Halo Armies - Project COMPLETE and CLOSED
Buying the first HALO toys, the obsession begins ...
So I started buying the miniatures. These were two of the first ones I bought, in a gas station on the way to work one dreary morning. Having them on my desk at the office cheered me up a little … until I started buying more. Then I wanted to start basing them and touching up the colors on the ones I didn’t like so much.
Thus began a little “mini-hobby” that would trickly on in dribs and drabs through the most of 2019. What started off with just a pair of “figures” (i.e., toys), is now an “army” of over 100 in four distinct “factions.”
I guess I should say I’m not really a HALO fan or know much about the IP. I played HALO 1 and 2 back on the original XBox, but that’s it. This was just because I thought the little figures were fun and it was a casual way to relax … almost like a hobby should be.
Two of the very first figures.
There are two "tiers" to these Mega Bloks toys, the "nice" ones as shown above, and the "blind buy" ones you get for about 1/3 the price.
More of the blind buy packs. There are also units packs, vehicles, etc. Note the clear blue plastic guys (hologram characters or some such), these would be the hardest to paint and and make into some kind of "usable" figure.
Okay THESE are the very first two figures, already out of the box. They are VERY posable for little "lego-esque" guys, and depending on how you pose them, stand up just fine without a base (they come with a little lego-like stand in their pack).
The army starts to grow! People around the office are starting to look at me strange. The silver scuba-looking guy in the center will need a new head and a new pain scheme. The orange guy on the left will also need a new paint job. There's a green team, a blue team ... maybe I'll start a red team? Meanwhile, the Arbiter Covenant guy will be given to my girlfriend, who enjoys collecting little creatures and monsters, etc. 
An "after and before" shot. So the school bus tangerine is the original, the brick red is mine. I also started making bases for these. Printed a whole sheet of sci-fi themed skins, glue-stick to wooden discs, cut, sand, a little black paint around the rim, done.
More "after and before" pictures. The "lower-grade" toys in the blind buy packs are the ones that really need help.
These are the nicer, "tier one" figures. They're also getting bases, and of some small enhancements like a wash, a dry brush, and some accents on their generic-looking "toy" weapons.
SNIPERS! Because, hell yeah ... SNIPERS!
Some more progress photos, trying to make the most of the "ugly duckling" toys and bring them close to the same level as the "tier one" toys.
Like I said, there are a lot of nice blue and green HALO guys, I'm also building up reds in the re-paint of the goofy yellows, oranges, silvers, etc
This is very cool! I like it! I recently did a toy repaint lately, unrelated, but it is fun to do something new and different so it really hit a sweet spot for me seeing someone do similar. Cool idea for the bases too btw, they look very cool with minimial work. Glad that it feels easy, quicky and relaxing.
Thanks very much, @mage ! 😀 Yeah, this was definitely very low-stress, just-for-fun, splash-paint-on-some-sh*t between “more serious” projects. Although to be fair, I DID wind up with over 100 of these things … so it became a semi-serious project all on its own.
@oriskany must feel great to have accomplished so much but with so little brain stress