd do one...

The 'beak' doesn't look right on the painted version photo...

Bit clearer on the unpainted version!

Amazon army update

 Figures for new mould have arrived with Pete Brown. Meanwhile I've done everything I intend to on the army until it comes back - unless... MOULD UPDATE! -Pete has also posted it today! (23/10)

It wasn't intended to be this big, but it's still too small for a 'proper' Review.

The figures have been displayed in single ranks rather than my usual double ranks. Makes the army look bigger.

Cavalry are very much prototypes... the horse archer is hopefully going to be supplemented by actual conversions and the spear/shield cavalry tidied up a bit. I expect to do a couple more squadrons of spear/shield cavalry and at least one other horse archer squadron.

General reviewing the troops as she passes behind Pegasus. Although there was only one Pegasus in 'real' mythology I'll probably do a herd.

Another lot I'll probably extend. It could be quite spectacular. 

One thing I thought of but didn't do was use the Enchantress riding a tiger as a cavalry officer. Might consider that in future.

The Amazonia Zoo

 Living where I do, this could get confused with the Amazona Zoo in Cromer. However, that is spelt without the 'i', so they are different.

This army has a strong tiger element.

Only a very confident enchantress would dare to RIDE a tiger...

I've rebased the beast mistress from an 80mm base to a 60mm one - looks a lot better.

Finally decided to put 3 tigers on a base to act as beasts!

Pegasus had to be painted white... I'm never happy painting greys and here I think the photo (for once) looks better than the original!

Still messing with Amazon spears/javelins/cavalry... 

I'm very happy with the way the 20mm cavalry legs fit on a 25mm horse - so the Amazon top and Greek 20mm legs combination works well.

Still needs a bit of filing/filling, but this spear figure worked realy well - it's come out a bit taller and looks good!

Amazons with pointy sticks

Starting work trying to find an alternative to bow armed Amazons. Mainly two or three spear/javelin armed figures. Firstattempt is the simple method of cutting the fan of the slave girl with fan to a spear point.

After doing a few I accidentally cut a spear point 'wrong' and it looks better! So a couple more of these made for a mould.

Meanwhile also working on a heavier spear woman and a light javelin woman.

Still working on the proof of concept models - I'm giving the spear woman a complete cloak rather than the scarf of the original, I need to close the hands up and I'll be a bit more careful with the angle of the shields on the arms. Overall, looking good.

Zangiran infantry, SS89 and 90

I decided to do these as Bw(X), rank of spears in front of rank of archers on the same base. That just seemed to be the right way of basing these. Strangely, on this frontal view the second rank is very well hidden!

One thing I hadn't considered is that are quite compact - fitting them on 60mm deep bases  leaves a big gap behind them! 

I don't feel I had any choice in the colour scheme for this unit - red and black just seemed obvious. The shield looked a bit bare so I felt it needed something else - they're supposed to be golden dragons...

One thing I did do was only have 3 figures in the second rank. This was done so that they could fire through the gaps in the front rank - could have done four with one not 'protected'  but decided against that idea!

Tauran cavalry

Think I've been neglecting the S&S side recently - this lot had been undercoated for ages - finally decided to do something about them.

 

I need another unit of horse archers to go with them then start on some infantry.

Meanwhile I have also undercoated a unit of Hykran horse archers. Never know how to paint them so it should be interesting. What army they'll appear in is anybodies guess at the moment.

Cataplana Guard Cavalry

Not exactly replacements, just extras with an undamaged standard.

 

They seem to have turned out OK - the basic orange/green with yellow cloaks works better than I expected. On this unit, the helmet crest is a green dragon - next unit I'll probably do either a red or orange dragon!

Not sure why I painted eyes on the king. I don't usually, except for the Admins figures I've been painting. They don't look bad on the figure - certainly better than on the photos!

Anyway, that unit represents the last painting session of the year. The tree goes up soon covering my painting desk.

