Raiding the Dusty Wastes

I got way too damn into my cleaning of my living space as I try and get the Giftmas presents wrapped and packed. In that, I mean that I inadvertently threw away my sprues for the Arab light cavalry and Anglo-Saxon infantry that I had lying around where I thought “they’ll be safe here”. That turned into losing the leader figure I was going to pull for the giant scorpion I have standing by for me to work on. I have since ordered a new single sprue that I will work from when it gets delivered. Onward and upward from this mishap!

I had an order of 3D printed columns arrive. It was a small shipment and I’m thankful that the pieces were hollow as it allowed cutting through and refilling with Apoxie Sculpt easy. I threw that on top of the base I’d been working on and threw on a little more filler turf. I’m quite happy with the results and will be even more so when done. The colors will be easy and so forgiving as compared to the rest of the model.

Presently, on the djinn, I decided to try and look at the musculature which will be a little tricky. With it being such a big piece that will catch quite a bit of eye I thought taking the extra care in trying to start good blends now was optimal. A basecoat of Vallejo black primer and then one of Proacryl’s Dark grey primer to build volume before sketching with a much lighter grey from Vallejo think that there is the start for step one before trying to push up to a higher contrast. Looking over more bodybuilding images than I care to admit to in order to figure out what the highest contrast might be I’m confident that next step will be pretty easy in the blending process. All the work is going into the undercoating as I don’t want to play with trying to blend colors and layers later and end up screwing the pooch. I’ll go back over it in the end with more zenithal highlighting before I work over the fleshtones which will knock down any great contrasts that just don’t work. The rest of the model seems like it’ll be a piece of cake by comparison from there.

I finished building the second unit of levy archers as outlined thus far. I considered the idea that Gerry had floated early on to play with different colored turbans but I believe the blue ones are the focal point of it all. Honestly, with so many people commenting that they really have their eyes drawn to that feature I’m not going to change it. I decided to have some in-unit bannermen. I think that there will be greater visual interest from the feature and allow me to demarcate units in a manner that wouldn’t break from the overall motif. I’ll just trade out one model from my first unit to allow for the flag bearer and pop him into the second. Having these models means that I need to sit on Photopea more and design for some time. Making decisions on colors and patterns after getting the Arabic script written as I want will not be easy. I remember where I keep my ibuprofen and hope I won’t need too much. So far the only part that caused a little consternation was modifying the levy figures in order to accommodate the wire for the eventual banners.

Gripping Beast’s sprues for the Arab Archers and Spearmen box generally just have one arm (only one lacks both) and makes for easy modification. Cutting joints with my jeweler’s saw, from when all models were made of metal, and then pinning the right position has been pretty easy given how often I’ve done it in the past. I managed only to screw up one fist that wasn’t thick enough for the drill bit to pass through without breaking the surface. It’ll be fine as I’ve covered it with a layer of glue that will hide the mistake under the paint. All other details can be worked on and put to right so casual scrutiny won’t reveal the modification.

From here I’ll just put a hold on the beast mounted leader and keep up the behind the scenes progress for other units. The downside of these updates is that I’ve come to dig deeper into the Age of Magic book and I’ve gotten the brilliant idea of what I want to do for Legendary units. I think I might need to limit my battleboards for what minis I bring to the table. A minis agnostic system is turning out to be a little dangerous to my wallet. Each step I take from here will be calculated as to how I can afford the creation process. Hiring the sculptor for the cyclops was rough enough with minimal reference material to get the model. If I really want the big bad bruisers for the table done my way I’ll need to jump onto researching images well before hiring a concept artist, a sculptor and then a printer. Should I start a GoFundMe solely for the purpose of self indulgence in this hobby?