And the scores are ...

114 painted vs 112 bought.

That was too close for comfort. I managed to paint up 17 elves today to drag myself over the finishing line. I will now go and fall into bed and get some much needed sleep.

High Elves

Barring bases and some other minor bits and pieces I have the first unit of Mantic High Elves finished!



I've already moved on to the scouts. I might even manage to keep the pledge this year at this rate.

I've just totalled things up properly using a spreadsheet and I think I now have 97 painted vs 112 bought.

15 more miniatures to go to break even. This might be close.

An early retrospective.

So is the pledge actually working? Sort of. It has cut down on *some* of my madder impulse purchases but I still ended up buying a load of maidenhead stuff in 2008 and Space Hulk and the new High Elf army this year. It has probably prompted me to paint more stuff then I would have done without the added spur.

What the pledge hasn't really helped to do though is reduce the number of unfinished projects on my list. The raw count of purchased vs painted doesn't provide much incentive to pick up some figures which are two thirds finished and see them through to completion. I guess this is partly due to my rather puritanical take on the pledge scoring system.

With this in mind I declare 2010 as the year of getting things finished. I still want to buy fewer figures than I paint but I will primarily be trying to complete projects rather than just randomly painting stuff up.

For something like Space Hulk completing the project is obviously just a matter of painting all the figures in the box but for other projects 'completing' is likely to be a little more vague. In some cases I have a large pool of models for a project (some of which don't work very well under the current rules) so painting them all wouldn't necessarily be all that fruitful but getting an army to x number of points with options would be a better goal (in the short term at least).

When I do end up buying new miniatures I'm hoping that I can justify them as adding to particular projects rather than just being shiny and nice. I think I will be making use of proxies in some cases so I can try before I buy and find out what works instead of ending up with units which get purchased, painted and never used.

Another thing I plan to do in the coming year is actually get out and play more games with the miniatures. It has been pointed out to me that if I spend half as much time playing games as I do painting up the miniatures for them I might actually get good at some of the systems. That would be nice.

Time is running out

Not much more painting done, not much time left, 5 more figures purchased. [facepalm]

Yes, I bought the Mantic metal characters pack. Actually I had a slight problem with it when it arrived as one of the figures was broken. One email later Mantic's super speedy customer service sent me a replacement which arrived the very next day. They also sent me a few more bases so I can base up the scouts I got as free samples. Jolly nice of them, thanks folks.

Painting wise I'm working through the Mantic spears unit. I've finally got the hang of the colour scheme so hopefully I can do the rest a bit quicker. Here's hoping.

Found the camera

And here are some picture I took with it.

1) The second batch of the Genestealers


2) The Broodlord


3) The Elven Bard


4) The Wood Elves


Now lets see if I can get on with some painting.

Elves in progress

Just thought I'd share a quick pic of the Mantic Elves I'm working on. My camera has gone AWOL again so its just a phone pic.



Still working on designs and colours but I'm getting there.

If you go down to the woods today ...

If you go down to the woods today ... you'd get very wet and cold, the weather is rubbish.

Good news is that I have finished the last batch of LOTR Wood Elves. That's one of this years projects completed, actually I think that's the first project I have completed this year.

At some point I finished the elven bard for the Mrs too. I think it looks really nice but it didn't seem to impress her sadly.

I've made a start on the mantic elves, doing the really thrilling job of painting the brown on the bases. There are some jobs I really wish I could fast forward through and this really is one of them.

I really do need to take some more photos as I'm a bit behind on that front.

The hare and the tortoise

Okay so maybe more tortoise, less hare but I have been chipping away at things. The Mantic order arrived along with another free sample so I received 54 miniatures + a warmachine in the end. For those of you who like photos I've done some unboxing ones to show off what you get from mantic here.

I've not quite felt up to painting this week so I've spend my time clipping, trimming and glueing. I now have the whole elf warhost assembled and washed. Tonight I'm aiming to glue the sand on the bases so I can have a crack at spraying them over the weekend it the weather's not too bad (and the forecast is good).

If I manage the get a good rythm up with painting the elves and get them completed in a reasonable time then I intend to expand the army. With the addition of characters I reckon the warhost will stretch to about 1000 points. Mantic will be issuing cavalry and palace guard (all the two handed weapon options for the special slots in the army) in the next few months so next year I'd like to take the army right the way up to 2000 or 2250 points. Right now I'm trying to focus on getting as much painting done as possible without buying any more stuff.

