Welcome back to Miniatures of the Month! It’s been an even hotter time here in the UK recently, so painting miniatures seems to be on the back burner for many people, me included. Therefore, we have another combined issue, and it’s possible the next one will be too, we shall see! That doesn’t mean we don’t have cool models though, let’s take a look.
Treeman (Bloodbowl) by Sam de Smith
This month I’ve tackled (ah-ha!) a bloodbowl treeman for my Old World Alliance team, the Albanite Auldies. They use a red, blue and yellow colour scheme to represent the Auld Alliance of Scotland and France – makes perfect sense for a hodgepodge team! – although here the yellow is coming from the greenstuff world flowers.
It’s a brilliant kit. The arms are on sockets so really posable and there’s two very different face options, the nest and boot are optional and you can put the side branches anywhere. This means Halfling teams can have two very distinct looking versions, should they choose to take both (and why wouldn’t you?)
But back to the painting. First and foremost, if you don’t want to paint on sprue, prime brown! This model has some very hard to reach places once built, especially the mouth; I used Colour Forge Trench Brown. I also washed the mouth and underside of the legs with GW Earthshade before assembly. Then, I drybrushed the model, first Vallejo Model Colour Cork Brown and then Yellow Ochre, before washing with Reikland Fleshshade. The leaves were painted VJ Game Color Dark Green followed by Livery Green, finished off with a 50/50 Livery / Deck Tan drybrush and then washed with Seraphim Sepia. The mouth and eye areas were drybrushed VJ GC Flame Orange then Golden Yellow, with the sockets given a layer of VJ MC Transparent Orange and the eyes themselves painted VJ MC Gloss White. The red on the boot in the tree was picked out with Gore Red over white, whilst the red (and indeed prussian blue) on his shield was done over an indigo base to give it more depth. A fab wee figure, a joy to paint and I would certainly do another!
Captain America (MCP) by Ross Coulbeck
Can you feel the confidence, the righteousness? Wanna have a rousing discussion about truth, honour, patriotism? God bless America!
MCP models continue to be a welcome break from more taxing models (see below), so I always highly recommend them, and they are good quality. And who better to make you feel better than Captain America himself. I kept him as his traditional colours, red, white and blue, because really what else can you paint Cap? I started with a White Scar undercoat, then used Blood Angels Red contrast and Frostheart contrast for the main colours. Of course, my painting hand isn’t so good that I could just avoid putting paint on the bits that needed to stay white, so I used my normal White Scar base paint for touchups. Probably for the best anyway, the undercoat white is never quite the same.
The base is a new one I’ve found for MCP bases. I could never quite get concrete right by mixing paints, and especially not consistent, but Dreadful Visage did the trick. In the pot it looks purple, but don’t let that throw you off, shake it up a lot, and I mean a LOT, and it comes out like concrete.
So there is Cap, ready to fight the good fight against Hydra, or anyone else.
Galactic Corps (Core Space) by Sam de Smith
I’ve been getting back into sci-fi minis this month, with the Galactic Corps for Core Space. This excellent expansion puts you on the run from law in Battle Systems’ rich space dungeon crawler, where you’re not just liberating ancient alien tech but now avoiding The Man. But hey, there’s a teleporter to build (and a shiny new NPC die!)
The game has always had strong Firefly vibes, so I decided to channel the Alliance a bit for these guys.
Whilst I like the sculpts a lot, I’m not going to hide the fact that the casts are a bit dicey in places, as fairly early examples of Battle Systems’ stuff – the more recent pieces are much cleaner. Still, really enjoyed painting them.
The gear has still-suit vibes, so that was my starting point. They were primed with Colour Forge Grey (side note, Colour Forge sprays are my go-to now , for value, coverage and stability, and Zatu stock the full range) and then washed with GW Nuln Oil, before dry brushing Vallejo Model Color Grey – not Deck Tan, for a change, because I wanted a colder, harder look to these. The blues were done with Prussian Blue, washed with Nightshade(2 by 2 with hands of blue); skin tones were done with Flat Flesh and Game Color Mahogany, but blended between for a range of tones, then washed with Fleshshade. Then, Vallejo Model Color Silver Grey was used to build up the light edges and panels, followed by VMC Ivory. Finally, bases were finished with GW Astrogranite and drybrushed Deck Tan (there we go) to match the rest of my Core Space figs.
