Thursday, December 30, 2010

Blood Angels old school Libriarian.

Hello! I have just received my Lightbox and I had some pictures taken to see how it works. Its quite big, meaning that I can finally take all my big stuff photographed but I have to play some more with the camera and the light!



This is one of my latest paintjobs, and the result of my new photo settings. I have to make a new background though, until then the pure white will have to do.



I would love to hear what you think, especially on the quality of the picture as I am working hard to improve on that section... ah and as always take some time to leave me a vote on CoolMiniOrNot ;)

Saturday, December 25, 2010

Merry Christmas!!

I would like to wish to everybody the Merriest Christmas of all. Hope that you got all the presents that you wanted and to be with all your loved ones!!

Tuesday, December 21, 2010

waiting my lightbox...

Hi all!

I just wanted you to know that I have bought a new lightbox and I have halted all new photo taking waiting for its arrival. I'm kinda sick on how bad my pictures are and I am trying to improve them, so I thought that this little fella would actually help...


Waiting to be photographed are the freshly painted additions to the Blood Angels commission I am working on, an old skool librarian on foot and a libby with jump pack. I am also building up my Imperial Fists so more to be expected on this field too!

Thursday, December 9, 2010

My Land Raider featured in FTW and House Of Paincakes!!

Just a quick snippet of info today, I wanted to share the fact that My Land Raider is featured in FTW Top Ten for the week as well as In the House Of Paincakes Weekly Top X where there is a great review as well ...

Happy Dance commence XD XD

Friday, December 3, 2010

Another Land Raider storms in

I have told you that I was preparing another post from my finished models in my Imperial Fists Army and here I am again with another Land Raider, the classic version this time!



This one features more Forgeworld goodness in the form of extra armor and Terminator markings in the doors. I just love these upgrade packs, they give so much flavour to an already great model that the Land Raider is.



Hopefully I'm done with the Land Raiders for the time being and I will focus on finishing more stuff from the army, mainly the Terminators that definately need some love! I have also almost finished my Land Speeder so keep an eye for this little bugger too!

As always please take some time to leave me a vote in CoolMiniOrNot and of course I would love to hear what you think!

Saturday, November 27, 2010

Imperial Fists Land Raider Crusader



I finally managed to get some time to take some pictures of my finished Imperial Fists models starting with the Land Raider Crusader. Great model and really fun to paint, I kinda don't like the fact that its the older metal version because the hurricane bolters were a pain to assemble and they don't have any kind of friction holding them in place resulting on a floppy sponson movement every time I try to move the model around, but I really like the side winged scull motif.



The model also features the ForgeWorld Imperial Fists doors and I think that these doors are a must to every Space Marines Vehicle around. I really love the way they transform the model to a shrine!

So I would really like to hear your comments and of course if you have some time to leave me a vote as always on CoolMiniOrNot . Don't forget to keep an eye on my other Land Raider later on this week when I get the chance to take some more pictures! 

Tuesday, November 23, 2010

For Dorn and Terra!

And thus another Tournament Sunday ends leaving me with the sweetest memories! As promised I am back to post some great pics from yesterday's Genocide Chronicles that I took part with my Imperial Fists and my new 40K friends.

3 great battles, 2 victories, 1 draw and a helluva time was yesterday's aftermath. Great place to play, wonderful terrain (although a little scarce on some places) and great gamers to interact! Anything more for a wargamer to ask? Let me give some details on the whole event

1st battle was with the new Dark Eldar and I was kinda worried on how to face them since I knew but little on this list...Loads of witches on fast raiders, Helions with the new Baron fella, loads of dark lances and Mr Absdurbael (I hope to spell it right... :P ) himself leading the fray! The highlights on this battle have to be my scouts that took down the 2 Talos before they could cause any harm and of course Lysander that eventually took Absdurbael down in the last turn of close combat. Unfortunately got carried away by the massacre in the close combat and failed to capture the opponent's objective and the game ended up in a tie... (although I won in VPs count).



I must say that the terrain was also really great! Although impractical in gaming terms in some occasions, it really got me into the mood!

2nd Battle was with Daemons. Thats an army that I know some things about and I was kinda confident when the matchups came along. But a game is a game and nothing is certain on how it will end up. The list was quite powerful with 2 Bloodthirsters, Kharnak and a pack full of hounds horrors, flamers and 2 Daemon Princes... I was really hoping for the Chaos Gods to continue being fickle as they were usually with this Codex! The game had its ups and downs with things being really balanced in most parts of it but I managed to turn the tides on the last turn scoring 3 more kill points and winning eventually a rather insecure game. This should teach me being overconfident...


