From JohnSh - Slaughterloo Orcs of Albion (20 points)

Slaughterloo Orcs of Albion

These are just a quick four Orcs of Albion to complete a unit for Slaughterloo Fantasy Napoleonic Game. No longer a fashionable game, my friends and I still love to play it as the figures look fabulous massed on the table, the rules are simple and straightforward and the 'nations' are very amusing. Orcs for Albion (England), Elves for Ferach (French), Todorini - Frogs! - of Nepolise (Italians) and many more.

Painted in a deliberately cartoony style with block colours, little shading (only on the faces) and finished with a satin varnish they are done to match an incomplete unit I bought at a 'bring and buy'. I jokingly refer to these models as the ugliest ever made in the metal, with over sized features, odd proportions and leering faces. However they take paint well and the exaggerated details really pop.

                                    

So that is four 28mm figures for another 20 points (woo hoo!). I'm really enjoying the process of picking groups of figures to paint. The Challenge let's me not get carried away deliberating over which army to work on, I can just go into the lead mine and grab whatever I fancy. To paraphrase a coal miner's saying "It's a great life down the pit, you can do whatever you want, all day long, as long as it involves shifting two and a half tons of lead".

I like your coal miner's attitude to painting John. I sometimes feel a bit like a pit pony myself when I'm buried beneath the lead pile! Unlike the poor pony however I've nobody to blame but myself... 

I've never been able to convince myself to buy into the fantasy Napoleonic scene despite the fact I'm very much taken with the miniatures themselves. You're clearly a big fan and it comes out in your enthusiasm for painting them and the cartoony style really suits the miniatures. I'm pleased that despite the system being OOP you and your mates continue to enjoy it and keep it alive. That's a big thing in my gaming, not letting external influences affect the pleasure I take from it so congrats for doing what you enjoy.

20 points added to your total and well done! Cheers, Millsy.

From Barks - 15mm WW1 German riflemen (102 points)

Another batch of WW1 plastics from PSC. These are the German riflemen and grenadiers. I prefer this brown-grey basing to my earlier British forces, so will re-do the latter after the Challenge.

When Barks submitted this entry I queried him as to the single paragraph of text and just the one photo. His response was as succinct as his submission and his reply "I don't think there's much to say!" covers it all I think you'll agree. So without further ado and before I write significantly more than he did, that's 102 points and job done! Cheers, Millsy.

From BrendonW - Getting a little Skewbald (125 points)

10 x Mounted 28mm, 4 x 28mm foot (and 1 banner and 3 freehand shields).

All Plastic except the Banner, that's paper.

The group picnic party.

Perry Plastics. Light Horsemen and 2 Pikes.

Mongol FireForge Maniacs. 

Gripping Beast Arabs. 

The foot with bow is a Dark Age plastic but with some Conquest Games plastic parts. The calligraphy on the Banner was made from an image search so that part is not free hand painted.

I was challenged within this challenge to try Skewbald horses. I am glad that was put to me. After an image search I found plenty of reference. I used to avoid horses as a painter but now I have overcome any hesitation in painting them. Below is a bonus image of team Skewbald. I have another Perry one waiting for a rider so perhaps that will appear next week.

Cheers from BrendonW

Brendon offers us yet more gorgeous medieval 28s both on foot and ahorse this week. 

I'm particularly chuffed to see you took my suggestion to heart Brendon and tried some skewbald horses, which, I have to say, are absolutely stunning! This kind of thing is what the Challenge is all about, pushing your own boundaries and producing something beyond what you've ever done before. I'd be very keen to see a tutorial on how these are executed at some point because I'm keen to have a go myself and I'd like them to come out this well... 

All up this latest instalment is worth 120 points and I'm throwing in an extra 5 for the hand painting efforts but more importantly the skewbald goodness. Well done mate. Cheers, Millsy.

From MarkH - 15mm WWII Germans (185 points)

Hi Guys

After three weeks of silence and setbacks I finally have some finished 15mm WW2 models to submit.

