Arena Rex Vargr

I continue to have little painting to show as my output is either slow or can't be shown due this time to being mostly my Santa Clause present for my target. But I can show you the latest finish from my Arena Rex collection. I had hoped to get one finished a month but that looks like it's not going to happen but still from an enjoyment point of view its a real blast.

This is Vargr, rather smaller than Aquila which was the first of the Arena Rex figures I have painted up. Not that Aquila is the largest of the Arena Rex figures I own. I selected this guy as my second model as I really liked the look of him.

Red Republic Games have used quite a few different artists to sculpt their figures but from what I have seen all are top flight sculptors and like all the others this one does not disapoint.

Great detail which makes the painting so much easier, though I have to say that I am extremely happy with the skin tones I have managed to get. Lots of layering and I think if I keep pushing myself I will really grow as a painter. I am more well known for my 6mm work so it's a lot of fun to show off something a little bigger. I think this figure is closer to true 32mm than many of the others, Aquila is 42mm toe to eye. This guy if he was standing straight would have to stretch to get to 30mm.

Unfortunately I was a little careless on cutting him off his sprue, snapping his ankle and pinning was not an option with the ankle being so thin. The fix ended up being a bit of glue and painting a leather band around his ankle to match the one just under his knee on the other leg. 

The action poses are only possible due to these models coming in multipart kits, in this case originally four, that is until I made it five part!

It's now possible for me to play a game with a couple of real models. It won't be much of a game but I am sure The Boy will be only to happy to hand me my ass on a plate.

Painting Contest, the final entry

I was going to do each item as a single post but time will not allow me to do this, so here is the lot in one go. I must say I was really happy to get all the figures I hoped to paint done. I painted more in the duration of the challenge than I have done at any other three month period. Even better, I still have the painting bug. I had a couple of days off and have jumped back into it with 108 6mm Napoleonic French Infantry and 4 28MM WWII Yanks all 2/3rd the way through and a bunch of Japanese 28's all cleaned and primed. More on these later as it's an interesting challenge all to itself.

16 British riflemen, all on the Warbase casualty counter bases. These are great value and whilst based they are not 100% finished as I need to add the Tufts that I was waiting for. I think these really finish off the models. I will do this when I have finished off the Yanks, so a few days to go.

I was not really enjoying painting these as I was not happy with the colour the battledress was coming out. Well I went over it with the colour watered down with a touch of white in it and it came out much better. The ink wash really then took it to how I wanted it to look. Now I really like them.

Next up was a unit of Cataphracts, I thought these would be a quick run over but in the end they took longer than I expected. I used 5 different metallic paints over the whole unit. Also for some reason I had a couple of lesser armoured riders, but I figure it adds to the look of the unit. Two different posed horses, just glad neither were charging. These are Essex so not my favorite but they do look fairly good and this time sat on their horses better.

The Command is for the Seleucid army . OK I know I have three bases that were with the army but I liked the idea of a command stand in heavier armour. These are Magister so don't fully sit with the Essex but they will be fine.

Given that I spent several days thinking that prepping these figures was a mistake as no way would I get round to painting them, then suddenly they are painted and I have a day to spare! Well they were easy and fast to paint but I also really enjoyed painting them (more Magister). When I saw the figures I immediately wanted to get them. The look of the figure is just excellent and I could not have picked a better unit to finish off the Challenge as I left the whole event with a positive painting buzz. This is really important, yes I was dog tired having really pushed to get as much done as possible but at the same time I was also looking forward to more painting.

I'm not really sad that the Challenge has finished, I think for me it was just the right length. However I have spent nearly as much time at the table in the last 4 days as I did the final 4 of the challenge, pleasure both times held me there but this time without a deadline hanging over my head. Very happy memories of the Challenge and happy to go at it again next year, but what Will it be on the table? Who knows for I don't.

Catching up on the Painted Stuff!

Paint or Blog!, not quite March or Die but close enough. These pics have found their way to Curt's blog for the Challenge but not here, so here goes.

First up are the two Napoleonic wagons I had bought off E-Bay in about November. They sat on my painting desk ready to go (arrived primed) ever since. A great thing about the Challenge was that it got many of us to work on projects we had allowed to go stale or just plain forgotten. These two really took little time once they were started. They are H&R 6mm and whilst the rules take no account of them I just wanted to do them anyway. Overall I am quite pleased with them and I am sure the odd photo will feature them in the future. At the moment we have no Nap games planned but I am working on a rules set that may give more feel of the period than we are getting from Polemos. Not that we would not use them but we want more than they offer to be honest.

Maybe at the back of my mind I had already decided to get the FoG Renascence rules, either way I used this as my entry for Female Fatal, after all more good men have been lost to women than war! The poor bugger linked to this lass has been lost to both! I had started painting this figure about 20 years ago and stopped part way through, unhappy with the colours. Well I was happy to strip it back and start again. I did it from start to finish at the end of a sitting. The flash has bleached the paint a little but the colours are much better and more historical. This base will ultimately end up as part of my ECW camp which I already have enough figures to be able to make a good mix.

Figures are FriKorps who were years ahead of everyone one else in this respect. I plan to re-look at my ECW armies, after all these were the first ones I painted and some will be touched up but others may end up being sold on. I have lots of the old Essex Dwarfs and unless I see something even better would like to go fully over to Matchlock, though this may have to be at conventions as their on-line catalogue lacks pictures.

I need to take new pics of my Ancients camp as I was not happy with the originals, so that one maybe next time.