Play Now, My Lord!

I know... I can't believe it either.  I'm playing Evony.  A bunch of my coworkers started playing it, and I'm in too now.  It's a "fire and forget" strategy game where things happen whether you are online to micromanage or not.  That makes a little tweaking every few hours enough to play.

You have probably seen the ads for Evony, with this example being the most tame of them.  I loved what Popcap did on this parody ad for Plants vs. Zombies (which is the best game I've played this year, easily.)

So here's the deal: come play Evony with us.  Join up on server 87, teleport to "Bohemia" (you'll start with a city teleporter) and join the alliance "UDIE".  It's fun and a bit addictive.

A Mystery No Longer!

Thanks to IbnIblis for identifying the mystery elf as Ral Partha mini "Elf Blade Maiden Mistress."

And now, I shall paint her!

Biscuity Endeavors

I have been on a quest to make decent biscuits for a while now. Not perfect ones, just decent ones. Until this weekend the best I could do was sort of Bisquicky dry lumpy things. I tried drop biscuits, rolled biscuits, multiple thin layers (hey it works for paint) and nothing ever came out the way I had envisioned.

Then along came Alton Brown.

On Thursday his show "Good Eats" was all about biscuits. By Saturday morning I was making biscuits that were decent. By Sunday night they were exactly what I had envisioned. The secret is all in the wheat. I kid you not.  If you don't have time to watch the video of the entire biscuit episode from the link above, just do this:

• 2 C winter wheat flour (or 1.5 C all purpose and .5 C cake flour)
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 4 tsp baking powder
• 1/4 tsp baking soda
• 1/2 C shortening
• 1 C buttermilk

Mix dry ingredients.  Cut in shortening until about pea sized lumps remain.  Mix in buttermilk until you have a sticky dough ball.  Dump ball onto floured surface and press out with hands until it's about an inch thick.  Cut 2" biscuits and bake in a 475-500 degree oven for 10-12 minutes.

The Ultimate Showdown

Tonight's concerts in Southeast Michigan:

Jonathan Coulton in Ann Arbor
They Might Be Giants in Detroit

What's a nerd to do?

Oh, and I may have just found my favorite tshirt ever.

Don't Even Ask

Because, seriously, what more could possibly be said?

Nurgle Monstrosity - Completed!

Last night Jimmy came over and retrieved his completed Nurgle Dreadnought. The thing is almost as big as a Land Raider. I gave it a decent paint job, but as I was doing it just as a favor I didn't put more than about 20 hours into it. And there is a lot of model there to paint. Since this is a gaming piece there's plenty of gloss varnish on the sticky bits. I don't like the way gloss varnish photographs but I do like the look of it on the table.

For complete pictures, check out my project blog: The Nurgle Monstrosity

Space Hulk meets Nurgle

Okay, not exactly. We've been sick at my house, first my wife and then me. The kids seem unscathed so far, but the taint of Papa Nurgle has definitely been upon us. I don't know if it was H1N1 or not, but we had all the symptoms and were both down hard for days.

At the point where I was finally able to stay up past the kids' bedtime, my wife and I played our first game of Space Hulk. Despite my previous rage against limited edition games, I broke down and bought one rather than risk never being able to get one except at greatly inflated eBay cost. If GW releases this game in an unlimited edition format you can bet that they will never be able to pull the "limited edition" stunt again. That trick works exactly once.

Neither Stef nor I had ever played SH before, but the rules were fairly straightforward. We played mission 1, and Stef's genestealers uttlerly destroyed my marines. In retrospect I should have been more aggressive about moving toward the objective. I was playing a very defensive game based mainly on my experience with the Space Hulk computer game. Overwatch is essential to the computer version since everything is moving so fast. With the new command points system and only five marines to worry about I could have played the entire game without overwatch and done better. Most overwatch action points were wasted. I also need to remember how well the heavy flamer template blocks movement for future games. All in all the entire game took about 45 minutes, including a number of rule lookups. The next run should be quicker, and hopefully the larger missions won't require a lot of reference.

And in case you've been living under a rock, the minis for this game are chicken fried awesome.

Adeptus Comicus

This little bit of silliness came about after I build my first drop pod and wondered how a dreadnought would be loaded on one. The troop carrying guts of the thing seem too integrated into the structure to be easily converted.

Anyway, the idea of how dreads might actually use a drop pod gave me a tickle, so I'm sharing the initial pencil with you. I plan on cleaning it up and inking it now that it's digital.

In case you can't read my chicken scratching, here's the script.

Technician: Brother Awesomenus is scheduled for drop assault but our last drop pod has troop restraints installed.

Brother Awesomenus: Fear not, brothers. I shall go into battle in the manner of our ancient forefathers.

Yes, I realize I wrote "manor" instead of "manner." Deal. Also, I have no real concept of whether an ancient Space Marine Dreadnought would call an Adeptus Mechanicus tech "brother." Same response... deal. I liked the dread calming the fretting tech with his kind words of wisdom. So there ya have it.

Can you ID the Mystery Elf?

My wife bought this for me at a garage sale a few years ago. I have not been able to identify it yet. I thought she might be a witch elf or Drow, but all my searching has not turned up an answer.

Clues:

• She was mounted on a GW square base with a 1991 copyright
• Cut marks on the bottom of the feet are consistant with a GW "slotta" base.
• She does not appear to be made of lead

Any ideas?

EDIT: Solved!

A Day in the Life

This will be edited all day. Feel free to live vicariously.

