Tabitha Enchenté

Sean dubbed this character Tabitha Enchenté last night, and so she shall be dubbed. Jeff offered some more painting tips for fine detail work, and I tried to apply them--with partial success. Pleased with the way her eyeglasses turned out, I tried to apply lipstick--but clearly that was an overreach. Still, I like the way it looks as though blood is leaking from her lips; perhaps she's a cultist or a vampire or some other evil creature. She's carrying an occult tome, so it's possible. 
 

Raul the Ghoul

Here's the Fallout: Wasteland Warfare version of Raul the ghoul, one of the companions who you can choose to tag along with you in Fallout: New Vegas. He's a mechanic, and I'm pretty happy with the details I managed to paint onto his suit, such as the white zipper and pocket flaps. 

I even managed to get his gun holster mostly correct, although these photos don't really show that clearly. 

Manitoba Jones

Here's another of the pulp figures Sean gave me for Xmas, clearly inspired by a Ford-esque action hero.

Out for Gold

I painted a grizzled prospector. Too bad I missed his eyebrows and glasses, which should not be flesh-coloured. I wish I could paint zoomed in like the camera eye. 

Other than the glasses and eyebrows, though, I'd say this looks pretty good for a beginner. 

 

Another Nightkin

Here's another nightkin, this one armed with some kind of heavy weapon. Look, another model in primary colours! Well, I think it works. 
 

Nightkin with Hammer

Here's a Fallout super mutant of the blue nightkin variety. This lone looks good to me; careful drybrushing and inkwashing have given the model some depth and realism, and limiting the paint job to a handful of colours seems to suit the piece well. 

Also, my #2 brushes have come in, but I'm going to save those for the more challenging models. 
 

The Years Between

It's the first day back at Lister Hall, a warm September morning; Mom and Dad have left and I'm arranging my clothes, my computer, my toiletries and other necessities in my traditional room, 139 Kelsey Hall. I arrived early, but soon I hear other voices out in the hall and I go out to greet many familiar faces from previous years along with some new to Main K. 

I join friends old and new in the lounge, its beat-up furniture showing the years, the television a heavy 32-inch monster. After catching up, I decide to head back to my room to read--only to find that Lister Hall's rooms are now self-locking, and my keycard, wallet, ID--everything I brought with me is in that room. 

I take the short walk from Kelsey Hall to Lister Hall to get some help from the security people. But along the way, I become confused. 

"This doesn't make sense," I think. "It's 2022. Why am I still in university? Why is it taking me so long to get my degree? Wait a minute, I DID graduate--in 1991." 

Security gives me a replacement keycard and I return to my room to ponder my peculiar problem. I mention it to some of my Kelsey friends, but they don't seem to understand what I'm saying. And my body is all wrong; I'm thin and I still have all my hair. By the calendar on my wall, I'm 21 years old. 

I look in the mirror and I see my eyes widen as I realize something terrible is about to happen, sometime between 1990 and 2022. And I'm the only person in a position to stop it. 

But now I'm here, in my other life in 2022, fat, balding, and about to turn 53. And there's no guarantee that tonight I'll transition back to 1991 to fix anything. This has left me with profound anxiety, because from my reference point now, the terrible thing has already happened. Or then again, maybe not, if I take care of it in that other now, sometime in September 1990
and the years between. 

Things You Might Find on Boot Hill

Today I painted this collection of stretch goals from a Kickstarter project offering Western-themed miniatures. The cowboys themselves are great sculpts, but I thought I'd start with the easy stuff: an old-fashioned water pump, a rattlesnake, three gravestones for Boot Hill, and a snake coming out of a pair of cowboy boots. 
 

Denizens of Different Jungles

I've painted two more of the pulpy miniatures Sean gave me for Christmas: a surly chimp and a mad professor. I'm not sure why both wound up in earth tones, but that's okay; they can be a thematic pair. It took me many tries to get the dry brushing on the chimp right, but in the end I'm fairly happy with the result. The professor's face looks a little muddy, but at least you can make out the features, including his glasses and goatee, each of which presented painstaking challenges. 
 

Spy Masters

Crooked Dice makes 28mm figurines, um, "inspired by" various films and television series. Here we have a pair of "Spy Masters," clearly based on characters seen in The Prisoner. Aside from the poor woman's face, I'm pretty happy with these. Number Two's face looks good, and I even managed, with much trial and error, to give him a mustache. And while I didn't even try to put Village numbers on their badges, at least the badges themselves are clearly in evidence and even round! Number Two's scarf should have another stripe, but I was certain I'd ruin the work I'd done thus far by even attempting to add the stripe. Sometimes you have to know your limits. 
 

