So, this week I am going to try and focus on one planet, the planet of aliens! With this in mind I have been raiding my unpainted horde looking for any aliens of any type and for opponents for said aliens.
[A lot of what I painted up this week, and unlike other posts, everything posted this week was started and finished in the same week, are miniatures that serve no immediate need. I have no gaming plans for any of these items. I bought the Aliens aliens, for the heck of it they looked nice, thought maybe they would be a cool Pulp Ally league.]
UPDATE
Well at the time I first wrote this post the statement " everything posted this week was started and finished in the same week" was true. However I wound up adding some figures at the last minute that had been started a couple of weeks back. I am always under the gun regarding posting so I have started adding the words first as I start to see where the week will go, then as the deadline draws near I start taking pictures, resizing them and adding them into the narrative.
Last night I had challenges updating this post and very nearly missed out for this week and as a result of this issue changing these words fell by the wayside, it was not my intention to misrepresent what I had done this past week, just a flub. So the 27 workers had been started a couple of weeks ago, but the remaining items were indeed all started and done in one week, which for me is quite fast.
Well we are on LV-426, so might as well start with some Aliens aliens. Found a guide on Youtube that motivated me to get started on these models. It looked quick and easy, and was. I have also checked out a number of other postings, but this one came closest to what I was envisioning them to look like. They were primed black, lightly dry brushed Leadbelcher then washed with Agrax earthshade. The original video suggested Nuln Oil, but I wanted some earth tones in the mix. Any images that I have found from Aliens made them appear to have more brown in the mix than black. I like the results better, but if I were to paint any more I might experiment with another metal colour, maybe a more bronze colour closer to brown.
While I have no colonial marines to go against these aliens, I did find 6 sci-fi mercenary types to fight them. This was the toughest group for me to paint so far! Not due to their poses or anything, they were tough because I just never got the inspiration. I painted them because I wanted troops to fight against the aliens, but nothing ever clicked with them. In the end they turned out OK, basic greens and browns and washes, they will do the job but unlike the UFO aliens I just never got into them.
In addition to the mercenaries, I finally finished off my henchmen/corporate employees (future face hugger victims) A mix of Crooked Dice and Ainsty figures, they will mostly see service in Spy-fy games. I really wanted to do some in orange, but orange presented some challenges for me. I ultimately succeeded but they do not match the images of the same figures by other gamers. The orange is not as bright as I wanted, but they do have a certain nice look of grimy workers.
Apparently, I have purchased a large number of grey aliens over the years, not really certain why, but I did. They are Bones miniatures, scaled to match up with 28mm, but I think I shall consider them 20mm point wise as they are so delicate. So far as I can tell the paint seems to have adhered well to the figures, I have had issues with this in the past. I have also painted up a leader for them, an aliens riding a hover chair by Crooked Dice games. This figure is more in line with 28mm.
The space ship is from the TV show The Invaders and works well with these grey aliens. It come complete with interior walls and side panels. I did not glue in the dividing walls as I wanted a more open area.. Saucer with glorious leader inside.
So, when not buzzing cornfields or creating crop circles, Grey aliens seem to like to chase after cows!
Got me a Z for the alphabet challenge, Zygons! Only have the two in my Dr Who collection, but at least they are done, I have some more Dr Who items in the pipeline. I depresses me to think how many layers I applied to these and yet they still look very basic. I do not recall ever seeing an episode with Zygons, and my internet search for images presented me with conflicting images. So here they are, not as red as some nor as pink or green, just somewhat fleshy coloured.
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| Morning Sam, Morning Ralph |
Space Invaders courtesy of Flying Frog, technically these are for a board game, but I figured I would try and paint them up. They are soft plastic and had thick bases (which I removed) and they have cool clear helmets! There were 18 troopers in two different colours, in three different poses, plus one leader figure without a helmet. Some of the weapons were a little bent and could not be corrected, but they were fun to paint. The skull colour used on the heads were based on the illustration from the board game. I wanted to keep the two groups in different colours and used a contrast green for 9 of the troopers and was going to use another contrast colour for the other 9 troopers. However, none of the other colours that I wanted to used would adhere to the figures...! So rather than using the same green I resorted to more conventional paint, P3 paints.
The invaders game also included a big beasty, again painted with conventional paints. I went with orange because I have no other orange creatures.
Moon base defenders vs UFO aliens! The 5 ladies are from Dr Who, while the aliens are by Crooked Dice. I know I have some spare weapons, but could not locate them, so the women still have the weapons they came with. Some day I am sure I will find my spare weapons and modify the figures.
The following aliens are part of an evil host, determined to conquer Earth. Sadly I have no Earth defenders ready at this time, but will when I reach planet Krypton. The figures are Old Glory Super figs, so I tried to paint them up like comic book villains.
When vegetation fights back! 1 Strange alien plant life has infected these poor unfortunates. They are the last of my aggressive plants to be painted, I already have a dozen or so plant models, most, like these, from Crooked Dice.
Finally, and for no good reason, some Old Glory pumpkin head servitors. These just came to hand while I was sorting through my room and I just figured I would get them done.
So points
- 20 points for planet LV-426
- 60 points for 12 x 28mm Alien aliens[Gale Force Nine]
- 135 points for 27 x 28mm worker figures
- 30 points for 6 x 28mm future tech mercs/marines [Hasslefree]
- 68 points for 17 x 20mm grey aliens [Reaper Bones]
- 05 points for 1 x 28mm glorious grey leader [Crooked Dice]
- 20 points for 1 x flying saucer base for Grey aliens
- 45 points for 9 x 28mm cows, yes cows [Pegasus & cheap dollar store toys]
- 25 points for 5 x 28mm UFO aliens [Crooked Dice]
- 25 points for 5 x 28mm Moon base defenders [Black Tree Design]
- 100 points for 20 x 28mm alien super henchmen [Old Glory]
- 45 points for 9 x 28mm aggressive alien plants life [Crooked Dice]
- 10 points for 2 x 28mm Zygons [Black Tree Design]
- 95 points for 19 x 28mm Space Invaders [Flying Frog Games]
- 5 points for large alien monster ally
- 25 points for 5 x 28mm strange animated pumpkin headed scarecrow servitors
Total 713
Yes that is a lot of points, however I suspect future posts will not have as many points, certainly not next week. I have basically picked the low hanging fruit, items that 'spoke' to me and that fulfilled various planetary requirements. I also doubt that I can maintain this activity level. Part of the idea of going big at the start is that I never stay focused on anything for too long, better to get a lot done at the beginning in case/when I fade in the home stretch, also keeping this pace for 12 weeks is just not too likely.
Alphabet Challenge
Squirrel count
- VSF
- Back of beyond
- Dystopian Wars
- Dr Who
- All Quiet on the Martian Front
- 28mm Sci-fi
- Superhero
- Pulp
- 28mm Fantasy
Well, that's another huge entry from Chris! This time with lots of fun aliens and their human (and bovine) victims/opponents.
It's just as well I was up late, or this might have had to carry over to next Tuesday (hint, hint!).
Tamsin
