In Celebration of Challenge XIII

Well, here we are at the end of the thirteenth edition of the Painting Challenge. The film lot is closed, all the votes have been counted for both 'Minions' Choice' and 'Challengers' Choice', Sarah has made her selection for 'Sarah’s Choice' and I’ve done the same for my SnowLord's selection. Whew, it's been a hectic few days! 

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Minions' Choice

Okay, first up! Our intrepid cabal of Minions have convened, muttered their sacred rights and made their 'Minions' Choice' for our last month of the Challenge.

The runners up are:

Dallas for his majestic and imposing Warhound Titan

Kerry for his whimsical Baron Munchhausen.

...and Simon for is incredibly impressive Jewish Revolt Temple Mount

The Minions' Choice' goes to:

Ken for his stunning Italian Wars Spanish Colunella!

Ken, for your prize you have a $50 gift voucher from Westfalia Miniatures. Congratulations mate!

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Challengers' Choice

We had 31 nominations this year for the Challengers' Choice, with a great responce from voters (in fact, there were only a few votes separating 1st and 2nd place). I found it a lot of fun to take in the gallery of nominees as it provided a wonderful retrospective of the thee months of the Challenge. Our Monday Minion Peter was kind enough to tally up the votes and so here are the runners up and podium finishers.

3rd Runner Up 

Curt for his Mad Maximillian Roadsters.

2nd Runner Up 

Sidney for his Samurai figures

1st Runner Up

Miles' Battle of Peleliu Project

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Podium Finishers for Challengers' Choice

Third Place

Tamsin for her enormously impressive and, well, just enormous 'Spirit of Camberwell'

After looking at it again I think you're right Tamsin. It really is worth 1000 points... :)

Second Place for Challengers' Choice  

Darrell for his sumptuously painted Byzantines. Here are just a few selections of his work:

First Place for Challengers' Choice' goes to: 

Ken for his fabulously salty and foamy WWII ships. Once again, bravo Ken! Challenge XIII has been a banner edition for you - well done!

Ken, for your prize you get a print edition of Simon Miller's 'For King & Parliament' and the 'Marlowe to Maidenhythe' scenario book from 'BigRedBat'.

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Snowlord's Choice

Honourable Mentions go to:

Kerry's  Italian Wars Gendarmes

Martijn's Don Quiote and Sancho Panza 

SnowLord's Choice goes to:

Sidney's wonderful Samurai-themed figures and terrain for his upcoming rules, 'When the Last Sword is Drawn'. Absolutely stunning work Sidney, Bravo!

Sydney, for your prize you get a starter boxed set of Moonstone from the good folks over at Goblin King Games.

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Sarah’s Choice 

Hi Everybody!

Another fantastic Challenge comes to a close! Well done everyone!

A highlight of the Challenge for me is seeing the terrific variety of female figures being presented.

The scope of this years figures - from cut throat lady pirates, Viking shield maidens, vampires and zombies, steam punk witches and French Revolutionary peasants, ghosts, nuns and queens and an excellent Frankenstein Bride - has been a real pleasure to re-visit these past few days.

I find that no matter how diligent I am during the Challenge, there are often figures that I missed or forgot about. It’s such a treat to come across these unexpected treasures!

I’d like to highlight the sculpting skills of GeoffreyT, his Bandida was a really fun entry and I liked the cool-hippy chick vibe of his sculpt. Very characterful!

Another of my favourite entries this Challenge was the elegant 75mm Female Duelliste from MartinC. The paint job reminds me of classic toy soldier style… which is awesome. The Duelliste herself could be the heroine from a Georgette Heyer novel .. also awesome!

This years Sarah’s Choice Award will be un-precedented .. and the Snow Lord agrees that I can do this …

We have two winners for Sarah's Choice:

StuartL and MattW!!

StuartL’s Malifaux Mannequins Showgirls, the fish seller, and his steampunk witch are all wonderful.

MattW’s Apple Lady with donkey, medieval milk maid and the French Revolutionary peasant women were also standouts for me.

