When Contrast Met Conquest: Space Marine Scouts

Good morning/afternoon/evening everyone!

When the list of Conquest issue contents came in, I bemoaned the fact that, amongst all the shiny new models that were being used in the set, they were including such older models such as Space Marine Scouts, Bikers, etc. These slots could easily have been filled with new models (a set of Rievers to replace the Scouts, for instance) especially as there have been recent releases (the new Vanguard Primaris, particularly) that would have been ideal to fill those slots. It just felt like a bit of a swizz to be using these old models  (and we're talking 20+ years old in some cases) alongside the new. So I'd pretty much written off the Bikers and Scouts, etc. and planned to dump them in the Crates of Unpainted Delights, to be used as conversion fodder or sold off on Ebay.
The Real Life happened.
Regular readers of this blog will know that, since the beginning of June (when I decided to make much more of the blog with all the new content) my painting output has been catastrophic. While I've managed to more or less keep up with blog posts in spare minutes here and there, a new job and family matters have meant I've fallen way behind on my commissions and personal projects.
"But what does this have to do with the Scouts?" I hear you ask.*
Well, as I was unwrapping the figures from the magazine an idea struck me. I had the upcoming evening free. The Better Half would be working overnight, and I like to use that time to get out to visit Eddie McSheddie.** I was wondering what I could do with that time. I really needed to catch up on my commission work. My competition pieces have gone out the window (apart from Eadbanger- there's still time for that...) and I really need to update on the projects that I started on the blog. Then I thought, what I really need was a bit of a palette-cleanser. Something I could bash out, start to finish, in one night, just to refresh the old brushes. If I'm honest, I could also use a bit of a soul-cleanser, too. The last few weeks, things have built up quite a bit, and have been taking a bit of an emotional toll on me. What I really needed was a bit of a night off, to just chill, and paint for fun. And I looked at the Scouts and thought, "Hmmm."***
So, I decided to get the Scouts and go from sprue to finished models in one evening. It's not entirely a cathartic exercise. I can use the models as part of a Kill Team and I can get an article for the blog out of it too. And it'll be a good little exercise in using the Contrast paints the way they were intended.
After looking through the Kill Team rulebook, and consulting the online forums, I realised that the shotguns and heavy bolter were not the ideal loadout for a Scout Kill Team. The generally accepted best loadout seems to be bolters or bolt pistol/knife combo, with a missile launcher. This put a bit of a crimp in my plans as a) the heavy weapon on the sprue is the heavy bolter and b) I really liked the idea of fitting them with shotguns, just for the look of it. then I realised that we'd be getting the missile launcher with the sniper sprue later in the collection, which solve problem a- I could simply paint up the missile launcher guy later, and use either/both as necessary. As for problem b? Rule of cool prevailed, I'm afraid. I wanted those shotguns and, if they turned out to be hopeless in-game then, well, i was never planning on playing competitively anyway and, again, I could always add a couple of bolter guys using the sniper sprue later.
the only thing left to decide on was the colour scheme. What chapter to do? And for this, I decided on Ultramarines. I know people say they're boring but the blue and grey (yes, I know Scout fatigues are supposed to be bone white, not grey white but grey looks better, so there...) colour scheme looks great on scouts and the Codex Discipline Chapter Tactic from Kill Team: Elites really appeals, and will work really well with Scouts, I think. Besides, it wasn't as if I was short of other Astartes to paint in different chapter colours. Plus, it meant there was no need to do any conversions to make them look more chapter-specific. I could do them straight from the sprue, which is what I wanted to do.
So, there we have it. An evening of free painting, five Scouts to blat through. Off we go.

I thought it would be fun to see exactly how long it took to get these guys from sprue to an acceptable tabletop standard (or "Battle Ready" as GW insist on calling it) so I'm going to time them closely and, to prove I'm not fudging the numbers, I'll photograph them next to the clock at each stage. So, here's the starting point, with the unpainted, unassembled sprues ready to go.

Okay, they're assembled and primed with Grey Seer spray. I've selected the colours to use (all Contrast):
Armour: Ultramarines Blue
Fatigues: Space Wolves Grey
Rubber, gun casings and metal: Black Templar (I'll use two coats on the hard gun casings to get a proper black)
Skin: Guilliman Flesh and Fyreslayer Flesh
Hair: Gore-Grunta Fur and Cygor Brown

Prepping these models for painting really shows their age. The edges of the armour plates are soft and rounded, sections merge into each other (this is particularly evident where the fatigues meet the pauldrons) and all the detail is soft, as if ever so slightly melted. And the mould lines are just awful. It's clear that the moulds for these models are well past their prime and this is a clear indication that these models need to be retired from the range. Compared to the clean, crisp castings of current ranges, these look like children's toys. As much as I'm glad that I've got these, so I can do what I'm doing, I have to again wonder why they were included in the collection. Anyway, just over two hours after I started (I'm calling it two hours dead, as there was a couple of minutes while I got an audiobook ready to listen to (I'm starting the Horus Heresy again) and there was a cat-related interruption...), they are ready for painting.

