Wow 30,000 views and the 71st

Merry xmas to everyone where ever you are in the world.....I hope you had an amazing day and things didn't quite get as crazy as mine.....two days on and my head is still killing me!!!

My blog has been up for a couple of years now and I have just noticed that I have topped the 30,000 view mark!! Quite surprising really so thank you all for your support and please don't be too shy to follow or share with others.

Here are some shots of my latest base for the 71st Highland Lights....tried to get a sense of urgency and movement with this lot. I had painted anything of note for the last two months or so but hopefully that should change in the new year!!

 

New Spellcrow Halflings

I have stumbled across some relatively new halfling releases from a company called Spellcrow.

 http://www.spellcrow.com/halflings-c-1_25.html

 They have the following 5 high fantasy style characters with a bit of a more feral feel to them....some decent sculpts in there but probably not that suitable for your rank and file halfling characters.

All the same still worth a look and probably someones cup of tea. They also have some other cool models and conversion parts in their range.

 

The 95th

Finished this unit of British Napoleonic 95th Rifles a lil while ago and overall I am pretty happy, prob some of my best painting to date but I tried a different approach with the basing which I don't think really paid off.

Haven't painted anything for 6 weeks or so but can hopefully get back into it and finished off that halflng unit.

Halfling House Miniatures

Introducing the first release of Halfling House Miniatures in collaboration with WhiteKnight Miniature Imperium : a Halfling Duelist and a Halfling Highwayman sculpted by Kevin Adams.

Well I have been sitting on this lil secret for quite a while now......I have always dreamed of designing and releasing my own miniature but never really thought much of the idea until I got talking to WK from WhiteKnight Miniature Imperium about his range of exciting dwarfs and goblins and the work involved in designing and releasing them. I loved the idea of creating one of the best halfling characters on the market and I ran my idea of a halfling duelist past him based on the body of one of his existing Kevin Adams goblin sculpts. WK was kind enough to allow me to do so and helped out with commissioning Kevin Adams to convert the sculpt to match my sketch concept below. Kev's work more than exceeded my expectations and I'm sure that you will agree that he has done an excellent job... so for good measure I also decided to get an alternative halfling highwayman option sculpted touting a double barreled musket......it would of been rude not too right? This character would be well at home as a leader/hero for any halfling army or a great character in a Mordhiem setting.

I still have no idea what I am going to do with these guys yet and if I am actually going to release them at all or just in a small production run.

The orginal concept sketch

Encase you were wondering what inspired the whole idea......

The 2nd Coldstream Guards, the Defence of the Hougoumon

To take a lil break from my smelly lil hobbits I painted up a command base for Napoleonic 2nd Coldstream guards unit I painted a few years back. The unit depicts the famous defense of the Hougoumont at Waterloo where the defensive forces lost 500 out of the 2000 defending it hence the high amounts of casualties in the unit. As an overall unit I don't think they look to shabby really although the lighting in the photos don't really do them too many favours. Figs are a mix of Victrix, Perry and Front Rank and I have another base to do to complete the unit at some point.

 

 

HOBBITTOBER FEST ROUND 1

As long promised here are the photos of the 1st half of the Hobbittober Fest unit all sporting traditional Bavarian Bier Fest Attire being Bavarian Alpine style hats, traditional trachten shirt and the famous brown Lederhosen! I gave it my best shot at painting drunken red faces and it seemed to come out ok on some and not so well on others. As you can see I have also experimented a photographic board and backdrop but not to sure if this really worked for me....

So what do you think....now just another 10 lil feckers to go!!!

 

 

Happy Hobbit Day!!!

What sort of Halfling blog would this be without the celebration of Hobbit Day!!!?? 

Happy HOBBIT DAY MOFOS!!!

Well what the hell is hobbit day I hear you ask? Well apparently Hobbit Day is the birthday of the hobbits Bilbo and Frodo Baggins from characters in J. R. R. Tolkien's the The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings. In the books both Bilbo and Frodo were said to be born on September 22, but of different years. Bilbo was born in the year of 2890 and Frodo in the year of 2968 in the Third Age (1290 and 1368 respectively in Shire-Reckoning.)

The American Tolkien Society first proclaimed Hobbit Day and Tolkien Week in 1978, and defines them as this: "Tolkien Week is observed as the calendar week containing September 22, which is always observed as Hobbit Day", but acknowledges that Hobbit Day pre-dates their designation. Ok most of that nonsense was a blatant copy and pastefrom Wiki ha!!

Conveniently in honour of hobbit day the legendary New Zealander Sir Peter Jackson has released the official trailer/teaser for the Hobbit to be released in December this year. Being the proud Kiwi that I am I cannot wait for the release to not only show case Tolkien's masterclass but also the film making talents of Peter Jackson while seamlessly show casing the beauty Aoteroa, the Land of the Long White Cloud (New Zealand).

