Awesome Dioramas in Bali

In early October 2018 I went on a family Holiday to Bali and while I have been to Bali a few times before it was my first visit to the Bajra Sandhi Monument in Denpasar. I read in Lonely Planet that it contained some Dioramas that display moments in time of Bali history so I was eager to see it and tick it off my ever expanding list of things to see in Bali. From memory all up there was around 20 Dioramas of excellent quality. Balinese craft work has a fantastic history of high quality and attention to detail. The glass windowed large Dioramas feature trick geometry in the buildings and larger figures at the front with smaller scales at the rear to create fantastic perspective and depth illusions. The superb background paintings that almost flawlessly meet the ground only add to the illusion. I didn't capture that many photos as you can see below. The struggle against the Dutch over time is featured a lot. The international Air-Port in Bali is named after one of the famous freedom fighters Ngurah Rai. For a sometimes miniature painter like me it's always a pleasure to gaze upon these fantastic creations.

Inside the walls of the Monument.  

Japanese occupation WWII. Handing out beatings for Road construction.

Dutch beach landing and assault.

Dutch attack on Balinese royalty.

Japanese surrender in Bali. Mount Agung in background.

More warfare with the Dutch forces.

Cheers from Brendon.

Varangur Fallen Kings of War

Made further progress in completing this unit of Varangur Fallen. I should get this completed before the Painting Challenge begins in Dec 2017. I have also started prepping the old Chaos warriors in my collection. I managed to acquire some more via Facebook. These will be for Sons of Korgan units. The new acquisitions will be re-painted and the old ones need some attention as well. I painted many ofthem with a purple colour that I must have liked back in the day. I will get rid of this colour by painting it black or metal. This will not be a bright coloured army at all.

Cheers from Brendon

Magus Conclave in progress

I enjoyed making one of these so much that I made another. These are two Magus Conclaves. They are a War Engine option for a Varangur army in the Kings of War fantasy mass battle system.

A trio of Evil Shaman channeling some demonic power to blast enemies from a distance.

 Theses are all ready to go for the Painting Challenge and I am looking forward to splashing paint on them. The bodies and most of the arms are Gripping Beast Arab infantry. Heads are from Games Workshop Chaos Warriors as are the Staff toppers. Some staffs are Spears with two diagonal cuts to transform them into wizardly staffs. I also nicked the old spears. Nothing complex about these creations but I really like them. 

So much Prep...so much..

Cheers from Brendon

Creating a unit of 'The Fallen' for Kings of War

This is a small project I had in mind a while back but have taken forever to get around to actually starting. It's been a while since I painted anything but I have been doing a fair bit of building miniatures and prep work recently.

Who are The Fallen? A unit option for a 'Kings of War' 'Varangur' army. Varangur are Evil demon/god worshipers. Kind of like Chaos in the world of Warhammer.
The options for this unit is as a Regiment or a Horde size. A Regiment is 3 miniatures and a Horde is 6. The rules allow to model less figures than 6 and even though I had 6 miniatures in mind I could keep one aside for a Hero option (Cursed Son). No product line exists that I am aware which is kinda cool as the imagination can cut loose on what to use.
Reading the paragraph of background fluff I get this......Blah Blah Blah deadly warriors...blah blah blah..loose formations....blah blah... hefty glaives.....
In the Stats they are Height 1 (Human height), and have a Speed of 8inches which makes them 3 inches faster than regular humans. Looking at the options my Varangur force is going to need some faster moving units.
I thought that these Warmachine Doom Reavers I painted a while back are a great fit for 'The Fallen'.
They have the movement, Giant Glaives, and a kind of crazy evil feel about them.The Stats have Defence at 5+ which is rock hard but I guess getting past a giant spinning sword is hard and also in a fantasy world magic can be used to explain anything. Even though Warmachine is 32mm scale (I think) the larger scale actually helps this unit of magic infused crazy lunatics.
Alternatively if the force was modeled from Historical Vikings a unit of Berserkers would look the part as well. Maybe I will do that in the future (another purchase).

 Above. I did briefly consider basing them on 40mm bases but decided nope opting for the single large base instead. 

Base cut down Mantic plastic unit tray. These bases come with a lip that actually makes them a little bigger than the Rule book base size so sliced them off. I had to trim and file down the lip in the middle zone. This tray was made for standard 20mm units at 5 across which is shorter than 3 x 40mm. Mantic make these at Large Infantry size now. Perhaps I should get some.

Removing the Miniatures from bases involved a strong pair of scissors to snip them one side of the slot. They came apart easy after that with no parts broken. As you can see one side of the Mantic trays has a nice texture.

Removing the slot plug from the feet did result in a sword snap off and also a leg at the knee but was easily super glued back together. I used blister pack packing foam to help avoid paint lose but it didn't save the breaks from my clumsiness. Most gamers would recommend pinning the feet to the base but the feet are actually fairly wide. I have placed them above to visualize final placement but the middle dude is glued to a rock.

