From TeemuL: Sarah's Romantic Choice [Romance] (50 points)

Here we are at the Romantic topic of the history. What would be more romantic in the 24th century than Commander Riker alone with a nameless female Starfleet Admiral? Nothing, I guess. The admiral has a cold look on her face, apparently very familiar with Riker's reputation, but it is doubtless that with his honey words Riker will break the ice and in no time at all these two will be spending some time in the Ten Forward with exotic drinks and plans to continue in the private quarters...

I was planning to create a little cinematic story around these two and romance, but somehow I still think I'm in the Tuesday crew and have lots of time. Well, I'm in the Monday crew and I had a one day less time... So just boring photos. I was worried not to get the "officer red" right, but in the end I think I managed to do it in minimum effort. I first painted them with Mephiston Red and then washed with Reikland Fleshshade and stopped in time before trying to do any highlights or anything. The shirts are now quite glossy, but some varnish should remove most of it.

These two are HeroClix WidKids models, I brutally removed their original clix bases and planted them on 32mm mdf bases and added some sand. More Starfleety terrain (like deck of Enterprise) would have been more interesting (and difficult) so I opted to do my quite regular scifi sand base with exotic plants (Army Painter tufts first drybrushed yellow and then a small dot of blue Contrast paint in the middle), which turned out to be quite nice.

During the Christmas time I was reading an old Space Marine codex and as you know, what you read, inspires you. I remembered I had this old Space Marine Predator in a box, bought second hand as part of a Black Templar army. It was basically sprayed black and then guns and track painted silver, no tidying up. I decided to take a rather easy way and paint it different black and somehow Raven Guard inspired me. I gave it a gentle wash with warm water and managed to remove the transfers. I carefully painted the whole tank black with brush, which was quite easy, because it was basically primed black already. I wanted a quick and simple finish so decided to pick up quite a little of the details, I painted the guns, dozer blade and tires white and tracks and vents silver. White parts got a Reikland Fleshshade wash before drybrushed white again.

I painted some highlights with two different shades of grey, but I only used it on the front of the tank, because I was lazy and figured out that there could not be light coming from every angle at the same intensity. I'm quite happy how it worked out.

Simple free hand chapter and vehicle insignia on the front, but nothing more. In the codex there was a lenghty topic on how the Space Marine tanks are named and I wanted to name my tank, too. And I was thinking how the ships often have female names and Space Marine tanks often have quite funny or pompous names and my tired brain started to think a proper name for a Predator painted during the Challenge... There is no space to paint the name on the tank really, but the tank is nevertheless named "Sarah's Choice", but I'm not saying the tank is female!!!

Yes, before the Challenge I had a plan, so far I have finished 0 models from the plan...

The HeroClix models are quite tall, somewhere between 28 and 40, but in the past they are scored as 5 point per figure, so that is 10 points. And then 20 points for the Romantic topic and another 20 points for 28mm vehicle for total of 50 points.

 

Sylvain: Your StarTrek figurines from the Next Generation series bring back memories from the 90s. I like the bright red color very evocative of the show and also a very bad omen for extras wearing that colors in the earlier series... The tank looks the business and will inspire fear on the tabletop. 

 

If you cold provide a map of your progress in the library, that would be greatly appreciated. Thanks! 

Edit: Added a map...

Edit: Added a photo of Sarah's Choice protetecting Sarah's Hot Air Balloon Pumping Station