Year One

It has now been one year since I took up painting again. Looking back, I'm surprised how much I've done.

I usually get about a half hour of painting done every day. Hopping from one project to another I work on 1-20 minis simultaneously which means a lot of half-dones lying around.

With these guys laid out, the funny thing is, I don't know if I've gotten a lot better at painting during this past year but I've definitely gotten a lot faster. And maybe I'm now getting more hits compared to the misses..

Anyway, as a hooray to myself, my top five pieces of the past year IMHO:

This arthropod. I'm happy with getting decent paint job onto the plastic I was having trouble with earlier. And I'm pleased with the way the light source effect turned out. I also think the pose turned out fine; the spider rearing back from the torch, probably thrown by some startled dungeon explorer who has just noticed a spider the size of a cow sneaking up on them.

This pirate. I always wanted to paint a classic pirate, but never got around to it before. Also, he was one of the early ones I did after picking up a brush again after taking a break for a decade. With him I felt like I was really getting my painting groove back on again, painting was starting to feel fast and easy, and I like the result.

These marines. Finishing a full squad was very satisfying. Also, the droids had been taunting me from my "to-paint" pile for almost 20 years. Finally done!

These watchmen. The second time a did a whole unit, and finding inspiration in classic art was surprisingly much fun.

This fellow. The paint job is crap, but he is the mini that broke the decade long hiatus!

Quite Elemental

More elementals from the City, Water and Air.

Like the Fire Elemental, I left these guys as I painted them, at the tender age of maybe 13-14 years. Enamel paints on unprimed metal. I know, it's lazy of me not to redo them, but remember being so proud of how they turned out, that I don't want to change them.  The minis are oldies from Ral Partha (see 11-427). I also have the Earth Elemental (11-426), but his paint job is too crappy to keep, so he'll be getting a new coat of paint one of these days.

It's Greek To Me, Or The Cyclops

Stranger cards in Talisman usually occupy a space and offer assistance to visiting player characters. The Cyclops from the Talisman Expansion Set just comes along, eats one of your followers or steals some of your stuff and then trots off to the discard pile. A sympathetic fellow.

The mini is an old Ral Partha cyclops-kin.

Goblins!

Talisman contains a total of 5 goblin enemy cards. 2 in the basic game, 1 in the Expansion Set and 2 in the Dungeon expansion.

I have now finished 4. They are Ral Partha orcs propably from the late 80's. Once again, I didn't have the heart to change my old colour scheme, I just added the hand emblem on the shields.

The Easy Way To Start A Fire, Or The Fire Elemental

Another attack of laziness for the Fire Elemental enemy from the City expansion.

The figure is from Ral Partha and I just felt that I wasn't inspired enough to add to the old paint job, so I just repainted the chipped base and called it a day.

Getting The Stars Right, Or The Star Predator

Something more cosmic, the Star Predator enemy from the Timescape expansion.

The figure is a walktapus from the Ral Partha Glorantha series for RuneQuest. An interesting, cosmologically convoluted setting with non-level based mechanics, which felt fresh in the 1988 edition.

This time I took some before-pics of the cephalopod previous to the new base and a fresh coat of paint.

Sitting On A Gold Mine, Or The Leprechaun

This little fellow shall play the part of the Leprechaun from the Expansion set.

The mini is an old Ral Partha gnome based and repainted. I hope you can recognize that's a half-buried pot of gold at his feet.

For comparison, here he is next to some of his brethren painted about twenty years ago.