First up:

A pair of 88's - 2 guns, 3 transports, 22 crew.
A pair of Pak 50's - 2 guns and 11 crews.
3 Captured Russian RSO's painted in German midwar scheme.
A German Pioneer Supply truck (I've been meaning to paint this one up for 3 years!!)

Next up I have some vehicles:

2 Elephants and a command Tiger P

1 King tiger

3 Puma armoured cars

And finially 3 Panzer IV L70 tank hunters

So a bit of a points dump for me this week. Hope I managed to get this in on time!

That's a serious amount of very well painted WWII goodness Mark! I'm particularly taken by the various camo patterns which are both convincing and work almost as well on your paint table as they would outside. 

Don't be too ashamed of how long it took to paint that tractor. We had a kubelwagen that took even longer, despite consistent taunts to it's owner. It eventually became know as "Die Kübelwagen der Scham" aka The Kubelwagen of Shame until I stole it and painted it. 

BTW, I'm going to go out on a limb here and suggest those might actually be PaK 40s, not 50s but I'm more than happy to be corrected. 

All up that 184 points of paintwork and I'm throwing in another as a lasting reminder of having finally painted that truck! Well done. Cheers, Millsy.

From EvanH - 28mm Pulp Adventurers (12 points)

I took three weeks' holiday and had hoped to get in some painting...

Well, what with babysitting our granddaughter on a couple of delightful occasions, and gallivanting off to the Southern Highlands and Tasmania, I didn't manage to get much else done (The fact that both locations have some remarkably good wineries, excellent food, impressive scenery, and are several degrees cooler than the humid hothouse nightmare that is Sydney in summer is probably immaterial. It was for my health, OK? Especially the flask of excellent Tasmanian single malt whisky, which was for purely medicinal purposes).

So here are the two figs I was able to paint and base to completion; two of Mark Copplestone's excellent 'High Adventure' range of Pulp figures. Mr Copplestone's sculpts are clean, precise, and are cast to a high standard, and I hope that I have done them justice. Both figs are painted with a combination of Citadel and Vallejo paints.

First up is Pecos Bob, a scowling ruffian with a flash waistcoat and a disreputable-looking cigar clamped in his granite jaw.

That said, he is actually kind to animals and gives generously to charity. But cross him, and you'll find yourself thrown bodily into the nearest patch of prickly pear!

The prickly pear plant was modelled from Green Stuff, to give the base a bit of a lift and the miniature as a whole a sense of place.

And here is one of Copplestone's Dinosaur Hunters, whom I have christened Algernon Caldecott-Bugg.

Algernon is an authority on the insects of the Amazon Basin, but is terrified of actually encountering them in the wild. He therefore carries his trusty shotgun loaded with bugshot* whenever he is in the field.

"Some of those butterflies are quite large..."

The fern on the base was assembled using brass-etched components from an old Citadel basing set.

Of course, with all the Lost World-related activity so common in the 1920s and 30s, the possibility exists that Algy may encounter some very large insects indeed...

"I warned you that this could happen, but NOOOO, you were all 'Of course there won't be any giant man-eating beetles on that mysterious mist-shrouded plateau, Algy, leave the elephant gun at home...' Well, WHO'S LAUGHING NOW?"

So that's two 28mm figs for a princely 10 points - who knows, I might get my total into triple figures by next week!

Stay tuned...

Ev

*Credit where credit is due, the 'bugshot' quip was actually the work of my youngest son. He's not even a dad, but he's able to come up with a proper Dad Joke at the drop of a hat. Truly, the apple doesn't fall far from the tree.

Very nice indeed Ev, although I can't help but wonder that you might have painted a third mini if you'd spent the time more wisely instead of detailing your holidays delights at such length!

My curmudgeonly thoughts aside you've done a cracking job and I'm sure the esteemed Mr Copplestone would agree. I particularly like the scholarly opaque look to Algy's specs which I'm sure will make encountering things with more than 4 legs much less traumatic. 

10 points for painting and a couple more for cactus sculpting. Well done! Now... what's next?