Bad Squiddo Women of WW2 - I've started work on the project at last!

Around this time last year, the  Bad Squiddo Women of WW2 Kickstarter (which has been available in the shop for ages) was shipped. Since then, so much has happened, apart from me actually painting anything from my pledge. This has now begun to change. I have several figures near to completion, but only one completely finished, and here she is;

This is SOE Annie, a wartime equivalent of the Sci Fi Raging Annie, who can be seen here, on the right of the photo.

Here she is from behind.

I have to say that I absolutely love this mini. The pose is terrific and the details excellent. I can see her featuring in a lot of Pulp settings as a femme fatale, straight out of the pages of a Raymond Chandler novel, or a feisty female private eye, as well as in some suitable TFL Chain of Command scenarios.

I thought that it was only fair that I painted her first. Next up will be a couple of real life SOE characters.

Toadstool Brownies

Last week I received a small parcel from Ian Brumby at Fenris Games, with the cryptic comment "teasers for the Kickstarter".

Inside were three really cute little minis, which I have duly painted up. Here they are from the front.

And here is a rear view;

I cannot tell you anything about these three tiny creatures, except that they are very nicely sculpted and cast and have plenty of character. They were a joy to paint and I am sure that they will be welcome to all manner of gamers who like fantasy armies with small little folk. They are around 18-19mm tall, so half the size of a 28mm figure.

I could see these being useful for Saga: AoM players who want a nicely different Swarm for their Lords of the Wild levies, and also in other settings where the the tiny inhabitants of magical forests and hedgerows might be encountered. 

I think that the Kickstarter will be launched very shortly, so keep your eyes peeled for details on various social media platforms.

Bad Squiddo Winter Soviet Kickstarter update

OK, so there is more news about the Kickstarter. It will now be happening on the 7th of April, for administrative reasons and will run for seven days.

Anyway, I have now finished the two sample figures Annie sent me.

We have an officer, with a pistol and a crumpled map, and a infantry figure with a PPSh sub-machine gun. 

Here is a rear view;

Lots of nice details on the two sculpts here, so plenty of scope for really going to town with textures and shading.

I decided to go for a nondescript grey greatcoat for the ordinary soldier and a better quality sheepskin-lined coat for the officer. The officer is also wearing a nice pair of leather gloves.

I didn't want to overdo the snow effects, so restricted it to a bit of frosty ground and frost on the dead grass around the feet of the two soldiers.

These were really nice to paint. Lovely crisp casts with plenty of detail and character to the minis.

I used Vallejo paints, Army Painter strong tone wash and Gamer's Grass tufts.

Here is the announcement for the Kickstarter;

A new Bad Squiddo Kickstarter is nearly upon us.

This is just a short post to let people know that Annie Norman of Bad Squiddo is planning a short Kickstarter, planned to open on March 31st.

The subject is one close to her heart, 28mm WW2 female Soviet troops, this time in winter uniforms with greatcoats and Ushanka fur caps, to add to her existing range of Soviet troops.

There will be a number of different figures, rifles, PPSh-41 SMGs, a LMG team with the obligatory Degtyaryov DP-27, an officer and other figures.

The picture below shows what will be available, and also shows some of the current minis too;

I have been sent two figures to paint myself already, they are currently based and undercoated and I am planning to get them completed over the next day or so, puppies permitting.

I am happy to report that they are up to the usual high standards we have come to expect from Bad Squiddo.

These will be perfect for Chain of Command, Bolt Action or any other set of WW2 rules.

The next Isolation project - Bad Squiddo Amazons.

Well I actually started this project about a month ago, here with a Standard Bearer, but I am now working on all the rest of my Bad Squiddo Amazons. Here are the first two I have completed;

On the website, Annie describes the figure on the left as an Assassin and the other as an Amazon Captain. I think of her as my Strategissa (the female counterpart of a Strategos, meaning "army leader").

I am really very pleased with these two figures. They are lovely clean casts of excellent sculpts and the folds and drapes of the cloaks and robes gave me lots of nice detail to work with. The tufts on the bases are also from Annie. They are Gamer's Grass ones.

Originally released as a Kickstarter, these are currently available on the Bad Squiddo website, along with many of their sisters.