Freedom Convoy (with apologies to C.W. McCall)

(Ah, breaker one-nine this here’s the Freedom Truck
You gotta copy on me, Flu Trux Klan, c’mon?
Ah yeah 10-40, Flu Trux Klan, fer sure, fer shure
By golly it’s clean clear to Lib Town, c’mon

Yeah, that’s a big 10-4 there, Flu Klan
Yeah, we’ll definitely get the snowflakes, good buddy
Mercy sakes alive, looks like we got us a Freedom Convoy)

Was the height of the ‘cron in February
In a Kenworth haulin’ flags
We’ll fly ‘em upside-down in Ottawa town
Our faces free of rags
We represent all the diff’rent races
Yeah, every shade of white
We’re gonna prove that COVID’s fake
By offending everyone in sight

‘Cause we got a Freedom Convoy
Whether or not it makes sense
Yeah we got a Freedom Convoy
And don’t you dare call us dense
We got a Freedom Convoy
Ain’t logic gonna get in our way
Yeah, we’re gonna roll this convoy
Until the Judgement Day
Convoyyyyy 

(Ah, breaker, Flu Trux Klan, this here’s the Truck)
(Hey, you wanna hide those swastikas?)
(Yeah, 10-4, the Fake News is makin’ us look bad)
(Better dance on some war memorials to distract ‘em)

Before long the locals were gettin’ riled
With us hollerin’ and honkin’ all night
But with the police on our side we had nothin’ to hide
We could park anywhere without a care
And piss on everything and everyone in sight

We’ll vandalize that Terry Fox
Ignore the statue’s silence
‘Cause we all know cancer patients don’t rely on science

Oh, we got a Freedom Convoy
Honkin’ through the night
Yeah, we got a Freedom Convoy
But nobody gets our plight
Support the Freedom Convoy
Ain’t nothin’ gonna get in our way
We got money from GoFundMe
And big donors from the USA

Convoy! (Ah, what’s that, Flu Klan? GoFundMe dropped us?)

Convoy! (One of our leaders wants to shoot anyone wearing masks?)

(Mercy Sakes, this is getting a little out of hand)

(Can I go home now?)

Convoy….

Something Lurking Down the Hall

 A couple of weeks ago I dreamed that I was working at Stantec Tower again. I was back on the seventh floor with several of my colleagues, but we were all wearing pajamas and bathrobes, cups of coffee or hot chocolate in hand, and our beds and clothes closets were right next to our desks. It was like one giant sleepover. And while I was genuinely glad to see everyone, I could hear people coughing and hacking down each hallway, like harbingers of plagues even worse than COVID-19. My heart started to race, and I woke up in a sweat. 

This followed a similar, earlier dream in which I went back to work at the Alberta Legislature Annex, even though I was my current age and I left my job with the Official Opposition years ago. In this dream, I had decided to just dash in to see if it was yet safe to return to the office. To my dismay, none of my colleagues of that era were wearing masks, and one even laughed at me, saying I was a fool to come back and that half our team was in hospital. 

So I guess I have some unresolved anxiety about societies around the world striving to get back to business as usual way too soon. 

Call me a worrier, but I'm just not ready. It's the prospect of so-called "long COVID" and cognitive impairment that scares me most. Plus, the idea of strictly isolating for two years only to stop too soon and get really sick, or die. . .or worse, to infect someone else . . . that haunts me. 

But people are "over it," I guess, so damn the torpedoes. 

Ruined Raider

Eurrrghh! What's up with this guy? Well, it's a Raider model for Fallout: Wasteland Warfare. As you can see, I had a hard time with this one, especially with the head. I'm not taking all the blame, though. The sculptor chose to create a head with a cowl draped over it and strips of leather wrapped around the cowl. So there are no facial features to be seen. How the raider is supposed to see, I have no idea. 

I used the tiniest brush I have to paint this and brought all my drybrushing skills to bear in an effort to differentiate between the different depths of this 3D figure. It was all for naught, so in high dudgeon I spattered Vallejo True Blood paint over all my mistakes. Now he's battle-hardened. That's my interpretation and I'm sticking to it. 

Per Jeff's advice, though, some new brushes are on the way, and I'm going to be more diligent about using a pallet. 

Wasteland Survivor

I tried to drybrush the brown hide leggings and the green jumper, but I don't have a brush of the right size or consistency to do it properly. At least, not with the overlapping, different-coloured areas of this particular model. I guess it looks okay at least on the table, but it feels like a step backward in my progress. 

On the other hand, I feel as though I haven't messed up this guy so much that he can't be improved. I may return to this model. 
 

Valentine’s Day It Is

Indigenous Warrior

Once again I'm trying to apply more discipline than paint. This was a really challenging miniature, with its many intricate bits. I think the shield and headdress and skin turned out all right, and the skirt is okay, but the chest area is problematic; the details are so fine that my hand just wasn't steady enough to capture all the nuances I should have. 

The warrior's back turned out a little better than the front, probably because there's a smaller amount of fine detail. And on both sides, the ink wash hides a lot of my mistakes. All in all, though, this is one of the better paint jobs I've applied to 28mm humans. 

