Friday 25 July 2014

More Fixes, New Models

Yesterday heralded the arrival of some more models to my preparation table - Arwen (foot and mounted), a Mumak Mahud, Bilbo with Sting, Gollum with Fish, Shelob, and the Nazgul.

I was very surprised to see that Shelob, Arwen, and the Mahud were still in metal - I thought that the last of the metals had been phased out about a year ago. They were however in white packaging, which I believe means they won't be around for much longer. Perhaps not surprising because they're older models that presumable don't sell well, but I noted that Gollum and Bilbo (both post-AUJ models) were also in plain white.

Finecast being finecast, and finecast not working so well in older metal molds, I checked the Nazgul first. Shock of all shocks was the anticlimax when eight out of the nine were miscasts. Problems included holes in the back of hoods; bubbles in armoured hands/feet, bubbles along arms; missing swords, sword hilts, and parts of blades.

I took photos and have since contacted and heard back from GW customer services. They're going to send me a box that will be checked before posting, and have also given me a gift voucher of $150 (the Nazgul set was $146). I love GW CS, they're really good about dealing with issues like this. It's the second time I've had miscasts, the first being an Amdur nearly two years ago.

The one good Nazgul:



So with a fix up of the Nazgul being almost entirely out of the question (it might be that I could cover them in flames and send them running from Amon Sul), I've since been working on other fixes and assemblies.

First up was Shelob. I could have complained about that model too as it came with two rear-right legs, but I decided I could fix it. To do so, I cut the offending appendage into 4 sections, and pinned it back together in a way that looked more like a left leg.




After Shelob, seeing as I had the putty out, I fixed up Boromir from a few days ago. I think he turned out pretty OK, given that it was done with the end of a compass (the best tool I have).


I also did a bit of work on Gollum, because I noticed that he was supposed to join to his coracle by a tiny surface area, so I decided to pin him into it, even though the pin will be visible at the end. It shouldn't be noticeable though.



Paints and Sauron should be arriving within the week. I'm a little concerned that the Nazgul will herald their master in the matter of casting, but that can be sorted if necessary.

Until next time, may the wind beneath your wings bear you to where the sun sails and the moon walks.



Wednesday 23 July 2014

My Collection

-----WARNING: BORING POST INTENDED FOR PEOPLE WHO WANT TO KNOW THE SPECIFICS OF WHAT I'VE GOT-----

So basically what I'm doing is collecting one of every pose of everything that appeared in the films (with a few notable exceptions - Faramir, Dork-Captain of Ithilien; Master of Laketown (possibly)' the pre-Hobbit versions of Radagast, Thranduil, and the Necromancer; and something else that I can't remember at the moment.

Just the top section of the list (named/important characters), there's 149 models. The way it works is that anything that appeared in the films is a priority for me, both heroes and basic troops. We never saw Citadel Guards in the films, so I'll not get those models. I hit a bit of a grey area with getting all the captains/bannermen of each race because there's a lot of them. Really, I only need a few models a representatives of each race, so one or two command models would be nice, preferrably nicer ones (so not the Minas Tirith captain standing on the orc...

Models that I have so far (including stuff that's in the mail at the moment):