Definitely treats for all of us to enjoy!

And, speaking of treats, Stuart and Matt, you both will get a $50 Gift Voucher from our good friend Kawe over at Westfalia Miniatures.

Thank you and congratulations!!

- Sarah

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Congratulations to all the nominees and winners. Thank you for sharing your wonderful work with us. To the winners, please email me to work out the details for getting your awards. 

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Before Challenge XIII concludes, I’d like to thank again our fabulous Minions for all their hard work herding entries, managing the Spreadsheet of Doom and keeping on top of the duels. I also wish to thank our Challenge Sponsors for their generous support of the event.  If you have a free moment please visit their web stores via the banners on the left sidebar and see if something strikes your fancy.  As I say every year, the Challenge doesn’t need prizes to be a success, but it adds a bit of sparkle to the show.  Thanks again to all our wonderful sponsors! 

Finally, and I really can't say this enough, I want to thank all our Challenge participants. This event would be nothing without all your industry, your humour and most of all, your open-hearted support. All of these make the Painting Challenge what it is. You folks are terrific, thank you.

So in closing, I bid you all a fond farewell. I hope you enjoy the next eight months 'off', and until we get together again next December...

In Memory of Oscar

- Curt 

EdwardG - A most excellent time was had

 Hello all,

A short wrap up from me. So many have already expressed their thanks and gratitude to Curt and Sarah, the minions, and all the other Challengers. And, I would like to add mine. Without all the constituent parts this Challenge would certain be less, if anything at all!

This year was special for me. In the November before kick off we welcomed our son into the family, and then during this Challenge I finally plucked up the courage to paint the Robin Hood figure that had been left to me by my grandfather after he passed away in 2021!

With an eye on progress, I managed an impressive doubling of my original total. I am not sure how, but I was certainly helped along the way by many a studio bonus!

A view of the complete haul, yours truly with my snoozy little helper, and finally a better view of Team Trouble and Chaos (yep they're already teamed up, gods help us!) 😆

I hope everyone has a great and safe Summer! I really cannot wait for the start of Challenge XIV!!

Best,

Ed

From StuartL - All's Well That Ends Well

Hi all,

Well, that is Challenge XIII in the bag, so I guess a wrap up post is all that is really left for me to do. First off, my apologies for not commenting on posts anywhere near as much as I should have. Between work, pushing myself to spend every free minute painting and a technical issue where my phone (my main way of viewing the challenge) and blogger refused to co-operate, I found it quite rare for me to have a chance to sit and post. Now that the challenge is over, I have been taking a break from the blog and painting in general, just to clear my head a bit and deal with some things I had been putting off over the winter. It was great to see so many challengers post so many cool models though. 

On to my challenge wrap up then. 

Minioning

This was my first year being a minion and it was.... challenging, but a lot of fun. The Saturday crew kept me pretty busy, and there was a lot to learn about how the challenge works behind the scenes. That said, it was good to see what my minionees were up to and watch their various projects grow. The time differences made things a little tricky in places as the 'challenge day' was split across my Saturday and Sunday. Assuming Curt will have me in such a position of easily abusable authority again, I wouldn't mind minioning in the future.

Duels

As I am sure many wargamers know, there are three great strategic blunders you can make. 

1. Starting a land war in Russia.

2. Underestimating indigenous forces when they are defending their homes. 

3. Entering a Squirrel duel when there is a retiree in the running.

Now, I have never made the first two blunders, but seem determined to make the 3rd over and over again. ChrisW absolutely thrashed me in the Squirrel duel, well done sir. Between the two of us we accounted for more than half of the total squirrels this challenge, so I will hoist my silver trophy with pride.

Despite my loss in the Squirrel duel, I am happy to be crowned two-time champion of the Skullz duel. Not only that, but I also set a new Skullz record at 1575, easily surpassing the previous record of 1363 set by...ME! Given that I have painted nearly all of my old Cities of Death terrain from GW, I doubt I will ever reach those dizzying heights again, but hopefully the duel will continue for years to come.

