Bandits

I finally painted something this year!

Bandits, or peasant partisans, or village militia, etc. They're a mix of Zvezda peasants and Hat/Airfix Robin Hood figures with a few mods, as I first showed off back in August (ugh). They look pretty good as a group, but let's take a closer look.

Melee dudes. You can see that the Zvezda figures are similar in style but noticeably taller. My wife asked me one time if I ever tried painting non-Caucasian figures. I pointed out that most of my figures had green skin, but she had a point that all my humans so far were people of pallor, so I tried a darker skin tone on some of these.

The Lord of Loxley himself, plus a fiddler, converted from a sitting Imex pioneer figure with some legs pilfered from one of the Merry Men. I'm pretty pleased with how seamless it looks.

Ranged units. The Zvezda slinger and archer with the mondo longbow absolutely tower over their Airfix counterparts, alas.

I've got a few more post ideas lined up, plus the guards I started at the same time I started the bandit project to finish up. Stay tuned!

Guards and Bandits and Bondic

No I'm not dead, real life vs. hobby time, etc. Let's move on:

I finally got a chance to take some pics of my next project, these bandits and guards.

The bandits are a mix of Hat's reissued Airfix "Robin Hood" figures and Zvezda's medieval peasant levy. The guards are mostly Caesar medieval soldiers, with a couple Accurate knights (acquired in a trade with Mike) thrown in. Most are out of the box, but I indulged in a few mods.

Fantasy guards are often depicted with polearms and crossbows for some reason, so I tried to select the Caesar figures that were so armed. This only left a few available poses. The answer: headswaps, plus some knifework to remove scabbards and the like for variety.

The bandits didn't need as many mods, but some of them that would otherwise have been wielding scythes and similar peasant weapons got armswaps (a scythe-wielding bandit seemed very strange!). Here you can see my new fascination in use. Normally when doing mods like this, I'd use wood glue to fill any gaps. But lately I've been experimenting with a newish product called Bondic, and I'm pretty happy with it.

Bondic is a non-adhesive bonding agent that's sort of magical. It's a solution with various plastic elements as the solutes. These plastics tend to form a solid, except the solution prevents them from doing so almost indefinitely. Zap the liquid with a UV light (the orange device in the pic above) after applying it with the pen-like tip, though, and the solvent evaporates. [edit: I didn't have this exactly right. See my comment below] The result is a solid mass of plastic in about four seconds where there once was a liquid. Magic!

I've found all sorts of household applications for the stuff, but the relevant use is for filling gaps in modded figures.

I also made up this bard-type figure, using an Imex pioneer figure for the torso (Sean did something similar, but I can't find the post right now).

You can perhaps see that the gaps around the arms of the gray Zvezda figures have some clear plastic around them. The base of the tan Hat fig also has some to fill the visible part of the hole in the washer I used as a base. That's the cured Bondic in use. The big advantage Bondic has over glue for this sort of thing is ease of control: you can add as little as you need, it tends to flow into crevices, and you can always build up applications if you need more. It's also a lot more durable than glue, as it's solid plastic. Just remember that it can't be used to glue things together like adhesive, but for filling visible gaps it's hard to beat.

I also took some shots after priming, just so you can see how it looks painted. No gaps!

I'm still in the middle of a big freelance job, but hopefully I'll have more time to work on figures soon. Thanks for checking in!

Fountains

As I was painting these fences, I was also working on some other scenery items. As it happens, they were all fountains, or other water-bearing structures.

These first two are Reaper bones pieces, a "Well of Chaos" and a "Water Weird. They are a bit oversized compared to Sven, of course, but I think they look okay. The "weird" has been modded so it doesn't loom quite so tall over Sven.

Subtitle: "The Joy of Drybrushing." The texture on the stone made these a breeze to paint: several layers of gray, a bit of brown, some gold on the details, and a blackwash.

The water is just some white glue, with a couple coats of Future Shine. Looks pretty good here, though I had some trouble with this method on the 1/72 fountains below. I think it works here because I only needed a few thin layers of glue for it to look like water. The water flowing from the tap is also Future Shine, mixed with a bit of black paint.

This piece was cast in blue plastic. To make the "Weird" more 1/72 compatible, I chopped off part of the base and took about half the height off the water elemental. The stonework was painted using the same techniques above. The water got much the same treatment as this large water elemental.

Here are a couple fountains from Italeri's "Urban Accessories" kit. These are actual 1/72 scale models; If the models above were 1/72, they'd be about this size. The one on the right is built per instructions. The one on the left has a lion head taken from Hat's "Jungle Adventure" set; I'm pretty sure I got the idea from Paul. I had to fill in some gaps with putty, which looks a bit rough, as does my attempt at highlighting. The water is again white glue with top layers of Future Shine. Unfortunately, I had to use more layers of the stuff to fill the basin, which despite my patient applications meant that the glue doesn't look very clear.

Finally, the small well on the left, from Imex's excellent "Southwest/Alamo Accessories" kit. Not much to say, but I think it looks very nice. On the right is an Italeri desert well, which I discussed previously, along with some other sources for 1/72 scale wells.

