Kent's PaintStuff

Haven't Posted Since When?!?

noreply@blogger.com (Kent) — Wed, 30 Mar 2011 06:45:00 +0000

Wow... It HAS been a long time since I've posted here. Ouch. I really need to work on that. I've been very busy with going back to school to get my degree, so I haven't felt as if I had a lot of relevant stuff to post regarding miniatures. There's always more homework than I feel that I have a lot of time to complete, but I have been trying to work on a few minis here and there. Not so much that is of earth-shattering brilliance, but a few works to keep metal and plastic people, in various states of prep/prime/painted-ness, scattered across my workbench at all times.

It is apparent that Games Day Chicago will be happening again this year, after a brief vacation from the Windy City, and GenCon Indy will also be arriving soon. I hope to be able to attend both of those events, and perhaps have an entry or two worthy of some slight notoriety from the judges. I'll just have to see how things work out in those regards. I'm slightly disappointed that I won't be able to make it to Adepticon this year, and participate in the first ever Crystal Brush competition. Unfortunately, there was a conflicting event on the schedule, and I had already agreed to it before I had noted the date of Adepticon on the calendar. Ah well, perhaps next year... That would also give me some additional time to prepare a few entries that might be worthy of the awesome competition present there at Adepticon.

So-- How are YOU GUYS doing? ;-)

Kent

Happy Halloween!

noreply@blogger.com (Kent) — Sat, 31 Oct 2009 23:06:00 +0000

Here's my recent entry into Reaper's Halloween Painting Contest, up on their forums.

For a bit of shameless self-promotion, I encourage my friends to go out to the forums and vote for their favorite piece. (I won't lie, I hope that MINE is their favorite.)

This particular mini is Reaper mini #02869 Elise the Witch, sculpted by the exceptionally talented Werner Klocke. A really fun figure to paint, as I feel that it basically has two characters in one small form, Elise and the jack-o-lantern on which she is perched. Very simple in its execution, the figure left a lot of places for me to embellish with my own style. It took a little bit of work to figure out that the clumps of material at her base were leaves, but when I looked very closely, I could actually distinguish each individual leaf in the small piles around the base! This year, in Reaper's Painting Competition on their forums, Elise is a VERY popular figure. It's no wonder that it's so popular, as it is an absolutely beautiful sculpt.

I'll update this post later when they have the voting available.

Okay, I'm starting to look at my WH40K army again...

noreply@blogger.com (Kent) — Fri, 11 Sep 2009 18:20:00 +0000

It seems that there are mulitple forces in the universe pushing me towards actually playing the 5th edition of Warhammer 40,000. (What?!? You mean there's a GAME to go with all of these figures??? Brilliant!) This post on Games Workshop's blog is just a bit more compelling to me. Amongst the blog pics, there is this low-res pic of the new Space Wolves sprue that I have been eagerly anticipating.

Of course, this get me a bit more inspired to dust off my old Space Wolves and get more units painted up! I just hope there's a minimal duplication of the items that were present on the previous Space Wolves sprue. I have enough of those older sprues sitting around that I can cull pieces/parts from those, but I want to be able to combine them with NEW components.

A couple of quotes from my regular gaming group

noreply@blogger.com (Kent) — Wed, 19 Aug 2009 15:13:00 +0000

"It's not broken-- It's a conversion."

"It's not badly glued, it's jointed."

GF9 Magnetic Basing System Review

noreply@blogger.com (Kent) — Wed, 20 Aug 2008 02:58:00 +0000

A while back, I purchased a bag of GF9 Magnetic Basing System, specifically 25mm Round bases w/ insert, item number GF9 04125. Gale Force 9 also produces a similar product for square bases of various sizes. These are discs of plastic and a magnetic rubber component, glued together prior to being laser cut, accompanied by a flexible sheet to which the magnets will ahere. As I was at GenCon, I saw their demonstration of the magnet strength holding a Games Workshop plastic Ogre to the wall of their display booth. Not bad for a magnet of that size, but I wondered about the strength as appropriate for a 25mm base holding a 25-30mm metal model.

