Blog one year old! ...and some Slann and WIP.

My blog is one year old!

I started my blog one year ago as a way of focusing my painting and collecting, and for course for the fun of it.  On all three of those I feel I have succeeded, and in that time have had, as of today, 33,070 views. Big thank you to everyone who has viewed and commented on the blog. I can't beleive how quick it has gone, but also feel that it's been a great focus and nice way to spend a Sunday afternoon or evening.

I did a review of 2013 in December to give and idea of how useful the last year has been here:
http://goblinlee.blogspot.co.uk/2013/12/review-of-2013.html

 I have had some interesting discussions, found out useful things, and got a lot of great ideas from people from chatting to them on my blog, via other peoples blogs, and the Oldhammer Forum. It has been good to find out that a lot of people are still interested in old miniatures and editions of Warhammer, as well as more current things.

Anyway, after last weeks great painting I have achieved less painting this week. However, as I am still slugging my way through the Slann army I did get around to re-painting the Eagle Warriors Totem suits with which I was never happy. In addition, I received my mail order from Outpost Wargame Services for the Aztec shields and banners for conversions, so I have been doing more converting and modelling rather than painting instead.
Outpost do a great range of Aztecs, Maya, Incas, as well as other ranges, and sell a lot of useful conversion packs of banners/weapons/shields. You can find the site here:
http://www.outpostwargameservices.co.uk/

This influx of bits lead me to swap around and replace a lot of the Slann standards, and add the new shields to the Totem Warriors, all of which I'll photograph as I paint them up.
I did paint the last unit of Slann Scouts, and re-painted some monsters too for use with the Animal Handlers.

Enjoy :)

1 year Cake!

 Slann Scouts. 

All five are the Solid based C32 Slann 'Brave'.

 Front and back view. 

I went for a simple paint scheme for hiding in the undergrowth, and also put more undergrowth on the bases. Also, I decided to paint the Slann's flesh grey as in both 1st and 2nd Editions of Warhammer it was stated that some Slann tribes were grey. So I thought I should have some that are!

 Monsters: 

two Giant Spiders, Giant Scorpion, and a Giant Bug (Scarab).

 Citadel Giant spider, creeping.

Citadel Giant Spider, crawling.

 Citadel Giant Scorpion.

I went for a black colour scheme to make it look more sinister when compared to the rest of the more brightly coloured Slann army.

 Giant bug.

It's a Giant Scarab Model from Reaper Miniatures, but I thought I will never use it in my Tomb Kings army, so it could represent some jungle dwelling bug. I painted the carapace with Vallejo Metal Medium and varying shades of green.

I will use it as an alternate Giant Scopion model to partner the one above.

 Scale photograph.

 At the bottom of one of my boxes I found these two, repaired the leg on the left one, and painted them up.

Both are early 1980's Ral Partha RP6 Giant Monsters, Carnivous Birds. The one on the left is also in the Runequest Range Dragon Newt boxset.

They are on 40mm bases, and will use them stand-in Sabre Tooth Tigers.

 While waiting for the Slann Scouts varnish to dry I painted this for no real reason other than I always liked it.

It's a Reaper Miniatures Air Elemental, which might come in handy one day.

 Outpost Wargame Services mail order.

102 Shields with skirt, and 18 banners.

 WIP Eagle Warriors. 

I never liked them before as I thought just having them in brown Eagle Suits was a little dull looking, plus I disliked the old shields on them. As what I consider to be the central regiments of the army they did'nt seem to me to look the part.

So I took inspiration from two sources, and then gave it my own input; the Aztecs (and other pre-colombian nations in the area) dressed some of their Elite Warriors in different colored feather war suits, as well as the Eagle ones; and the the progress of theottovonbismarks Slann:

 http://forum.oldhammer.org.uk/viewtopic.php?f=20&t=1523&start=50

I need to pick a paint scheme for the sheilds and paint the banners.

 Red, blue, and green. 

As the all the Totem Warriors are a chosen elite from the best of the spawn bands, I am painting up the flesh in the mixed colours I am now doing for them but still with the majority green. 

I am also scrapping the idea of doing the whiter underthroat for the general Slann population as I think they look better all one colour.

 Yellow, Eagle brown, and white. 

There are still more Eagle brown Slann than any other colour, but they are now not the majority.

 A selction of the feather head dresses. I decided to give each one generally different colours rather than uniform, like Knights with differing sheild designs and heraldry.

 Two Heroes. 

I painted the one on the right as an albino to suggest he has been marked out by the Slann God's for greatness, and a black warsuit to constrast with the skin and the other warsuits.

 Standard bearers. 

The One on the left is an Aztec standard called 'Smiley Demon'. 

What army should not have one of those!? :)

 WIP Slann Emperor. 

I was not happy with having him just placed on top of a litter like all the other lesser Wizards. He did'nt look very grand, so I have started converting up a much bigger litter for him to sit on. I will be clutting up the litter with all sort of things including treasure chests, pet frog, and also the walking book familar from the Chaos Familar range!

Two random Spawn Band Slann I painted. On the left a converted 'Nanuazin', on the right an unlisted slann with sword. 

This week I plan on finishing off the Eagle Warriors, painting up the replacement standards I swapped into other units, doing more conversion work on the Emperor, and making a start on the Jaguar Warriors.  I also keep meaning to contact the CCM Wiki with photographs of the unlisted Slann, so will try to do that too!