27/02/2022

Time to let Ol' Painless out of the bag

 Once I've finished the monstrous Gargant, I'm clearly in the mood for much smaller stuff. I can't face another large project right now, so I believe I can take the opportunity to paint single minis or any other kind of standalone project.

My palette cleanser today will be this "Ace" by Hasslefree Miniatures, a mini that have been waiting for some time to be painted:

No, not Blain. Ace, I said
 
I've heard that Hasslefree has been experiencing some delivery issues for some time now, but to be honest, it's been quite a long time since I last placed them an order (you know, my mountain of shame doesn't allow it) and I always got the best of them.
Whatever the case, the sculpt is simply magnificent, as usual. It of course resembles Blain from the Predator movie, though it's not an exact replica of the character.
I tried to get it as close as I could, so it meant those 80's Woodland fatigues:

It took me like two or three tries to get a green I was comfortable with
 
Painting camo is always tricky. If you do it right, it will work and you will see a blurry object with no definite shapes (as that's what camo is supposed to do!). But you can't forget that you are painting a mini and that it should look good and distinctive on a board!

I most likely won't achive neither of both goals
 
I used a soft green on all the other gear. It makes some shapes recognizable, I hope, but the camouflage itself is still there.

A mess of greens and stuff
 
I finally made the kneepads, boots and weapon with different shades of black:

The Ol' Painless
Little else! Here you have the final result:



 
I have to say I was much happier before I saw the pics full screen, it makes all the mistakes awfully apparent :D
Anyway, quick'n'dirty job, so I'm happy with what I got. Let's get a comparison shot

Wait, are these two even the same scale?

I'm quite satisfied with having painted anything in kind of a week's time. It feels strangely good! I guess I'll paint a few more standalone minis before I come back to full units or whatever. Who knows!

21/02/2022

Ork Gargant 28mm finished

 It is done.

I've finally ended this project. Closure! Party!

You last saw this thing like this:

Coming from this post

So I had to do the box and the banner. Not minor endeavours, trust me. But with Mork's help (or maybe Gork's), it was achievable.

WARNING. TONS OF PICS AHEAD.

Let's go for the box!

This was the raw piece

First thing to do was primer spraying it all over in metal:

Still looking like two fruit boxes

Weird boxes though
 When the air in the room was breathable again, like a couple of days later, I begun to paint the inside. Sorry, I forgot to take pics of the WIP. Not that you are losing that much, nevertheless, as I didn't want to overdo this part. I painted some random colours on random pieces and dirtied it all over. Some Ork glyphs and some hazard stripes are the only thing that required a little bit more attention.

Quite an oversized garage, isn't it?

I'll make better stripes for the next one. Sure
 
I left the explosion of colour for the outer sides. First stage was applying the raw colours. here you can see the box from all the sides:




 
So clean that it hurts. Let's get hands (and everything else) dirty!



 
Working on this monster has been kind of challenging. I couldn't put it on the table, as it's way larger than my workspace. Painting it on the floor wasn't quite an option and I didn't have a proper stool or another similar surface. So I had to keep it between my knees, holding it under my only light source (I can only paint in the late, very late nights, and I can only count with this gooseneck lamp)

Painting against the adversities

But I finally came to a result

Then I just added some tiny details here and there
 
Here you have the finished box:







Some close-ups of a few details:


I started using the horned skull here and there and now I have it everywhere!

 
Apparently this Gargant was raised by Sir Allen Apsley. It raises questions

Glyphs and checkers. RT power!

Oh, and blue flames, just to not make them black



Main entrance

Upper view

 You can see I left the handle unpainted. Just a practical matter, as I would eventually end with all the paint on my hand!But I think it works in its original grey.

 

Now that we have the box, the final item to finish the project is the back banner. If you remember, my pal Rinahe had already made the relief, so it wasn't just a plain sheet of paper; it had all the items on it

Hard to see, but I'll solve that in a minute

The original source is of course this beauty of old:

There was really no point in painting mine differently, so I simply used the same colours. Here you have this step by step:

Main basic raw colours

I used watered down Contrast paint directly on the paper to represent the fabric of the banner. It's the same colour I used on the Gargant itself, so it all would look coherent:

It's a DIN-A4 size paper, BTW

Same process on black, to represent the fabric

Then red

And finally white, the hardest one to achieve

Now I only had the face of the Bad Moon left:

General idea of what I wanted

Iyanden Yellow Contrast paint again

Rest of the colours

If you zoom you'll see the threads in the eyes or the toof, for example

General overview

Slightly weathered and on the banner pole

So this is it.

Be ready to witness the glory of Mork. Ye all praise his Orkiness.

Ladies, gentlemen et al., BEHOLD.

Behold, for this is Morkstroke, and he is the bearer of doom, altar of Mork, holy glory of his name:

Seriously, look for the Orks on his shoulder for scale reference

I honestly don't know what else to provide to give you an idea of its size

Here you have it next to his home:

Should I have painted the box yellow? Hmmm...

Properly stowed

The banner has its place too

Storage is the main concern when you deal with such a beast, so the solution my pal Rinahe provided me is quite clever and solves most of the problems. Of course you still have to deal with room enough for two fruit boxes together! But it's quite easier than needing space for the Gargant totally assembled.

I'm most happy with Morkstroke, you can bet. It's been one of the largest projects I've faced so far and it's taken me roughly more than a year (with other projects involved, of course, but a year no matter what). I think I'm in dire need of some smaller projects just to breathe fresh air again. I have no idea of what will I paint next, but I guess I'll try some regular 28mm minis (I have plenty of those!).

I hope you've enjoyed the Gargant project as much as I have!