First notes-- The instruction sheet specifically mentions the use of cyanocrylate glue (superglue), and discourage the use of PVA glue. It specifically says that PVA glue will eventually peel away from the textured plastic of the topside of these bases. Ouch. That kinda sucks, as I usually use a PVA glue to attach preliminary coats of sand and gravel to the base. Perhaps if I give the top of the base a thin coat of Super Glue (not the gel I normally use for attaching components), then let it dry, that dried surface might provide more tooth for the PVA to attach to...

Secondly, the difference between the basing material and the magnetic material is pretty apparent by the touch and texture. It looks and feels almost as if it were an actual sandwich. There is the matter of the resolution of the laser cut circles. On my batch, the circles were not as smooth as I would have liked. In order to fix these issues, I first tried filing the edge of a base, but the difference in material consistency made it a bit difficult to get a smooth edge. I then covered the offending edge with a layer of Bondo Glazing and Spot Putty, which I was later able to sand, file and smooth the finish to something I found more acceptable. I hope that this is a more permanent solution as well.

The problem with this is the fact that I would normally buy these bases with the intent of saving time. By the time I go through such measures to fix the appearance flaws, I've spent more time on each base than if i were to stick a magnet in the bottom of a GW base... These might be ideal basing solutions for some gamers that want to hold their minis to a metal component or affix the included flexible ferrous sheet piece to a movement tray, but sadly, I don't think these will work well for me. IMHO, it's a good idea, but the execution is somewhat lacking. This is a big disappointment to me, but I'd give these a D rating if I were into that type of system with my reviews. I think this is the first product that I'd give such a rating. :-(

Games Day '08

noreply@blogger.com (Kent) — Tue, 29 Jul 2008 20:33:00 +0000

Back from Games Day Chicago this year. I had a lot of fun, hanging out with Team North America, along with sharing the space with Team Montreal. I slaved long and hard painting on stuff prior to the event, only to get a single entry completed. Boromir turned out okay, but there are still a few things that I might have done differently with the figure. At least he made the first cut, so that's a good sign in a category that packed with excellent entries.

Now I'm looking at clearing off the paint desk to make room for new projects, and maybe actually complete a few old projects too. I'm scouring through bottles of paint, many of the GW versions are worthless and dried-up. Many of these even have the re-designed bottle lids with the flip-top caps. They suck. I think GW has improved with the bottles for the new Foundation line of paints and the new Citadel Washes, but I'm not going to spend another dime on the older paint pots if I can help it. I feel like it's just throwing that money away. I'll spend my paint money on Reaper Master Series.

Reaper Chronoscope Minis

noreply@blogger.com (Kent) — Wed, 25 Jun 2008 14:36:00 +0000

Happy birthday to me! All right, my birthday was a couple of weeks ago... For my birthday, I decided to gift myself with Gale Force 9's 12 piece sculpting set. A very nice kit that includes several tools that have already proven useful in my sculpting endeavors, as I had to try them out right away. Good, well-made tools with a nice little carry case, with 2 extra slots in the carry case for other tools. (Although I already have more than enough sculpting tools in my arsenal to fill the extra slots...) I hope I can manage to keep these tools from walking off from my desktop in the future! I may need to figure out a quick way to mark them as mine.

It should be noted that my regular Thursday evening game group bought me, as a birthday present, a set of GF9's diamond files, with which to clean minis. These are excellent files and I really enjoy them. Although the files are small, they remove material from minis very quickly! I'm surprised! Thanks Jay and Dawn!