7:22 AM: woke up. realized I had turned alarm off. freaked out getting kids up for school
8:13 AM: dropped kids off at school without breakfast. MEAP is today.
8:28 AM: call from Stef to see if I'm okay, since I was so freaked out getting the kids to school
8:37 AM: determined perl daemon process I started last night is still running. so far so good.
9:05 AM: dumped about 20 lbs of recycling off my trash-hole desk
9:22 AM: call from 800 number at desk phone. didn't answer
9:37 AM: off for my third cup of coffee. is it time to go home yet?
9:45 AM: minor panic attack thinking about the fact that the code we are just about to move to production works in Zimbra 5 but not Zimbra 6. Our hosting provider for Zimbra is planning on upgrading from 5 to 6 in about 4-6 weeks, giving us a narrow window to come up with something new. Current project took about 4 months to complete.
9:52 AM: taking a minute while Ann Marie gets her code moved to a test server to refine repackager process for EMU Today. Just prettying up the presentation a little.
9:57 AM: putting on my magnificent "bose triport" headphones to listen to Abbey Road again. This makes about 100 times in the past three weeks.
11:09 AM: Apparently Ann Marie and I have been working on a different schema assumption (mostly because I didn't change the table creates in the svn repository) so we're getting that ironed out. hooray for unit tests.
11:16 AM: Whoops. killed my daemon by dropping the primary event table. I need to change the query code to try and autorecover from a db connection error rather than just die.
12:05 PM: Walked up to the student center. The mural of pandas on the wall where "Panda Express" chinese take-out used to be is odd.
1:20 PM: Fifth cup of coffee. EMU Today harvester is done and on beta tab. Next stop, public beta opt-in.
3:50 PM: Our little cabal of technocracy has decided that our vendor is insane, and we've decided to do the work ourselves. It will be a metric crap-ton of extra work, but the OT won't be half bad and the result will be a system that we can use in a timely manner for a lot less money. Also, cup #6 of coffee is cold and nearly empty. I guess "cup" isn't really the correct term. It's a travel mug that holds about two mugs worth of coffee. Does that make this cup 12? Just finished listening to the Beatles rooftop concert on youtube.
4:22 PM: Back to trying to get what I was working on before the 2:30 meeting going.... can't seem to get the channel app to read the ldap attributes passed to it. There are other working channels here that do it, so I must have a configuration option wrong. Rule One of Life: if it doesn't work it's probably not someone else's fault.

My New Best Friends

It's been a long time since I've worked in any industrial settings. Back in those days I used to carry around things like safety glasses and earplugs all the time, since I regularly needed them.

This weekend, I came to love earplugs again.

I've been having trouble hearing people lately. It just seems like select people are mumbling most of the time. Asking them to speak louder doesn't help me, since loud doesn't seem to equate to clear. As we packed the family into the car Saturday morning to head to a nephew's birthday party I grabbed (on a whim) a pair of earplugs from my travel kit. I had a bit of a headache and the kids were pretty riled up so I was already expecting a loud ride. Add to that Stef's recent fondness of playing books-on-tape type stories for the kids in the car using her little speaker she bought and the earplugs seem more and more attractive.

What I didn't expect is that they would help me hear better. With the road noise and most of the incidental passenger sounds pushed down, I was actually able to hear and understand voices better. In Manchester, MI later that day I was able to understand the announcer with the bullhorn just fine with the earplugs in. Without them her voice was just an incomprehensible buzz/echo.

The only downside is that people think I'm avoiding listening to them when I wear the earplugs, an irony I'd say since wearing them results in me understanding more. I think wearing earplugs is less detached looking than wearing headphones, since headphones always give the impression that you are listening to something else, whereas earplugs mean you are just listening to less.

One in a Million Rolls

I have never seen this happen. Ever. Well, I have now and I don't suppose I will again. We're still not sure how it happened. Inspection of the table afterward showed nothing that would have obviously caused it.

Here's the same roll from another angle. After gawking at it for a while, manager Brett came over and bumped the table edge so it fell on its side. What was the end roll? A one. On a roll to wound. I asserted it should be a rending wound for being so unusual, but since I wasn't playing nobody cared what I had to say. ;-)

Saturday I actually played a game at the Paint Creek Crossing GW store. I had intended to participate in the Headhunters event, but instead of running at 1 PM and 4 PM apparently they only had one run at 2 PM. Oh, well. I still got a 2k pick-up game in with my Skaven. My opponent refused to play anything less than 2k and I found out why... he had a Vampire Lord on a dragon that constituted about 1/3 of his points. I shot the thing like crazy but couldn't seem to do any damage to it, not even with two characters blasting warp lightning and 8 jezzails. My opponent didn't really know the rules very well, so I was just sort of letting him call the shots; I hadn't played in over two years, and I was just looking to have fun. I wasn't really doing him any favors I know, but I didn't really feel like arguing. Another fellow who wasw willing to point out rules saddled up to the table and started pointing out errors, but soon after that my opponent ran out of time and had to leave. Having gotten a taste of playing again I think I will be back. My ten year old daughter came with me and enjoyed it, so I'm hoping this will be the start of her gaming experience.

Quote of the Day

On the fact that mnemonics are no longer allowed in certain schools...

Foil! First, inner, outer, last! It's always worked for me!

--Ann Marie

How To Win Customer Loyalty

I have to hand it to Brett at the Paint Creek Crossing Games Workshop store. He has always been a pleasant fellow with whom to interact, and I mean that with no sarcasm. He's a salesman without giving the hard-sell. The way he handles the painting competitions there is just one example of his professionalism.

When I found out there was a painting competition last weekend I finished a couple of models to enter, and my daughter, son and nephew (between the ages of 5 and 8) all did the same. My daughter really loves painting, so to enter her first competition was a big thing for her. She asked what sort of prizes you get for winning, and I told her at this level that it's just for fun and you'll get a certificate if you win (like in past competitions there.)

We all submitted our models, and my dreadnought won in large model. None of my kin won, but they didn't seem to mind. Brett then surprised me by handing me a prize... one of those bolter ammo box miniature cases! I don't even know if you can get those anymore! The winner of the contest got a battleforce of his choice!

So, between making my GW experience a pleasant one (again), giving my kids a category in which to compete (even if just for fun) and doling out unexpected prize support, Brett has certainly impressed me.

I Rage Against "Limited Edition"

I want Space Hulk. Ya hear, GW? I want to spend my money on your product. The problem is that I don't want to buy it now. I want to buy it, oh, more in the February time frame.

"Don't wait!" says GW. "Space Hulk is limited edition and will only be available for a short time!"

You know what? Hogwash. Plastic figures cost a ton to tool, and if GW has gone to all the trouble to make new dies for the Space Hulk figs, then they are planning to sell a lot of them. I'm guessing that means more than will fly off the shelves on 9/5/09. So either they are looking to spend a ton of money developing a new game that will be impossible to buy in a month or they plan on releasing an unlimited edition later. I can wait until then. If they don't plan on producing it after this limited release, then forget it. I don't want another unsupported game (cough*bloodbowlnecromundabattlefleetgothicmordheim*cough).

Seriously, guys. I pre-ordered Black Reach because it looked so great, and it wasn't limited in any way. Space Hulk looks great, but the idea that I might miss my chance to buy it because I don't feel like ponying up $100 right before my kids go to school really grinds me.