Let's wrap up with a quick discussion of other 1/72 scale fountains.

This piece is a resin cast from Airfix, designed for WWII games but perfectly suitable for other genres. The box shows a sort of spigot that's not included in the kit; the hole in the top basin is part of my attempt to install one. A similar piece is by Armand Bayardi. It's a bit more expensive and harder to find, and whether you get it direct or from Michigan Toys (only store I found that has it), the shipping is awfully high. Still, it's a very nice-looking piece.

Drow! You stabbed me!

An extraordinarily busy March and April meant that I put off painting the dark elf figures I put together months ago. But they're done now!

Pretty simple painting; a lot of grays with some purple, which looks more washed-out in these photos than in person. Because of the dark color scheme, I did a lot more drybrushing than I usually do, with light gray on the clothes and pure white on the face and hair. These are pretty typical drow colors, though I suppose the blue hair might be a bit unusual. I think it works though; with the heavy drybrushing, the blue almost looks like a wash, so it's more of an accent color.

Below are the sword guys. The figure on the left is an unmodified Caesar elf. The rest are Alliance elf heads on various bods, mostly Caesar. The female fighter has an Arcane Legions body, while the one in the middle has one from a Hat Celt leader.

Next are the archers. These are mostly unmodified Caesar elves, though I swapped the "conehead" elf head with an Alliance head for the figure on the left. The running archer has a bod from a Hat "Robin Hood" figure.

A couple spellcasters. On the left, a Caesar elf head with a Caesar "Adventurer" body. On the right, an Alliance elf head with a Twilight Creations cultist bod.

Here's Sven the 1/72 comparison viking with Salogel of the One Inch Guild, with his counterpart from the Realm of Lolth.

But which one is the real you?!

I decided to finish these guys first before working on the driders, also featured in the first drow post. They're next!

10-figure endrowment (drow and drider mods)

For my gnoll project, a bunch of Alliance elf figures donated their bodies, leaving me with a small pile of elf heads. So it seemed natural that my next project make use of them. Hence, dark elves, or drow as they are known in D&D.

The orange heads are from the Alliance elves. The gray bodies are either Caesar "conehead" elves or Caesar adventurers. The sorceress was originally human, but I borrowed an elf head from the Caesar set.

Some more mods with the Alliance elf heads. The bodies here are a Hat "Robin Hood" figure, a Twilight Creations cultist, a Hat Gallic commander, and an Arcane Legions warrior priestess. The cultist figure got a bit of a height reduction just by cutting off the base and part of the robes.

Figures from the back, mostly to show off how I kept the hair on the elf heads mostly intact. Note the yellow bits of Milliput that fill in the gaps.

While making the drow, I decided to make some driders as well. In D&D, these are drow that have been punished—or rewarded, depending on the edition—with the spidery form of their spider goddess Lolth. The "jorogumo" figures from the Arcane Legions Han booster provide the spidery body.

The drider sorceress' torso is from a Caesar elf. The others are Alliance elves. Without their gangly legs, they actually look pretty good as elfy creatures.

With the Caesar elves seemingly OOP, the Alliance elves are the only choice for 1/72 plastic, but they are awfully tall. As a source for headswaps, though, I hope you'll agree that they can be worthwhile.

I'm hoping to get these primed this weekend, then we'll see about painting. Stay tuned!

Four more orcs (of sorts)

Wrapped up a few unfinished minis over Labor Day weekend.

From left to right: An unmodified Caesar Miniatures orc, an orc scout or shaman made with an orc head and weapon and an Imex "Friendly Eastern Indian" (originally discussed here), an orc musician made with an orc head and a Hat "Jungle Adventure" figure (a repaint, since the paint started coming off the original figure, seen here. Somewhat disappointed by how this turned out, since I botched a lot of the details trying to quickly re-prime it), and lastly an orc figure from the D&D Wrath of Ashardalon game, adapted here as a 1/72 scale bugbear.

Here's Sven hanging out with all my orcs.

And here he is trying to fit in with a few of my bugbears.

The other bugbears include another D&D figure (actually manufactured as a bugbear, first shown here), and a few converted Age of Mythology figures. I'm thinking about repainting or replacing the AoM figures; they make merely adequate bugbears, and at any rate I think I can do better paintjobs and conversions now. The D&D orc and bugbear figures, on the other hand, complement each other quite nicely.

This will be a busy month, but I have a few post ideas. Stay tuned!

Ask the CFM: Female characters

A pretty big installment of Ask the Cheap Fantasy Miniaturist today. Back in August 2013, Taylor Jordan writes:

I was wondering if you were going to sell any figures that could work for female warriors/cleric/paladin archetypes in the 1/72 scale. I'm finding that to be the most difficult thing to find, and of course my randomized Caeser set didn't come with any female fighters ><

This is an excellent question, and one that I've been wanting to explore more fully. I don't want to give the impression that female characters are like some sort of alien species, like elves or orcs, but female characters in general do present a challenge to the 1/72 fantasy miniaturist. 1/72 scale is principally a historic hobby, and the fact of the matter is that historically speaking, very nearly all soldiers have been male. So male figures are vastly over-represented in this scale as far as fantasy gaming is concerned. Luckily there are options if you know where to look. So let's see what's out there.