While at the FLGS (Friendly Local Gaming Store), I also noticed a few blisters of the new Chronoscope minis from Reaper. This is Reaper's new line of figures that will encompass all sorts of genre's, including sci-fi, steampunk, historical and basically anything that doesn't fit into their "fantasy" or Warlord lines. As with the Warlord minis, these are tabbed to allow for fitting on round slotted bases, with which these figures are packaged. The bases seem to be a generic round slotted base, but I hope this means that Reaper are considering making the round variant of their plastic bases, as per their 1" square Warlord bases with the small lip around the edge. Of the new line, I managed to snag the mascot "time chaser" of the line and an Indiana Jones-styled adventurer.

Sasha DuBois, time chaser, was sculpted by the wonderful talents of Julie Guthrie and Bob Ridolfi as a single piece mini. She's holding a pocketwatch (perhaps it is actually a "chronoscope"?) and wearing a waistcoat. Unsurprisingly, this is a beautiful sculpt to start the line off with! Because of that, there isn't much more to be said about the figure. I can't wait to actually take the time to paint her.

The second of these minis, Jack 'Dodge' Harrison, is a multi-part figure that includes a choice of 3 different heads and 4 separate arms (2 left, 2 right) holding a variety of weapons. This is a great precedent for this new line! Of the arms, there are two holding pistols, one holding a whip and one holding a machete/sword. I'm slightly disappointed with the whip, as it seems a bit thick for scale. Well sculpted and fairly accurate, but a bit thick compared to the rest of the miniature. Jack was sculpted by Gene Van Horne, and the 3 heads include a variant wearing a fedora meaning that this figure can easily be transformed into everybody's favorite 1940's archaeologist. The other heads include one that has a buzz-cut hairstyle smoking a cigar, and another wearing a pilot's cap. As I recently completed a figure of Dr. Henry Jones Jr., I think my version of "Jack" is likely to undergo a slight bit of conversion, as I have another hero in mind, using the pilot's cap head and possibly a one-eyed dog on the base. (Bonus points to anybody who gets the reference prior to the figure being completed!) I could nitpick about a few details of this, but I think I'll just let that rest for now.

These two figures make me want to go out and get the rest of the Chronoscope line. Already, these minis are tempting me to put down other projects in the works, so that I can put paint on these! I will persevere and work to complete other figures though, with looming deadlines approaching. Still, it makes me think about other purposes that might be met by an adventurer and a time chaser... Hmm....

New Digital Camera-Take 2!

noreply@blogger.com (Kent) — Mon, 16 Jun 2008 18:12:00 +0000

Woo-hoo! A new digital camera for my birthday from loving girlfriend, Nottygypsy! (Again, "Happy birthday to me!" only this time it actually was my birthday...) My previous Kodak digital camera didn't hold up too well and took a bit of a beating. It gave out on me before I was able to use it to it's full potential and motivate me to paint (and post) more miniatures-related stuff. This new camera is a Canon A590 IS model, as I did a small amount of internet research and found that DigitalCamera-HQ.com gave it high recommendations, and it was in the proper price range. So far, I've been very pleased with this Canon point-and-shoot camera, and it has all the essentials for minitature photography, including a macro mode. Hopefully it will prove much more reliable than it's predecessor in motivating me to do more miniature work.

Heresy Miniatures Review

noreply@blogger.com (Kent) — Sat, 02 Feb 2008 02:00:00 +0000

Okay, my latest pile of swag arrived in the mail yesterday, some of the sci-fi goodness from Heresy Miniatures. Andy Foster and his friends do some great sculpts. Andy's sculpting style captures great caricatures of heroes from tv or movies. Easily identifiable as to who the mini resembles.

A long time back, I snagged one of his initial Thrud the Barbarian figures. One of these days, I'm going to actually have to PAINT all the Thrud minis I've accumulated. Hopefully, I'll be able to do the sculpts justice, as Andy's is beautiful and captures all of the "thrud-ness" that is Thrud.

Although I didn't order any of his fantasy-themed miniature in this particular pile o' swag, I really like the approach Andy has taken to some of the fantasy miniatures. Many of the characters are sculpted with the heads or arms separate, allowing for multiple options when assembling the figure. This makes these ideal for building role-playing characters. I wish more manufacturers would take a hint from this concept.