Other news, I sent a couple of 12" moulds to Pete Brown (the Mouldmaker) in Nottingham by 1st Class 24hr Tracked... hopefully so that he can cast the figures off  them them and put some of them on 9" moulds so I can cast them. Current Tracking situation for this 24hr delivery service? See below!

Tuesday 29 November 2022

03:35

Item Received

Sheffield MC

Monday 28 November 2022

18:39

Item Received

Peterborough MC

Saturday 26 November 2022

13:05

Item Collected

Wisbech DO

Thursday 24 November 2022

22:14

Sender despatching item

 

Testing my eyes ...

 By trying for a better paint job...

OK, Few bits I could do a bit better, but fine for starters.

For example, couple of minor white spots where I didn't quite get 100% coverage!

The figure in question is SS56, Priest of Matri from the S&S Range. I might try a few more like this and look a skirmish forces.

Vanha archers

Finally finished the Vanha archers. I've mounted them as (DBA classification) as 3Bw - they're only going to be used with HoTT rules in Fantasy battles and their are no skirmishers in Fantasy battles - everyone has a big sword and finishes up using it.  Having said that, if I ever get round to doing the javelin armed Vanha I'll probably put them on Ps bases. I've stuck to the basic Vanha 'green' scheme.


One thing I've never been is consistent. I did 18 of these on 6 bases, should have 12 on 4...

 

I mean, the spears are on 4 bases... 

With the swordsmen and possibly another spear unit (4 or 6 bases?) this will give the Vanha a reasonable infantry component. 

Being on a roll, I've also undercoated the swordsmen - these will make good Palace Guards and I'm actually thinking of red turbans.

Vanha Swordsman

During my recent spell of casting I had (continue to have) serious problems casting the Vanha archer. It became increasingly obvious that it wasn't viable any more. So a new mould is in order, but they're expensive and I needed morte than just an archer to justify the cost...

When I did Aquiland and Nemidian moulds I sorted an officer for them. OK, new project, Vanha officer. Basically cut the spear off a Vanha spearman and replace it with a suitable sword. I now have masters for Vanha swordsmen...

Not sure how well they'll cast though - the sword is very thin and doesn't do all that well when attached to other figures. I can but hope.

If you go down to the woods tonight...

It's a good idea to have some woods. As well as some general purpose dotted around the town trees.

So I've bought a load cheap Chinese trees.

Several different sizes up to 6" -  about 30 scale feet or so.  They cost £10.22 in total.

For this lot - 45 unbased trees. I'm basing them on 2p pieces.

Of course, a few monsters make the woods a bit scarier, so some Garrison S&S Tree Demons. Some of the flock has come off the trees in transit so I've glued some of it on the demons as added foliage.

A Liche Lord and 2 ladies

These ones look a lot better 'in the flesh' than they do in photos.

The RAFM Liche Lord in his tomb entrance seems to have been made from the same dolly as the Egyptian Queen figure. It seemed reasonable to group them together, and they really do look nice on the table.

 The Liche Lord with a couple of winged friends. 

These are two of the 'Egyptian' ladies - one painted 25 years ago, one a couple of weeks ago.  

These figures are some of my favourite RAFM figures - but a picture over twice the size of the  original figure does show up painting defects!

Egyptian Monstrosities

Plus another couple of views of a Manticore.

The sphinx is the one that arrived with the two right wings and has had them swapped with another figure that used the same wings.  I like the face, not sure about the body.

More ready painted toys pressed into service. The 'Nile Crocodile' is a bit iffy, but does the job, giant lizards and cobras just seem to be very useful.

One thing I don't worry about as much is base depths. Beasts are supposed to be 80mm deep, frankly, if 60mm looks more 'realistic' then I use 60mm.

More on Chinese dragons

As I said on an earlier post, I intended to get another Chinese dragon and probably paint it blue.

Done.

I've also put together a vaguely Oriental wizard element, shown here with both dragons. Note to self: do a better photo of these sometime!