Ace of Squig Cakes

If anyone gets the food channel, the show Ace of Cakes shows the creation of the Squig Cake that was at Baltimore Games Day this year.

I watched it last night. It was very cool.

Stages of 40K

This is strictly from my own experience at 'ard boyz last year. Your mileage may vary.

EDIT: I changed the image a little... I had beginning of turn 5 wrong, and changed the verbiage a little.

Natalie Dee!

It is rare indeed that I stumble randomly upon an internet comic artist who is so refreshing. Natalie's work is the opposite of exposition, something I have become quite bored with lately. Her comics are simple and elegant, and while not the three panel gag that typically gets emailed around I find myself happier after reading them.

Awesome indeed, Ms. Dee.

TV Metagame

The other night my wife and I were watching a truly horrid "Guinness World's Animal Records" or some-such. No, I don't remember why. It was late, and we were tired.... anyway.....

A few minutes in, during a shot of the audience applauding, I saw a woman tilt her head in a strange fashion. A couple minutes later, another audience shot showed that same woman tilting her head again during applause. It looked eerily similar to the first shot. I decided to review that shot again to find someone else in the audience that had a distinctive action, then rewind TV and see if the editors had just spliced the same audience shot in multiple times. Sure enough, a fellow in the middle rear of the audience (whom we can only describe as "special") clapped with his hands over his head, half standing and shaking his head. His performance would be very easy to identify as identical. Rewinding the live-TV using the DVR I verified that the footage was exactly the same earlier in the show. I saw three different clips used three times each during that show.

The game: be the first person to identify a repeated shot in a TV show.

Sneak Peek of TableTopReady.com

I've been working on a new commerce site that I'm hoping to launch in September. The Black Templars Dreadnought seen here is for the store and is the sort of things I plan on selling, specifically assembled and/or converted miniatures primed and ready for gaming or painting. I will also feature some of my painted work on the site as well. The address is TableTopReady.com, which I think describes the mission well. Need a tactical squad with a drop pod for a game in 2 weeks? If I have it on the site it will be in hand and ready to ship.

If I can keep my wholesale supply chain intact I'm hoping to sell most items at around 100-120% of MSRP. So let me ask.... since there are so many discount wargaming retailers around, is it worth paying full retail to get the figures assembled (with mold lines scraped), based and primed? Maybe with a little nicety or two like the special weapon in a tactical squad magnetized so you can swap meltagun, plasma gun, flamer or bolter? One thing I've noticed on the FTW list is that you are all inspired hobbyists. Does this sound like a store that you could see buying from?

Blood Ravens Land Raider Crusader WIP

Here's the first tank that I've painted for myself getting closer to completion. I still have a lot of highlighting and freehand work to do, but I'm fairly happy with it right now.

I lost one of the headlights, so I converted a sensor from another Land Raider Crusader that I built as a Redeemer.

Land Raider Assembly Instructions - part 2

First off I'd like to apologize for not taking pictures of the assembled "part 1" assembly. I starting building the thing and before I knew it I had the outside hull glued on. Whoops. Hopefully a written description will be enough.

Okay, so now we do the "sandwiched" portion.

The first time I built a Land Raider (without instruction I'll add) I had to cut open and reassemble the thing twice. Knowing that pieces need to be sandwiched between the inner and outer hull would have saved me a lot of heartache. Here's what you'll need:

• the two little round and one rod front door linkage pieces
• the two doors that meet with square "teeth"
• the door piece that is a control panel one one side and a tool kit on the other

Take a look at the linkage pieces. They match the posts coming off the front door on the left side of the tank. One of them is clearly marked which linkage round piece it gets. Glue the round pieces to the door posts, but make sure not to glue the door shut in the process. DO NOT glue the linkage rod into place! Once the exterior hull is on the rod will be held firmly against the round linkage pieces and allow the door to open/close in unison.

As to the square teeth door / control panel thing, you have a decision to make. Either they can go on the gun sponson side or the access point side. It really doesn't matter. This one will be a Land Raider Crusader, so I wish I had put then on the back (to match the Hurricane Bolters) and left the front ones as unobscured access points.

When glueing the outside hull on, it's helpful to have a piece of tread from each side as a sanity check that the two hull pieces are spaced correctly.

Next: the top and sponsons

GW Reverses the Trend

Well this is quite a nice surprise. Check this out:

GW 2009 Annual Report Summary
GW 2009 Full Annual Report






The executive "supervike" summary:

• Revenue up 14%
• Pre-tax profit up 682%
• Debt down 84%

They've really turned it around compared to the last couple years.

Land Raider Assembly Instructions - part 1

About 10% of my traffic seems to be people looking for "land raider assembly instructions." It's time to give the public what they want.

What you'll need:

• The interior walls
• the floor
• the front portion that includes the top turret mount (plus the little sensor plate that goes in it)
• the exhaust pipe half that faces toward the front of the Land Raider
• the interior engine detail piece (with the purity seals and adeptus mechanicus symbol)
• both front access doors (the ones that rotate open)

These are all the pieces that sandwich between the two interior walls.

First off, prime all these pieces. I recommend gray automotive spray primer. Paint the interior walls (if you plan to... but why wouldn't you?!), the interior engine detail and the floor. Once assembled these parts will be nearly impossible to get to for painting, so do it now. You can paint the top part with the turret mount now or after assembly. Glue the sensor to the top turret mount before or after painting, but before the assembly steps below.


Once everything on the interior is as painted as you want it, you will need to trim the interior engine detail piece a little. I've found that this little fellow makes it really hard to get the Land Raider to fit together correctly unless you scrape the corners of the outside edges (left and right) to create a little taper. Being able to easily slip the interior engine piece in will make getting a good fit much easier.

After dry fitting everything to make sure you have an easy fit, it's time to glue. The rear part (engine exhaust) and the floor are straightforward, but you'll need to simultaneously insert the top front door and the top turret mount to get the hinge areas between them to mesh easily. Don't forget: don't glue the front doors! When everything's together you should have a nice square fit, with the top turret mount piece fitting nicely against the top of the two interior walls. Now insert the interior engine detail (which should go in easily.) A drop of glue from the interior of the engine area will hold it in place.

Next: the parts that sandwich between the interior walls and exterior hull.

Continue to part 2.

Quote of the Day

Overhead from a coworker's phone conversation:

"Everyone at their abuse department is so hostile."