I thought that I had had a disaster when I varnished these. I usually use Humbrol spray varnish, which I always give a good shake to ensure the contents of the can are properly mixed. I was horrified after spraying to see that all the metallic paints had fogged. I can only assume that there was residual humidity in the air. However, I was able to salvage matters by a judicial application of additional paint over the affected areas, which solved the problem. Strangely, the parts of the figures with no metallic paint weren't in the slightest bit fogged, otherwise I would have had a real problem, requiring the olive oil treatment.

Bad Squiddo Amazon standard bearer

I've had the Bad Squiddo Amazons since last September when the Kickstarter shipped, but until now I hadn't got round to painting any of them. This standard bearer is the first one;

I think she is a lovely figure and her Squid standard is great. I decided that it needed to be painted with a bronze body, turquoise eyes and purple or turquoise tentacles, because they are very Bad Squiddo colours. I decided to carry those colours over onto the standard bearer herself, with her purple belt and turquoise helmet plume and tunic edging. Her armour is a mixture of bronze plate and brassier scales. I couldn't decide whether her blade should be iron or bronze, but I decided on the former for colour variation.

Here she is from the rear, the view her troops would see advancing into battle;

Here from the front, the view her enemies would see coming towards them.

The tufts are Gamer's Grass, also available from Bad Squiddo.

Aftermath post-apocalyptic Kickstarter figures

I backed this Kickstarter ages ago, and I've had the figures for a fair old while too.

The figures were inspired by the box art of the original 1980s game.

Now, I've never played the game, but I thought that the figures were nice, with a fair degree of retro cool about them, and I also thought that I'd be able to do something with them in other settings.

However, I wanted to give the male figure are much more classic 1930s space opera film appearance, so I decided on a red/gold colour scheme for him, because I saw him as being a character in Pulp games, using the Crooked Dice 7TV Pulp rules. The female figure also looks like someone who could happily sit within a 7TV world.

I am really please with the pair of them, nice crisp sculpts, no flash and great to paint.

I have vague ideas about maybe using the pair as time-travelling characters for sci fi pulp, with the male character being some kind of futuristic space lawman and the woman as a 20th century Earth scientist he has hooked up with on his journeys through the dimensions of the space time continuum. I've even got a name for him; Star Marshal Solarion.

New! Science Fiction figures!

Around this time last year, I backed a Kickstarter run by Antediluvian Miniatures which was all about a small range of science fiction figures that they described as Bounty Hunters. Now, this coincided with me having another look at some simple sci fi rules that I'd been working on, on and off, for around three or four years and I thought that these figures would be ideal for some of the characters that I'd been thinking about. Anyway, as tends to happen, other things got in the way and the minis sat in a box until couple of weeks ago, when I decided to revisit my draft rules and, at the same time, start working on the minis.

Anyway, rules aside, I've finished the minis off and I am really pleased with how they have turned out. There are eleven in total, but I've photographed them in two groups.

The first lot have a certain formal look about them, being quite military-looking, apart from the rather nice figure on the left, who is either a humanoid female in serious combat armour, or maybe a droid. I think I prefer the former interpretation. The others all seem to be wearing light body or flak armour, and a couple are carrying mauls or clubs as well as their guns. I've given two of them anti-blast visors, which I've given a lick of gloss varnish so that they have a nice reflective appearance.

This second group are of a more disparate (and desperate) appearance, definitely from the other side of the Law. I have decided to keep an orange theme for a few of the figures, representing the kind of utilitarian garments that a crew of a ship might wear. The sharp-eyed will notice that one of the first group is also wearing a similar thing with his flak armour.

The short guy on the left is wearing heavy power armour with two integral guns, and he also has a power claw and is carrying a blade. Well tooled-up! In front, there is a little blue alien, who I really rather like, and next to him a kind of humanoid mutant rat who looks pretty pleased with himself. I really love the big lizard alien with the big gun. I think that it is my favourite of the whole set, but I am also rather fond of the scavenger type guy with the beat up armour held together with chains and rope. Finally, the big blue alien/mutant/whatever/ was fun to paint. No weapons, but big teeth and four arms seem to make up for that.

Now, I need to give my rules a final revision and it will be playtesting time.

Bad Squiddo Dwarves and Amazons

Annie Norman at Bad Squiddo has a new Kickstarter running at the moment. There are two separate sets of figures, Dwarves and Amazons.

People who follow this blog will probably remember that sample Dwarf figure that I painted up recently, and the rest of the Dwarves are similarly excellent figures. There are a number of really useful models available; A Captain, a Thief, two Champions, two Berserkers, a Wizard, a Bard, a Rogue, a Monk and a Ranger, which pretty much covers all the bases for a band of Dwarvish adventurers for a wide variety of fantasy rule sets.