I should also point out the fact that the Daemon army was a real beauty to see. Really well painted and I really enjoyed playing with it, no wonder it won the best painted army award in the end (more on this later)

3rd Battle was with the Eldar. I don't know how this happens but it seems that in EVERY Tournament no matter how many players are playing with them, I ALWAYS get to play with at least 1 Eldar army... it is as someone sets this up and I must say that my statistics are not the best against the pointed ears... but this time it was different. A rather unusual army list consisting of loads of jetbikes, shining spears (boy I haven't seen those fellas in ages) fire dragons, dire avengers and the Avatar. The highlight of this match has to be the lonely Terminator that after successfuly survived for 4 rounds of combat with the Avatar, eventually hammered the Eldar god to the ground! Victory for me again and a surpisingly easy one as well... I'm slowly starting to get over my Eldar phobia.



Overall our team finished 4th with a point difference from the third one, really nice result considering the fact that we had to face some of the top players in Greece!

Last but not least was the best painted army contest. I was nominated for best painted although my army is far from finished, I had some units just painted the minimum 3 colours for the requirements of the tournament. I lost to the great daemon army that I played with in the 2nd battle, a fair result. Hopefully when I finish mine I will get it next Tourney ;) Here are some pics of the finalists for the best painted army;



The winning best painted army!

So there you go, If you look closely you can get a glimpse of some things I finished painting for my Fists, I'm in the process of getting pictures, so stay tuned to see more yellow madness coming up!

Friday, November 19, 2010

Painting frenzy!!

Hello once again! This will be a short one just to let everyone know that I am still alive and that I am currently painting like a maniac (hmm that one sounded a lot like Metallica's all time favourite... ) to try and finish my Imperial Fists army till Sunday... yup you heard it right, there is a great tourney gig going on that I will take part in and I am trying to have a Tournament legal painted army! Yup I know that its a really big task but I am kinda moving fast. So far both Land Raiders are finished and I am in a good place with my Land Speeder, the Termies and the Drop Pod... I promise that as soon as the Tourney is over I will post pics of my Army as well as the games of the Tournament as always, so give me a couple more days!

Sunday, November 7, 2010

Blood Angels Techmarine with Servo Harness

Hello everyone!



This time I have another piece of the Blood Angels commission I am currently working on these days, a Tech Marine with servo harness. A great model but there are so much going on that I think it may be a little over the top.



I have also painted the limited edition piece in the past, you can check him out in CoolMiniOrNot.

I'm pretty much pleased with how it came out, as always photographing red is a complete nightmaire. Anywayz, tell me what you think and maybe leave me a vote as always! ;)

Saturday, October 23, 2010

Skaven Plague Furnace finished!!

How many of you are familiar with Murphy's Law ? The main concept of this law is that nothing is as easy as it seems, and it definately applies with this model too!

Following my latest post I have decided to rebuild my Skaven army and I thought that this would be a somewhat easy task, having all this wood and metal and skaven fur to paint... little did I know when I was undercoating this monstrosity.

Clan Pestilens was always one of my favourite skaven clans. My army lists always include at least one unit of crazed plague monks. The latest book of Skaven gave me one more good reason to include even more of these fellas, and that was the almighty Plague Furnace! I've played several games with this crazy warmachine and I must say that each game would manage to surprise me in a good way. But I always included it as a proxy, using the screaming bell model, although I had the kit laying around somewhere in my closet.

First of all I must say that this is a magnificent model. It has to be one of the best plastic kits GW has ever produced. Everything sceams in detail and motion. Its like watching an animated film come to life. But all this come with a price in terms of difficulty. When I realised all the amount of tiny details this model had, I knew that this wouldn't be as easy as I originally thought it would be, but then again, I always loved pesky and difficult models. Either way this would be a centerpiece to the army and it deserved all the attention I could give it!

So here it is in all its fuming glory... the Plague Furnace;


I am generally happy with how the model turned out. As always I am not happy with the picture but I think I am improving in this field, hopefully I will manage to get decent pictures one day :P 

I would really like to hear what you think and see your votes in CoolMiniOrNot as usual!

