From AdamW: Vikings horny, but not on their helmets. Lust (58 points)

Dante's Divine Comedy : Lust

 This is my entry for the Lust circle of hell. No explanation or justification really needed to explain this one, as it's pretty clear why the Viking victors are taking their female captives.

The figures are 15mm from Peter Pig, painted using mainly Army Painter speedpaints (not a gimmick KenR ;) ).

I didn't really have anything suitable for this and some others sections so I had to temporarily increase the lead pile. My initial overall plan was to concentrate on painting up projects, but as a newbie I wanted to take part in the Divine Comedy Challenge for fun.  Obviously I could have just painted individual figures, but these sorts of mini-vignettes can be used on the table.

As an historical gamer it's probably the first time I've painted a female chest, but as the intro by Curt says, the figures could be titillating..........

Points

 20  19x 15mm Vikings/prisoners @2pts  = 40  38pts

Lust Bonus = 20 pts

Total 60 58 pts

There are two Vikings carrying their victims on their shoulder. I have counted each at two figures, as although they are one casting, they were sold as two figures and took as long to paint. Hope that's ok?

(phew that was close...got distracted and almost hit that tempting little Publish button)

An excellent contribution for the Lust theme, Adam, very creative! You put those speedpaints to good use, and I agree that they are certainly not a gimmick. 

As for your points, I am going to be a litte strict here though. Partial  figures, such as prone figures for instance, are only gaining you half the points value. I think it is fair to treat the carried models the same way.  So, 58 points for you! 

Martijn

From KyleC - Winter Viking (25pts)

So a bit of a massive shift from the Death Guard tanks... but here's a slowly freezing viking model by Loot Studios. 

A few buddies from Turkey are planning a painting jam on this model. Was offered a chance to paint it up also so this was my vision. 

However I wanted to give snow and cold a shot as I have a fairly massive Space puppy army for Horus Heresy. And they will have snow on their bases so this was a great trial model to see how it works. 

It's a fairly standard model,.and straightforward as it's just one piece altogether. Making some parts of the model harder to paint than others. 

I referenced Roman Lappats Snow and Ice PDF for how to do the snow, and took the make the base blue too far it seems. But that's part of the learning phase and still gave me a very cold feeling (something I am feeling right now in our attic). 

I did my best to incorporate the blue cold reflection on his clothing and shield. While also adding specks of snow on his clothing. 

In the end.. a good palette cleanser before tackling a ton of LI infantry.. and a fun little exercise to trial snow and cold colors. Can't wait to trial this across an entire army! 

Being a single 32mm model that's a whopping 5 PTS for me. Plus maybe 20 PTS for History being he is a Viking? 

____________________________________

Lovely work on this chilly chap, Kyle. I like the snow effect, and the blue tones from the base and his clothes nicely reinforce the cold weather he's having to endure. Really, the man needs to go inside for some warm spiced mead and a slice of pie!

Well done!

- Curt

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!

From PeterB - A Viking Bust - Art House - 80 Points

 

Well met fellow Challengers, it has been a fortnight. A bout of mystery illness and extra weekend working slowed my work a little so I unfortunately did not have anything to post last week. I am however back with a vengeance.  

After successfully completing the full house last week with my faithful Green Security Pass leaving me at the Casting Couch studio, I now have no choice but to attempt to collect a full set of Blues.

With my newly acquired Blue Security Pass around my neck (I am sure Tour Guide Tamsin could provide a suitable lanyard so I don't lose it) a quick hop down the path and I am at Studio Art House.

On the theme of Art House, I have been meaning to have another attempt at painting a 3D printed bust a friend of mine asked me to paint for him a while ago. I really enjoyed the task, so I asked if he minded printing another one for myself with the intention of possibly entering in a painting competition at the next show I go to. Don't get me wrong, I don't think I am anywhere near good enough to win anything, but I just thought I would do it for the experience. Doing this hobby has helped me to keep challenging myself. Writing my blog, meeting new people, chatting to strangers at shows, it keeps the mind fresh. Why not get the adrenaline rushing with a little competition as well?

The paints are all Coat D'arms and Citadel paints, but there are lots of mixes going on. I tried to avoid using washes and inks to avoid the shine they produce, instead opting to make washes by just watering down the acrylic paint with water.

I have had the piece a good couple of months while waiting for me to paint it, I was saving it for the challenge. I did think about changing the colour scheme from my first attempt, but it is pretty similar to last time. The main differences are the washes being my own mix this time. I can't promise I won't have another go at him before April when I go to Salute, but for now I am happy with him.

 

Some close up details

 

Size wise he is 140mm tall so 20 points?

Studio bonus for Art House 20 points

Oh and last post I visited 4 studios but only claimed 60 points, so can I claw back that extra 20 please?

So, total, 60 points?

Minion MilesR: Wow that's not a mini - its a piece of art.  Amazing painting - at 140mm tall, I think he's worth 40 points and that's still stingy.  As for mercy, well Gus and I need to confer......  OK we voted and mercy was approved by 2 votes to 1.  Gus says Dogs get 2 votes.  Mercy shall be granted - THIS time...  80 points total for you

From Edward G - My first post, two 28mm chaps gone a Viking in Black and White [30pts]

 Hello all!! 

I'm very very happy to be back for my third challenge, it's such a wonderfully inspiring event every year :) This year is certainly the most challenging for me to date. Long gone are the dreams of beating my +1000pts total from challenge 10. This year not only do we have the doggo to keep me busy, on the 3rd November our little family welcomed our son, Frederick Peter, into the world. And while he's wonderful in every little way, he does keep us busy and target reduces hobby time :D

To kick off this year, I had planned to start the tour of the great film lot in Under Construction, but with a personal deadline of this Monday looming, I realised the minis would themselves still be under construction. So I dived into the lead pile, looking for some pre-primed minis that could be painted up in a couple of hours. With luck, I found these two chap. Both are Reaper mini metals from a long long paused Saga project. I decided that as these chaps were from the venerable depths of my lead pile (deeper than the 10yr country+house move re-boxing strata!) that these two should most certainly appear in black and white!

Without further ado, I present this years retro smash hit...(with a poster made by AI image generators, amazing, but also honestly rather scary that machines can do this. Soon they will be painting our minis for us!) 

Staring Olaf Olafson

And Ulric Ulricson

With amazing scenes and captivating dialogue such as:

Olaf: "Ulric, why is your left-hand axe bent?"
Ulric: "Why isn't your left-hand axe bent?! It is all the rage down in Oslo don't you know."

Olaf: "oh, I don't have a left-hand axe"

DUMM DUMM DAAAAA!!!!

Back to real life, I hope that this year my photos are better than previous years. I am trialling a new system in the basement, which my wife describes as "Quite a set up", so I believe she approves. I might need another lamp for the opposite side, so I will see where in the house I can grab one for the next photo shoot! 

As for points, I hope my maths is correct in counting the following:

- 2 x 5pts for 28mm foot figures = 10pts

- Location bonus for Black and White = 20pts

Total = 30pts

All the best until next time!

Ed

Great to have you back posting this year Ed and congrats on the new arrival.  Wishing you lots of joy and sleep.

Fine work on these venerable Reaper metals they came out nicely in their greyscale.  While I know they were banged up to meet a deadline I can see these appearing as undead in a DnD or similar game.  Your photos came out well.  Good luck raiding the house to improve the lighting.  I find that if I filch something that my wife will notice, sometimes it prompts a trip to Gnome Depot to pick top something that she thinks will work way better for me (and sh'e normally right).