Now they are all glued to the base. I have nudged some small rocks next to some feet to try and help them stay attached to the base.

Here they are after the sand has dried with the lone 'Cursed Son' on his 25mm x 25mm base. I may add even more rocks before painting the base. It is most likely that I will paint over the Red Armour as well with black. Red is the faction colour for Warmachine. I will also change the hair colour of the unmasked individual as well to black. The blond just does not contrast well against the skin tones.

Cheers for now
From Brendon

Long time between posts

Recently I have been building some Perry plastics for my Red & Black army. I managed to get a good deal via facebook from someones collection which included a box of Infantry. I was mostly after the stack of mounted Knights in the deal. I put the infantry to one side for a long time until I decided I can use them to make some 'double ups'. 'Double ups' help make my unit trays look a little more fuller.

I have not been very active in the wargaming hobby for a while. The lack of posts here is a reflection of that. I have been active in the physical sense though. During late September 2016 I decided to join the Gym life again. At various times in my life I have joined Gyms.
I found myself getting more and more uncomfortable with weight gain and after a holiday which saw me active in the outback I decided I wasn't fit enough to enjoy it as much as I could. A year on and September 2017 sees me signing on for another years membership. My weight has declined from around 126kgs to 91kgs and I feel so much better for it. Of course it meant cutting back on hobby time but I have a few projects planned so watch this space.

Cheers and thanks for stopping by.
Brendon

Prep continues and new unit trays

I purchased some laser cut MDF products from Knights of Dice. 4 x Cavalry Troop unit trays and some cavalry single bases.
The outer lip on the unit trays required gluing on to the base which was no problem. After that dried I carefully angle cut the edge so they match my existing unit trays. Sand was glued on the edges as well prior to paint and flock.

Cavalry Troop unit trays with some blank spacers after primer spray.

Fireforge Mongol horses. Some on 50mm square bases.

During my prep for the Painting Challenge I realized I was a little short on Cavalry bases (25 x 50mm) but I had a few 50 x 50 bases. Looking at my Cavalry regiment trays that I had made in the past to accommodate 8 on a unit size for 10 it is actually legal to use a minimum of 6 miniatures on that Unit size in the Kings of War rules. For a Troop (5) three is also acceptable.
A light bulb went off in my head to make a few Calvary bases with one miniature on a 50 x 50 base.
Another economic way to make my collection stretch out to gain more units. I think this is also well suited to units that are classified as a 'Skirmish' unit in the KoW historical rules. Skirmish units do not block 'Line of Sight' so a unit with less figures and more space suits this rule in my opinion.
The square base is also great for the occasional horse on a bigger angle rather than the disciplined straight ahead usual way of basing.

Anyway if that is too many words here is a Perry Knights MOSH PIT!

Cheers from Brendon

Perry Light Cavalry for Curt

These I painted on request for Curt. They have now traveled all the way from here....hot sweaty Darwin to the Snowlord in Canada. 1 x Perry Miniatures Plastic Light Cavalry 28mm set of 12 mounted miniatures. I am really looking forward to seeing them in his awesome basing style.

Curt left the Art Direction wide open but he did identify an historic Light Cavalry unit. The Jinetes.
From an email exchange and an example he sent I decided that these guys who served in the Italian Wars didn't need a consistent uniform colour. Also shields are to be applied by Curt. As these figures have a left arm that usually results in the left fist sitting very close to the Pommel I made some custom adjustments. The Torso at the shoulder join was cut back and so was the top of the arm to provide a new wedge gap that made the arms tilt outward. A couple have minor conversions with weapon swaps and the occasional arm/head from other kits completed the construction phase.

The grey horse does not look as yellowy in real life as it does in the photos below.
I hadn't done any commission style painting in a long time and not for anyone who already paints to a very high standard. I just ended up treating this job like I was painting for my own collection and really not treating it any differently. I painted an excess amount of horses (16) to make sure of a good variety with a couple of specials among them because that's how I treat my units. I mailed these with the riders unattached to the horses so Curt can pair them up.

Perry Miniatures are finely detailed. They take me longer than most other miniature makers to get to completion. These arrived at my place during the Dry Season when I was busy doing Dry Season activities. Camping most weekends so a few months of practically no hobby activity at all really.
During this project I also broke it up by doing some smaller ones for me which actually helped I think.

Cheers from Brendon.

Ogre Oldhammer Flashback

Came across these old Games Workshop Ogres in the depths of my Mancave. Painted a long time back they have some interesting skin tones that if I painted them now they would look very different.
These would have been painted with Games Workshop paints which I don't use now.
These ugly dudes have a lot of character even today and they are all metal.

The basing was natural sand unpainted with a few tiny areas of flock grass. From memory I made a standard for this unit which had it's on pile of rocks to make it free standing and was placed on the grey flat rocks of the front row middle Ogre. That Ogre I am sure is a Blood Bowl character who I added the two severed heads. I added the bell on the chain as well which would have been for the inclusion of a unit Musician.