Finally, in the Turnip28 competition, I was never really in it to win it. Before the challenge started I didn't even have any minis for the game and just threw stuff together from my bits boxes. The minis were fun to build and great to paint, so I will hopefully have a chance to finish off my army sometime before the next challenge. One of my local gaming friends has also started building a force of root-related horrors. 

Painting

For this challenge, I set myself the target of 2160 points, which should have been enough to propel me to the dizzying heights of the 10,000 lifetime points club. In fact, I managed to surpass that target by nearly 1000 points, finishing on a personal best of 3116 points. True, I had to abuse the heck out of the bonus points system, (about 680 points came from the Studio Tour and Lady Sarah's Limousine), but I also finished 449 models, again a personal best. Speaking of models, this is my entire output except for my gift shop entries, which have already been passed on to their new owners:

Wrap-up

So, that is Challenge XIII over and done with, time to start preparing of Challenge XIV. With a new edition of 40K on the way, dozens of armies and projects half complete (and some new ones started) and ideas for a home-made skirmish system kicking around in my head, I have plenty to keep me busy over the next 81/2 months. See you all in December!

Please Vote for AHPC XIII Challengers' Choice

Hi All!

We had another terrific Challenge this season, with loads of dazzling submissions from talented hobbyists from around the world. Below you will find the list of nominations for the Challengers' Choice Award along with a pic which activates a link to their submission(s).

Millsy and I have set up a Google form to handle the voting. How this works is that you can vote for three nominees. Your first vote is worth 3 points, your second 2 points, and your third is 1 point. To dissuade non-participants from voting, the form requires you to put in your Challenge handle and email address (similar to this year's Duels submission form). We're also allowing previous Challenge participants to vote as well, so if you're of that enviable cadre feel free to join in.

The voting will close Saturday, April 8th at midnight (CST). We'll tally all the votes and I'll announce the results on Sunday, along with the Minions' Choice, SnowLord's Choice and Sarah's Choice.

Enjoy the gallery and remember to take time to vote!

Thank you!

Curt

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Click here to access the voting poll.

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The Challengers' Choice Nominees for AHPC XIII

AlanD’s Lopers

AlanD’s Inter-War Armoured Cars

AlexK’s Rhino

Barks’ Swarm-o-Gaunts

BruceRs US tank Crewmen

Curt’s Turnip28 entries

Curt’s Mad Maximillian Cars

Curt’s Mork Borg/Forbidden Psalm Adventurers

DarrellH’s Byzantine Project

DallasE’ Matilda II

DallasE’ Warhound Titan

DaveD’s Vietnam War entries

DaveX’s Ghostbusters

GeoffreyT’s Batman

GeoffreyT’s Shimmy of Elvis

GeoffreyT’s Froghemoth

GregB’s Horus Heresy entries

GregB's Mando and The Child

JohnE’s Napoleonic Gothic

KenR’s WWII Ships

KerryT’s Italian Wars entries

MilesR’s Peleliu Island entires

Millsy’s Russian Civil War entries

PaulOG’s Turnip28 Crabs

RayR’s 2mm WSS entries

RobP’s Sassanid Elephants

SarahHC’s entries

ScottR’s Pyrrhic Army

SidneyR’s Samurai entries

SimonG’s Temple Mount

TamsinP’s Spirit of Camberwell

Adamc1776 Its a Wrap

I managed to paint a few more than 750 point this year a small number compared to other years but a good showing.

8 sailing ships 5 for the Royal Navy and 3 pirates and 10 World War Two era ships 5 Japanese, 2 American, 1 Royal Navy and 2 Italians 

Figures included a hero of the Tolkien legendarium , orcs Irish on 4 and 2 legs, zouaves both north and south, Scotsmen, and Iroquois warriors.

That doesn't count my daughter's barn and the bear ornament for my wife. I earned 10 Squirrel points so I think I had an eclectic and productive challenge I also had a lot of fun and hope all of you did too.