Hence the name, I suppose.

Missed Chicago

My chance at a 2nd Golden Demon passed me by this weekend when I skipped going to Chicago Games Day. We just don't have the money for that kind of thing right now.

/sad

I'll admit though, the pressure to up the ante from the past two years was a little intense (albeit all self imposed.) In '07 I set my sights on getting first cut, and made honorable mention (for my Skaven Giant.) In '08 I wanted to get a trophy of some sort, and I took home a bronze in 40k large model (for my Ork Warboss.) This year I was hoping for at least a silver.

The funny thing is that I keep looking at my old competition pieces and I'm less and less happy with my technique. I really hope that means I'm improving as a painter.

Next year's competition will feature two of the really good ideas I had this year, which were for fantasy regiment and fantasy single. A friend of mine had a really good idea for duel (which is now "diorama") which I might steal if he doesn't want to do it himself.

The "Skilled Rider" Rule

I just had a nice description from my coworker Subbu about traffic in India. I'd say these drivers are acutely aware of their surroundings. They would have to be to stay alive I'm guessing.



Subbu was saying that when he got here he couldn't believe that nobody honked. In India, apparently everybody honks pretty much all the time. After getting used to driving here (you know, with rules and lights) he can't drive in India any more. He has to take a taxi.

Celebrity Fleshtones

Lately, I've been thinking about chucking a couple of paints that I've never really liked: Citadel's Dwarf Flesh and Elf Flesh. I mean seriously... what flesh is actually either of those colors? Dwarf Flesh looks way too orange and Elf Flesh is far too yellow for pale skin. Even cheap acrylic craft paint has better fleshtones. What I use now are P3 Midlund Flesh or Citadel Tallarn Flesh foundation, and highlight up by mixing in a white (skull white or Reaper Linen white.)

But then I saw this picture.

My wife's computer has one of those annoying Real Media film.com news pop-ups in the system tray. I don't typically pay two seconds of attention to it, but this picture immediately got my notice. Here we find Kendra Wilkinson and Denise Richards, appearing to exemplify Citadel Dwarf Flesh and Elf Flesh.

I guess I won't throw those colors out quite yet... maybe Citadel can rename them "fake tan" and "overexposed flash" or something.

Upgrade Failed

So I finally clicked the "upgrade" button on my Blogger template. Guess what! Fail! Most of my content went over just fine but for some reason the comments link is refusing to show up on my posts. People can still leave comments, but they have to go into the post itself to do so.

Grrr. I know "black box"ing things makes life easier for 99.9% of the users, but I'm still jealously clinging to my control at the source level.

EDIT: Win! Reading some forum posts, I tried clicking the "Revert Widget Templates to Default" link (in Layout, Edit HTML, at the bottom) and it worked! I don't know what about the comment widget had been modified but apparently the default version is the good one.

Cheesing Out on a Challenge

I'm having a crisis of list creation. A friend of mine and I have been gearing up for a battle between his Orks and my Space Marines with allied Witch Hunters. He threw down the gauntlet first, setting the fluff for the battle and choosing the armies. (He actually chose Witch Hunters, but I don't have enough to play 1500 points effectively, so allied SM are okay.)

So here's the deal. I don't like fielding list that would be perfect for destroying my opponents army but would be useless against an entirely different army. I think there should be more to the game than picking "scissors" if you know your opponent took "paper." On the other hand, with the fluff that has been developing around this challenge it would be completely clear that I was going to have to face Orks. Would I then be justified in loading up on plasma cannons and heavy bolters? Am I cheesing out if I take Telion to pop any Nobs with PK's before they get to whatever armor I've brought? If this was your garden variety scheduled game then I would never tune an anti-Ork list.

Should I just sort of tune an Ork list or just completely go hog wild about it?

So Now Sweet Sixteen Turns Sixty-three

Okay, random thought......

Bob's Seger's song "Rock and Roll Never Forgets" has the line "so now sweet sixteen turns thirty-one." I use that as a mnemonic to remember that the code for the coffee I like at the local grocery store is code 31 on the u-scan lanes.

If sweet 16 was 31 when the song was released (1977) that makes a birth year of 1946 (can you say baby Boomer?) and a sweet 16 year of 1962. So what rock and roll songs would have been popular at that time?

In the top 25 of 1962, 4 of them have some variety of the word "twist" in the title. (btw, way to milk it, Chubby Checker.) Most of the songs wouldn't qualify as rock and roll by any historical standard. Here I copy the list from musicoutfitters.com:

1. Roses Are Red (My Love), Bobby Vinton
2. I Can't Stop Loving You, Ray Charles
3. Let's Twist Again, Chubby Checker
4. Stranger On The Shore, Mr. Acker Bilk
5. The Stripper, David Rose
6. Johnny Angel , Shelley Fabares
7. The Loco-Motion, Little Eva
8. Breaking Up Is Hard to Do, Neil Sedaka
9. Mashed Potato Time, Dee Dee Sharp
10. Soldier Boy, Shirelles
11. Hey! Baby, Bruce Channel
12. The Wanderer, Dion
13. Duke Of Earl, Gene Chandler
14. Good Luck Charm, Elvis Presley
15. Let Me In, Sensations
16. Wolverton Mountain, Claude King
17. Slow Twistin', Chubby Checker
18. It Keeps Right On A-Hurtin', Johnny Tillotson
19. The One Who Really Loves You, Mary Wells
20. Palisades Park, Freddy Cannon
21. Midnight In Moscow, Kenny Ball
22. Sheila, Tommy Roe
23. Twistin' the Night Away, Sam Cooke
24. The Wah Watusi, Orlons
25. Peppermint Twist, Joey Dee and The Starlighters

If 1962 was a bland year for popular rock and roll, 1977 was lousy with disco in contrast. Bob Seger leaves us with a universal truth: if you have to pick between catchy lyrics and sociohistoric accuracy, go for the song lyrics.

EDIT: What, nobody's going to call me out about calling 1962 bland? There are 12 songs out of the 25 that don't include the word "twist" that I immediately identify as classic rock and roll songs of the era.

My New Favorite WIP holder

I started mounting high quality paint job minis on corks to avoid touching the emerging paint jobs with my filthy meat appendages. That's all find and dandy until you need them to actually stand on their own. I tried a variety of makeshift holders, and even switched to sawed-off champagne corks (so they'd be much thicker at the bottom) to try and fix the falling over problem.

