The 15th Annual Analogue Hobbies Painting Challenge

The leaves are off the trees, there's a cold bite in the air and I'm ready to pick up a brush and settle at the hobby desk.  

As a reflection to my outlook on this funny old thing called Life, this year's theme will be Dante's 'Divine Comedy'. Participants can join me in journeying with Dante to the various locations of Paradise and The Inferno. Hey, at least we'll be warm!

The Basics

The Painting Challenge will extend from the first day of Winter, 12:01 am December 21st, through to the first day of Spring, 12:01am March 20th, Central Standard Time (CST).

Miniatures (i.e. figures, vehicles, artillery, etc.) can be prepared, assembled and primed prior to the start date, but you cannot start painting until December 21st. In order to gain full points. The figures should be based (if appropriate) and any planned groundwork completed. The figures have to be painted by you. 

The Challenge follows the honour system in the completion and entry of figures. 

Miniatures can be in any scale and from any genre (pulp-adventure, science-fiction, fantasy, etc.).

The Challenge provides a simple (if imperfect) scoring system so participants can establish a benchmark to work towards. To be clear, the Challenge is NOT to judge the work, but to simply help inspire hobbyists to get stuff done.

For purposes of scoring, participants will create draft blog posts of their work on the  Analogue Hobbies Painting Challenge blog. Up-to-date scoring (or as up-to-date as we can manage) will be handled by our intrepid team of Minions and displayed the blog's main page. 

I will send out an email to new participants a week or so prior to the event to provide additional details on submitting your entries to the Challenge blog.

Note: All participants must have at least one entry submitted within the first four weeks of the event (i.e. January 21st). Failure to do so will result in being dropped from the Challenge roster. Yep, remember, this is not called a Challenge for nothing. :)

 

The Scoring

Below is an outline of how we score entries:  

6mm foot figure = 0.5 point
6mm mounted figure, artillery piece or crew served weapon = 1 point
6mm vehicle = 2 points

10mm foot figure = 1 point
10mm mounted figure, artillery piece or crew served weapon = 3 points
10mm vehicle = 6 points 

15mm foot figure = 2 points
15mm mounted figure, artillery piece or large crew served weapon = 4 points15mm vehicle = 8 points

20mm foot figure = 4 points
20mm mounted figure, artillery piece or crew served weapon = 8 points20mm vehicle = 15 points

28mm foot figure = 5 points
28mm mounted figure, artillery piece or crew served weapon = 10 points
28mm vehicle = 20 points

40mm foot figure = 7 points
40mm mounted figure, artillery piece or crew served weapon = 15 points
40mm vehicle = 25 points

54mm foot figure = 10 points
54mm mounted figures, artillery piece or crew served weapon = 20 points
54mm vehicle, limber, etc. = 30 points 

Other scales, miscellaneous models/figures will be scored on a submission-by-submission basis. 


Terrain Submissions

Feel free to enter terrain with your submissions, but they will not be eligible to be scored for points.

Welcome to the 'Divine Comedy'!

Those doughty Challengers who wish to to gain bonus points can gird their loins to participate in Dante's journey through The Abyss and Paradise. Dante's path will feature various locations which participants can explore by completing a themed hobby task. Once you've completed the task at a location you will get bonus points and will be clear to travel on to the next location. 

Remember, participants do not need to engage with The Divine Comedy to enjoy the Challenge, it is a voluntary diversion for those wishing to try some theme-based challenges.

In a few weeks I'll follow up with another post laying out the specifics of Dante's travels, its layout, and the bonus themes. I promise it will be hellishly good fun. ;)

Our Marvelous Minions

Keeping to form, I will serve as the Head Daemon / Tormentor-in-Chief / High Dork Lord, etc., BUT I've also 'convinced' a happy group poor souls to serve as 'Minions' to help me keep this all chugging along. Here are the wonderful people (along with their assigned days) who have taken my Faustian pact to assist in this year's Challenge:

• Monday: Millsy

• Tuesday: PaulOG

• Wednesday: GregB

• Thursday: TeemuL

• Friday: MartijnN

• Saturday: SylvainR

• Sunday: Lady Sarah

We also see the return of MilesR who will be our spreadsheet guru and PeterD who will keep on top of the Duels (see below). Thank you guys for stepping up to help for this year's edition!

Signup, Personal Targets and Duels

For those wishing to participate please send me an email, providing the following information: 

1) your full name (no, not your cool nerdish handle, your actual name),
2) your country of residence, and 
3) your points target for the three months of the event (see below).

My email address is:
curtcampbell at mac dot com 

I will post a comment below when the roster has been filled and will follow-up with an email in a couple weeks detailing the specifics of the event.

Points Target: Many participants have found the personal points targets to be a great incentive to maintain their pace over the three months of the Challenge. I encourage participants to pick a target that is just beyond your comfort zone, but still achievable. As a rough benchmark, 300 points is considered a manageable amount for someone who is new to the the event and/or has a busy work/life schedule. Also remember that a significant amount of points can be secured by tailoring submissions to this year's various themes (more on this later).

Duels: Also, related to the points targets, many people have a lot of fun issuing 'paint duels' to other participants. This could be racing to meet a declared target, painting the most figures for a specific period, etc. We have our indomitable Minion, PeterD, to keep track of the duels, but more on that in a later post.

The Cost of Entry

Last year we had great success with our donations to our local libraries. Thank you again to all those who supported that worthwhile cause. This year I ask participants to donate to either to Doctors Without Borders or The Glow Mission - both worthy charities in need of support. 

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Challenge XV begins at 12:01am December 21st!

Now, sign up for the Challenge and get you minis arranged for painting. We'll see you on the start line in a few weeks!