After a coffee break and a bit of fuss with the cat I started painting again at bang on midnight so what you are seeing here is the result of just shy of three hours painting with the colours mentioned above. Of course as with the previous batch of models I did with the Contrast paints, they don't stand up to close scrutiny but they are perfectly usable as tabletop miniatures, purely for gaming, and there would be no shame in stopping right there. That's the great thing about these new paints. They really do save a lot of time getting the models to this stage. With traditional paints, I'd have to have done a base coat (which would have taken longer than applying the Contrast paints, as traditional paints don't flow as well, meaning they take longer to apply, getting them into all the recesses and tight spots) and a wash to get them to this stage. At five hours from sprue to done, I'm not complaining.

Of course, I'm not going to stop there. At a later date (probably when we have the second set of Scouts from the collection) I will go back and finish them off with some highlights. But, for now, they'll do. They just need a coat of varnish and they can go away in the figure case until I need them. One issue down, 34 to go...



*Also, "Stop rambling and get to the point!" Was shouted from the back...
**It's growing on me, but I'd still like suggestions for a better name.
***No kidding, I actually stood in the kitchen, holding the sprue in my left hand, and stood in the thinking pose, right hand on my chin, my index finger tapping my top lip...

Monday's Random Stuff Post.

Good morning/afternoon/evening everyone!

Well, it's time for the weekly WIP and, once again, it's a big hatful of nothing. For the second week in a row I've been unable to get anywhere near the painting desk. Unfortunately The Real World continues to throw challenges in my way. Once again, I hope things will settle down this week but you know what they say about hope, and good intentions...
Anyway, enough of that. Let's have a loo at a couple of things that have popped up in my feed this week.
Did you think that Firefly ended too abruptly?* Ever fancied writing your own adventures for Mal and the crew? Well, now's your chance. Gale Force Nine are offering a fantastic prize of loads of Firefly Adventures stuff. All you have to do is come up with a job for the crew. Head on over to their Facebook page for more information.
Fancy applying for something more permanent? Privateer Press are looking for entry level staff. Some of the biggest names in the industry started out in retail, warehousing and similar jobs. If you fancy a foot in the door of the industry, this could be the perfect opportunity for you.
I'm afraid that's all there is from me today. Hopefully, next week, I'll actually have some proper updates for you. If you want a bit more reading, there's an update on the Stuff Of Legends page. In the meantime I'll leave you with a couple of pictures of a well-known dwarf...


***UPDATE***

A couple of hours after I published this post originally, in the early hours of Monday morning, I received a phone call from the hospital telling me my dad had lost his battle with pneumonia and had passed away during the night. As you can imagine, because of this there's likely to be some disruption to my blogging schedule for the next couple of weeks. I ask you to please be patient with me, and normal service will be resumed as soon as possible.

Thanks for reading!
-Stu






*What a stupid question...

Eldar Phantom Titan: A Bit Of Legwork

Good morning/afternoon/evening everyone!

I thought it was a good idea to update on progress on the Phantom Titan. In the last post, I was talking about putting the base elements together. Now it was time to start work on the Titan itself...

Having got the main elements of the base in place, I was now able to start positioning the legs and feet. I knew that the right foot would be resting on the broken cannon arm and the angle of that cannon presented some difficulties. It would take a lot of fiddling, and a great deal of swearing and quite a lot of Blu-Tak to get the positioning right. The trouble is, there are so many parts in the feet and legs, an I couldn't risk gluing them until I was certain of the positioning,* hence the copious amounts of Blu-Tak. After quite a bit of adjustment, I managed to get the feet into a position where I could glue them together and a couple of pins** were inserted into the bottom of the feet, with corresponding holes drilled in the base, although the feet weren't glued to the base.

When it came to assembling the legs, pins were put through the hips into the groin section and through each side of the knee joints. The knees were also strengthened with pins from the knees into the upper and lower legs. Multiple pins were used to attach the legs to the foot assemblies. You can see, in the photographs, where the holes for the pins were filled with green stuff.

Finally, all was assembled and the whole thing was made secure. I then filled in the base with some ground-shaping using Das modelling clay, with some stones mixed in to give some texture.


The entire leg assembly is not fixed in place yet, for ease of painting later, and to make it easy to transport the finished model.

