First Hordes Miniatures

[Vaul]

Still waiting for my mail order hordes army to arrive, so I picked up just one model from vagabonds in town to get started on.  I also picked up some vallejo paints, which I had not used before.  So here he is, the Lord of the Feast.



I have to say, i'm not especially happy with how he turned out, but I was trying several experiments here.

- Vallejo paints, I found these a bit hit & miss since i'm used to the gw stuff.  I like my paint to be thick enough that I can actually get a lot of drybrushing done, as is my style with painting, but without it caking too much.  The 'leather brown' I used (to undercoat the whole model) was fine, but the green and yellow paints I picked up were horribly watery... maybe i've gotta pour some of it out first before I get to the consistent part of the container, I dunno.

- I attempted to just mash a whole lot of different hues and paint mixes into this guy, but with mixed success.  He didn't end up looking as bright and striking as I am planning my army to look, but on the other hand he does look like he's a part of nature, and the colours lend him a 'soft forestland' atmosphere.  Still, it's not exactly popping.

- My first attempt at putting some basing flock on small section of the actual model, it is meant to look like he's just emerged from the undergrowth, or perhaps has just been stuffing grass down his pants.  I've been looking to try this out for some time, at the moment the jury is out, it might look better on the warbeasts though.

- I actually used a sample pot from the reaper miniatures range that I got given at battlecry.  This stuff was sublime!  Just what I wanted from a pot of paint.  It was a turkoise colour, and on this model i've used it on the sword.  Really happy with it, so i'll be using that on all of the areas of my army that are meant to be weapons/armour.  Should give them the type of circle vibe i'm going for - forest dwellers that have carved a lot of their gear out of naturally found material that has been enhanced by magic.

But then again i'm biased as I love reaper.

[Hausdorff space]

I have to say, i'm not especially happy with how he turned out, but I was trying several experiments here.

Well he still looks pretty good.
...all you need now are some Shifting Stones for some stupid-long teleports into the enemy.

[Chris]

Sweet model,

Vallejo are sort of the middle ground between GW and P3 paints. Where GW are chalky and dry out fast which makes them good for drybrushing P3 are incredible for blending but can be harder to drybrush because they are intended to remain liquid and stretch their pigment further.

[Sectiplave]

Yeah I quite like this one, he looks very earthern looking. It might not look super exciting from a distance, but has a great realism feel going for it.

[Lazarus]

Not your best work for sure.

Main areas what look like i painted (what is not that good), the sword and the antlers. The dry brush looks bad on the antlers and the sword just does not look that good. Skin looks like it needs one more lighter tone i say.

Model looks very dull might just be all the browns in there.

[Rasputin]

Looks ok to me but depend what level of painting you are after .... changing to vallejo from Gw can be hard I tried it myself a few years ago, but ended up keeping my Gw paint and selling of the vallejo as I could never get the hang of it.

My missus used almost exclusively Reaper Paints and achieved awesome results with them, the strangth of them lies in the triad system that gives you a colour a shade and a highlight in one set that can make for some quick painting....

[Vaul]

Bloody minis still haven't shown up so I hit vagabonds to get me one more model to paint while i'm sitting at home on my break from work.  Went back to some conventional ideas for this guy, so he looks a bit cleaner and brighter than the previous attempt.  Still, the choice of colours are way too boring, I tend to go for a surreal, over the top fantasy approach to my armies and this isn't it.

I'll be trying to decide whether to drop the blues and greens and go for a more yellow/orange/brown autumnal theme much like nick's wood elves, or go for a full-on heavy green look, with lots of olive, emerald and mossy green.  I'm glad of the fact that there are less models to paint in hordes!

[NeckFace]

the red and other warm colours would look nice against the greys.  though you may be tired of painting red by now?  alternatively a warm brown-orange for the fur, with cream/flesh tones for the flesh-underbelly areas could pop next to the greens.

or this may be an issue with the flash washing out the appearance of the model, but your shadowed areas could be darker, running a dark/black wash into the recesses and folds will help bring more contrast, definition and make the highlights pop more

[Vaul]

I've always been looking for an excuse to paint a pure green army.  Not orcs or dark angels, just something that you wouldn't expect to be pure green, for example I had an idea to do an 'emerald city' tomb kings army or a 'mossy undergrowth' beastmen army for fantasy.  Well maybe I can try it with the circle.