Now I have it figured out. As you can see in the pic (which is a WIP from my "Big Box of Eldar" project blog) the Sabol paint tray makes an excellent WIP fig holder for these cork mounted figs. Even non cork mounted figs can be placed in the star-shaped cavities. About half an inch of insertion will hold them nicely without contacting the model to the foam. I intend to use one of these to hold 20 tactical Space Marines in the future for actual army transportation once I get them painted and properly dullcoted for protection.

650 Years Summarized

History is a funny animal. We tend to learn about events in the singular and miss the flow of one event to another. If you learned Bible stories as a kid you probably experienced this as well, learning anecdotes of history without much time context.

I'm going to connect some of the dots for a short segment of biblical history. If you know some of the stories buy aren't a biblical scholar then you might get a sense of the bigger picture.

About 1700 BC:

• God calls Abraham to pack up and leave to go to a land that God would show him, and promises him and his wife a child despite their advanced age and childlessness.
• Abraham and his wife Sarah have a child, Isaac. God commands Abraham to sacrifice Isaac but supplies a ram as substitute for the sacrifice at the last second.
  
• Isaac and his wife Rebekah have children, one of whom is Jacob.
  
• Jacob has 12 sons, one of whom is Joseph.
  
• God gives Jacob the name "Israel" after wrestling with him.
• Joseph's brothers are jealous of their father's obvious favoritism of Joseph (including the gift of a coat of many colors) and so they fake his death and sell him into slavery in Egypt.
• Joseph interprets a dream Pharaoh's dream of fat/thin cows as meaning seven years of plenty were coming, followed by seven years of famine. Pharaoh places Joseph in charge of storing the plenty to prepare for the famine
• After the seven years of plenty, Jacob and his family move to Egypt to escape the famine.
• The children of Israel (Jacob) thrive in Egypt, until a Pharaoh comes to power who does not know Joseph. The children of Israel are forced from residing in Egypt to being captive there.
• About 280 years after captivity in Egypt begins, Moses is born.
• At age 80, Moses leads Israel's children (now a multitude) out of Egypt.

If you actually read all that, did it fill in any gaps? Were there things you knew of connected in ways you hadn't known before? I'm just curious more than anything. As a child I did not grasp the connections in biblical history that as an adult I see.

Akiko Rocks the B3

Oh, man. Oh, man. Oh, man. I just heard Akiko Tsuruga for the first time on local jazz station WEMU. She rocks the Hammond B3 harder than anyone I've heard in a while. And by rock, I mean jazz.

Go to her site and listen: http://www.akikotsuruga.com/Eindex.html

August

The room dimmed as we danced
Spinning weightless laughing
Embracing with gaze fixed
And morning came
To prove it was not a dream

Unlikely Pie

Someone left a "Marionberry" pie in the break room today. It sounded like a joke to me... I mean, come on. Marionberry? Were they out of Halleberry or something?

As it turns out there really is a Marionberry. Part of me is disappointed.

New Project Blog... a Nurgle...um.... Thing

I'm painting a large model for a friend during our weekly hobby sessions, and it's a monstrous Nurgle abomination. Actually it's a Nurgle Dreadnought, but very few parts come from the Chaos Dreadnought kit.

Check it out:
http://nurgledread.blogspot.com/

This will be an interesting one to try and pull off.... it's a complicated conversion and I'm not relly sure how to paint it to do it justice.

Are You Smarter Than A Freakin' PhD?

Go read this: http://www.iop.org/EJ/abstract/1742-6596/150/5/052252

I'm serious. Is this a joke?

Have I lost all ability to comprehend anything technical / scientific? To be fair, there are five authors. If I could understand 20% of that I'd feel better.

The Squirrel Underpants are to keep your head from exploding, a practical application of the lowest common denominator. Squirrel Underpants are the opposite of science in both real space and k-space.

Paint Creek GW Reboot

This is a follow up to my previous rant about the fallen state of the Paint Creek Crossing GW store.

I stopped in the store today just to see what was going on. I've done this a couple times since Lance "left" and it's been a friendly experience. For the first time today I had a chat with Brett, the new manager there who will be staying on for a year or so to get the store on track. My impressions?

Breath. Of. Fresh. Air.

Brett really seems to "get it" when it comes to gamers and hobbyists. People coming in and playing at the store in a friendly way is something he encourages! People who antagonize and cause grief for others will be asked to leave. (He indicated that a few key players had already been asked to do so... I'm pretty sure I know who he meant.) We chatted about upcoming releases in a way that was informational and not hard-sell. I had a smile on my face. I felt comfortable.

...and I bought something before I left.

Friday Voynich-ness

So here's the fun. How long will it take the Wikipedia entry for "Voynich Manuscript" to reflect the fact that it was the subject of an xkcd comic?

Inquiring minds want to know. I want to know.

Ultraforge Makes Quality Yuckiness

This was a fun one to paint. He's on eBay right now, along with the Imperial Fists Land Raider Redeemer w/ Chronus.

Lord of Pestilence
Land Raider Redeemer

Lord of Pestilence, WIP 1

Big thanks to Sholto for the response to my last entry. I soaked the model in Melaleuca "Sol-U-Mel" and brushed all the old primer off quite easily. After a half hour or so in Sol-U-Mel I rinsed and reprimed, and it really seemed to take so much better.

So I started painting.... I like it so far. Ultraforge minis are pretty amazing.

btw, there are some on ebay right now (new, unpainted) if you are interested.

My First Brush with Resin

I have a number of Ultraforge models that I plan on painting and selling (or just selling... anyone?) and I am thrilled at how great these sculpts are. And they're big! Even this one, the "Lord of Pestilence" towers over a terminator and is almost as much mass as a dreadnought, and he's the smallest of the Nurgle-esque models UF makes.

I tried to prime him up tonight for painting, and made a discovery. Resin resents being painted. To get paint to actually stick to resin takes an act of congress or something, even after carefully scrubbing the thing in soapy water. Thankfully, automotive primer spray stuck quite nicely, but getting it in all the little nooks and crannies of this model was a struggle. I also found that a spray of Testors Dullcote would create a workable surface, but I don't think I would use that unless I needed to repair an area and didn't want to destroy the paint around it.

And yes, that is the same LR Redeemer in the background that I posted a WIP pic of earlier. I just can't seem to seal the deal on that one....