New Vegas Deathclaw

 

Here is the first model I've painted after Jeff sent me some new pointers. While I'm still using my old brushes and not the ones Jeff recommended, I did my best to follow a couple of key tips: put less paint on my brush and cover the model in many coats instead of rushing and trying to cover the model in one thick coat. I applied the same thought to drybrushing, taking more time to ensure my brush was virtually free of paint before applying. If you look closely, you can see that I started with the legs and still had a bit too much paint on my brush. The tail, torso, and arms are much closer to what I envisioned. I also used the same two paint colours on the base, the idea being that perhaps this creature has evolved to resemble its surroundings. The effect is muted a bit by the shrubs and rocks I added to the base. 

You may note that the model is missing a talon on its right hand. Rather than glue it back in place, I decided to add some Green Stuff World true blood to the stump and palm to suggest a wound. Then I added some more blood to the other claws and some on the creature's horns and body to imply the results of a fierce battle. 

For my own part, I think this represents an improvement over my last few paint jobs. Of course, any faults remain my own; they're not due to Jeff's advice, only in my failing to apply it properly. 

I'm calling this a New Vegas deathclaw because I tried to give it a colour scheme of sepia-ish tones to match the its computer game counterpart. 

Super Mutant Fist

This guy is a super mutant fist. It's a bad photo, but of the humanoid figures I've been painting recently, this one is probably my favourite. The big gun is the weakest element, but the base looks pretty good and I think I did an okay job on the skin and various armor bits. 
 

Rusty Skills

For this workstation, I had in mind the Fallout games, which seem to show that a lot of the furniture is made of metal, including the computer desks. I primed this model in black, painted the computer terminal silver, then coated everything in various shades of rust from the Vallejo rust effects kit. The only place unmarred by rust is the front of the computer, which I imagined as plastic. My justification for covering the entire thing in rust comes from seeing some flooded areas in the Fallout games. I don't think it's beyond the pale that a desk might wind up as coated as this. 

The Vallejo kit comes with brown iron oxide pigment, you'll see some piled up to the left of the terminal. I love the 3D effect the pigment provides, but the stuff is messy as heck to work with, leaving stains all over my hands and everything else I come in contact with. I need to think of a better way to apply the stuff; right now, I'm just trying to dump small amounts from the bottle and use the brush to spread it around, which works to an extent, but it's a bit haphazard and I feel like I should have more control. 

Jeff recently sent me some excellent tips that I'll apply in future models. I have a bit of backlog to share so better models may not turn up on the blog for a while, but I definitely feel like my improvement has stalled a bit. But I'm excited for what's ahead! 

Trashed Bins

Here's a trio of rusted-out trash containers. I think I've gone a bit overboard here, which means I need to go back to the instructions that came with the Vallejo rust effects kit I used for these models. And I also need to take my time. You'll see another example of going overboard with rust tomorrow. 
 

Super Mutant Overlord

Here's a super mutant overlord photographed in very poor lighting so as to hide my mistakes. I do like the skin tone and the rust effects, however. 

Eggs on the Beach

Here are some mirelurk eggs (left) and hatchlings on the beach. The "sand" is a Vallejo acrylic texture, which I applied with a plastic tool rather than a brush. The texture looks a little more like mud than sand to me, but it looks okay on the table. 
 

Signs of the End Times

 

Here are a couple of cobbled-together post-apocalyptic road signs, along with some miniatures for scale. Drybrushing the raised letters really makes the text pop.

Here's what they look like from behind. 

Tabitha the Nightkin

Here's Tabitha, one of the super mutant variants known as nightkin. You can find her in Fallout: New Vegas. Don't worry, she's friendly! If you're nice, that is. 

In this case, I painted the model before assembling all the parts, and I tried to duplicate the colour scheme I found online. I think she's not bad? 
 

Rugged Hero

This may be my best 28mm human figure so far. There's muscle definition, clear facial features, some shading, a simple but effective base, I've mostly kept my colours between the lines...not bad. I mean, by Earl standards. 
 

Red-Gloved Raider

I have trouble painting the Raider models for Fallout: Wasteland Warfare. They tend to have all kinds of gear: belts, bandoliers, makeshift armor plating, pouches, leather straps to hold things in place, and so on. These details are even tinier and harder to paint than the tiny model itself, and so my Raiders wind up looking pretty messy. I guess that's life in the Wasteland--covered with grime so the details are washed out. At least that's my in-universe explanation for their shoddy appearance. 
 

Puzzled Plunderer

I'm happy enough with the way this black-and-silver mini turned out, but I must admit I'm a little puzzled by the sculptor's posing choice. Why does this man's axe hang limp at his side, and why is he staring into the distance, scratching his head? Perhaps he's seen something astounding? Maybe his prey escaped? Perhaps he's questioning the mysteries of existence? 
 

Evil Desk

Well, of course a desk can't be evil, but it looks like the sort of desk some evil mastermind would use.