Sunday 3 February 2019

"Loping Into Battle, The Bloodmaster Carves Through The Enemy Ranks."

"Each whistling swing of its blade of blood opens throats and splits torsos..."
This 52mm tall "Finecast" Herald of Khorne is produced by “Games Workshop” for their “Age Of Sigmar” range and comes in seven "finely detailed resin" components, which are the devil's own work to assemble as the model doesn't come with any instructions whatsoever. This lack of guidance was admittedly eventually resolved, but not before I had spent some considerable time pouring over the Nottingham-based company's website so as to ascertain how all the Bloodmaster's numerous and somewhat fragile skulls came together.

“The strongest of the Bloodletters”, the figure was treated to two layers of “Vallejo” Heavy Red before being generously washed with "The Army Painter" Strong Tone Quickshade. The "rampaging combat master" was then dry-brushed with more “Vallejo” Heavy Red and, as I wanted the Chaos daemon to tie-in with the palette of his previously-painted brethren, had his horns, hands, hooves, spines and sword hilt undercoated with “Citadel” Abaddon Black. Afterwards, most of these ‘blackened’ areas were blended into the surrounding spotted skin courtesy of some careful dry-brushing.
Skulltaker WIPs - U'zhul has been assembled, primed and had all his gold areas washed
With the majority of the Khorne Hero's flesh completed, I subsequently turned my attention to his truly formidable Blade Of Blood, as well as the great warrior's thigh armour, horn ring and wrist-guards, by priming them all with "Vallejo" Heavy Sienna. These parts were later treated to a double layer of "Vallejo" Gold, a hearty wash of "The Army Painter" Strong Tone Quickshade and a robust yet somewhat careful dry-brush using more “Vallejo” Gold.

Finally, I painted all of the Bloodmaster’s teeth with "Vallejo" Dead White and his forked tongue with Heavy Ochre, before washing them both with "The Army Painter" Strong Tone Quickshade. In addition, I 'picked out' all of the Bloodletter's numerous skulls using a combination of "Vallejo" Iraqi Sand, "The Army Painter" Strong Tone Quickshade, "Vallejo" Dead White" and "Citadel" Carroburg Crimson.
"Toon Realms" WIPs - One of King Victor's Men-At-Arms, Pootle The Wizard and a Royal Guard
Having completed the Blood God's Herald, I am already making some considerable progress on my "Finecast" model of U'zhul the Skulltaker. However, unlike before where I've always primed my Bloodletter's using "Vallejo" Heavy Red, I felt the heavily robed immortal champion would probably be far easier to paint if I finished all his gold adornments first, so have gone with a "Vallejo" Heavy Sienna undercoat instead. This is predominantly due to "Vallejo" Gold having a nasty habit of sending tiny flecks of paint flying onto the rest of the model even when the brush-tip itself is kept well under control.

Sticking with Fantasy wargaming, I have finally turned my attention towards some 'Forces of Light' miniatures for my "Dragon Rampant" project using the "Toon Realms" range by "Lucid Eye Publications". Joining my wizard, Pootle, will be a couple of units of good King's Victor's Men-At-Arms and his Royal Guard; both of whose colour schemes will be inspired by those of Gondor as seen in Peter Jackson's 2003 motion picture "The Return of The King".

14 comments:

  1. I gave up on resin as I'm cursed to keep knocking them over and breaking them !!

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    1. Ah... I didn't mention in my posting, but I superglue a ton of small metal beads onto the underside of my "Finecast" mini bases, to give them some heft and stability.

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  2. WHat an impsong looking figure, but was the effort of gluing mutiple bits for the final figure ? - I'd say it was as it's quite an imposing figure.

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    1. Thanks Joe. The Khorne Herald is an awesome mini imho, and was well worth the extra time to get finished.

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  3. Great work on the herald Simon, and a good start on skulltaker, look forward to seeing how you paint up your toon realms

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    1. Cheers Dave. More "Toon Realms" stuff coming, as I've a few finished minis from the range yet to be posted :-)

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  4. Despite being fiddly to go together he has turned out great. Nice job Simon. Nice work on more Toon Realms figures. I quite like the frogs that are coming up for it.

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    1. Thanks very much Simon. I'm really pleased with the Bloodmaster, and like you, really looking forward to "Lucid Eye Publications" releasing "Caverns Of The Frog King".

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  5. What a great piece simon, awesome job.

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  6. Still loving those Toon Realms figures. Just imagine if GW had called their Khorne Demon Lord as Pootle! LOL!

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    1. Thanks Bryan. Pootle is indeed a corking name!! LOL!!

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  7. The Herald looks quite nasty, in a good way. Wouldn't want to meet him in a dark alley! I think I prefer the Skulltaker sculpt, so can't wait to see him finished. I love the idea of those toon figures as a "serious" army! I suppose they will be facing off against a frog army soon!

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    1. Cheers Undercoat. The Skulltaker is a corking mini imho, absolutely caked in detail. The goodies for “Toon Realms” will be Knights and Ents to begin with, and then I’m hoping to paint up a Frog force as a third faction at some point :-)

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