Wednesday, October 20, 2010

revisiting the Fantasy chain of events... one rat at a time!

Do you get that feeling once in a while that some seemingly different events can lead to a chain effect and eventually lead you to get decisions that you wouldn't otherwise?

Don't get so serious all of a sudden, this blog won't change its subject to some philosophical rumbling of some sort ... but I just had to share the chain of events that lead to what seems to be my next model (or rather project) to come...



Firstly I have to say a great thanks to PapaJJ for his great Skaven (and ork) gift a couple of months ago, that really got me again on to thinking more out of my 40K box, more on this in future posts...

Secondly, last Saturday I decided to dig my Fantasy books and stuff and arrange a battle with a good friend of mine. Its been quite a while since the new edition hit the shelves but this would be only my 3rd battle with the new rules This would be a great 2000 pts one since the previous 3 were only 500pts test battles. Anyways, as you may have already known, I have quite a few Fantasy armies (including a massive Empire army and a large Tomb Kings force) but my big Fantasy love is the Skaven! There is a post somewhere around here that shows my old skool Doomwheel. So here I was, leaving my commission work for a while, digging out my Skaven Army Book making army lists ... and it was fun!

The next day I went to play the battle against my friend's daemons. I must say that I absolutely loved that game and I totally love the new rules! The result isn't that important, just the fact that it really got me into Fantasy stuff again and that I killed my third BloodThirster in 2 different game systems in 2 weeks time :P :P

Last but definately not least ... was this :




That was it... next thing I knew, I was hanging in my closet trying to find that order I did back then when the Skaven Army book was out!

Oh yes, the vermin tide is coming... and it will be nasty!!  XD

Friday, October 15, 2010

Blood Angels Vanguard Veteran Sergeant with Jump Pack



Project Blood Angels is slowly but steadily progressing and I have just finished another addition to my friend's army, the direct only Vet sergeant with jump pack!



Its a wonderful model with clear details and really fun to paint. I have some objections with the sculpt of the head but other than that I think its a wonderful addition to a BA army. I didn't try anything fancy here, just some extreme highlights on the power sword which I thing turned out ok. 

Again photographing red turns out to be a nightmaire, the highlights are vanished... :( but you can get an idea...

You can also leave a vote on CoolMiniOrNot as usual ;)

EDIT: Taking the advice of Antipope I shot the model again and I think that the result is far better now! Many thanks for you tip! XD

Sunday, October 3, 2010

Another Tournament is over

... and what a great experience... with 34 people attending and loads of fun in a great place!

3 Battles were played in total, I got to play with Eldar (I can't seem to get away from them in tournaments...) Daemons and Imperial Guard. I got 2 victories with Eldar (yupeeee!!!) and Daemons (Ghaz got the title Daemonhunter from this battle, see the pic below) but got beaten by the Guard, from a very powerful and fast list with Vendettas and loads of Stormtroopers and veterans and of course meltas...! 

One Bloodthirster down... 1 more to go :P



3 Great games and one helluva day full of gaming!! Can't wait for next time!! XD

Wednesday, September 22, 2010

Photographing minis

Hello again!

From the Warp Blogspot will have a collaborative post running on photographing miniatures so I have decided posting an article on how I photograph my minis.

I must say that my photographing skills are rubbish. Only recently I have managed to start playing somewhat succesful with my camera's settings and stop shooting everything in auto... The past years I have gathered ideas and tutorials from around the internet and I have narrowed to some things that I think work for me

The most important thing in my opinion is the original lighting... no matter how great skills you have in Photoshop, you cannot create a great pic out of a crappy shot. Therefore I decided to create my own lightbox...


This is how my lightbox looks like

As you can see, its just an ordinary cardboard box. I think that the size of the usual A4 paper box is the best for a similar lamp setting. For bigger boxes you would need bigger lamps I guess...

Anywayz, I took the box and created square holes in each side of it. Next thing is to cover the holes with white tissue paper (any kind of semi transparent kind of paper would do actually) so as to blend the light smoothly. Just leave the front hole free (obviously...) 

Next thing is to start playing with the light. I got 2 lamps loaded with 80Watts daylight bulbs which are pretty much ok although I should start trying using a 3rd one I guess, or stronger bulbs. I have arranged them in this way, although again I'm open to suggestions here as it seems that there is room for improvement. 