I am not sure but Oldhammer experts may be able to confirm this or not.....the Ogre with the shaggy hair and goat horns may have been an Ogre Shaman.
With the inclusion of the Purple colour that I seemed to have used a lot back in my Warhammer Chaos days these may have been for inclusion of my Chaos fantasy army. The unit tray was a homemade cut and paste job. Hmmmmm. I could actually re-base these for Kings of War and only use four of them to represent the same size unit of six.

I am currently very slowly cleaning out my Mancave to make way for human occupation again. It will become a bedroom as it was a long while back when someone returns to the nest. I will have a work station located elsewhere so it shouldn't cease productivity. Well.......hopefully not too much.

Cheers from Brendon

Two more Cavalry Regiment trays

On the back of completing two trays last week I produced two more but this time with a different layout. An economic six 25x50mm bases fit on these two. Modeled below with Perry Knights.
Theses Regiment sizes are for Kings of War and are universal for my other forces in my collection.

It really pleases me to see these completed. It makes it really easy to get more cavalry onto a table.

Cheers from Brendon

Kings of War unit trays from Mantic

Hello. These are the Mantic plastic unit trays for the Kings of War fantasy game or the Kings of War Historical wargame.
Two options are available as at writing this.
Small...for 20mm square based infantry and Large....for Cavalry on 25x50mm or Large Infantry on 25mm squares bases.

They are a single piece with one side with a Textured surface ideal for gluing figures directly on (if you have removed bases they typically come on that is) or the reverse side with a small raised lip.
The reverse side has guidelines for cutting the 4 trays into Regiment (half) or Troops (quarters).
So one set will get you 16 Troop trays....or 4 Hordes...or 8 Regiments or a combination.

Small and Large trays. Rough surface side on left and other (lipped) side on Right

Easy enough to trim down in size if required.

Fill up the trays with miniatures and game-on!

 Above I have placed my custom MDF Warbases 'Horde' tray onto the Small 'Horde' tray and the only thing I can say is that they appear to be a fraction bigger than the rule book size. The horses are on 25x50mm bases and have a little bit of wriggle room which is better than the space being a fraction on the small side making a tight squeeze or adjustments in my opinion.

My conclusion. Bloody good product which will be very handy for Kings of War games.

Cheers from Brendon

Re-Basing some Dark Age miniatures

I re-based some of my single based Dark Age collection. Removing them to replace with two on  the 25mm round base. I made many of these with Saga or Lion Rampant in mind when first created but I decided to re-base to help make my 'Kings of War Historical' units look a little fuller. Among these below is a couple of freshly painted Dark Age Gripping Beast warriors but it's mostly older ones.

Hacking these dudes under the feet among old sand, paint, glue and flock requires patients. Some wargamers have said that re-basing is something hobbyists should eventually do and it's been a very long time since I have done anything brutal like this.

The chain-mail wearing dudes make for a great Shield Wall look and feel when based like this and I have painted a whole stack of new ones which I will show here soon when they are completed.

For Kings of War I use custom made trays (Warbases UK) using the dimensions for those rules. Below are 'Regiments' which are based on the old 20 soldiers each on 20x20 bases in 4 ranks of 5 across.
Each tray has 3 of the new double based warriors. This takes the total up to 12 (not 20). I think a rule/guideline may exist for 50% +1 as a minimum for a unit of 20. I don't care much for that myself as I prefer what looks good or just the fact that someone has turned up happy enough to play a game. Even better if they have painted miniatures.

"We are angry and confused!"......."Are we Viking or Anglo-Saxon/Danes?" 

Cheers from Brendon

Viking bits swap plastic fantastic

These generic Dark Age Vikings in progress are rank and file to increase my marauding hordes ready for Kings of war Historical. I have been working on them for what seems an entire ice-age. Built at glacial speed months ago......it took a long time before any paint got clumsily splashed on them. I started painting them recently to break up a period of painting a lot of 28mm horses for a very cool project for a certain Canadian citizen. I don't usually like to stall or interrupt a project but it just started to feel a bit production line and I didn't want any of that to affect the painting. Anyway these rank and file sword fodder are made up of a variety of kits to get slight variations that will likely go unnoticed once in a unit.
Anyway on with the images....

'Shield Beater'.

Gripping Beast Viking Head, Saxon Arms, Body GB Dark Age Warrior,

Shield from Conquest games Normans, Slightly larger than GB shields.

'Resting Balls Stabber and Face Stabby Sword dude'

GB Saxon Bodies, Viking Heads, GB arms with hand/weapon swaps.

'Brace for impact dude'

 FireForge arms on a GB Body

 'Mash your face with Pommel and Make you duck dude'

 FireForge Bodies, GB every thing else

'Spliiting headache maker'

GB Body and Head, FireForge Mongol Arms, GB Axe

Anyway cheers for now from Brendon and hope you don't mind the fact that these photos I used the crappy setting with colour, focus and light.