Dreadball Spring Clean Hobby Challenge 2022

There’s 25 models left to be completely finished, 6 of which just need eyes, bases and varnish as a bulk job at the end.  That’s 19 models that require bringing up to that standard.  I was busy across the week so I focused on a small job I could fit around stuff.  Melissinandra was almost finished, so I worked on her.  On monday evening I painted her hair and based hr shoulders, and on friday I finished her off.  If you look at the studio scheme she’s painted black and covered in lots of nice thin green glowing lines.  So clearly, those lines must be sculpted on so you can pick them out?  Probably nice thin trenches you can pin wash, and hard edges you can run the side of a brush along?

Nope.  Nothing.  Worse than that, there’s impossible to remove mold lines in the way of these lines.  Its a hard to see mess.  Once again, the studio/shop display piece is not the sculpt they’re selling (And their painter is much better than me).  I painted on the lines by hand as best as I could, but I didn’t do as many.  I’m not a mad man.

Turquoise Hair

Base Reaper MSP 9078 Surf Aqua
High 1 Gently drybrush 50:50 Surf Aqua and white
Wash Reaper MSP 09471 Bright Turquoise
High 2 Dryrbush Surf Aqua
High 3 Repeat High 2 but even lighter

Turquoise Metals

Base MP0017 Aquamarine
Wash with MP0013 Deep Bronze Green
High 1 with base
High 2 with base mixed with P3 Menoth White Highlight
High 3 & 4 add more and more Menoth White Highlight

Green Glow

Undercoat with white
Base 2:1 P3 Yellow Ink: P3 Green Ink.  If this is a glow, don’t be too afraid about going outside the lines.  It can look like OSL

Once that was done I went to bed and watched the 2003 Daredevil Directors cut.  With Multiverse of Madness coming up, who knows what’s going to get pulled in.  I’ve this theory that Jennifer Garner has filmed something MCU that we haven’t been told about.  Look at The Adam Project film.  Most of the others are MCU actors, or we’re waiting for them to get pulled in.  It feels like a side project started while something else was getting made.  She played Elektra back then and I’ve not seen that spin off yet.  I can see her potentially reprising that role for a few minutes in a multiversal situation.

So I remember Daredevil being ok, but not brilliant.  It hasn’t aged well.  The special effects on the exaggerated jumps are bad and overused.  Bullseye is clearly auditioning for a role in a Matrix sequel.  Daredevil gets a bit rapey towards Elektra!  When they meet in a coffee shop she tried to leave and he chases after her.  She refuses to give him her name while insisting she’s leaving.  She’s showing no signs of interest.  He doesn’t want her to leave so he grabs her and starts a fist fight because she won’t tell him her name!  It ends up flirty on both sides, but to begin with he is straight up attacking a woman because she said no to him.

The film does nothing with Elektra either.  She’s just there to die.  Her only back story is that she’s got rich parents and knows how to fight.  one good thing about this movie though, is that it didn’t kill off any of it’s bad guys.  They learned from the Batman movies.  There’s another problem.  In terms of tone and wonky camera angles, this film often felt like it wants to be somewhere between Michael Keaton and Adam West’s Batman.  Not a good choice.

It’s Saturday morning and I’m between models.  The blue cloth on Weiss and the prison warden has been intimidating me since the beginning.  It’s not something I feel I can just drybrush. It’s going to require time and focus and proper painting techniques.  A Saturday morning seems like the best time for that then.

Blue Cloth

Base VMC 70.899 Dark Prussian Blue, previously airbrushed on over a zenithal prime
Pin Wash GW Nuln Oil
High 1 Cygnar Blue Base
High 2 Cygnar Blue Highlight
High 3 Cygnar Blue Highlight with increasing amounts of P3 Frostbite
It was all then unified with a glaze of P3 Blue Ink which I may have thinned with a little GW Lahmium Medium

So Weiss is now all done except his red.  I can paint the wardens tie red too while I’m at it.  I need to paint his shirt white first though, and there’s another models who has red and white on him so I should do him at the same time: The Teraton Kraato Gon.  He’s going to need his skin painting first though.  While doing that I got tempted in to doing his shell.  I don’t think I’ve ever painted a tortoise shell before and wasn’t sure how to do it.  I came up with something.

Teraton Flesh

Base P3 Mouldy Ochre
Shade GW Agrax Earthshade
High 1 Drybrush P3 Mouldy Ochre
High 2 Drybrush P3 Menoth White Base
(I’ll come back for the bony protrusions later)

Tortoise Shell 

Base P3 Battledress green
High 1 P3 Beast Hide drybrush
High 2 P3 Hammerfall khaki drybrush
Wash GW Athonian Camoshade
Targeted spotty GW Agrax Earthshade wash, while the last parts of previous stage are still damp
Repeat Drybrushes lightly to taste

Light Brown Leather

Base P3 Beast Hide
Wash GW Agrax Earthshade
Drybrush Hammerfal Khaki (Done at same time as shell)

For some reason, this model didn’t want to dry in a hurry.  He seemed to have areas where paint wanted to pool and just sit there.  I had ample opportunity to go and do some light gardening, and wash some sprues for a later project.

With him all caught up, it’s time to paint the white.  I grabbed a light grey and based with that, and then kept adding more and more white to it to develop the highlights.  This was done to the Teraton and both Wardens only.

White Cloth

Base Reaper MSP 09148 Ghoul Skin
Highlights Ghoul Skin with more and more pure white, never going full white

I delayed the red a bit here as I decided to paint the wardens skin next.  According to the studio schemes I had 2 other models to paint the same, so I grabbed Tracer and Rathmar Ul-iheq and did all 4 models at the same time.  I followed a Asset Drop Guide 7 using the Foundry African Flesh triad.

African Flesh

Base Foundry African Flesh Shade 126A over a zenithal prime
High 1 Foundry African Flesh 126B over all but the darkest regions
High 2 Foundry African Flesh Light 126C
Shade Pin was Army Painted Strong Tone in the darkest recesses

I quickly and lazily painted the cigar here too

Cigar

Base P3 Beast Hide
High P3 Hammerfall Khaki
Wash AP Strong Tone
Put a dot of P3 Ember Orange on the end

It was apparently getting a little late, and I wanted to watch a movie so I called it there and went and watched the 2005 Elektra Directors Cut.

Elektra was something of a bland movie.  A huge shame as I’ve always liked Jennifer Garner and I think she was a much better stage fighter than Ben Affleck.  her back story doesn’t seem to gel with what we saw in Daredevil.  Now she’s been an assassin her whole life, even though in the previous movie she was sheltered by her daddy and not allowed out alone.  Either that, or in the 6 months between films she’s had a life of martial arts training, and a life as a killer for hire.  It doesn’t work.  It feels like someone tried to force their existing script to fit Daredevil.  All the cast appear to be TV actors, except General Zod / Stick, so I’m guessing this had limited budget and support.

Anyway, that’s me all caught up on every Marvel movie since the first X-Men film in time for whatever Multiverse of Madness decides to pull in or reference.  What?  The Punisher had a sequel?  Oh, and I’ve forgotten the Legion TV show, which I’ve not even seen a trailer for yet.  And there’s the fabled Roger Corman Fantastic 4.  Oh well.  Another time perhaps.