Overall quality control is superb. ALL of my figures were excellent castings, with very little cleanup on each. The mold lines were minimal and there were NO instances of mold mis-aligning. Maybe I just got lucky with this batch, but I'd prefer to think that the gang at Heresy was just doing a great job.

Dr. Hugh McCrimmon
Okay, I'm not a big Dr. Who fan, but this representation of David Tennat was just too good to pass up.

Captain Nathan (Macolm), Haylee and Rev. Shepard (Book)-
I really hope Andy can get around to doing the rest of the Serenity crew, as these first three sculpts are great.

Ellie Mental and the Major-
Great likenesses of Bruce Willis and Milla Jovovich from The Fifth Element. I'm going to have to put that movie in the DVD player while I'm painting these minis.

Vincent B. Ruddock, wanted criminal. Armed and dangerous with his... teacup.

Security team and pilots-
The separate pistols are great, allowing you to put whichever style of gun in the character's hand that you prefer. This would even be helpful if you decided to use other manufacturer's weapons. That might be handy (pun intended) if you were going to use the minis in a GW Necromunda gang or such. Many of the minis in the security detail and such seem like there would only need to be a small amount of modeling needed to have some characters reminiscent of the original Battlestar Galactica colonial warriors and pilots. It will certainly be on my mind whenever I get to the point of painting these figures. It also makes me consider ordering another batch of these guys to model with different weapons to make a greater variety of sci-fi characters... I think that idea might have to wait until the the bank account is a little healthier.

I also snagged a whole mess of 20mm plastic round slottabases, and some new 30mm round bases. The 20mm bases I intend on using for several hobbit-sized figures, as I think they'll be the most appropriate, without using a full 25mm base. I'm still not quite sure what I'll use the 30mm bases for, but I'm certain that something will eventually come up for that use. As the Heresy site allows you to order the individual figures with your choice of base for each figure, I selected the 20mm bases for each of mine. Surprisingly, many of the figures I ordered would probably look pretty good on either a 20mm round OR a 25mm standard round base. For the most part though, I'm likely to use standard-sized GW 25mm bases for these figures I ordered this time around.

Overall, theses are beautiful minis that I hope I get the opportunity to sit and paint sometime soon...

Bad News/Good News

noreply@blogger.com (Kent) — Tue, 31 Jul 2007 19:13:00 +0000

The bad news is that I didn't get my project done in time for Games Day Chicago. :-( I tried really hard, pushing myself to get my figure done in time for the event, but I just didn't manage to pull it together in time. So, with that in mind, I stayed home. I really wasn't feeling too good about myself or my abilities because of that particular setback. I felt like I let the Project MMVII group down, as well as myself.

The good news is that I'm going to Games Day LA to enter my project there! I already have my flight booked and some tenative travel arrangements. Hopefully, it will be a good trip for me. I'm kinda surprised that GD LA would follow so closely on the heels of Chicago, but at this point, I don't have much room to argue. That also doesn't leave me much other time to paint, either! I'm hoping that I can turn this into a good showing on my behalf, but we'll see how things turn out.

That doesn't leave me much more time to work on stuff for GenCon, which will be immediately after Games Day. No bets on how many entries I'll have done for GenCon though...

GenCon Painting Contests?

noreply@blogger.com (Kent) — Tue, 24 Jul 2007 22:55:00 +0000

So I was looking at the stuff for GenCon, which will be following Games Day by two weeks... The various categories there present an opportunity to paint something different from Games Workshop minis, especially if I try for any of the manufacturer's awards. Last year, I managed to snag a gift certificate from Reaper for a unit of Half-Elf Deathseekers. If I'm going to attempt any such entries, I'll have to plan them out a little bit so I can make a quick transition of my paint time immediately following Games Day. I'm not betting that I'll win any awards at GenCon, but that goes for ALL painting competitions. Besides, I'll be there with my friends anyway. That's the important bit.