Just in case you have been living under a rock here is the link to the trailer for you.....looks fantastic although I admit being a New Zealand hobbit lover I am about as biased as they come.....

Oh and to also celebrate Hobbit day here are some of White Knights recent releases which I missed earlier.....some cool halfling wizards!!! Available here White Knight Miniatures get them while they last!!!

Foundry Halflings Released

Well I am currently half way through my Hobbittoberfest unit and have been too lazy to get some shots of them and the 95th Rifles due to drinking issues ;-) .....so I figured I would buy some time and post up some shots of the recently released Foundry Halflings I previewed a lil while back. There are four halfling packs priced at 10 pounds a pop

Personally I think that they are a lil hit and miss but I like the adventurers and the town guard marching with latern ...oh and the guy in the barrel would of been perfect for my Hobbittoberfest unit......not to shabby overall I reckon although I would prefer to purchase the models individually instead of in packs though.

More info here
http://wargamesfoundry.com/fantasy_ranges/single_packs/halflings/

Slack, Slack Me

Ok, ok I've been slack and no updates for a while but gaining a brand new girlfriend can do that to you and a real live one this time too ;-) Yeah right you say.... anyone who spends hours painting up lil men and then writing blogs about it is definitely lying about having a girlfriend.

Well despite the lack of updates I have actually been busy and have finally completed my 95th Rifles Unit and hope to get some pics up here in the next week or so. Naps? Who cares, much to tall! I hear you say, well fair enough but I am actually busy at work on the next unit of wee fellows with the Hobbittober Fest unit below already based and with the first 5 drunken feckers nearing completion so as the morons on tv say...stay tuned.

New Hallfings from White Knight Miniatures

Long time no update? Well here you go!!!

Some exciting news from WK over at White Knight Miniatures is that he is set to release his new halfling heads sculpted by Kevin Adams. The highly detailed heads are full of character and can be utilised with his modular goblin landsknecht bodies to make large units of halfing warriors.

Currently on offer are 12 different head options (plus command) to be used on 12 different bodies (plus command) and 5 different weapons options...spear, halberd, sword and shield, crossbow and musket/rifle. Who could ask for more right? I may not be very good good with numbers but a rough calculation off the top of my head says there is about 10 billion different individual figure options there!!!

Finally budding halfling enthusiasts can build massive halfling armies with large rank and file units which is long long overdue in my opinion.

So hurry up and start saving your pennies for this pending release!!!

More info below.....

http://whiteknightminiatureimperium.blogspot.com.au/

painted by Timbor over at http://mylifeinmm.blogspot.ca/

Latest Arrival....The Big Fella

Well guess who just arrived in the post.....the World Famour Marauder giant that's who!! I have been scouring e-bay for over a year now for this guy and although there seem to be many of them floating around it can prove tough to snap them up at a decent price. I finally managed to snavel this one for the bargain price a mere twenty pounds so I think I have done alright here. This big fella combined with the odd ogre should give my wee fellas a lil more muscle and hitting power. Such a lovely scuplt and I hope to start painting him once I get the next two halfling units out of the way maybe some time late this year.

I'm also on the look out for the old grenadier goblin war giant if anyone notices one floating around at an affordable price?

Now to finish off the 95th Rifles and then I can begin work on the next halfling unit the patrons of the Bobbleshire Inn then closely followed by the mounted questing halflings....The Knights of The Kitchen Table. So many big plans so lil time.


Oh and I also won this old citadel space hobbit.....I have no idea what I am going to do with him although I do have around 10 different ratling scouts floating around somewhere collecting dust ha!

A Half Break

Well sometimes you can have too much of a good thing....so I decided to take a lil time out from my Halfling project and pay some tlc towards my long neglected British Napoleonic force and now I am currently working on a 24 man strong 95th Rifles force. Here are some shots of the first nine. I have experimented with a more liberal as apposed to a precise painting style and have also tried a different basing technique. The liberal style seems to have worked a treat and I'm extremely happy with the overall outcome thus far....I would almost go as far as saying it is probably my smoothest unit to date. The blacks and the greens are rather forgiving and make for a quickly painted unit especially compared to the red and white rad coats. I have based them in a way that they can fight as a rank and file unit as well as skirmish. Minis are perry plastics, metals and some offensive rifleman thrown in there as well for good measure. I found the metal Perry's very nice to paint as well.

What do you think? Should I stick to halflings or do some more Naps? I only have two boxes of British infantry, one box of highlanders, one Victrix Cannons and one box of Perry Hussars to paint.......