Ruffians 5

 I'm trying for another weapon (hand) swap now that the invaders have gone.

With metal models, it would pay me to buy an electric modellers drill and a small vice.

Boring a hole with a pin vice in plastic is a doddle but metal makes it a slow job.

The pins were inserted and super glued (none too accurately - I had to bend the pins afterwards)

Then the pins were cut to the length required and the new weapons glued on.

Again, it's doubtful if these little fiddles will disguise the fact that we have three sets of triplets here.

I'll not know till the paint is on.

Still, never mind all that. What about that Test Match!

Ruffians 4

 More small changes.

The blade at the side of the RH one is a slightly different shape and the left one has had his horn nicked.

I could change the 'lean' slightly too.

It would be good to raise the arm of the RH one.

Small changes like this won't make a jot of difference unless I can do something about the neckerchiefs.

A head swap would do it.

Right.

Signing out again now as the invaders are here for a week!

Ruffians 3

Reducing the length and girth of one of the clubs and giving it a bend and a notch here and there is a start to making these models look different.

The 'hood' is not looking too great and may have to go but here is the pouch replacing the set of keys. That's not a slimmed down club but the axe, waiting for a slight breeze to knock it off.






Later, a bag of spoons stolen from Lobelia, replaces the coil of rope. The axe replaces the club but I doubt the join will survive the initial spray of undercoat. I should have done any other mods, given it a hot soapy wash, then glued on the axe.

Here's the club in the grip of an axe man, super-glued on that shortened pin.

Ruffians 2

So the two weapons were sawn off and a hole drilled in the hand of the axe man and the detached club. Here the pin is pushed into the super glued hole. When all is set, the pin will be cut down and super glued into the hole in the club. The axe handle is too small for this treatment so I'll try just gluing it on. When that doesn't work, I'll have to give him a different weapon.

The two archers on the left are twins so I've cut the lower part of the bow away from his knee and bent the bow away from him as if just fired. Mind you, the initial pose is of the bow just fired though still 'bowed'. Curious.

The third archer is a different model with a 'ready to fire' pose but, for some reason known only to the strange people at GW, also wears a mask.

Ruffians 1

I've set aside the ball point pen Ents as the Ruffians have arrived. That's the GW ones, not the grandchildren. Typically, the twelve Ruffians are actually five models and you receive three sets of triplets such as these club members.

Trying to make them look as different as possible is a challenge. If they were plastic it would be easier. Head swaps would help but there are scarves or long hair problems with that. I've removed the spherical bottle/cooking pot thing on the first one here and tried to square off the third one. There should only be one set of keys to the lock up so I've removed the keys from the back of the middle one and I'll cover one set with a Greenstuff satchel. I'll perhaps do a hand/weapon swap with an axe man and change the shape of one of the clubs giving all three different weapons.

Ballpoint Ents 1

The start of an experiment.

Creating an Ent from copper wire, a variety of tubes and rods, some old ball point pens and Greenstuff.

The heavy duty wire was threaded through the first two hollow pieces to make the lower limb.

Here's the Greenstuff applied below the knee

I soon realised that a better way would be to thread the wire through the lower body area and have the same piece going down both legs.

However, one thing at a time.

This will do to see how the surface looks when painted.

The rough look was created by rolling the soft Greenstuff between two pads of pot scourer.

Slow progress - again due to a house full of guests, the allotment, Settlers and a deeply depressing Test Match.


You might note the ingrowing toenail on this fella.

Warriors of the Dead 4

 All done.

Where I could, I tried to introduce a few changes but there really is very little scope.

An angle change to weapons or the addition of a different shield was all I did.

I made no changes to the spear carriers.

The outer guys in the following cases are the original ones on their translucent pedestals. 

The lack of this obviously gave them a height difference and changed their angle.

The weapon angles were easy to change.

 I think there is a slight hue change too.

Here the weapon angle change was a large one - on the left.

Just imagine he's about to kill a man at his feet.

Warriors of the Dead 3

The next stage was a light dry brushed in white for edging, then metal painted Gunmetal (rather than chain mail as on the earlier ones.

Gold is Gehennas Gold and this, and the steel areas were all washed with Nuln Oil,

Beards and hair were also different from the earlier warriors as I used Bleached Bone and Bubonic Brown, sometimes mixed.

Still, never mind all that - what about the ICC World Cup eh!

Warriors of the Dead 2

Next stage is a medium dry brush with white.

Then a wash with Thraka Green (shaken and stirred)

More variables.

Warriors of the Dead

I'll detail my painting method when I can get at the record book.

(House full of visitors again!)

OK. Primed with white spray and painted with 'slightly' diluted Shadow Grey.

How slightly?

Heavy dry brushed with a 1 to 1 mix of Snot Green and Fortress Grey.

(The result depends on the consistency of both paints)

Lighter but still heavy dry brush with Fortress Grey.

You can see there are variables here so it's pot luck if they look like the originals.

Certainly they'll be missing the translucent green pedestal that the originals had that didn't really work.

Visitors gone so I can get on with the next stage.