Gandalf the Grey (current single, The White Council, Escape from Goblin Town, Gandalf and Bilbo, Gandalf on Cart, Orthanc, Rivendell, Fellowship, Khazad-dum, Breaking of the Fellowship)
Gandalf the White (BGiME, standing on rock, Minas Tirith mounted, Helms Deep mounted)
Saruman the White (The White Council, Orthanc, Palantir, Scouring of the Shire, Mounted)
Galadriel (The White Council, Protectress of Lorien, Galadriel and Celeborn)
Elrond (Last Alliance, Master of Rivendell, The White Council)
Frodo (with Arwen, Fellowship, Breaking of the Fellowship, Captured by Gondor, Osgiliath, Shelob, Orc Armour, Mt Doom, Scouring of the Shire)
Sam (Fellowship, Breaking of the Fellowship, Captured by Gondor, Shelob, Orc Armour, Mt Doom, Scouring of the Shire)
Bilbo (Escape from Goblin Town, Bilbo with Sting, Gandalf and Bilbo, LoTR)
Gollum (Gollum with Fish, Gollum on Rock, Captured by Gondor, Mt Doom)
Legolas (current single, Fellowship, Amon Hen, Breaking of the Fellowship, The Three Hunters, Defenders of Rohan, Legolas and Gimli mtd, Helm's Deep, Heroes of the West)
Thranduil (King of Mirkwood)
Tauriel
Gimli (Fellowship, Breaking of the Fellowship, Three Hunters, Helm's Deep, On Uruk-hai, Legolas and Gimli mtd)
Thorin and Co. (Escape from Goblin Town)
Thrain (the Broken)
Aragorn (Weathertop, Fellowship, Breaking of the Fellowship, Three Hunters, Defenders of Rohan, Helm's Deep, King ft)
Faramir (Captured by Gondor, Heroes of the West, on foot with sword raised)
Elendil (on foot, Sauron)
Isildur (ft and mtd, Sauron)
Denethor
Boromir (Captain of the White Tower ft and mtd, Banner on foot, Fellowship ft and mtd, Breaking of the Fellowship, Dying)
Bard
Girion
Theoden (foot with shield, original armoured mounted, Defenders of Rohan)
Eomer (Defenders of Rohan)
Eowyn (Helm's Deep, Fall of the Witch-king)
Gamling (ft and mtd, Defenders of Rohan)
Hama (Defenders of Rohan)
Palantir (Orthanc)
Azog (ft and mtd)
Lurtz (Lurtz an Grishnakh)
Ugluk (Ugluk and Vrasku)
Grishnakh (Lurtz and Grishnakh)
Shagrat (original)
Gothmog (original ft and mtd)
Merry (Fellowship, Breaking of the Fellowship, Heroes of the West, Scouring of the Shire)
Pippin (Fellowship, Breaking of the Fellowship, Heroes of the West, Scouring of the Shire)
Haldir (unarmoured w/ sword, unarmoured w/ bow, Helm's Deep)
Gil-galad
Radagast (Escape from Goblin Town, Radagast on Sleigh)
The Witch-king (Twilight holding out hand, Weathertop, Fall of the Witch-king, Minas Tirith)
Alfrid
Grima Wormtongue (Saruman and Grima, Scouring of the Shire)
The Mouth of Sauron (ft and mtd)
8 unique Ringwraiths (The Nazgul)
The Watcher in the Water
Arwen (ft two handed sword and mtd, with Frodo)
Shelob
Sauron
Grinnah the Goblin (Escape from Goblin Town)
The Goblin King (Escape from Goblin Town)
Balrog (Plastic)

Gothmog's Lieutenant
King of Men 4
Army of the Dead (all plastic poses, metal except stabbing with sword pose)
Dead Marsh Spectres (all)
Cave Troll with Chain
Moria Goblin Captains (sword and bow)
Mordor Uruk-hai (1, 2, 3 from original blister)
Morannon Orcs (all plastic poses)
Mordor Orcs (all plastic poses)
Morannon Orc Captain 2
Orc Taskmaster and Drummer
Fighting Uruk-hai (all plastic poses)
Uruk-hai Crossbowmen (all poses)
Uruk-hai Banner Bearer 2
Warg Riders (all plastic poses)
Goblin Town Captain (Escape from Goblin Town)
Goblin Scribe (Escape from Goblin Town)
Goblin Town Goblins (all poses)
Rohan Royal Guard on foot (1, 2, 3)
Warrior of Numenor 9Warriors of the Last Alliance 1, 2, 3, 4)
Gondor Ranger (Captured by Gondor 1, 2, 4)
Guard of the Fountain Court (1, 2)
Warriors of Minas Tirith (all poses)
Warrior of Minas Tirith Banner Bearer (1, 2, Gondor Commanders)
Minas Tirith Captain (Gondor Commanders)
Rangers of Middle Earth (all poses)
Haldir's Elves with Bows (1, 2, 3)
Haldir's Elves with Swords (1, 2, 3)
Haldir's Elf Banner Bearer (Heroes of Helm's Deep)
Elf Captain 1 (Haldir's Elves Command)
High Elf Warrior (1, 2, 3, 4 Warriors of the Last Alliance)
High Elf Spearmen (1, 2, 3, 4)
High Elf Banner Bearer (Elf Command)
High Elf Captain (Elf Command)

