Isengard Reinforcements

This is more a catch up post now I've some photography space set - these were actually painted at the start of the year. 

After the fiddly elves I thought I'd go for something a bit swift and easy, so quick painted a group of Mordor Orcs and Trolls for my (slow grow) Isangard army.

Little Goblins

 

A quick and fun bit of painting - the Ral Partha\Demonworld\Blighthaven pack of 15mm "Goblin Rabble". A bit smaller than the usual Demonworld sculpts, as you would expect, but very characterful indeed.

I experimented with the usually overly strong GW "Orc flesh" Contrast paint by mixing it with Contrast medium (after a light tone wash). The weakened contrast paint was excellent and I'll be trying it again with some of the other super-saturated colours in the future.

15mm Dungeon Inhabitants

 

I've been thinking about re-starting (after one adventure) my dungeon delving, but in 15mm this time. I needed a few more figures painted though so have been putting paint brush to (small) metal & resin to populate the dank hallways.

Orcs Assemble

After my previous Orcs post I looked out all my GW Lord Of The Rings Orcs\Uruk Hai from the project box and assembled two 12 model units. Nominally Light Infantry and  Heavy Infantry in Dragon Rampant terms. Whilst it has taken me longer to finish them than expected this was due to lack of sitting down at the paint desk rather than slow painting rate.

The Trouble with Orcs (Part 9)

 

So Slapchop v2 was dished out on a variety of different figures from my proposed Lord Of The Rings Orc army (notionally for Dragon Rampant).

A few negatives here in that I'd forgotten about the detail casting (or lack of) on these plastics, something I'm sure I've moaned about in the past.

Also, as far as my new found skin formula goes, the amount of skin on display in this army is minimal, so no great revelations there.

To be honest I'm pretty underwhelmed by the results here. The palette is very subdued and samey with no real eye catching detail. They do fit the feel of them in the movie though and are also only going to be used en- masse and not as individuals, which as a saving grace. They are also super fast to paint up with this method!

I think I'll paint up a unit (12 figures) of at least one type and see how they look and how long they take.

The Trouble with Orcs (Part 8)

I've been seeing a load of Youtube videos on the latest fast painting trend going under the name "Slapchop" or more specifically "Slapchop v2" as demonstrated by Ninjon. Basically prime black, grey zenithal and heavy white dry brush before using translucent (or in most cases Contrast) paints.

The Trouble with Orcs (Part 7)

 A Grenadier Orc with Halberd. As I hinted at in the previous orc I gave this one an intermediate angled prime of grey between the black and white zenithal. It seems to have worked to a certain extent, the large amount of chain mail on this lad maybe lessens the impact. One thing I've taken from this figure however is that I'm going back to doing normal eyes, not just red fill. I much prefer it.

The Trouble with Orcs (Part 6)

 

I've just started stocking these Orcs in the shop ( Here ) - Ral Partha Gargantuan Orcs. Big, gnarly and savage looking. I really like them. When they came in I thought I'd quickly paint one up to show. So a black prime and a white zenithal highlight like all the cool kids are doing now before using Games Workshop Fyreslayer Flesh Contrast. It's resulted in a mean, dark finish which I like, but I may try a similar but different priming method to compare with on my next Orc.

The Trouble with Orcs (Part 5)

 

My Orc painting project came to a sudden halt with this lad, A Standard Miniatures Mon-Oger Archer. Ironically I was trying to follow a suggestion and use just washes. "Nice and quick" I though, but I just couldn't get it to look good and eventually lost the impetus.

Well after a 19 months (how time flies!) of ignoring him later, actually finished he's finished! The skin, which was the point of the project, formula is long forgotten, but at least I feel I can move on again...

The Trouble with Orcs - Part 4

 

Staying with the classics theme I picked an 80's Citadel Orc Champion as my next victim. In an "old meets new" way I thought I'd brave some G.W. Contrast Orc Flesh on him. The results were poor, with the heavy pigments saturating even the generous muscular sculpting of this veteran. So out came an old citadel paint. I don't know what the colours name is as it is 25+ years old and came in a box set so had no label on it! It has brought the flesh up to a bright old school green which is quite effective with the dark contrast paint still in the deep crevices  - so big grins all round! 

The Trouble with Orcs (Part 3)

Orc 3, and you're not going to get more classivc than a 1980's Grenadier Orc. The higher lead content from this era means I lost count of how many times the halbard blade came off (OK, 4 if you're asking and I know only the first one counts againt the metal!)

The Trouble with Orcs (part 2)

Second Orc completed in this side project. I want to say he's an Alternative Armies figure by the style, but I can't find him on their site so I don't know (part of the job lot source).

EDIT: He's a "Mon-Oger" by Standard Miniatures. Thanks to Greg on the Alternative Armies FB page for his help

For skin tone this one couldn't be easier: White primer and Vallejo Game Ink black green. Literally that's it. I thought I'd better give his clothes a strong colour otherwise he'd look a bit washed out. 

The Trouble With Orcs (part 1)

First painted Orc in a long time.

Despite having done fantasy roleplaying and wargaming for over 2 decades my son was surprised to find that I only have one single painted Orc (see the sad example below). This both is surprising but expected to myself. I've have a problem knuckling down to Orcs, despite them are a most obvious foe after the ubiquitous undead.