Pre-Games Day

noreply@blogger.com (Kent) — Mon, 23 Jul 2007 18:51:00 +0000

Hey wow.. It's a week before Games Day and I'm freaking out trying to get my stuff painted again. What else is new?

I'm really hoping to get my entry finished as part of the Project MMVII team. I'm thinking there's going to be some sleepless nights in the next week, though. I just really pray that my final piece does justice to the rest of the entries and doesn't look like complete crap in comparison.

Camera and Desklamp

noreply@blogger.com (Kent) — Sat, 30 Dec 2006 08:39:00 +0000

For Christmas, the new digital camera should help with updates of painted miniatures! Well, that is, IF I actually finished painting any minis within this lifetime... I have been working on a few projects though. We'll see if I can get some stuff finished for 2007. How's that for a New Year's Resolution?

The new(-er) desklamp should help too. My primary desklamp finally died a while back, and I've been hesitating on spending the money to replace it. Managed to get another one fairly cheap though, of the same style. For those interested, I normally use a Luxo-type of swing-arm lamp that has a circular flourescent bulb surrounding a normal incandescent bulb. I really like the GE Reveal bulbs for the incandescent portion, too. The combination of these bulbs gives me a good bright light with a broad spectrum. I also have another swing-arm lamp mounted on my desk with just the flourescent bulb, but surrounding a magnifying lens. I rarely use the magnifying lens though. As I'm near sighted, I see things better up close than farther away. So, I usually paint without my contacts or glasses and can see the detail well enough for my purposes.

Back from GD Chicago '06

noreply@blogger.com (Kent) — Tue, 01 Aug 2006 19:10:00 +0000

Chicago Games Day this year was a bit of a rushed trip. As expected, I drove out on Friday to stay with my buddy, StrayCatt in the Chicago area. An uneventful drive, aside from a crazy country detour because of construction in Iowa before I got to Des Moines. Once I arrived there, my buddy and his wife fed me, then he and I sat down to finish out a Golden Demon entry or two.

Over the past couple of weeks, I was working on a miniature for the Warhammer 40K Single Figure category. I actually had started some of the conversion a year ago, with an intent of entering it for GamesDay '05; but reality set in and I knew that I wouldn't have enough time to finish it out for the competition. With that in mind, I was determined that I would get it finished and entered for this year. As the evening wore on, Catt went on to go to bed and I intended to get a bit of sleep for myself. Boy, was I wrong. I ended up staying awake all night in my effort to finish that single miniature. All the while, I would look at the clock and count down the hours that I had left to finish. Eventually, 7am rolled around and Catt pulled himself outta bed. It was at that point that I made an honest assessment of my progress and realized that I wouldn't have that particular entry finished for this year (again). That was a frustrating decision to make.

So, without much fanfare, I dug into the small case of other miniatures that I had brought along for the ride, most of which was for GW's Lord of the Rings game. There were a few minis that I thought would be passable as entries in the LotR single figure category, so I proceeded to dust them off and tidy up any shelf damage those figures had suffered. Nothing too drastic, just a scuff here or a slight scrape there. Easily remedied. Then Catt looked into my figure case and said something along the lines of "What about these other miniatures you have in here?" He was examining some of the plastic figures minis from the Return of the King boxed set that I brought along in the off-chance that I might actually try to play one of the pick-up games with them. (What?!? Actually play the silly game? Are you insane Kent?!? --Wait, don't answer that one...) I told him that was the reasoning for bringing them, but he pushed the idea forward... "Why don't you try entering some of these in the unit category?" The best I could do to deny him was to respond that I didn't have a display base for those figures. He quickly countered this by reaching into a drawer and pulling out a fully varnished plaque, ready for a treatment to hold minis. "I'll bet we can make a quick display base for you..."

