I have been complaining about running very low on painting and basing supplies and as luck happens we needed to pick up our daughter for an urgent Melbourne hospital appointment. This was in two stage,s from our old haunt in Konongwootong North in the Western Districts to Bendigo and then Bendigo to Melbourne.

The trip to Konong was like Santa had arrived as Maree brought back all of my “stuff” (a technical term for “highly sophisiticated simulation apparatus”) that had been there for at least two decades, I kid you not. This included some old favourites:

Hero Quest was an all time family favourite and there were lots of other goodies to share around to fellow PIGS. There was also the original box set of Beeky Spacemarines, old school metal Fimir, the original metal rough riders that will now become Australian Light Horse and lots, lots more.

It was like shopaholic heaven in Bendigo with all of the shops open. Good friend Mark M had steered me right on where to go for essential supplies:

The trip to Bendigo finally meant that I could undercoat more figures that would take another twelve months to paint! The trip to “GUF” and “Power Grunt” solved my problems and then Andrews goes and “@£$%&” lifts the restrictions and in a few days I could visit my old haunts anyway. Always new I couldn’t trust a politician.

Being the dutiful wife Maree had organised a Father’s day present which also arrived this week (yet to find out if it was late for this year or early for next).

Yep she is a Gemini with all that entails, and sad to say it is all true, especially the scary bit.

Finally some brand new shiny stuff also arrived:

Hopefully these Infinity figures will kick Blake’s cute ass. The Nomads weren’t my original choice for a faction but they looked cool even though I find red hard to paint. I thought the description on the box summed me up so hence the choice:

“Three Gargantuan Spaceships endlessly traverse the sphere doing what others cannot or will not do. Sticking it to “the Man”. Facing the establishment and contesting ordinary definitions of normalcy and acceptability. Do you want to think for yourself? Do you want to travel? Then you might have a Nomad spirit”

Enough dreaming. Hopefully I will finish my Napoleonic Portuguese tonight and then back to painting more zombies.

Hi All I haven’t finished much this week.

“Zeke” was painted up to be an Amish Zombie Hunter. After all the Comandment “Thou Shalt Not Kill” doesn’t apply if they are already dead does it “English”!

For the “End of Days” rules Zeke will be a Good Smaritan armed with a revolver and a pump action shot gun. He is also armed with “Holy Writ” which gives him “Inspirational Presence”.

The figure will also be used for “Dead Man’s Hand” with the following stats:

I have also put together a few of my WW2 British Commando figurers, with the rest to follow, which will be used for “The Unit” with my Dr Who figures:

I have also started to re-base a small contingent of Portugeuse Napoleonic Figures for “Sharp Practice”. I hope to get these finished during our Club “zoom” meeting tonight which is, alas, instead of our normal gaming night.

This week has seen a bit of everything and not a lot of anything getting done.

I finally finished the last six “Silence” for my Dr Who Game.

The Silence

Next was the new Footsore Miniatures war correspondents:

These have been painted up as imbedded media in British Afghan cams.

What’s Hugh the ex-Playboy photographer shooting?

The “exotic dancer” is from Eureka Miniatures.

Well I’ll be dammed! That alien can transform itself!

Wait! There’s aliens in them there buildings.

The war correspondents have a great range of poses that will make them excellent for various scenarios. Sorry about the lack of basing but Covid has made obtaining material very difficult at the moment. Back to the beach for more fine sand!

The big project in terms of time was glueing together these Warlords Fallschirmjager:

The photos depict the Platoon command, three squads and a pile of “spares”.

Last but not least was the hero from the movie “Zomboat” – Dorothy:

Unfortunately I now need to build about 6 feet of canal including at least one lock.

“Oh, I know
That I don’t need a whole lot of anything
I just want a little bit of everything”

– Keith Urban

Hi guys here is my second attempt at painting a background. I set myself a time limit of 5 minutes to complete a 24 inch by 36 inch canvas, but failed miserably taking a whopping 6 minutes and 47 seconds from start to finish!!

My inspiration for this was the shipping channel between Cowes, Phillip Island and the Mornington Peninsula in Melbourne, Australia. From the photo below you can see that, whilst it is a beautiful place to live and game in (we PIGS members are indeed blessed), the photo is a bit boring for a background. As a result I have used this as a guide only.

Here is how I interpreted this I, very loosely I must admit.

Here is the final result:

Hope you enjoyed this.

Hi everyone I have decided to paint a backdrop or two for photographing the miniatures that I have painted. I decided to start with a cityscape style background. The trick with any background is to make sure it highlights the figures and doesn’t distract, because you want people’s eyes to concentrate on the figure and not what is going on in the background.

The videos are a bit amateurish as this is my first attempt. I will get better or stop doing it!!

The materials used were just a cheap canvas from a $2.00 shop, tubes and pots of budget acrylic paints, and enough small sponges for the amount of colours you are going to use.

Using some black paint I then blocked in the buildings with a sponge, added some dark blue paint to the same sponge to give a slightly lighter colour for the building shadows.

I then added the trees by dabbing the sponge to create a rounded look, and added some brown with another sponge for the branches and trunks. I also scraped away some of the black paint on the buildings with an old paint brush to show the orange underneath for windows and to create an isometric view, and then added some white and yellow for the lights in the buildings.

Some purple, pink and blue paints were used for a bit more depth.

This photo gives you are view of the whole canvas showing what would normally appear in the background.

Batcan and boy blunder…….go Cobblepot!

I only used an 18 inch square canvas this time just in case it became FUBAR. Next time I will use something about double the width.

Whilst I will do better for my next attempt, I am happy with the concept, but not necessarily the end product – at least for a first attempt………. after all I am an impressionist (I’m pressed in it)!!!