Good weekend

Painting wise this has been a really good weekend not only did I not buy anything (!) I also managed to finish 8 more figures with 8 underway as well.

At the end of last week I had a chance to do some painting but I had mild PNKD symptoms at the time so didn't feel up to tackling the terminators. Instead I settled on the LOTR wood elves I bought earlier in the year and decided to block out the areas of colour that I could manage. Since then I've carried on with them and I now have 7 elves finished and the remaining 7 washed and ready for highlighting. I've also started painting and elven bard I bought for the Mrs and finished the broodlord too. I might get back on the right side of the pledge after all.

71 painted vs 104 purchased.

Now that was quick

Storming painting session tonight! I've now finished the remaining 11 'stealers. Just the terminators and the brood lord to go on the space hulk front.

63 painted vs 104 purchased.

Game on.

And the pledge news ...

So now I've got that lot painted I've got the pledge totals so far.

Checking the photos, I've got 52 miniatures painted (counting each bike as 2 minis). So far I've bought 14 wood elves, 35 minis from the space hulk boxed set and 2 free mantic elves. 52 vs 51 - yes!

Well actually its more of a nooooooooooooo. Yesterday I cracked and ordered a big box of those mantic elves so I have another 52 miniatures and a bolt thrower on the way. Looks like I'm going to have to get really busy with my paintbrush in the next three months if I'm to keep the pledge for this year.

BIG Update!

I've finally got round to getting decent pictures of this year's output. Here we go:-

Life in the slow lane.

This week hadn't been very productive. I'd had PNKD every night which has stopped me from painting. Yesterday I had yet another attack and was contemplating another evening of shooting cowboys on Smokin' Guns but instead I decided to at least try to do some painting.

The attack was reasonably mild and confined mostly to my right side and I didn't have any spontaneous movements either which made painting a possibility. I decided to try somethign easy - basecoating the remaining 'stealers and in the end it turned out rather well. I positioned the model with my left hand and did a basic brush stroke action with my right, bracing both hands in close to my body. It may to have been the neatest or the quickest painting I've ever done but I managed to get through all the remaining 'stealers and put a black wash on the carapice too.

This morning (with all limbs functioning correctly) I washed the purple areas (the heads and the hands) of the stealers so that they're all ready for highlights when I get a chance to paint. I even black washed a couple more 'stealers which had been on the shelf and I'd forgotten to do last night. My unconcious mind had helpfully woken me up in the night to inform me that I'd missed them ... gee, thanks.

Progress

Things are going pretty well with the Space Hulk miniatures. The 'stealers are surprisingly easy to paint up which means that I now have the base colours on most of them. The terminators are also coming along.

I think I forgot to mention that I got sent a couple of free samples of the Mantic Games high elves. Free miniatures are always nice but in this case they're damaging to my pledge totals! I've made a start at painting them and I think they'll turn out nicely. If I didn't already have so many projects on the go I would be very tempted to buy some as they really are very cheap indeed.

Temptation awaits

Things were going so well with the pledge, too well, and then Games Workshop released Space Hulk. Darn. Unable to resist the lure of the shiny new edition shelled out for my very own copy of Space Hulk. Only afterwards did it dawn on me that the game contained miniatures and this was going to throw a major spanner into the pledge.

When my box arrived and I prised it open I was really impressed at the quality of the contents the sculpts are probably the best plastics GW have ever produced.

Yesterday I took advantage of the lovely sunny weather to get everything glued and primed and today I made a start on the painting. So far things are going well. The Genestealers are pretty easy to paint if you stick to the colour scheme the studio used in the artwork. As for the Marines, I'm pretty used to painting Blood Angels by now. I already have the armour done right up to the highlights on about 8 of the terminators, what's likely to slow me down is the huge amount of decoration they seem to be carrying. I'm still pretty positive that I'll be able to turn this major dent in the pledge into a pile of painted miniatures. Here's hoping.

I've made some progress on my 40k army too. I've turned a load of half painted Veterans into a load of fully painted veterans. Not sure what to do on the scoring front for these.

Head out on the highway!

Bikes done!


Land Raider done!


Get in!

Get your motor running ...