And so it began. I grabbed the best 10 orcs I had finished, along with a spare Saruman figure that was ruled out of entering the LotR single category. (Not a bad paintjob, but I didn't find it as dramatic as my other choice, Arwen and Frodo on horseback.) Catt snagged a bit of sculpey and smoothed it onto the plaque, now covered in aluminum foil. Then I placed each mini in the tenative position on the sculpey, marking it. Using the marks as a guideline, we quickly carved out the circular impressions where each mini would go. A quick bit of texture applied with a toothbrush, and Catt removed the foil/sculpey combo, and baked the top piece while I stayed behind and touched up orc bases. When it was finished baking, Catt sprayprimed the sculpey with black, then baked it for another 5 minutes, making the primer paint-ready. He handed it off to me and it was still hot! I quickly drybrushed the base with enough gray and white to match my orcs (and now Saruman's) bases. A batch of super-glue to mount the painted groundwork to the varnished base-- then I added the static grass to the entire thing, base and miniatures together. We finished the whole thing at 11am, in less than an hour!

Waitaminit-- 11am? Games Day started at 10am and Golden Demon entries were only accepted until noon. Ack! We rushed out the door, placing my entries in a box. Just in case of any breakage, I threw a couple of tubes of super glue into the box as well. Closing the lid, we hopped in the car and took off down the road towards the convention center... Only to find ourselves waiting in Chicago traffic! Argh! Nooo!

As we arrived at the convention center, Catt handed off my box of entries to me and said, "No time to check them over, we gotta go!" We hopped out of the car and--didn't do a fast walk, or a light jog... We ran. Flat out. As if we were being pursued by the hounds of Hades, through the catwalks and bridges from the parking garage to the actual convention center. At one point in our rush, Catt attempted to pick up the pace a bit-- but I held off, considering that I felt stuff rattling around in the sealed box I was carrying. Finally reaching the registration desk for the Golden Demon entries, the time was 11:55. Made it, on time--just barely. Ours were some of the last entries accepted. As I opened the box to quickly inspect the damage I imagined with every footfall of our mad dash, I found that absolutely nothing had moved since we left-- save the tubes of super glue that were jumbled around, making more noise than damage. It was at that point that my heart finally stopped beating out of my chest. Whew!

From there, the event was fairly calm. We stopped and talked to some of our painting friends, eventually snagged a bite for lunch after first cut judging was complete. We were both consoled with the idea that almost all of our entries made first cut. Sometimes that can be a task in itself at some Games Day events. Returning from lunch, the final cut judging was beginning in some categories, so we hung about nearby to check it out and BS with our friends. Unfortunately, not all of our entries progressed so well. But, with all of these events, "There can be only one!" Well, one each of 1st, 2nd and 3rd place winners, that is.
Eventually, as the judging was completed, we made our rounds checking out each category's winners. For all the stressing I did over certain entries, I was surprised by the entry that I had spent the least amount of prep time at this particular event...Fortunately for me, my LotR group snagged me a bronze! This also awarded me with an unending amount of flak from my buddy, StrayCatt. No real surprise there. After all, that's what friends are for...

It was also good to see some of my friends do well with their minis... Although a bit disappointing the StrayCatt's entry didn't do as well as hoped. I gotta figure out a way to get him back in the swing of things with painting. Hell, I gotta find a way to get me back in the swing of painting. Put that on my "to do list..."

Following the rest of the excitement at Games Day, we did't do much this year. In year's past, the Mini-Painter Yahoo Group would go out for dinner, but we passed on it this time. We went out for something quick to eat, then back to StrayCatt's house. I eventually grabbed a bit of sleep for that long drive back home to Kansas.

From the winners' circle pics, they managed to grab a semi-decent shot of me (without the goatee for a change). The shirt I was wearing was a bit more purple than seems to show in the photo, but here's where I credit the GW photographers and thank them for the shots of my minis. (My own camera seems to have walked off a while back...)

Finally, here's a link to the rest of the Demon winners for Chicago '06, to see what I had to compete against in the Lord of the Rings Group or Monster category, and the entire Golden Demon winners for '06.

