June - Wildcard month!
Absolutely steamed through this month, and then completely ran out of puff in the last week. Having used all my 'safety net' models (except a few of the Snotling lads below), I knuckled down and painted hard, and now I don't want to paint another orky thing for a while 😅
Anyways...
Lil' snotling runty assistants:
I'm not one really for specifically going out and collecting, say a complete range of minis from the get go. However, nearing the end of the challenge, I had a look through the catalogues and saw that my gretchin range was nearly complete. I put a call out on one of those facebook trading pages, and lo, these snotling guys came up... How could I say no! (I am still rooting around for a few, but they are nigh on impossible to find).
Runt with pennant:
I thought he could wave a finishing flag for the speed freeks of the army...
(The official fluff on the little flags was that they were to represent markers for injured orks, so the Doks could find and fix them, ready for the next battle in a campaign)
Runt selling squigs v2 (USA catalogue)
I painted on a USA reference - Kool Aid, 2 teef a go. Who doesn't want a go on the kool aid?
I kinda wish the spacing on "a go" didn't read like ago, but never mind - it's a Snotling anyways...
Runt with plans.
A rare thing, a runt with a plan... Does it make him more dangerous?
Gretchin assistant. Let's hope he doesn't trip...
Grot assistant carrying spanner. I loved painting this one - the sculpt is amazing!
Regular gretchin carrying ammo box and shotgun.
Painted with stripy trousers to fit in with the freebooters, although I've not added the blue stripes. Yet.
Gretchin assistant,
I'll pop him in with the regular grots
Gretchin trooper Gugluk reportin' fer dooty with some knock-off power armour. This little dude was a nightmare to find!
A grot loading his blunderbuss
Another grot - this one at least kinda looks like he knows what he's doing...
Gretchin with peg leg
This double armed grot.
A pain to paint - super detailed trousers! Needless to say I bypassed most of that though...
This chainmail wearing grot:
A grot meaning bizniz with a sawn off shotgun and a blade. Not to mention some snazzy follicles!
Another burly grot with shotgun
Hop Splatt Field Gun
I always wanted the model for this, and this one was created by buying the separate pieces at different times, over the course of about a year.. The gretchin crew will probably mix in with the regular grots, as I'd like the gun to be towed by a wartrak.
Poor lil' mite...
I think I could have been much more inventive on the colour scheme/detail for the field gun. But at the time, it was a case of grinding through and just popping EASY paint on a model to get back into the painting groove...
A regular ork toting a heavy flamer. hawt!
The striped cabling was inspired by Fillipo's wonderful Iron Warriors (painted here in the Old World Army Challenge). Gotta love a hazard stripe!
Another heavy weapon, this time a massive heavy bolta... A tricky one to place this bolta. Eventually I settled in placing it quite far forward on the shoulder, and pinned it in place.
An ork with a repurposed heavy bolta (I'm not quite sure where this weapon comes from, but I suspect it's squat tek. Stripy trousers to fit in with the freebooterz)
And this ork with a heavy plasma...
A freebooting boy.
This lad is separate legs, separate torso. I have used the torso before, so I guess he now has a twin!
I also rebased by ork big boss into a bigger base as befitting his status...
And then made some v.quick banners. One for the runtherd and one for the Nob bike.
This beastly lungbursta was created by Sam Nash (he can be found on facebook on the oldhammer groups). It's a multipart cast from a model he made using plasticard.
Initally I did not know what to do with it, so I took inspiration from his painted piece and block painted some colours on.
The colours were first off painted flat all round, and then I used some heavy stippling over the top of the dry flat colour to create a gradient. Then I edge highlighted the ... edges.
I popped some flames on the front - why not!
And the TONK sat like that for a while...
And then motivations struck out of nowhere. I would graffiti the tonk up. First off, I saw that you can buy some cracking graffiti transfers suitable for 28mm, but I talked myself out of it - primarily because of the cost, and also because I wanted IMMEDIATE ACTION.
A quick google on graffiti and graffiti tags yielded a great piece about 28mm wargaming graffiti by a guy called Robert Jones: link - and you can see the influence in that straight copy of the word MEK on the top of the side panel below. The other half of that piece is representing Sam (g)Nash...
I then needed more inspirations, so I added some things from computer gaming and ork lyfe:
Bullet Bill - the bestest of Orkness distilled into a bullet. Brilliant.
Arrows - for that go fasta vibe
Waaargh Orks - book reference
Mork - kinda a White Dwarf vibe
Mushroom 1UP - never saying no to a 1UP! Also fungus.
Fasta - does what it says on the tin. Probably, a little bit, my favourite piece.
Squig Rule - was supposed to say Squig Rulez, but I ran out of space. The Squig is a copy from a google search on 'graffiti squid'
On Fire - another copy of a tag I saw on line. Who doesn't like fire? Orks love it.
Ork iz best - naturally! Another straight up rob from the google images.
Furst - coz who wants to be last?
