The May Update - James' Hobby Progress

And just like that May's over and done with. I've been finding the days have been flying by staying at home. Once again however it has meant lots and lots of time for hobby. In my last post I detailed what I'd managed to paint in April, working through a few backlog goals I'd set myself at the beginning of lock down to try and keep myself productive. Now that May is in the bag I wanted to do the same again. So what have I finished?

The big goal for May was to finish off the hostiles from Blackstone Fortress. I only had 3 models left to do, the Chaos Space Marine sand their dread leader Obsidius Mallex. Before painting them I decided I wanted to challenge myself with the models and so set about trying to paint them to an 'Eavy Metal standard, that is to say nice smooth blends, crisp highlights and extra detailing on surfaces like scratches and OSL. My long term painting goal has always been to get to an 'Eavy Metal standard on a Space Marine. If I can achieve that then I'll be a very happy man. As I've been painting consistently for over a year now I figured it would be a good time to push myself and see where I'm at skill wise on these models. There's a lot of fine detail to pick out, as well as variable textures so I'd be pushed to get to a similar standard as the folks in the Citadel team.

Up first were the two Chaos Space Marines. I figured I'd use these guys as a practice before moving onto the big bad himself. 

As you can see I elected to stick pretty closely to the studio paint job, only variating colours where I thought necessary (aka couldn't work out what the hell the 'Eavy Metal used). I've put a few close ups of the models down below to show a bit of the detail but overall I'm very happy with the end product. 

I definitely think it's a step up from any painting I've done before but already I can see a few areas that need work, most notably my edge highlighting. The lines around the armour aren't as crisp as I'd like and I still need to work on establishing the transition from chunky highlight to edge highlight. That however is something I can only get better at with practice and is something I'm eager to spend more time doing. Perhaps I'll need to collect more marines in the future!

There are however plenty of points I'm very happy with on these marines. I think I've done a good job establishing blends on the fabric and metallics. I wanted to try painting the "warp gold" that GW have used on all their Black Legion models and think I emulated the colour well. It's been good practice using standard paints as washes as well as it's given me a good insight into how powerful a tool they can be. 

After the marines I moved onto Big Chungus himself, Obsidius Mallex. The practice on the two marines prior helped me to speed through him a bit faster but there were a few new areas to work out. The cloak in particular had me stumped for a bit working out the best colour to use. In the end I settled for giving the fur a nice bright and warm contrast compared to the overall cool look of the rest of the model, which I think works really well. 

There's again some bits I'm not too happy with, the face being one of them, but I feel a lot of that just comes down to brush control and practice, practice and more practice. I think I'm also going to look into improving my photo set up. The lamp I've got at the moment is amazing for painting but it tends to bleach the colours on the models a bit too much. 

So with those three models done I've completed the hostiles from Blackstone Fortress and with it one more of my goals for lockdown. I've also added a few more pieces of completed scenery to my Warcry set, so lets check in on my progress

James' Hobby To Do List
- Assemble the Dreaded Ambull expansion  - Done!
- Assemble all Necromunda terrain from Dark Uprising - 40% complete
- Paint all of the hostile miniatures for Blackstone Fortress - Done!
- Paint all terrain from the Warcry starter box - 80% complete
- Decide on paint schemes for my Imperial Knights and Necromunda gangs - Done!

Not too shabby for two months work if I do say so. The only things left to do on the list are some work on terrain. However there's a spanner that's been thrown in the works, I've unfortunately been forced to move homes and as a result have lost pretty much all my old hobby space which is going to slow me down a bit. I'll keep the list going just because it's a good way to keep me going back to kits I've left untouched for too long, but my progress is definitely going to slow. 

There's also another reason I won't be paying as much attention to my To Do List as previous, but you'll have to look out for another post on that. Long mentioned rumours of 9th edition 40k have been confirmed and with it, our groups desire for another Tale of Five Wargamers has been stoked. The Xenos prepare for war....

Until next time,

James