So, next job would be to put together the body sections. That'll be in the next instalment...
Thanks for reading!
-Stu

*I'd already made the mistake of gluing a couple of bits together, thinking that I could just pull them apart and reposition them. It turned out that the superglue I was using was remarkably effective, remarkably quickly...
**When I say pins, I actually used rivets, with the heads cut off. Strong, easy to clip to size, and easy to get hold of from your local hardware store...

Using Contrast Paints Part 1: Back To Basics

Good morning/afternoon/evening everyone!

It's taken me a while, but I've finally had the chance to sit down and get some work done with the Contrast Paints from GW, have a play with them and see what I think. There's been a lot of discussion about these new paints over the last few weeks. Some love them, some hate them*, some see them as a gimmick, some as an essential new way of doing things, some as an overhyped bit of money for old rope. I see them as a useful tool, with many applications, some less obvious than others.
Whatever your opinion of them, it's undeniable that these new paints have caused a stir and, as there is so much to be said about them, I didn't want to just rush off a quick overview and be done with it so, over the next few weeks, I'll be looking closely at them and, hopefully, providing some useful insights as to what they can be used for.

With that in mind, I thought I'd start at the very basic level. GW have marketed these new paints as a way of banishing the grey hordes and getting your miniatures painted quickly and effectively,  a way for even the world's least proficient painters, or those who really don't enjoy the process, to get armies ready for the tabletop. So I thought I'd put that idea to the test. I grabbed a random selection of miniatures from the deepest, darkest recesses of my Cupboard of Unpainted Wonders and tried to put myself in the position of a complete novice who's bought his first box of miniatures, paints and gubbinz and is launching himself into "The Hobby" for the first time. My goal with these miniatures was to paint them as fast as possible. I wasn't going to worry about tidying up mistakes, worry too much about getting things "within the lines" or care about creating any sort of masterpiece. The goal was to get some figures on the table as fast as possible. I should note, I had an ulterior motive for this. At my FLGS I've been running a few taster sessions to show off these new paints and I knew that some people who would be coming along would never have picked up a paintbrush in their lives before. The models I was going to show them had to be exactly the sort of things people like that could produce and be happy with. Here's the results of my efforts. All these models were painted with a single coat of each colour, over either the Wraithbone or Grey Seer spray primer.



I think you can all agree they look pretty rough and ready and, by my standards, fairly bloody awful. But that's not the point. For a ten-year old, painting their first figures, they're going to look great. On the battlefield, they're going to do just fine. The real point is, though, each one took me less than ten minutes to do. Some of them closer to five. That means that I could bash out a whole unit in an evening. "So what?" I hear you cry, "I can do that with traditional paints." Well, yes, of course you can but I can guarantee you aren't going to get results that look as good as this in the same time using traditional methods. You'd need at least to do a flat basecoat then a wash to get miniatures that look like these and that's going to take you longer. Even just doing a flat basecoat will take longer than these as the way the paint flows goes a long way towards speeding up that process.
There are a couple of issues. Some colours, the really dark ones especially (Black Templar, Cygor Brown) may need thinning slightly with the Contrast Medium to stop them being too opaque. You have to bee quite liberal with the paints and allow them to flow. This can mean getting paint on areas where you don't want it and makes doing small details difficult. Also, you need to use them quite fast and plan out your route across the model, so as to avoid tidemarks forming. Pooling is an issue, too. Obviously, some pooling is required for them to do their job, but care needs to be taken to avoid too much pooling, as this can result in a patchy finish. You also need to look out for tiny air bubbles between details, as these can dry as unpainted patches. Knowing how much to use, and how to use it, comes, like with anything, with practice but even the most inexperienced or cack-handed painter is going to find themselves producing serviceable results in no time.
So, for the beginner, those with more miniatures than time, those who find painting a chore, or those who may not be skilled with a brush, these paints are going to do exactly what their makers have said they will- banish the grey and get those collections painted. But this is just the barest hint of what these paints can be used for. As with any tool, Contrast has many uses and, over the next few weeks, I'll be demonstrating that there's more to ways to make use of these new colours than just slapping them on.
I'd love to have your feedback on this so please feel free to comment. Also, if there's any aspect of painting (with Contrast or without) that you'd like me to cover, please let me know.

Thanks for reading!
-Stu

PS: I'm doing one of the demos of these paints Saturday 6th July from 10am-3pm at That Little Craft Shop in Minehead, where you'll be able to see these figures and try out the paints for yourselves. If you're in the area (unlikely, I know, but you never know) then pop along and see what you think.








*some even managed to hate them before even trying them...fancy that?!!