Finally I have printed several backgrounds with my latest one being this brownish that you all see featured in my latest minis. This is something personal for everyone but I feel that 2 colour gradients work better. 



I have also experimented with texture patterns as the mettalic plate that you see in the back of the brown one, I have the feeling that it isn't that effective as it distracts the eye from the centerpiece of the photo which is the model itself.

Finally I must give you the link to the articel that really inspired me in setting all this straight : http://strobist.blogspot.com/2006/07/how-to-diy-10-macro-photo-studio.html

That was my photographing experience presented in short, I would be really grateful if you could help me improve in any way! 

Monday, September 20, 2010

Astorath the Grim featured in ALL THINGS FETT Blog


I just wanted to let everyone know that Astorath had been featured in this great Blog held by CounterFett here :
http://counterfett.blogspot.com/2010/09/terrific-painter-at-hot-new-blog.html

I must say that I am really honoured by the kind words and the least I can do is to urge my readers to follow this great blog as well!

Astorath the Grim

Hello everyone!!



I have been telling you about my work on Astorath the Grim the past couple of weeks. Well I have managed to pull out some time and finish him (this really sounded like Mortal Kombat ... :P) So here he is...


I really like the way the scenic base from Micro Arts blended with the dynamic pose of the model harmonically. I am happy with the final result, really nice model and very detailed. So I would be happy to hear your thoughts and opinions on him.

I am continuing my work on the rest of the Blood Angels project, more updates soon !

One final thing, FTW blog roll (link to the sidebar...) have started a collaborate post on photographing minatures based on the combined experience of all the bloggers out there. I will be posting my way soon, although its far from being perfect, I think it quite works some times (not really happy with the photo of Astorath though... :(  )

Anyways, take care everyone!! 

EDIT  I have forgotten to give you the link to the CoolMiniOrNot voting page as with any new model I finish, here it is in case you would like to leave me a vote or a comment! :) http://coolminiornot.com/259948

Sunday, September 12, 2010

One more tourney is over...

...and what a great time it was!! Our team placed second overall (I remind you it was a doubles tournament) and I must say I played one of the best battles with a rather interesting Ork army. As you can see from the pics it was a fully blown up Nob Biker Speed Freek WAAAGH!! with a double Warboss mayhem!!


Uhh... sir I think we may have a problem....! 

It was so tense trying to take all these double wounded T5 frenzied killing machines, it almost made me homesick of my own orks ...

Heres a more panoramic view of the same caption, one click before the massive close combat started!



Things didn't go so well for my Termies lurking in the Raider (mainly due to my inability to roll my 2+ Armor saves... :S ) but the tides of the battle eventually turned mainly due to the great firepower that we had... 

Great stuff... thats why I love this game so much!!

On to the painting table once again, more updates soon!!

Saturday, September 11, 2010

new commission ... and then some!

Hello everyone! It's been quite a while but I've been busy as hell for the past couple of weeks and the scedule won't seem to change for the next 2 as well so updates will be scarce...

On the bright side, I've got 2 more commission jobs settled, A Blood Angels and an Eldar army. I've started working on some Swooping Hawks as you can see from the picture


I have also started work on the Blood Angels part of the commission with a wonderful new model, Asorath the Grim. Pics of him soon as I am ready to finish him, most probably today!

Last but not least, tommorow I will be attending a doubles 40K Tournament and I will give you a report as soon as I can, so keep an eye on this space.

Take care everyone!!

Sunday, August 15, 2010

Back from vacation!

I just wanted to let you people know that I'm back from a quite long vacation. This break was everything I needed and now I am ready for more painting! Stay tuned ;)

Saturday, July 31, 2010

Voting started for Bor in WAMP Forum

Hey there everybody! Just wanted to remind you that voting started in WAMP Forum for my mini of Bor Dragonbane. Got some great entries and competition will be stiff but thats the point anywayz ;)

So I would really appreciate if you had the time to cast a vote for me here

Wednesday, July 28, 2010

Vacation time

Hi!! I am currently on vacation as I have mentioned in my previous post. Just letting you guys know that my painting projects are currently on hold for as long as I am wetting my feet in the waters of Lefkada, an island of the Ionian Sea in Greece. Here's a picture of where I currently am... just to give you an idea



Yeah, these are my feet peaking at the bottom of the pic... :P

Hope that you are somewhere having a good time too enjoying your vacation. More updates soon, but most probably with more beaches and other cool locations ;)