And I'm stressin' again--

noreply@blogger.com (Kent) — Tue, 25 Jul 2006 21:54:00 +0000

Of course, it's the week before Games Day Chicago '06 and I'm still working on my entries. I was hoping to have a lot more done at this point than I currently have accomplished. This is nothing really new, though. I wish for once that I could better plan my project time in order to get things finished without working myself into a frenzy at the last minute. At least the miniature that I'm working on has a good coat of primer on it. I'm taking this Thursday off work in order to stay home and paint, too. Maybe that will help, maybe not. Friday will have a good chunk of time eaten away with just driving to Chicago. Fortunately, I'll be staying with my buddy, StrayCatt again. Time will tell if I can get at least one good entry done before Friday. Speed painting at it's finest! (Yeah, right...)

As soon as I get back from Games Day, I'll start working on the few minis that I have in mind for GenCon Indy '06. As I'll be staying with another friend out there, Orca, as I do most of these conventions-- mooching off my buddies in one city or another. It certainly makes it a bit cheaper and easier for me to justify going out to Chicago or Indy. It's just as questionable whether or not I'll finish my entry (entries?) for GenCon, too. Last year, I felt I did a pretty decent showing there at Indy. I hope I can do similar for this year, too...

Maybe I'll be able to get some sleep between now and then too, but I doubt it.

Games Day Chicago 2005

noreply@blogger.com (Kent) — Fri, 09 Jun 2006 19:11:00 +0000

Okay, it's been a while since I really posted anything of real relevance as to what's going on in my life, but last few months have been a whilwind of activity. So, with that in mind, I guess I'll begin to go through several things with this post. Most of this is ALMOST a year old at this point, but I figured it would be good to put the relevant info up for all to see anyway.

To begin with, I was in frantic preparation mode for Games Day Chicago. I always enjoy attending these events, sponsored by Games Workshop as their big "dog and pony show," but they're a bit more enjoyable when I get to attend such events with some of my buddies. This time, my friend StrayCatt invited me to stay the weekend at his house and use it as our base of operations. I readily accepted, thus feeling like I had sealed my way into attending this year's event. No backing out now...

So, I had been working on a few entries for the Golden Demon painting competion at GD Chicago. The demons are a fairly prestigious award throughout the miniature painting community, and I'm proud to say that I already have a couple of those resin-cast statues on my mantle. (I really do hate bragging about it.) But, just like potato chips, one or two is not enough.

Unfortunately, I didn't bring my schedule to a grinding halt and work solely on painting for the 4 weeks prior to the competition. Instead, I leisurely worked on a few entries that I hoped that I'd get done in time. Prone to distraction, at one point I even stopped to buy a gallon of paint and then painted my hobby room, thus destroying the horrible mint-green walls that had infected that room before I purchased my house. A nice neutral-colored environment to paint in now soothes me instead of stabbing my retinas while I attempt to paint...

Then for some reason, I shifted the focus of my attention to the batmobile (my '98 metallic navy blue Trans Am), as it had taken some damage when I hit a curb earlier. Several months earlier. For those several months, it was resident within the garage. It was obvious that I messed up the actual wheel, but there was also some damage to the suspension for that wheel. So I slowly pushed forward, aquiring one component at at time, until I finally had the necessary pieces/parts to reassemble the suspension to a satisfactory state. After which I (finally) drove it down to one of the local shops to have the wheels aligned and have my work checked by a professional. Mind you, I completed my share of work on the suspension at 4 am before I was planning on leaving for Chicago, then took it into the shop for alignment promptly at 9am... Can't fault me for timing on that one, eh? To sum it all up, I had an 8 hour test drive to make sure that the work was done properly. With all of that out of the way, I was able to drive my own car (instead of the "green beater" loaner car from my parents). This in itself pleased me to no end...