The hard part will be making everything look distinctive, you'd have to use every tiny part of the range of green available to you if you wanted to get away with a monocolour thing like that.  Perhaps with a bit of practice on the hues it will work, at the moment i'm thinking that for skin & fur it will be a very brownish olive, for cloth the same sort of minty green that i've used on my last guy here, for weapons they'd be a jade stone colour, and i'd use the brighter sort of flock like on my empire army or the cityguard gaming tables etc.

[Chris]

Cranking out the dudes.

You can do everything painted in green if you make use of your shade colour. For example shading the browns and greys for the fur in a golour like Cryx Bane Base (something greeny grey and dark) will carry that green hue over.

[Big D]

Damn I love those Circle wolves, but as a faction they are too tree-huggery for me. One of the feral Warpwolves however will eventually make its way into my Vamp army as my Vargulf

[Vaul]

It's always hard to get a good photo, but if you could see these miniatures in person you could further appreciate how happy I am with them!  Third time lucky, I guess.

I found I was able to apply the lessons I learnt with the last two attempts.  What i've come up with now is a nice colour scheme that is cohesive and very pleasing to look at (for me at least).  Managed to get everything painted nice and neatly and finished.  Hopefully hordes players are ok with the way i've done with line of sight markings with the static grass overlapping the sides of the base - I thought that was a great idea, I couldn't think of any other way to put those markings there without letting the model down.

Something I think of the WM&H universe in categories of the natural, supernatural and the artificial.  For example you have humans and animals, plants and critters etc in the game, but you also have supernatural magic spells, and 'otherworldly' beasts.  And of course the man-made weapons, jacks and so on.  You could think of Khador as very much steeped in the man-made, artificial, heavy weapons military and so on.  Cryx take the supernatural AND the artificial together, like many other factions do.  But I like to think of Circle as having a very special synergy of the natural & supernatural together (much as the other hordes factions do, but in their own unique way) to the complete exclusion of the artificial (even their weapons?).

That's the idea behind my colour scheme for the army, to use natural green, grey and brown colours but in many places enhanced to the point where they glow in a way that you wouldn't see in nature, so that you can feel the pulse of magic in support of them.  Really looking forward to painting more stuff.

[daemion]

truly cool seeing them tonite luke. great job mate.

[Vaul]

Thx Bro!  Kromac is doing great but I haven't got my usage of the wolfriders themselves to 100% yet.  Getting better with them each time though.

[Hausdorff space]

those Wolfriders look much more 'ethereal' on the table.

[Vaul]

Latest progress:

[richardbarby]

they look dam good mate

[HarasinCreed]

They look really good man. A question are you generally just dry brushing the models and washing them? or are u layering.

[Vaul]

All of the above.  Half of me wants to take my time, doing each area of each model to the best of my ability, but the other half of me wants to finish the current project and get onto the next.  So a lot of the time I cut corners, overall quality drops.  but yeah I wear my crappy brushes out a lot, drushbrush heaps... I have niched out a style that works but doesn't produce the best work i'm capable of, and finishes things quick.

[Philfy]

On the whole I like what you are trying to achieve Luke.

One thing you might try though...  the model bases...  see how one looks with some of that brighter/more glossy static grass.  Just a few small patches of it on top of the tufts you already have  (or else try some of those lil static grass tufts you can get).

I suspect that it may help add to the "magical" effect you are seeking with the models and bring them up a lil more out of their bases.

Otherwise - hope to see you in October.  Nice work.

[HarasinCreed]

All of the above.  Half of me wants to take my time, doing each area of each model to the best of my ability, but the other half of me wants to finish the current project and get onto the next.  So a lot of the time I cut corners, overall quality drops.  but yeah I wear my crappy brushes out a lot, drushbrush heaps... I have niched out a style that works but doesn't produce the best work i'm capable of, and finishes things quick.

Well i think it is really good cause it produces a high standard of miniature at quite a fast rate as far as i can tell.

Edmund

[Vaul]

More minis, especially since it's CTA this weekend.  Which stalker is painted better?

[wouster7]

@Vaul

You painting is definitely getting progressively better. The Stalker on the right in my opinion looks like it has more tones and clearer detail. Not too sure as it could just be a play on exposure from the camera. Mike uses a photo box which really brings out properly the effort of coats on a mini. Would be keen for a better photo, looking good so far.

[Hausdorff space]

That army is coming along nicely Vaul.

I think the Stalker on the left looks better (slightly darker tone), though the right is perhaps slightly better painted? Hard to tell.
What is that mini you're using for a Satyr?

Good luck at CTA!

[Vaul]

That's 'baby satyr' who acts as a gorax.  I hope the CTA guys don't mind it.