Dreadnought Arm Swaps

I've been trying out some video tutorial making lately. Here is one I put together that describes making dread arms swappable between Black Reach dreads and box dreads.

Painting for Quality, part 2

The second installment of Painting for Quality is up at mybattalion.com. Check it out. I really need to figure out how to do macro mode and movie at the same time. If I could get that working I could really put together some useful tutorials.

I bought a Targus flexible tripod at RadioShack over the weekend. It's the best $8 I've spent in a long time.

Pandemic.... ?

Swine Flu (aka "Pig Sniffles") has been all the talk around here lately. I just heard that the nearby Plymouth/Canton schools have been closed due to suspected cases. Considering how much panic has been going into this, I thought I'd give it a little analysis.

Flu kills a lot of people. About 36,000 Americans die each year from it. That's about 1/100 of 1% of the population in whole. So far the Swine Flu, aka A(H1N1), has confirmed numbers of 876 infections and 26 deaths in the U.S. and Mexico. That is a 2.9% fatality rate, much higher than the overall influenza fatality rates each year.

The WHO defines pandemic as "widespread human infection." We are currently on phase 5 of their pandemic scale, meaning that human-to-human spread of the virus into at least two countries in one WHO region has been confirmed. Assuming it gets to full blown pandemic mode, the expected infection rate is 25-35% of world population.

6.77 billion humans x (25-35)% infection x 2.9% fatality = 49.1-68.7 million deaths worldwide

Let's hope that equation is very wrong.

And not to let potential tragedy go without some attempt at poorly timed humor, this may be the time to move to Madagascar. Or not.

Painting for Quality, part 1

I am publishing a four part article series on MyBattalion.com designed to take painters to a level higher than basic tabletop. Part 1 is there now. I plan on publishing one segment per week.

Let me know what you think!

Old Guy Update

Last week I experienced what some would call a "rite of passage" of aging. I got bifocals. At some point in the past I could have imagined not liking the idea, but I absolutely love these things! I can see again! It was getting hard to do much of anything up close with my glasses on, and my vision isn't clear for very far with them off. I have to retrain myself to not look over my glasses at near objects now.

By the way, did I mention I love my bifocals? I really do.

The only complaint I have is that I have to actually move my head to look at things. If I hold my head level and look at the floor using only eye-tilt the floor is somewhat blurry. It's disconcerting at first, but you adapt quickly. And I can see!

Social Networking for Gamers

Go sign up at mybattalion.com. I've been hot and cold about social networking in general, but I'm interested to see what a niche specific social network will produce. I've already discovered a local gaming club that plays regularly in the neighboring town, which was terribly difficult in the low signal to noise ratio environment of facebook.

Don't even get me started on myspace....

Working with Water Slide Decals

I've been thinking about decals lately, mostly due to having to paint so many Blood Ravens chapter symbols on my growing army. It's a bit of a pain to get them consistent, and somewhere along the line I had enough people ask me if they were decals to actually make me want to try decals.

The problem, as most of you who have tried to use decals on space marine shoulder pads know, is that flat decals don't sit well on aggressively curved surfaces. From various other tutorials around and about the interwebs I discovered "Micro Set" decal solution. Basically, it softens the decals so that you can smoosh them into position, more or less. Its counterpart, Micro Sol, is even more effective at softening. The fellow at the hobby store told me that if Micro Set does the job, then there's no need for Micro Sol. They were out of Micro Sol anyway, so I bought what they had. I've been testing it with decals on Mr. Missile Launcher here, and the results have been encouraging. Basically, you brush Micro Set on the shoulder, place the decal, then brush more Micro Set over the decal. A few minutes later the decal should be soft enough to tap down with a moist towel into some semblance of flat. I've had to make multiple passes with Micro Set over the highest part, so I might pick up a bottle of Micro Sol and see how that works.

After the first try I was surprised to see the first decal dry up and fall off the model! Maybe I wet it too long and it lost all its adhesive. For try #2 I put some matte varnish over the decal to try and "glue" it in place and hopefully obscure the edges a little. Big mistake! The varnish (Vallejo Game Color matte varnish) clouded the decal significantly. Spot testing the varnish elsewhere didn't cause the clouding. With the current run I wet the decal with a cloth from the back, hopefully retaining as much of the adhesive as possible.

Once I get these things to wrap around a should pad properly the next step is to print my own and see how they work. I bought a Testors decal printing kit (a paltry $10) and have been experimenting with the free image processing software Gimp to get exact measurement printing. Gimp 2.4 was terrible at it, but Gimp 2.6 is wonderful. Once I get a reasonable decal sheet of Blood Ravens icons I'll post them here. I'm a little concerned that the spray sealer that covers the printed decals will stand up to the rigors of Micro Set, but I'll find out in time.

Masking - No Salt Required

Salt masking has been all the rage lately, mostly thanks to giganticdark's amazing Space Marine. The technique requires multiple passes with a double action airbrush, which can be something of an inconvenience if you don't actually own one. This tutorial describes how to use a brush-on masking medium to achieve natural looking wear. This is a very basic tutorial, so please experiment and see how you can alter it to produce more complex effects. The key is this stuff: Vallejo Model Color Liquid Mask. It's a water soluble acrylic that dries to a gummy consistency like rubber cement. The key here is that when it's set it is easy to remove, revealing whatever color was under it.

Step 1: Deepest color. I started with a Rhino that I had basecoated Red Gore. To the area I planned on weathering I painted Reaper Shadowed Steel (basically boltgun.) Viewing the result, I think I would go with a brighter metallic next time, like Chainmail. After the steel dried I applied a very diluted wash of VGC Orange Fire, the brighter of their two oranges, to give the impression of corrosion. Let this coat dry thoroughly before continuing.

Step 2: Apply the mask. Put some of the mask on your pallete, pick a bit up with a coarse brush and then tap the mask lightly on the areas you want to reveal when the process is complete. Try to keep the pattern of application somewhat random while controlling where you want to wear to show most. It's much easier to see when dry, so don't be afraid to apply a little, let it dry, assess the pattern and then apply more as needed. I haven't tried this myself, but the "toothbrush spray" technique may work for random splatter patterns. Let the mask dry thoroughly before continuing.

Step 3: Match the base color. Paint over the mask and wear color with the base color again. I know I sound like a broken record on this, but multiple thin coats make for smooth paint jobs, not thick paint globbed on in one coat. Let each coat dry before applying the next, until the wear area roughly matches the rest of the paint color.