Eventually, I managed to get going down the road to the Windy City. An uneventful drive out... Made to StrayCatt's house and we stayed up for a few hours painting together to finish out our respective entries. A good time painting and hanging out with him is always worth the long drive. Of course, the entries I was working on had to be changed before I walked out the door in KC, simply for the fact that I'd NEVER get my original ideas finished in time to enter them, in addition to working on the car and driving out... Corners had to be cut, so I chopped them off full force. But, since I was going to visit my bud, I figured I'd let them be and stop worrying about it. I'll try to use those uncompleted ideas for (1) next year's Chicago or (2) another Games Day event, such as Baltimore, Atlanta, or LA. I do see it as unlikely that I'll make it to LA though. Hmmm something to think about later.

The event itself was a lot of fun. StrayCatt and I dropped off our entries and chatted about with some of our mutual painting friends. I strolled about through the store, looking at GW stuff I refrained from buying, including some of the Forgeworld resin models that I'm kicking myself for not pre-ordering. Then I visited with some of my friends from KC that were participating in the plastics conversion contest. (Although they were mainly doing so in order to get the free squad of space marines that was provided, but I can't blame them for that one...) StrayCatt and I went out to eat with several members of the Mini-Painters' list, while we waited on results from the first round of Demon judging. When we returned, two of my three entries had made first cut. Not bad. I'll take it.

I attempted to pass through the Demon entries and scrutinize them a bit closer, but continued to run into friends and aquaintances to talk with, so I didn't get too far through the line. A few hours later, I returned to pass by to see the 1st, 2nd and 3rd place entries marked above thier respective diplay cases. As I went through, I saw that StrayCatt's entry in the Duel category placed 3rd, so that was encouraging. (It's always cool when one of my close friends wins.) But, one of mine made it to the final 3, so I was excessively pleased with myself. I had to do a double-take to realize which place I had actually been awarded... 2nd place in 40K single mini. That was a bit impressive to me, considering that particular category usually has more entries than any other. Wow.

After the awards ceremony, StrayCatt and I headed out to eat with a more expanded version of the mini-painter list. We had a bit of fun chatting things up there. I got to know a couple other guys a bit better from that, including the Slayer Sword winner, Chris Borer. Everybody was a hoot to get along with though.Eventually, as everybody was getting ready to turn into pumpkins, we decided to take off and head back to StrayCatt's house. We didn't stay up late, but we sat around for a bit BS'ing and throwing out a couple of ideas. Eventually Catt started twisting my arm a bit harder for me to make an appearance at GenCon in the next couple weeks. He twisted a bit harder, but I have to admit, taking 2nd in a diffucult category started to revive a bit of enthusiasm in the hobby for me. I told him I'd think about it a bit more seriously.

The next morning, I got up bright and early and headed out to make the long trek home, but my buddy had already headed out the door that morning. He and I are very similar in that we jump through all kinds of hoops to help our good friends out with manual labor. StrayCatt was on his way to assist in building a deck for a buddy. No problem. I was able to get going on my own and eventually made it back to the land of wheat and sunflowers. A relatively uneventful drive, therefore affirming some of my semi-mechanical skills fixing the batmobile prior to the trip. I returned somewhat tired, but at the same time, but also with some slightly renewed in painting motivation. Not a bad trip. Not at all....

Now, to see if I can duplicate the accomplishment (or better) for 2006 GamesDay.

It's me with long hair!

noreply@blogger.com (Kent) — Fri, 21 Oct 2005 22:40:00 +0000

Okay, this was a picture taken several years ago at the Games Workshop Chicago Grand Tournament. At the time, there were a few accompanying pictures of miniatures from my army that I brought with me, my Space Wolves. Unfortunately, the group posting those particular pictures went away prior to me setting up this blog. Ah well...

This is my first post... howdy

noreply@blogger.com (Kent) — Fri, 21 Oct 2005 21:59:00 +0000

I am drinking a beer with anthony.

Eventually, I will set up my page -- here's some of my stuff.