From MikeW: 28mm Viking Shield Maidens, Wild West and 40K Orks Imperial Guards (125 Points)

Work commitments and travel prevented me form submitting a post last week and as I have now pretty much completed my 40K Ork army I have found myself concentrating on fewer figures to get a (hopefully) better finish to some of these.

I still have a box of Wargames Atlantic Conquistadors and two boxes of Warlord Games Landsknechts waiting to be cracked open, so hopefully these will get started before the end of the challenge.

Having reached the Superhero Studio the week before last, I'm going to travel over to the Wild West Studio to complete my 4th Blue Studio and throw myself at the Director's Chair for guidance on what he wants to get the Red Pass.

The five Viking Shield Maidens

To get to the Studio I'm submitting a group of 5 x 28mm Viking Shield Maidens, these 3D Print figures are from 'Badger 3D Creations' and are  a little on the fantasy side but to my eye actually pretty good fits for my Viking Army.

Maiden One. Hand Axe and leather top & leggings, small fur collar.

Maiden Two.  The pattern on her green robe is actually moulded on,
this shot also shows shield detail, chainmail and gold head band.

I undercoated the figures in white before layering on the basic colours, I then used washes and Speed / Contrast paints to add shading. The details on the figures are really well moulded so it seemed relatively easy to pick these out with paint. Figures were then matt varnished and based in my usual manner.

Maiden Three, sword, shield and chainmail with green leggings and fur topped boots.

Second, front view. Detail of chainmail is clearly seen.

Maiden Four. Showing shield and side view.

Front view, showing leather skirt and leggings

Maiden Five, showing spear and leather armour, I gave her red trousers

Rear view, showing shield, leather clothing and her lovely flowing hair!

Next we have the 3 x 28mm Wild West figures I painted in the Studio, these are old Wargames Foundry or maybe Dixon figures that have been kicking around my lead mountain of shame for years! They seem to be towns folk, rather than ranch hands, so I have 'dressed' them in mostly greys and browns.

Unfortunately I had issues getting my phone camera to focus on these guys, I think the light was going towards the end of the day

Left a city slicker in bowler hat, reaching for more ammunition for his Winchester, centre is maybe a lawman with pistol. Whilst right is a famer firing his Winchester. 

Next up we have a Warhammer 40K Ork Kill Kopta, I have two more of these on the go and hope to have them completed in the next few days. These models are full of detail and I find that I keep going back to the to add to that detail, however, I decided to concentrate on one to get it completed this week.

My first Kill Kopta, one of three I got in eBAy lots and with only one set of rotas supplied between them! These I scratch built from coffee stirrers and plasticard. 

Another view, additional rivets are self adhesive 2mm rhinestones sourced from eBay,
175 per sheet for less than £2.00 

Close-up from the side showing the extra gun added to the Skis

And the other side with an additional missile added to the front of the Kopta.

Next on the list of items for this post is a 28mm Late 17th Century Polish mounted Officer, this guy was again found in my 'lead pile' and had obviously been overlooked when I was paining up may Polish Army, he will be pressed into service accordingly!

Polish Command figure, in typical 17th Century dress.

Another view...

I have given him a nice red cloak that compliments his horse's attire, he wears chainmail and caries a wahammer. Again a white undercoat with base colours blocked in and washes, inks and paints applied to add depth and shading.

Last figures for this week are a group of 4 x 40k Imperial Guardsmen, after all I have to have a force to oppose all these Orks! So I have quite a few Guardsmen and accessories collected over the years bit I want to expand tis force and I was taken by the Wargames Atlantic Raumjager Infantry set, so I got a frame off of eBay to try them out.

The completed test set of Wargames Atlantic Raumjager / Imperial Guardsmen

As expected they were high quality moulds with lots of options, their dress is different but similar enough to classic Games Workshop Imperial Gard Cadians for them to work well together. Additionally I mixed and matched GW parts with these figures to make the cross over even less obvious.

An Officer figure, wearing a Wargames Atlantic headgear but with Games Workshop Imperial Guards helmet on his belt and GW arms pointing and holding a Lasgun.

In my Warhammer 40K universe these Guardsmen are from an urban world, hence the grey overalls, the armour and webbing are in an ochre type colour just as a contrast to the drab uniforms. FYI, I did have a Space Marines army but that is now long gone but I'm dabbling in building a new one - question is which chapter. Likely they'll be in blue but Ultra Marines are too obvious, that said I do love the Ultra Marines....

Guardsman with a automatic shotgun, again with a GW helmet and a
backpack to aide unit integration with older figures in my collection

Guardsman with GW Comms Pack and helmet, all the rest is WA kit.

Guardsman with Flamethrower, this is WA kit but with GW backpack & helmet added

The Wargames Atlantic figures with GW counterparts, to show how well in my opinion the figures can be integrated together to give a more interesting look and feel.

I'm definitely going to investing a full box of these WA figures, I have already sourced a supply of spare GW Imperial Guards heads to go with these re-enforcements! So one schoolboy error on my part was to base them on my standard mdf round bases, these will need to be changed at some point for standard GW bases, but that's a task for another day!

So last thing this week here is my current location regarding Studios - Knocking at the Director's Chair!

POINTS

5 x 28mm Viking Shield Maidens @ 5 Pts ea            25 Points

1 x Lady Sarah Bonus                                 20 Points

3 x 28mm Wild West Foot Figures @ 5Pts ea            15 Points

Wild West Studio Bonus                               20 Points

1 x 40K Ork Kill Kopta @ 20 Pts                      20 Points

1 x 40K Ork Pilot @ 5 Pts                             5 Points

1 x 28mm Late 17th C Mounted Officer @ 10Pts ea      10 Points

4 x 40k Imperial Guardsmen @ 5Pts ea                 20 Points

TOTAL                                               125 Points 

From TeemuL: Nice to have you back for our regular Thor's Day team before the Challenge ends, Mike! Those shieldmaidens are lovely, very nice sculpts and your paintwork shows all the lovely details. Good to see your Ork (and Imperial Guard) force(s) to grow, too. Your scoring is a bit off, the correct total is 135, but I'm not going to punish you for that. :) And you have already passed your initial target, good job!