Analogue Hobbies Painting Challenge V: March

First up for February was my entry fee or 'Curtgeld'. I pondered awhile potential antiheroes to send Curt for this year's challenge. I was initially tempted by Dirty Harry and few others from Kev White's excellent Hasslefree range, but nothing quite appealed. Those of you who followed last year's challenge will know that Curt and I share a love of Steven Erikson and Ian Esslemont's Malazan Books of the Fallen (MBotF), and epic series of fantasy books. Might these offer inspiration for suitable Curtgeld?

The MBoTF have an extensive list of Dramatis Personae, with many more antiheroes than true heroes. After lengthy consideration and searching for suitable models, I settled just a couple of weeks ago on Ben Adaephon Delat, better known as 'Quick Ben'.

When we first encounter him, Quick is a Squad Mage in the 9th squad of the infamous Bridgeburners, the grognards of Empress Laseen's Malazan Empire. Squad mages are petty magic users rather than the powerful members of the High Mage cadre, being capable of mere illusions and deceptions to aid their squad mates. Hailing from the Seven Cities continent, he is described as dark skinned, tall and lean. Erikson doesn't go in for much more description of characters than that, so I had some flexibility in choosing a suitable miniature!

Except Quick Ben isn't all that he seems, which becomes clear as the series progresses. He seems to know the most about what's going on, vanishes off on unspecified errands, turning up again at all critical junctures, usually with a solution to some problem or other and vague hints of what the heck is going on. It transpires that he was previously a High Priest of Rashan, or Darkness, before burning his vestments and adopting the warren of Meneas or Shadow as the source of his power. But that's just the start of it - there are plenty more reveals as the story progresses when Quick is concerned.

So why an Antihero? Well, the Bridgeburners are pretty heroic, particularly the noble but naive Ganoes Paran and the roundly respected Whiskeyjack. But there's a darker side to both Adaephon Ben Delat and Kalam Mekhar, the bearlike ex-Claw assassin and Quick's closest partner. To avoid spoilers I'll just reference the events of the pursuit across Raraku, the Holy Desert, and Quick's support for Kalam's mission regarding the Empress in Deadhouse Gates (my favourite of the series, by quite some way).

The cover art for Deadhouse Gates

This miniature, 'Karick-Dar, Apprentice' is from Australia-based Guild of Harmony miniatures. I'm not stoked by how he came out, it just didn't quite come together how I imagined. No fault of the mini, I just didn't quite nail the colour scheme and can't quite decide how I went wrong. I wanted to use a lot of grey, but in hindsight perhaps i should have bitten the bullet and done him in full greyscale in Curt's style. I also failed to find a suitable mini for Kalam Mekhar to pair him up with. Still, I hope Curt likes him 

Continuing the theme of single minis, next up was one where it did just 'fall together'. Tradition dictates that each Challenge, I make an offering at the Altar of Sarah, by finding a suitable female miniature to compete for the 'Sarah's Choice' award. Happily, Pulp adventuring has provided a rich seam to mine and I've done quite well in this little niche. This year I had this quite exquisite miniature from Hasslefree, "Madge".

With the months of the challenge nearly gone, the time came to promote her to the top of the painting queue. I was actually away in Wales at the time, but took a little hobby box along. The weather was pretty wet, which meant plenty of painting time, though the table I set up at was a little dingy in the evenings. She came together just how I'd imagined, you'll note I even brought out the tartan and flowery-headscarf-effect paints. Phew!

This Kev White sculpt is just so excellent. The tartan worked nicely (more tartan coming in my next post too - I'm on a roll!) and flowery headscarf pretty well too, though a bit more 'cheery tulips' than 'Cath Kidston'. I gave her a moorland base using some lavender flowers, which I really like but hadn't found a project to use on. She'll join the tack of misc Pulpy miniatures. 

Oh dear, two miniatures in a month's worth of challenge? Not great. For the final straight, I was working on what came to be a real bugbear - highlanders for the Sudan. I bought them ages ago and have had the prepped for a year, so the challenge offered an opportunity to have a crack at them. Unfortunately, it was a little too much to ask in the time I had. Still - they were nearly done - just three colours to go as of submission and coming together nicely. 

A fortnight later and they're finished up and will be posted up in all their angry-charging-Scots-in-tartan glory in the next few days. Oh, then I'll get on with the second half of the unit!

Closing the Challenge: the Lady in White

To round out my Challenge, I wanted to make a final stab at retaining the Sarah's Choice award. When I saw this miniature, I was a little struck by the ethereal grace of her. I thought she'd look great alone on a cliff edge, looking out. Perhaps a sailor's wife, waiting for his return, quietly looking out over crashing waves for sails on the horizon, with the breeze catching her hair. Or perhaps she is a ghostly spirit of a long-forgotten memory, a goddess or elven queen.

There's only so much space on a 30mm base, I wasn't up for making cliffs and crashing waves. But I thought I'd position her offset slightly from the usual position on the base, which I think draws out her loneliness a little. A simple paint job to bring out the simplicity of the sculpt, in my usual clean style. I tried a new recipe for the blonde hair and am rather pleased with it. She was a pain to photograph though, the flash often makes the dress look harshly pale.

This is about the fourth round of photographing her - every time I spotted niggles that I had to return to the painting table to put right. While I felt she deserved me doing her eyes, I rarely do them for a reason and this shows why. Sadly, that's the best I could manage. 

Still, she is a lovely miniature and was a joy to paint. Hasslefree Miniatures. 

Analogue Hobbies Challenge: Coming to a Close

With a sigh of relief, the Painting Ronin can lay aside their brushes. Three months of some quite amazing work in the name of points, sharing, camaraderie and prizes.

First up, my deepest appreciation for our host and guide, Curt. To make so much time to run this competition is a gesture of great kindness, it truly must have been a Herculean effort. But rest assured, it is deeply appreciated by me, the rest of the Ronin and the rest of our hobby blogosphere who could watch the fun unfold. Curt, I salute you as the jolly nice chap that you are. Hopefully, 50-odd colourful (and greyscale) Samurai will be reward enough, in the end.

On my performance, I managed a miserable 365 points, well below my 500 last year and 550 target. I just ran out of steam in the end and was too distracted by othre commitments. But I'm pleased with what I did finish. My focus was on Pulp and WWII, with a smattering of other genres . My entries over the past month are below. First up, a second batch of Artizan Greatcoated Germans. While they need a little grubbying up, I'm pleased with how they came out, a few lessons learned from the first batch.



Just the one camo smock in an autumnal scheme

The whole bunch together

Next, a few French Foreign Legion in khaki, to make an appearance in a North African Pulp games. Artizan Designs once again, I think these were a 'useful somday' bargain bin or eBay find.

A pair of ladies, one Pulp adventurer from Hasslefree and one armed Victorian lady from Mutineer. I actually had three ladies on my final entry, The third was the one I was most pleased with, but painting her went right to the wire so I will add a couple of finishing touches before posting her up here.

So now the dust has settled, there is voting and prizegiving to be done. One prize is awarded for the 'People's Choice', so do head on over to Analogue Hobbies to vote on your favourite entry.

Finally, a quick shout out for another Easter giveaway at Sippin' on Paint Water - head over there if you want a chance at some mysterious goodies!