Cheques and bad moon lid - I struggled to think what to paint here on the main hatch. I initially went for a Worms style Holy Hand Grenade, and then a cherrybomb, then a grenade, but settled on the cheques and the simple bad moon in cream to pull it out from the background yellow.
All looking good, so I applied a coat of lacquer and then did some weathering. I did try using some oils (many thanks to Liam - insta link, for the push to try it), but really quickly I just reverted back to acrylics (Vallejo Smoke, mixed with GSW fluro orange and a bit of black)...
All complete, so I give it a coat of matt varnish to kill the shine...
oh noes
Actual nightmare!
I must've been whhhaaaaaayyy too eager and sprayed too much varnish on (or maybe it was too humid), which resulted in this devastating frosting 👇.
There is a tiny bit along the side panel with the mushroom too.
Anyway, I tried rubbing it with white spirit in the hope the varnish would be removed - no effect. Then I tried nail polish remover, which was incredible (a little bit too incredible as I did rub a bit right back to the bare bones).
Then I painted on some gloss varnish, as I read that that helps, and then re-applied the matt spray (thinly this time!). Then back in to correct the rubbed off part.
Anyhow, here's the finished tank pics - there's a lot of them I'm afraid, but I am super pleased with it!
You can see it's a bit muted and hazy👇, but it's soooo much better than what it was. I'm very fortunate that it was just the back panel....
I think if I were to paint this again, I would probably paint some graffiti underpaint for the tags, so the background for them isn't just the TONK hull colour.
This month also saw a personal milestone where I took da boyz out to battle! This was my very first game of 40k. We played the most recent rules, with 2nd ed minis. A massive shout out and thanks go to Dave (grinningloon on Instagram) who patiently took me through the game. He was using his wonderfully painted and converted Goffs to beat up my boys. Highlights included:
Warlord showdown
Gretchin attacking his warlord after he'd defeated mine
Gretchin wounding a mega armoured Nob in hand to hand
His dread causing my buggy to explode in hand to hand
My Mek missing everything he aimed or swung at.
Good times, although there are A LOT of rules. For EVERY mini...
Again, all thanks to Dave for making everything flow smoothly!
My set up (my group shot pics will come next month in the Round Up post)
Dave's set up
Surprize! The Goff dread relishs scaring da grotz
The two ork warlords pose for a pic
The courageous grots try to avenge their boss, but to no avail
The imposing Goff army, plus a few bitz!
Intro: link
January: leader - link
February: R&F - link
March: R&F - link
April: R&F - link
May: R&F - link (as a heads up, I forgot to add a link section like this one at the end of this May month)
JUNE: WILDCARD and CHALLENGE END
12... 4 x runts
70... 14 x gretchin
FREE... 1 x hop splat field gun
FREE... 2 x crew
22... 1 x ork w/heavy bolta
FREE... 1 x ork w/flamer
22... 1 x ork w/heavy bolta
38... ork w/heavy plasma
12... 1 x freebooter
FREE... 1 x TONK
Total: 176
Next blog post is the wrap up post with some glorious army shots! Hopefully, see you then :)
Tom // frogbug100
Man, I love your army. The way you work with the colors are so grear. Can't wait to see your final post with all them together...
ReplyDeleteAh, thank you - you legend!
DeleteBrilliant! I don't think I've ever seen some of those grots before, and certainly not all painted up like that. I would have been heartbroken if that had happened to my TONK, you managed to pull that back really well and without losing heart. Bravo sir!
ReplyDeleteYou need a proper game of 2nd Edition 40K now! :D
I think if there's one thing that army painting has hammered home to me, is that I can't be too precious over the paintworks so yes, I was gutted but not as gutted as I would have been if the model was on it's own (and not surrounded by a million orks!).
ReplyDeleteI think finding someone who's up for a game would be a bit of a challenge in my neck of the woods, although there is a high chance I'll be having a game of original necromunda pretty soon!
Nice one :)
That tank is incredible! Fantastic work as always!
ReplyDeleteCheers Bill!
DeleteStunning, and there's load of it, too.
ReplyDeleteCheers! Thankfully I think they're a bit bigger and less detailed than your Nippon force. I couldn't hack all those armour panels!
Delete*Gasp* reading this post has truly made my day! You've captured all the wild joy of oldhammer orks - and there is just so much detail and character to enjoy! I'm inspired to pick up the brush again. Thank you!
ReplyDeleteHoly moley, that is awesome news - and I guess the main reason most people post their painted works, to inspire others. I'm chuffed to bits!
DeleteSo much love gone into those little guys. Brilliant work on the tank, and well done on the rescue mission - that sort of thing can be heartbreaking.
ReplyDeleteThe range of emotions when I saw that had happened was intense 😂
DeleteNice one 👊
Bonkers good! Such a great selection of figures painted to an eye wateringly high standard. There's so much character in those gretchin that you've really capitalised on. Will we see a photo of ALL your orks at some point?
ReplyDeleteYes for sure - all the lads will be mustered for the Warp Up post at the end of this month. Undoubtably they will be joining the orks from last years OWAC, so there's the beginning of a mighty Waaaaagh happening!
Delete