We'll start with 1/72 figures made specifically for fantasy. From left to right are a Caesar Miniatures Undead vampire, three Caesar Adventurers, two Caesar Elves, and an Alliance Orc (set 3) which could just as well be human. More Caesar Adventurers can be seen here. You'll see I'm missing the female warrior character that Nathan mentions; it hasn't been in either of the sets I've purchased (which seem to be missing the exact same figures, but that's another post maybe). A lot of these are on the mild, Larry-Elmore-esque cheesecake side, which may not be to everyone's taste. Other options abound, luckily.

Arcane Legions figures, for more 1/72 figures made for fantasy. Left to right: a Han hero, three Roman priestesses, and Egyptian lion rider and Han "jorogumo" (spider monster) with leg swaps from Caesar figures, and three Egyptian sorceress types.

Some historic 1/72 figures easily adapted to fantasy. Left to right: three Orion "English Pirates", two Hat figures from the "Gallic Chariot w Warrior Queen" (i.e. Boudica) set, a Hat druid from their "Gallic command" set (which seems female but also seems to have a mustache, so ??), a Caesar "Hebrew Warrior" (who could be Deborah or possibly Judith), a Caesar noble from their "Samurai w Ninja" set, and an Esci/Italeri barbarian.

Civilian figure sets offer many more female figures in 1/72 than military sets. These are just a sample of what I have, from sets made by Strelets, Linear-B, and Imex. The figures represent diverse eras from Rome to Renaissance England to Early American, but I think they actually hang together just fine for fantasy.

As I often mention, halflings and gnomes from larger-scale fantasy miniature lines—such as Dungeons and Dragons or Reaper Miniatures—may be easily adapted to 1/72 scale. This is a great, if relatively expensive, way to find female character minis. The painted minis are D&D figures; the unpainted are Reaper Bones. From left to right: a gnome fighter, Champion of Yondalla, halfling cleric, halfling archer, Lidda the halfling adventurer, halfing paladin, Elliwyn the gnome bard, and Cassie the gnome sorcerer. The D&D halflings can be a little on the small side for 1/72 humans but should work fine at the table. The Reaper figures are about the right height, though the large heads may be off-putting to some.

A special challenge is finding suitable female minis for gnomes, halflings, and dwarves in 1/72. Here's the best I've been able to find. From left to right: a D&D halfling tombseeker, D&D halfling veteran, Lidda the halfling rogue (repainted), a gnome rogue and dwarf cleric from the World of Warcraft board game, and Ingrid the gnome rogue from Reaper Miniatures. The last two are the best I've found for cheap 1/72 female dwarves, though the World of Warcraft figures may now be hard to find.

Here are the female figures I've painted myself. To the left of the Arcane Legions witch is the original bizarre "Modu Shanyu" figure for comparison.

These are perhaps not all the plastic female character minis available that will work for 1/72 fantasy gaming. Hopefully that gives an idea of what's available. As always, if you have any other questions for the Cheap Fantasy Miniaturist, please ask in the comments!

Zombie Animals (and other not-so undead wild beasts)

Like these figures, but don't need 90 of them? Check out my sale page, where I'm selling sets I don't need.

Okay, zombie animals weren't exactly something that was on my bucket list, but when I found out that Twilight Creations had a new expansion to their popular Zombies!!! game, and that it had a ton of animal minis in six different poses, I had to check them out. Twilight Creations usually only has one pose per set, but when they have multiple poses and sell them cheap, they're worth a look. They look like this:

A hyena, tiger, lion, bear, gorilla, and chimpanzee. Spilling entrails and rotting flesh included!

Let's ignore the zombie-ness of these figures for a moment and consider them just as animals. Here are some real-life comparisons between these animals and humans, courtesy of National Geographic:

Hyena, tiger, lion (no mane)

Grizzly bear, gorilla, chimp

Apart from the large hyena—which could be adapted as a bear—, you can see that these figures are actually a pretty close match for 1/72 scale. That's actually great, because 1/72 scale wild animals are pretty hard to find. I figure a little bit of Milliput or even wood glue in the, um, exposed areas will suffice to make these look like normally vital megafauna. And if you happen to need a 1/72 scale zombie chimpanzee, you'll have plenty.

Comparisons with other animal figures:

Comparisons with a lion, wildcat, and monkey figure from Hat's Jungle Adventure set (formerly Airfix's Tarzan set). Not bad figures, but that lion looks absolutely tiny. The middle figure is actually pretty accurate as a lioness, though.

Comparisons with a polar bear and gorilla Safari Ltd. Good Luck minis. Yep, that hyena will definitely work as a bear.

The figures themselves are actually of a harder plastic than the usual rubbery Twilight Creations material, and are quite durable. I paid under $18 for the game, and with 90 minis included, that comes to under 20 cents a mini. Not bad if you need a ton of zombie animals or don't mind converting them into un-undead beasties.