The Amazons set is similarly varied, featuring a Captain with two Bodyguards, two Elite Guards, an Assassin, a Musician, an Archer, a Spearguard, a Champion (accompanied by a guinea pig sprite) and two "little wolves", who are two Amazon girls.

As with all Kickstarters, there is a range of pledges, up to a huge one which gives you two sets of both ranges, plus all the stretch goals.

You can also buy into bundles of existing figures from the Bad Squiddo collection, including some excellent resin scenic items, many of which were formerly part of the Ristul range.

What a surprise - a sneak preview of the next Bad Squiddo Kickstarter

Well, actually I am sure that people who follow Annie on Facebook and elsewhere know that there is a new Bad Squiddo Kickstarter in the offing, and that it will feature Dwarves (a.k.a "Dorfs" in Annie-speak), so saying that it is going to happen isn't really a huge surprise.

However, I did get a proper surprise when a small parcel from Bad Squiddo arrived at my house on Friday, mainly because I wasn't expecting anything. Mystified, I opened the box and found the usual fruit teabag, a small figure in a ziplock baggie and a note.

To be honest, I felt honoured. I don't think I am a bad painter, but I am certainly not a Matt Slade, Kevin Dallimore, Paul Sanderson or John Morris in the paintbrush stakes, so being given the chance to paint up an advance figure from the Kickstarter made me really happy.

Anyway, I soon found out that I had a small grumpy woman with a big axe to paint. I got to work as soon as I could and finished her this morning.

There was something about her that spoke to me, saying "I am a grizzled veteran of many fights in the deep places of the world", so I wanted to give her grey hair, and well-worn clothes, but also the richly-embellished accoutrements of a fighter of great repute, hence the jewels set in her belt.

I didn't think she would be wearing bright colours, so I settled on a muted colour palette.

I must say that she was an incredibly crisp and clean casting, with absolutely no flash or moulding lines and she painted up a treat. 

Once again, Annie has really hit the bull'e eye with this figure, and also with a very timely female Dwarves Kickstarter, which will surely be featuring in more than a few Masters (Mistresses?) of the Underearth warbands for Saga Age Of Magic in due course. Equally, there are possibilities with other rulesets. Me? Well I am going to be revamping my Frostgrave band in the near future and I am sure I can find a place for a grudge-bearing Dwarf with a huge axe.

So, an absolutely terrific figure. Just don't mention the Hi-Ho song.

My Last Sunrise - The Vampire Hunters

The only upside of having an elderly Westie with a bad cruciate ligament (although she is on the mend now) is that, because I need to keep an eye on her and carry her around a fair bit, I can spend a lot of time painting.

So, thanks to Maisie's gammy leg, I've managed to finish off the rest of the My Last Sunrise figures. There are six of these in total. First, here are two fighters who place their trust in sharp blades;

Next, a couple of stout fellows who use faith, chemical warfare (a.k.a. holy water) and pointy things to send the Undead to their doom;

Next, courtesy of two fearless females, ranged attacks;

The figure on the left is a witch called Clara on the Bad Squiddo website and she has a small McGuffin that looks like a gold scorpion in her hand. I wanted to give her a more obvious magical attack and decided that a ball of magical fire would work quite nicely. After all, vampires don't really care for that sort of thing, do they?

Anyway, here is the assembled Scooby Gang (Buffy fans will know what I mean);

Now, I have cleared enough space to get some Shieldmaidens prepped for painting.

Anyway, here is Maisie, being totally unfazed by her knee ligament. Her sister Daisy is doing her own thing out in the garden. I expect I'll have to carry Maisie outside fairly soon. Of course, once she's out there, she will make her own way back into the house. I think she's having me on a bit.

My Last Sunrise - The Vampires

As promised, I've been working on the Vampires from the Bad Squiddo "My Last Sunrise" Kickstarter. It is worth mentioning that all these figures are now available from Annie's website, here.

Vampire lore tells us that all vampires are "made" by an existing vampire, the most famous being Bram Stoker's Dracula. Here is the leader of this particular vampire "family", a somewhat dramatic and Byronic-looking figure. He's clearly just nipped out for a bite, but is a bit of a messy eater.