Step 4: Remove the mask. Use a colour shaper, pencil eraser, or a stiff brush that you have an irrational vendetta against and gently brush the mask off the area. It's gummy and will pill up, but it comes off eventually leaving the wear color from step 1 revealed. If you get it on a brush, soap will do a pretty good job of removing it.

That's it! A low sodium technique for natural looking wear. I'm sure this group can figure out interesting variations to get the most out of this. Show me!

My Level 18 Tourist has GDSM and Magicbane

This one comes from the "if you have to ask..." department.

I'm a long time fan of the game Nethack. Even before it was Nethack, I was busily souring my first stab at higher education playing its predecessor hack. It took me something like 17 years to win it for the first time. Yes, I kept coming back for that long, and I'm still coming back.

Currently, I have a very unlikely game going... a tourist in Gehennom with basically a full ascension kit in hand. I don't have the Book yet, but the Bell and the Candelabra are mine. As you can see from the screenshot, I have nearly every intrinsic. Currently, I am on a very low level (or high, depending on how you think of it) in a locked room doing the "cursed scroll of genocide" with nurses thing to gain max hit points. I still have two wands of wishing (wow didn't always mean World of Warcraft, kids!) that can be charged again with the Platinum Yendorian Express Card. I can hardly believe I'm saying this, but I may just ascend a tourist.

And for the uninitiated, GDSM is "gray dragon scale mail" and Magicbane is a unique artifact athame.

Blogger Tip: Wrapping Text Specific to Multiple Images

One thing I've struggled with in my blog is the ability to post multiple images and have text roughly aligned with each image. That way I can actually write about the image that's next to the text.

It's going to take some html changes. Don't be scared. You can do this.

If you don't know what html is, don't worry. It's the language that a web browser (Internet Explorer, Firefox, etc.) uses to know where and how to put stuff on the page you are viewing. Html "tags" tell when to start and stop a particular format. The starts look like <this> and the stops look like </this>. Got it? Good, because you don't need to know any of this. Read on.

Here's the quick list of what we're going to do:

1. Load an image into the post
2. Add some text to go with the image
   
3. Add a snippet of html before the image
4. Add a snippet of html after the text

So start by composing a new blog entry and import an image into it. Just for grins at this point, click the "Edit Html" tab in the upper right of the compose window. The code for the image is a big scary block of html that starts with <a onblur="try... and ends with ...border="></a>. It should be about 5 or 6 lines total. Again, you don't need to understand it... you just need to be able to find the <a> at the end.
Okay, so switch back to "compose" mode (upper right tab) and add some text to the post. Now, switch back to "Edit Html." If you entered your text to the right of the image if should show up after the </a> part. That's good. That's what we want. Now find the end of your text. That should be pretty easy to do. Got it? Great. Guess what... we're half way there.

Okay, here's the fun part. Go back to the html and find the beginning of the image code again. Right before the <a paste this code:

<table style="border: medium none ;"><tbody><tr><td valign="top" width="100%">

Good, now go to the end of your text and paste this code in:

</td></tr></tbody></table>

Good. Now go back to "compose" mode and look at it. Okay, so it's not so impressive.... yet. The trick of this is that those code blocks can be repeated to get the text to stay with the relevant image. Each separate picture and the associated text is surrounded by its own "table" tag. This way, the browser knows to keep them separate. The post immediately below this one is a good example of two pictures with associated text.

Here is the updated post html, the parts I added are red. Since there are two pictures there are two "table" tags included, as you can see below:

<table style="border: medium none ;"><tbody><tr><td valign="top" width="100%"><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjoSWLwihwZWVfFdR_DapsP5f3wDUbiWr0t_LeV3-g3a2OUf4G1rmRD4IKmcPON4WyrOjBmpKTtJaUArTPHFxwFUTVYixn_o_DVPgv6ohDcla-fUPls9GS7GQd6T3AbyvYzoGIM/s1600-h/wip1.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer; width: 320px; height: 243px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjoSWLwihwZWVfFdR_DapsP5f3wDUbiWr0t_LeV3-g3a2OUf4G1rmRD4IKmcPON4WyrOjBmpKTtJaUArTPHFxwFUTVYixn_o_DVPgv6ohDcla-fUPls9GS7GQd6T3AbyvYzoGIM/s320/wip1.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5319591784571512354" border="0" /></a>Hmm. The title sounds like "Kibbles and Bits"... Menites and Kans, Menites and Kans, I'm gonna get me some Menites and Kans.

But anyhoo.... I converted a Killa Kan from various bits, and I think he turned out okay. Meet Stompy and Chompy. I think the rationale behind Chompy's name is self evident, and of course Stompy is up on one leg. The third in the set is tentatively named "Clyde," named for the ghost in Pac-man who broke the rhyming pattern. I don't know what Clyde will be, but he won't be a stock Kan. Anyone care to share ideas?</td></tr></tbody></table>
<table style="border: medium none ;"><tbody><tr><td valign="top" width="100%"><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjW7BKuVUUoiBG7FlpdUc-sMU92_6vsgFNQ1TWwqvwK2Of2xQ15z646NKEKaUf3IGz8KIAMx1wIIQrIGlthF-fFf8TMl-9BnL5ykODbw4rvj02tffVjuXqF2gvsgNcR2wvpwfzL/s1600-h/wip1.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer; width: 320px; height: 176px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjW7BKuVUUoiBG7FlpdUc-sMU92_6vsgFNQ1TWwqvwK2Of2xQ15z646NKEKaUf3IGz8KIAMx1wIIQrIGlthF-fFf8TMl-9BnL5ykODbw4rvj02tffVjuXqF2gvsgNcR2wvpwfzL/s320/wip1.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5319593172141889330" border="0" /></a>Also up are some models from the game Warmachine. I play the "Protectorate of Menoth" faction, and I absolutely love the models in this game. I have a standing challenge for a 500 point fully-painted game around May 1, so I'm planning what models need painting. My opponent will almost assuredly field Khador, so I'm in for a first-class whuppin'.</td></tr></tbody></table>

That's it! Go to town and let me know if it works/doesn't work for you or if you've found a better method to accomplish this.

