Striking While the Iron Isn't Humid

Not pictured: the author.

The weather over the past few months has been less than acceptable for spraying, so when a window of warmish (for the season) and reasonably dry weather opens it's best to take advantage of it.  I did just that today by varnishing the zombies and Hans torso that have been on the painting table for far too long, priming four Terminators and a Tactical Marine that come from EV's recently acquired Dark Vengeance, and priming/basecoating a full Wotan and a medium walker torso.  I considered arms for the medium for a bit but couldn't settle on either Luther or Ludwig arms while the Lothar arms won't be camo and thus need no spraying.  As if all that wasn't enough I also sullied myself by going into an actual GW to poke around at their Dark Angel stuff, namely FoC unlocking characters and direct order bits.  In case you're like me and have avoided GWs like the plague you'll be glad to know that it hasn't been for nothing.  The full court sales press is still on and even having an obviously disinterested party along for the ride is no deterrent.  I did confirm that I could get direct order only stuff (looking at you Chapter specific upgrade sprues) shipped to the store while also avoiding S&H charges, so my suicide mission was successful.  I will need to shower for the next 72 hours, continuously, to feel normal again though.

Day old progress, still sold as fresh.

I assume most of you don't come here for disturbing mental images, so let's get on with the army men.  Attentive readers will have already pieced this one together, but we'll cover all the bases anyway.  Yesterday I finished up the zombies (metals and skin), the Hans (not much really), and got a start on one of my IK minis (very rough color blocking).  If I'd realized what state the Hans was in I would have (tried to) varnish it a while ago, but the painting table has been gathering dust for quite a while.  I did paint the base black as a way to make up for it to myself though, which puts it one step closer to a finished base than all my other Axis models.

The zombies got some actual attention.  They were also my experimental guinea pigs, which seems appropriate, as I tried out a couple different approaches to doing their skin.  In keeping with the easy painting theme of the army I simply washed the skin twice using green and either red or purple and also varying which color went down first.  I did two or three of each combination so I'd have a varied horde of shamblers.  The red zombies have a more mottled, decaying feel to them with one color or the other being dominant in spots across the head.  The purple zombies are the opposite, being a fairly uniform shade of unease.  The order of application didn't have much effect in the end.  I also washed the bronze ball hands with green to try and get a oxidized sort of finish, but that didn't really turn out either.  The ultimate result of these efforts is two units that are tied together by their jumpsuits, but distinguished between units by color/style of hands and varied between members by their state of decomposition.  Hopefully I find an equally simple solution for telling my Battle Grenadiers apart.

Getting ready to rain death from above once again.

For dessert, the Hans.  This is the first big(ish) vehicle that I've painted in quite a while and the first that I've tried to wash large portions of.  The wash muddles the white and light grey parts a bit, which is unfortunate, but it does it by mottling the whole thing, which isn't so bad as it helps with the camo look.  I picked out a few bits in metal, mostly pistons that wouldn't make much sense to paint in the real world.  Dust is historically accurate after all.  (Dust is not historically accurate.)  The left shin guard will get an identifier of some sort, either a number or a sigil, which will be repeated on the left knee of the other walkers.  I'll probably put numbers on in another place or two, plus an Iron Cross or other still-to-be-determined symbol on some prominent flat surface.  When I (liberally) wash the other walkers I'll take a bit more care to not let the wash pool so much outside of the crevices.  I like the mottling but wouldn't mind having less of it.

Reinforcements will be arriving in a bit, once I make my mind up on exactly what they'll be.  Dark Vengeance is a thing that will happen, plus the Dark Angels codex.  After that it'll be some combination of Dreadnaught, Scouts, Raptors, Uhlan, light walkers, Ravenwing, and Deathwing.  Chances are good you'll see them in the future on this very blog.  Warmahordes coverage will also be appearing as the latest round of seasonal leagues is up and running, this time with a hobby component.  My dance card, it is ever full.