Cyberpunk RED - Rockerboys

Cyberpunk RED miniatures from the Rockerboys faction. Tried to evoke lots of 80's Vaporwave and retro-future Miami Vice with the color choices. The Manager has some of the most effortlessly awesome eyes I've ever done, and the skin and hair on the Guitarist just glows. The assembly was kind of a pain being resin, and you might notice some mistakes if you look too closely as these are tiny tiny minis. But I enjoyed it more than I thought I would. Hopefully, I get to paint more if they keep doing that system.

Manager

Guitarist

Keytarist

Nolzur's Marvelous Minis - Palette Cleansers

I call these small projects Palette Cleansers because I paint them in between other big projects like whole army units or big figures and terrain. The Nolzur Minis by Wizkids are cheap, already assembled and primed. They can be frustrating with mold lines, but they are decent enough at 3 ft. These usually come in two sculpts per pack.  I picked one and surplused the other for trades or teaching others how to paint.

Golden Dragonborn Sorcerer

Classic Barbarian with Sword

Warmage with Spear

Mustard-colored Wizard with Staff

Bronze/Gold Dragonborn Cleric or Wizard with Staff and flowing Blue and White Cloak

Red Dragonborn Cleric with Green Mace

Purple Wizard with Green Fire and Staff

 

 

 Black Dragonborn with Spear and Shield

 

Skitarii, Mashal, and Tech Priest Dominus

Just finished these 12 minis, all with a similar palette. I only paint right now, so they are probably not playable on the tabletop, lol.

A different Dominus is the mini that got me back into painting 5 years ago, so it was refreshing to take another crack at this mini after having learned so much! I have learned a ton about blending and layering since then. The robes are richer, the metals poppier, and I am much more precise.

The marshal was a little disappointing, honestly. I wanted so much more from this mini in terms of greeblies and detail. It ended up being a scaled-up squad leader with a scepter. Literally, their leaders are just taller? Maybe I'll take another crack at his robes and add some trim to liven up the back of the mini. Big sigh.

The squad is where I took all my chances. Again, I painted a squad of these guys about 4 years ago, so the second chance brought many opportunities for improvement. I loved the purple glow, but I still think I can improve my technique. Tips appreciated. I'm not sure I have the heart in me to do a third squad. Going to try some Sicarians and other Ad Mech units instead.

A bit anxious about what to do to make my Next units stand out but mesh with this scheme:

• ⁠Sicarians can basically echo the black jumpsuit with metallic bits, but I feel like going with that will lack some pop. Maybe leaning into the purple energy on their blades and finding accent pieces to pop with yellow and green?

• ⁠Pteraxi are the same conundrum, but a wing vein with a green on yellow pattern might be fun. I intend to do the flamer squad. I can really amp up the muzzle burn with purple hues rather than make them glow to match.

• ⁠Dunecrawler, ironstrider, and robots: I still haven’t done any armor. I don’t want green tanks. I need a good primary color. Was thinking a brown would pull in the base colors, but drab armor is not very 40k, but I’m planning a smooth ivory for my knights. That would tie all the big boys together visually. I’ll have to think on that.

Regardless, no more AdMech for a bit! After painting a big batch like this, I am going to take a break and paint some one-off RPG figs and smaller squads with more painting variety and skill-tests. A batch of Harlequins with their diamond tights and trailing streamers would do me well.

Star Wars Legion - Clone Wars Core Set and Commander Rex

 After painting Rex with my son, he convinced me to get the core set (what a fool I am). The kit was good for a first offering for new players and new collectors. And I got to take Citadel Contrast for a spin to add another skill for my painting belt.

The models were decent. ObiWan and Clone Troopers were supplied in bags, basically clean except for mould lines.  Owing to their spindly bits, Grevious, two Droidekas, and the  B-1 Battle Droids were still on sprue. The plastic is definitely different from Games Workshop sprue. It was less solvable than GW plastic when using Testors and Tamiya plastic glue. Parts kept coming unwelded, but a little super glue put it right. Detail was tight and almost always movie/animation accurate, and the extra parts for Grevious even allowed for some simple conversions (see below for an extra surprise; you can blame my son for it). After assembling them, I realized the 28mm accurate scale is so much more fiddly than the 28mm heroics I'm used to.  Hands and guns are smaller.  Weapons are smaller too. But the accurate proportions make for great squads. In a crowd, they look like right even when base to base.

I was not interested in spending months painting these minis.  Especially since my son had lost interest in playing almost immediately after purchase. I was delighted to find Sorastro's painting guides for Legion.  He helped me get from prime to table-ready in less than a month. This was my first adventure with Citadel's Contrast paint, and the advice to thin with medium and how to handle flow was excellent.  His colors were spot on too. After spending the pandemic bemoaning my mistake, it was refreshing to go so fast from concept to finished product.

Dan Moves North

Plenty has gone on in the past year. Here's a quick rundown:

- Learned how to quilt. 104 patches from my tour-guiding days on a lap quilt.

- Learned how to Black Badge at DEF CON 26. Shout out to my fellow Murder Hobos, PunkAB, and the entire Dungeons@DEFCON team for this kick-ass experience.

- Learned how to move across country through forest fires and with cats

- Learned how to survive a leg infection possibly from a cat scratch (not pictured; it was pretty gnarly)

- Learned how to not buy board games. I finished a 10x10 (play ten games ten times or more) without buying any new games in between. Moving thinned the collection, but it still takes up an entire linen closet.