Adepticon before the storm

Dusk before the dawn of Adepticon 2015.

I've never been kept so busy at adepticon, nor so tired. After several weeks of long nights, early mornings, and both of those even more so at the con, I am beat. 

Here we have the pile of terrain as I began packing on Monday. I left the zone mortalis boards walls seperate from the tiles to reduce space consummation. I would also finish the final color for now at my friend Joe's house on Tuesday night to get a few hours off of my trip.

The new home of adepticon, the Marriott renaissance hotel.

Adepticon staff may be worked into the grave, but this is what some get to go sleep finally at the end of the day for a few hours.

Finally the main hall where most of action took place. This is 2/5th of the room, with the wall divides up. Fantasy, historical, most skirmish games were in two smaller rooms across the hall and privateer press on the second floor hall, and conference room.

Then the next day...

Soon...

Adepticon the time of champions comes in just days. Here is an assortment of the various terrain projects I've been working on the last couple days for the soon to be legendary Badab War event.

Here we have the tiles for the zone mortalis boards drying after priming with gesso. I took a few wrong directions with these, and a lot in total with the whole project. But as usual many useful lessons learned. 

The measured out wall sections.

So I had to make three landing pads just for one mission. Annoying but I think it should be one the funnest. Did I mention there is twenty four different missions? That's right one mission not one table.

Landing zone secure.

Here we see one major lesson learned. Used screen door mesh for flooring on tiles. Don't use metal mesh, use carbon fiber. Measured out sections and adhered with spray adhesive, went too far with additional glue to secure to tile. This will strengthen the bound but added time is questionable. We'll just skip the details it's better that way.

So Friday I was all ready for an additional day of work, hobby work, not WORK work. Had to go in and clean paint off of AstroTurf. It took nine hours. I did learn though that if you want to paint your turf, mix in detergent with the paint. This will prevent the paint from fully adhering. That was not the cause here.  

After that little sideways jont, here we see where I'm at roughly today. The walls are not glued down yet, I think I will wait till arrival in Chicago to do that for time, and storage.

Lastly large scatter terrain, and interior machinery for mortalis boards.

I'll be trying to post something everyday at Adepticon so please check back to see the happenings at the greatest place on earth, and don't worry I'll annoyingly remind you on social media as much as I can.

The time grows short

In our last installment we saw the beginning of a grand adventure into hobby madness and obsession. Continuing with that theme, and the Executioners that I have finished for now. I have one half of my assault terminators.  

And here is the mass currently being worked on for my Badab War event at Adepticon.

And the start of the zone mortalis tables. I hopefully will photograph this frequent enough to give an adequate tutorial once finished.

Adepticon is when?

Finally making a post after too long. I have been going back to school, while working almost full time has evaporated most free. I'm looking to add an AAS in graphic design to my BFA in illustration. Maybe then I can achieve a career in a lower middle class office position. But on to the toy soldiers.

Sometimes you go, I need to post on the blog, but you just don't feel you have anything to put up. Then sometimes you go it's BEEN TWO months! 

So I'm running an event an Adepticon for the first time, the Badab War narrative. I wanted to get my executioners 3rd company project finally started, the reason I started writing a blog, and named it after their mighty, and foreboding fortress.

The idea was to have my salamanders to be a ringer if necessary for the loyalist, and Executioners the secessionist. Since then I completed a few units and built a Helios landraider for them, but knew with school it wasn't going to happen. I still have to build a few pieces of terrain and some zone mortalis boards, so they are going to be delayed. But for now here is my tactical squad I have finished so far. 

Still have to do chipping, weathering, and custom decals, but for the most there good to go. I know my scheme and now I just have to finish the other 10 units in the company, their transports, and elements of the 1st, 7th, 8th, 9th, and 10th. Plus numerous resources pulled from the armoury. 

This may take awhile.

Dreadnoughts in the snow

A friend ended up with with guy just assembled and thought I could paint it, and he would see about selling it on the internet. 

Here we have a base coated model ready for detail work.

Jump ahead all the way you see the model just before getting its fresh blanket of snow

 

And here we have the finished model with gale force 9 snow. Now let's see how much Jake can get for this guy.

And a preview of what's to start coming as Adepticon nears.

Stormwolf process

I have finished my stormwolf, and now you can join me on a trip through its construction.

Here I have all of the pieces laid out in the state at which I will begin painting them in. 

I found I was unsure of how the aircraft was to sit a top the flight stand. Just inserting them together left it lop sided, and drooping. So I rigged up this sprue stop, or whatever you would call this. I then pinned the stand so it would insert with the model with some more support.

Here we see the iron priest finished in his cockpit all ready to take off, he had to wait a while though still.

Now with the control panel finished I was ready to insert the pilot into the top panel of the stormwolf.

With this part done I will now paint the inside of the cargo hold. Once that's finished I will be able to seal up the body of model and begin painting the rest of the model.

Imperial vehicles make your best friend the humble rubber band. I covered the canopy with tape, and have not yet glued it in place. This will be one of the last steps. It is blue tacked in place right now.

 

Here is a shot of the interior, I forgot to get one earlier.

Jump some time ahead. I have all the base colors, and washes done. Now on to highlights, and weathering. You can see what I've done with the base using a two part epoxy I got to try out from a wonderful Smooth On employee who was running their booth last year at adepticon. I cut out two layers of foam core, then penciled on an outline. After seeing how well the stand fit in, and getting it snug I applied the epoxy. I'm leaving the stand free for transport. But now to jazz it up alittle.

So the base is large, and I didn't want to leave it with just rocks and grass. So my idea was have wolves running beneath it. To give it action, and motion. Defiantly need to get a proper photo set up, having a hard time getting a big guy like this lite.

So here is the finished model. Jumping again into the future quickly. I'll add some more insignia later in a few spots, but otherwise I'll call it good.

Finally a look at the base.

Slow progress

This guy I actually did about the same time as Erik Morkai, just after I finished him. Since then in the few games I've played these two have been reaping a heavy toll on the enemies of humanity.

He is also one of the longest owned models I have.

Finally getting near the finish on the storm wolf. Just clean up then the highlighting, and finish it off with some freehand and decals.

And finally a little distraction that is on my mind because I will be running a game at Adepticon on Friday. This is my command squad for the Executioners project in which I will be building the entire 3rd company. 

I still have some puddy work to do on the standard bearer, but I should finish a certain plane first, and thunder calvery before I sucked in the wrong direction.