Getting Fixed

While I wait for paints to arrive by post (ideally by the weekend), I've decided to get my models bases done and painted. Normally, I'd do my bases last, but it's the messiest part of the model so it makes sense to do it first really. I've also taken the opportunity to fix up a couple of second hand models that I got a while ago - Gandalf the White (my next planned paintjob), and the mounted Fellowship Boromir. Not too bad, considering that they combined cost me about $15NZD.

When I got Gandalf, the lower end of his staff was missing, and the top end of the staff was bent 180 degrees out of place, so bending it back wasn't going to fix it. It was a bit of a fiddly job to drill into the head of the staff, but it's all secure now - bending it will probably break the join at the wrist before the staff breaks. I stripped him down previously, hence the dull tone on most of the metal.



I didn't initially realise that Boromir was broken when I got him, as his arm was glued on and looked about right. When I stripped him though, the arm came off, and I saw that he had no upper right arm, so the previous owner had cut the arm off at the elbow, and then glued the lower arm to the shoulder. The horse's hoof was also buggered where it joined the base, and there was no tab to attach it to the base, and the hoof was deformed.
I've now put a pin up the horse's leg and into the base, and it's now nice and secure. The arm, however, will be a little more problematic. I've put in an armature of about the right length, but I'm not sculptor. I very rarely bother to alter the pose of any model at all, so I don't know if my technical abilities are going to be sufficient to fix the arm and add enough detail to it so that I can paint it up nicely later with no evidence of the underlying structure. The same applies to the hoof, but I can at least hide that in grass if needed.



Until next time, may the wind under your wings bear you to where the sun sails and the moon walks.

Sunday 20 July 2014

First Time in a Long Time

I done been paintifying.

Last time I took up a brush was over a year ago, around May/June, and even then I only painted Elrond's inner robes and sleeves. The time before that was the end of 2012/start of 2013. However, in the last three days, I have finished Elrond, and painted Aragorn and Eowyn. In doing so, I have discovered that I lack a few paints, so I definitely won't be doing more than priming models in the next week, if anything at all.

This was the first time I have tried using pre-made grass tufts on bases, Citadel Mordheim Turf. It looks good, but the stuff that holds the tufts together is white... and kinda visible, which is annoying. Also, I learned a bit about using tufts of the right size, when I realised that there were smaller tufts in the container. To that end, feel free to guess the order in which I based them.

I am particularly pleased with how Eowyn turned out, more so than the others. It is also one of my favourite poses in the entire range, though the other two are very good contenders for the position.

From painting these guys, I think the main things to improve upon are painting blonde hair, and making sure to keep paint on skin very smooth. Whenever I do blonde hair, it always ends up looking a bit dirty, and it's very difficult because in reality it can go from dark to light very quickly, and (particularly yellowy-blonde, in comparison to white-blonde) seems to go from almost dark brown to white across its shades. I did water down the paint for the skin quite a bit, but with the number of layers on there, it formed a rough surface anyway.

Click for big.









I have no idea what I'm going to paint next. I have been buying up a lot of heroes, hopefully catching some before they go out of production (I notice that Gandalf on Cart and Angry Galadriel are both in plain white packaging now), as well as picking up some that are already history, such as Weathertop Aragorn. Therefore, I have a good 60-70-odd models to choose from, plus a few from the Hobbit range too. 

[EDIT]:
(I say 60-70, but it's a gross underestimation. The number is somewhere around 200, and then there's rank and file troops, and other bits and pieces on top of that number.)

I also never posted finished photos of Legolas and Gimli to the blog. I'm sure I'll get there eventually.

Until next time.