Friday, July 16, 2010

Bor Dragonbane



Hello everyone! Just a small update before I hit the road for my summer holidays. I have just finished Bor Dragonbane as you can see from my submissions, a piece that I painted for a Painting Competition in WAMP Forum (you can see the gallery here http://www.wamp-forum.com/photopost/g593-avatars-of-war-2010.html) that finishes by the end of the month. It would be great to leave me a vote when the voting starts if you like my piece that is. Also as always I've uploaded him to CoolMiniOrNot so it would be great to leave me another click here : http://coolminiornot.com/255057





So I would like to wish you a lovely summer and hopefully I will continue updates in a couple of weeks, or maybe sooner if I can get my hands on some Internet  ....

Till then... cheers and take care!!
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Sunday, July 4, 2010

Wingblades project finished!

Hi there! I was busy finishing one of my commission projects, the Wingblades. The customer wanted to create a renegade chaos SM army BUT with no chaos symbols whatsoever and Dark Angels iconography. This is one of the final pieces of the army, the converted Lord from Grey Knight Captain Stern and various bits from the DA sprue.


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The pic is a little rubbish but my camera is off limits at the moment so my cell phone camera has to do... to give you an idea at least...

If you are interested in other pieces of this army, check out my photobucket album

More to come as my Imperial Fists army is getting in shape, stay tuned ;)



Wednesday, June 16, 2010

Dark Millenium

I knew that this would be an outstanding BLAST but I couldn't possibly imagine the magnitude of PURE AWESOMNESS that would be the new 40K MMO... We're off to new levels of burning here I think...


Tuesday, June 8, 2010

Imperial Fists Vindicator Finished!!


Hello again! I just wanted to share with you my finished Vindicator. I am really pleased with the way it turned out. I went for a really battle damaged and worn out look, hope that I didn't went overboard... :P anywayz I would love to hear you comments as I am building my Imperial Fists army!


ah, and don't forget to leave me a vote in CMON ;)

Saturday, June 5, 2010

Imperial Fists Vindicator

Hello there! I am currently working on my Imperial Fists army and I must say that things are progressing well! I had the old version of the Vindicator model and I decided to upgrade the looks of it by using the newer version of the Rhino. I thought that the process would be an easy one but there were quite a few things that needed modding... eventually after qute a few hours filling, sanding and cutting the end result looks something like this:

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(click on the thumbnails for larger pics ;) )

Still there are some things I need to finish before it hits the primer but its pretty much finished...

 

For those that don't remember how the old model looked like, it was something like this :  

So, tell me what you think... more to come as I prepare this baby for painting! 


Monday, May 31, 2010

Blood Angels Librarian with jump pack

Hi there! I have been busy with my commission stuff lately and updates were quite low... but this is about to change. I have finished a Librarian, a really sweet conversion from a friend of mine that I painted for his army. More BA stuff to come so keep your eyes peeled
It would be quite nice of you if you could leave me a vote on CoolMiniOrNot





I have also been working on my Imperial Fists army, mainly on Land Raiders (yes thats a plural there ... XD) so again wait for updates! It has been a Space Marine feast the last couple of months

So I would like to hear your comments on this one, more to come!

Thursday, May 20, 2010

shopping frenzy!

Hey there! I was on a doubles tourney last week with my Imperial Fists. Played with my friend with Blood Angels and the thing went really well. This situation got me into seriously building my Fists army starting with the Land Raiders :P 

Got myself some stuff and hopefully you will see the results somewhere in this space soon. 

I've got another tourney on Saturday, this time based on the Clash of Heroes scenario from the brand new Battle missions book. Can't wait for this one, you'll have full scale report this time ;)

Monday, May 10, 2010

Paul Bonner strikes back!

I just wanted to share with you people the joy that I felt when I saw this OUTSTANDING illustration from the new Forgeworld Book from my all time favourite artist Paul Bonner. Most probably you have seen it too by now but I think that it is too good not to be shown again...


I'm in love :P




Monday, April 12, 2010

new post, new tourney ...

It's been quite a long time since I've posted anything but I've been busy as hell preparing myself for another tourney with my orks! It went quite well but damn, I hate those eldar! Here are some pix: 


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As I said... I hate eldar :P

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hur hur... canned food :P

More to come as I take pics of my freshly painted Nobs and Snikrot ... stay tuned!