Of course, vampire lords have to have brides, and here is the Count's trio of lovelies. Their arcane powers of seduction have lured many an unsuspecting victim to their doom. Male or female, it doesn't matter to these ladies. They are equal opportunity blood-drinkers.

And here is the Count with his backing singers. They literally knock 'em dead wherever they appear.

The Count has also recruited some muscle. First, a terrifying psychopathic Revenant, who may or may not be a vampire, but who certainly likes a bit of blood-letting. I think she likes her meat very rare.

The Count also has two fearsome ladies of the night whose skills with a blade are legendary. Tangle with these beauties at your peril.

Here are all the Count's bodyguards together. What a delightful trio they are!

My Last Sunrise - finally making a start

Last year, Bad Squiddo launched a small Kickstarter called My Last Sunrise. The theme was vampires and vampire hunters, plus a couple of other rather nice figures. I backed the KS and I've had the figures around for a year now, undercoated but nothing else done. I am currently trying to reduce my lead and plastic mountain, ready to really get into my Swordmaidens, so I decided that now was the time to unleash some Gothic Horrors onto my painting table.

I've blocked in some basic colours on the vampires, which I'll be finishing off next, and I've also completed two figures, a Golem and a Werewolf, who I think will have a dual use as random monsters in Frostgrave.

Anyway, here they are. First a rear view;

And now the front;

I particularly like the Golem. I think he is a rather menacing and characterful model. I wanted to see if I could take the figures off of the slotta bases, of which I am not a fan, and it worked fine for him, but looking at the rest of the range, I realised that some of the figures would need pinning to give them strength on a simple MDF base. Therefore, I cut down the MDF base I'd stuck the golem on and glued him onto a slotta. This has had the effect of making him even taller and more impressive, I think, so not really a problem.

Anyway, I'm thinking that the other figures won't take too long to complete, so hopefully I'll get them out of the way over the next couple of weeks.

Freyja's Wrath painting update - Freyja is finished

Well, there is always an upside to bad weather, and here is the proof.

Freyja will, naturally be the Warlord of my Saga Viking warband, so she has to be on a larger base, but because she is such a fantastic model, I wanted to make the base a bit special, so I added on two of her special cats. The name Freyja is Old Norse for "The Lady". She is associated with love, sex, beauty, fertility, gold, seiðr (a kind of Norse sorcery that Freyja, a member of the Vanir, taught to the Æsir), war, and death.

Freyja is the owner of the necklace Brísingamen, rides a chariot pulled by two cats, is accompanied by the boar Hildisvíni, and possesses a cloak of falcon feathers. I did a bit of googling and discovered that a colour often associated with Freyja is russet, so I clearly had to paint her robe in that colour.

Anyway, this model is really lovely, I think that her cloak, with its feathers, is pretty amazing and I love the way her hair has been modelled. I really didn't want to overwork her, so I kept the range of colours to a minimum, but I wanted to link her cats into the overall colour scheme, so one is a similar russet to her robe and the other matches the grey of her cloak.

My first Freyja's Wrath figures are finished

A week or so ago I posted that my Freyja's Wrath Kickstarter had arrived, and therefore I really had to get started on painting a few figures. I knew which one I wanted to do first (My Heroine, a personal favourite), but I wanted to work on a few all at once, because that would give me plenty of other things to paint while I waited for work done on one figure was drying.

The minis I chose were the My Heroine vignette, The Seer, Svala the Standardbearer and Dagmar the Champion. I also undercoated Freyja herself, but she is still a work-in-progress.

Here are the four finished figures together;

And here they are separately. First, My Heroine, a Shieldmaiden home from the wars greeting her girlfriend;

Next, Dagmar, a Swordmaiden champion, with a hand-painted shield design. As she is modelled with two swords, I am thinking that the one in her hand might be a legendary blade she has captured from a recently fallen foe;

Next, the somewhat sinister figure of The Seer, a supernatural creation from the chthonic darkness which is at the heart of much of Norse mythology;

And finally, Svala. Her banner is hand-painted, but taken from an image based on one interpretation of the raven Landeythan (land-waster) banner of Harald Hardrada, downloaded from the internet. I know that many images of this are triangular, but this one fits the model better.

I am really happy with how these have turned out. The castings themselves are incredibly clean and have lovely sharp detail, but are not unrealistically ornate. They are simply what Annie Norman does best, offering us believable and realistically-proportioned female miniatures.

Now, I can't wait to get stuck into the rest of these gorgeous figures.