On the table: Menites and Kans

Hmm. The title sounds like "Kibbles and Bits"... Menites and Kans, Menites and Kans, I'm gonna get me some Menites and Kans. But anyhoo.... I converted a Killa Kan from various bits, and I think he turned out okay. Meet Stompy and Chompy. I think the rationale behind Chompy's name is self evident, and of course Stompy is up on one leg. The third in the set is tentatively named "Clyde," named for the ghost in Pac-man who broke the rhyming pattern. I don't know what Clyde will be, but he won't be a stock Kan. Anyone care to share ideas?

Also up are some models from the game Warmachine. I play the "Protectorate of Menoth" faction, and I absolutely love the models in this game. I have a standing challenge for a 500 point fully-painted game around May 1, so I'm planning what models need painting. My opponent will almost assuredly field Khador, so I'm in for a first-class whuppin'.

My First Eight!!!

Since I discovered CoolMiniOrNot way back in '05 I have had the singular goal of getting an 8.0 score on one of my minis. Today I looked at my gallery and realized that I had one! The duel entry from Chicago Games Day '08 had been hovering in the high 7's for ages, but today it's at 8.0.

So why would this make me so happy? The miniature isn't any better looking at 8.0 than it was at 7.8. It still didn't win a trophy. I think the big deal is that I've always defined 8 as the "great" range for minis on CMON. To think that about 100 people think my mini is (on average) "great" is an encouragement. Golden Demon is a tough competition. To even think about competing against the likes Chris Borer, James Wappel and Vincent Hudon takes some cajones. It's easy to get discouraged, especially competing in categories like 40k single model.

The simple plan: Keep painting. Get better. Win a silver. Win a gold. Win a sword.

...someday

The Dollar Store = Kitbash Heaven

I have a confession to make... I'm frugal. Okay, maybe cheap is the right word. Either way, I've discovered in the past couple years how great the dollar store is for kitbash raw materials.

In case the term is new to you, kitbashing is taking something and disassembling/destroying it to get at its core components, then using those components to make something else. The toy section is especially handy, since a lot of the items have similar scale to wargaming. My BattleWagon shown here is a kitbash of a garden variety GW Ork Trukk, a dollar store steam roller toy and a dollar store Hummer Limo toy. Other bits from older GW models plus some styrene (used gift cards) were used as well. The big shootas in the front were originally the exhaust stacks from the steamroller.

The other Dollar Store item I really like is clocks. For only a dollar you get a wealth of cool gubbins like gears and springs and clear plastic disks. For Orks, all those fiddly little gears look great. I even used some broken gears to base my Grand Scrutator Severius last night.

Other Dollar Store items you might find useful:

• laser pointer (true LOS!)
• hobby paint brushes (for glue mostly)
• craft sticks (tongue depressor sized or smaller) for wooden planks
• plastic shot glasses for mixing 2-part epoxy
• steel cookie sheets for carrying magnetized models
• basing material (small rocks, spices, etc.)

Three Fails

1. Failed my "job" roll
My application that was supposed to go into production today wasn't correct. I'm scrambling to finish it now.

2. Failed my "parenting" roll
My five year old had been telling us that his pre-school class does "show and tell" so he had to bring something, typically a toy dear to him. It turns out that his class does no such thing, and this was just a sly attempt to take his favorite toys to school. The fact that it took three weeks for us to find out is the embarrassing part. Nice one, Jay.

3. Failed my "40k gaming" roll
I played a substitute game of 40k Saturday for a friend who had to cancel on someone. It was a 1500 point game vs. Space Marines. Since my friend plays Orks I took Orks too. The list I faced was that Salamanders character (Vulcan?) to 10 marine squads in rhinos, three Dreadnoughts, Three Predators (AC, 2xHB) and three Land Speeders. Ouch. I got destroyed. Granted, I had to scrounge to get to 1500 points, I've never played Orks before and I've never actually won a game of 40k, but I was still the optimist! Once he had nine kills points to my 3 we called it, roughly the end of turn 4. In honor of my Warboss' crushing defeat in the unstoppable grip of his Dreadnought I am painting my opponent a Warboss head to place under the foot of his Dread. In fact, I should pledge some sort of hobby favor for any loss I incur.

Wait, maybe I should make the "plain, blue police box" I owe someone first... (yes, I mean you.)

Imperial Fists Land Raider Redeemer WIP 1

This one has been on the shelf for a few months awaiting completion, and I think I'm going to get it done this week. I don't know how I would have done this without an airbrush. Seriously, I'm on at least coat 10 of yellow on the multimelta gunner and it's only now starting to look reasonably smooth. One of the goals for this one was a painted interior, so I ended up painting in the middle of assembly. That was a new experience, but I think it turned out well.

This is headed for eBay fairly soon. I made Chronus and the gunner removeable so you don't have to field them if you don't want. The final piece will include an "on-foot" Chronus in addition to the Chronus shown in the pic, both converted to Imperial Fists.

If anyone is seriously interested in purchasing this before it goes on the block, shoot me an email.

Take Cover! Final

Facing superior firepower and running low on ammunition, this Blood Raven waits for the right moment to unleash boltgun fire on the enemies of the Emperor. I wanted to convey a sense that the cover was insufficient compared to the enemy, and hopefully the big glowing hole in the rock says that clearly enough. I think this is the final product. Unless I find something glaringly wrong with it tomorrow then this is it. Thanks to all of you who suggested improvements. I really appreciate the feedback. It's interesting to note the difference in his right leg in terms of delineation of the kneepad, the lack of which was pointed out by Wienas. Both photos were taken in a light box with no direct light sourcing, and the darklining around the kneepad is far more visible in one pic than in the other. I'm guessing the camera was going through a little "red freak out" trying to figure out how to capture this. I didn't put the scorch marks Lord suggested, as I had envisioned that he wasn't right there when the hole was blasted in the rock.

Special thanks to Felix for the photography tips. These pics were f3.1 1/15 sec ISO 50. This is the first time I've been able to use the light box without pointing a light right into it. You, sir, rock.

The OSL was about as simple as it could be. I mixed some orange paint in with a great deal of P3 mixing medium and glazed it on in very transparent layers. It's pretty effective visually for the amount of effort. Damage on the shoulder pad is thin lines/spots of Reaper Bone Shadow with thin lines of skull white underneath. The key to thin lines is dilute paint and controlled brushload. Too thick and the paint gets chunky as you paint. If you pick up too much thinned paint on the brush it beads up or flows on the mini.

Like it? Give it a score on CoolMiniOrNot! http://www.coolminiornot.com/216976