Monday 4 January 2016

Review of the Year - Painting

Another year gone by, so as is traditional it's time for the annual look back at hobby highlights. This post will look back at my painting efforts over the past year. There's a companion gaming review post to summarise dice adventures.

The start of the year was dominated by the Lion Rampant project. Over a period of four or five months, I built and painted a complete late medieval force of Perry Miniatures Wars of the Roses figures. It was nice to complete a project in such a short timespan - some of my projects have been plodding along for years!


My painting mojo was obviously firing on all cylinders in spring, for I quickly fired off a few more units for various projects, including some warg riders and  Rohan troops for my Lord of the Rings collection, and these undead vikings, which I am unsure what to do with - something will come to mind at some stage. Sometimes it's good just to go with the flow and paint up what you fancy. 


After all those units I wanted to slow down and concentrate on some individual figures for a change of pace. We had started playing In Her Majesty's Name, which requires just 10 or so figures for a complete force, so I made a start on my oriental faction, the Silver Serpent, with these rather finely featured Malifaux figures. Actually, I slowed down to such an extent that this trio took me over three months to complete!


It was some time in late summer that I bought the Age of Sigmar starter boxset. I kept the chaos figures to add to my collection and sold the rest. I painted up the warriors, marauders and daemon beast model, and also finished painting a unit of ogres plus a lord on jugger, to give myself another skirmish faction to play in various game systems. 


Last but definitely not least, I started a dwarf project. Even though I already have a fully painted army for Warhammer, and a fledgling Lord of the Rings force, I could not resist buying a complete army from a forum sale. It's a project to savour, one to mature down the years. I painted up possibly my finest single figure of the year in the shape of a dwarf champion, followed by a splendid looking unit of rangers. More short beardy painting is sure to come in 2106. 


I reckon 2015 has been a good vintage for my painting. Two warbands completed - the Wars of the Roses force and the Khorne Warriors - and a good start made to a dwarf army, plus a little progress made on my Lord of the Rings collection. Looking to the year ahead, I am determined to get two small forces together for some steampunk gaming, so more work on the Silver Serpent and some new figures. The boxset of Blood Rage figures is calling to me, more vikings on the way. And no doubt the dwarfs will make an appearance too. I don't like to plan my painting too much, my enthusiasm for projects ebbs and flows and I make best progress if I just paint whatever takes my fancy at the time. 

2 comments:

astrochelonian said...

I've been finding it difficult to sit down to paint after coming from work, so I've been limiting myself to cleanup, assembly, and priming. I have four figures in different stages of painting, and ideally I'd do some work over the weekend, but holidays mean family, which means my attention must be elsewhere. I'm very tempted to take a week off work and isolate myself for a week, doing nothing but painting.

...mmmm, very, very tempting indeed.

Seeing your year in review is very inspiring. Not only does it bring me hope, some of your projects are similar to mine (the 100 Year wars army, for instance), and I can steal—er, borrow—ideas.

Great job! Keep painting!

Nord said...

Thanks for your comment. Time is a precious commodity, especially with family and work taking up so much of it. Just keep plugging away and, little by little, your figures will be painted. Good luck with the HYW, there's a painting guide on my blog somewhere that you might find useful.

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