Yesterday the sun came out. This has been a really wet summer so far, but a bit of sunshine was just what I needed ... to get some more priming done.

In the house move I found my old can of blood angels red spray paint and it had just enough in to prime the space marine bikes. As it was a quiet day I managed to get them all about half way finished too. This will be my first new 40k unit for about 2 years at least.

All in all a good weekend.

Little by little we cross the line

Make that 24 painted. I think I'm getting the hang of these dwarves so things might move a little faster from now on.

Keeping track

Just in case anyone wants to know the score ...

14 purchased vs 20 painted

I'm winning!

Okay so I might not have managed to paint all that many miniatures so far this year but I have managed not to buy many either. Here's hoping that the second half of this year gives me more of a chance of making a dent in that lead pile.

Busy

If you've read any of the recent posts on this blog you'll know that I'm having trouble finding days when I can both pick up a paintbrush and have enough control over my muscles to be able to do anything with it. So this weekend I got to thinking - things might be hard at the moment but am I going to let my condition slow me down? Well yes, obviously, duh!

But seriously, I got to thinking if there was anything I could try and do when my symptoms are mild enough well, to be able to do something. So this weekend I gave a few things a go and it turns out I can do some of the more basic tasks like glueing sand to bases etc.

I've also managed to snatch a few clear moments over the last couple of weeks so I have a few things to show off:-

Firstly this is the next batch of dwarves which I will be priming as soon as the great British summer throws up a dry day.


Next up ... a landraider ... THE landraider. I've had this model for years. Every attempt I've made so far to get it ready for use on the tabletop has stalled. Today I finally got the darned thing assembled and now all it needs is some paintwork. I'm optimistic that it will be ready for a game sooner rather than later.


Another assembly job I've managed to tick off this weekend - some space marine bikes. I bought these two years ago to the day and I've finally put them together.


And finally these are all the dwarves I have finished so far this year. I'll get decent shots of them when I've sorted the basing.


So that's it for now, things are definitely moving though which has cheered me up no end.

Against the odds

I had a few clear days with almost no PNKD symptoms at the beginning of the week so I cracked the paintbrush out. The result is another finished batch of dwarves and another on the go.

I think I've got the hang of the colour scheme for the little chaps so I should be able to paint them up a little quicker from now on ... whenever I get another chance to do some painting.

I'm still here!

Bit of a gap there. The reason for the lack of posts is quite simply they I haven't been painting. I haven't been painting largely because my health has taken a turn for the worse recently (lots of PNKD attacks) which has meant that I have had very few opportunities to paint when I have had enough muscle control to hold a brush and a figure.

Last night, for the first time in a very long time I got some painting done. I painted up an old Aurak Draconian figure to represent my Dragonborn character in tonight's D&D game. Its a nice miniature, 90's Ral Partha and very different in style from the GW stuff I've been painting recently. I've got it ready for the game which is a success as I thought I was just going to have to use it in its plain grey undercoat.

2 Steps forward

... and one step back.

+ Got those 6 dwarves finished and started on the next batch.

- Bought a command pack of two metal LOTR wood elves to make up some character models for the SoBaH warband.

Number 2 daughter joined me for the painting session and worked on the bretonnian archers I gave her. She tells me that she wants to paint goblins next which will mean a trip to storage to get her some to paint that I won't miss.

Bits and pieces

The LOTR elves got doused in Halford finest black car primer and I dabbed a bit of paint on some of those dwarves. Not the most productive od weekends but at least I moved things on a little.

On Saturday I also played a miniatures game against Daughter number 2. We drew at one game apiece.

Waiting for busses

... and then two come along at once.

The first batch of dwarves for the year are almost finished.

And they're off

There are slow starts and there are slooooooooooooooooooooooow starts.

A combination of illness, apathy and real life(TM) have prevented me for doing any painting for the last six weeks but last night I finally picked up a paintbrush.

Taking a break from painting shouldn't be so bad as long as I've been taking a break from buying miniatures too, only I haven't. At the beginning of the year I bought a box of GW LOTR plastic wood elves to split with my eldest daughter so I'm 12 miniatures down already.

Last night I prepped the Wood Elves and clipped them from the frames. These are destined to become another SoBaH warband when I've finished with them. After that I carried on painting the dwarves I started in December. Its a start anyway.

Its all go round here