Sylvain's Challenge - The Man With A Plan

Above is a group shot of my painting booty for this year's Challenge. All the miniatures within the green line were painted since December 20th. The other miniatures you can see were painted just before. Actually, I started last Summer, prepping and priming most of the minis I wanted done for this Challenge. I was unsure I would have enough time to do everything in 3 months, so I started a month earlier. I revamped and re-painted miniature houses done by my Dad 40 years ago, I painted some Lizardmen, some Wood Elves war dancers and a dragon for Warhammer as well as a few D&D characters, all before the Challenge. Oh, and I also built a French bunker in Vietnam for Curt. All this pre-challenge activity, like a professional sport drug, gave me a tremendous momentum when I picked my brush on the official starting date of December 20th.

I finished the Breton on December 24th. I just could not believe it.

The Tau were done on January 1st.

The Viet-Crons were completed on January 4th. For both the Tau and the Viet-Crons, I kept the palette very simple, so I could do them very quickly. By January 4th, after only 16 days, I had already painted enough miniatures for 1102 points. But I did not want Greg to have a heart attack, so I delayed posting this army until the 15th of January.

It took me 13 days to do the Wood Elves (January 17th). I needed almost four times the colors I used on my WH40k armies.

On January 19th, I paid my dues to the Challenge organizer with a trio of rebellion leaders.

On January 28th, I finished the Royal Navy project. This was the most labor intensive of my projects because of the water bases. But I think it's totally worth it.

On January 31st, I finished the last project I had prepared: the convoy, that I posted as a bonus theme. At this point, I did not have anymore miniatures prepped or primed.  Prepping and priming is something I prefer to do during the Summer. I waited sometimes a few weeks before posting a completed project because I thought it was more pleasant to present one army at a time.

I must confess that I had a very detailed painting plan from the very start of the Challenge and that I scrupulously stuck to it, not diverging one bit. For each project, my paint jars were maniacally lined up for greater efficiency. I know that there must be a therapy somewhere for my case, but like Amy Winehouse, I say no, no, no.....

This is me in Norway encouraging non-believers to try "Sild" (marinated herrings, yummy!).

The Challenge provided me with lots of motivation to finish old projects and now the way is clear to do some more! Thank you Curt and the minions and thank you to all the Challengers for a joyous three months of painting. Enjoy the rest of 2016.