Alchemy and Anarchy

I have begun working on two small groups of miniatures from different ranges, Rackham’s Alchemists of Dirz and Corvus Belli’s Nomads. Even though the styles and background of the miniatures are quite unlike each other, I am still planning to use similar techniques and a somewhat common palette, so that I’ll be trying out some ideas on one set that I can then translate to the other and vice versa.

The Alchemists are a faction in Confrontation made up of clones and clones masters, mutated beasts and drug enhanced ritual warriors. Their mechanics and design are centred on controlled mutation and the range includes some very neat, skinny, humans and some very dark beasts. Here’s a gallery of the original artwork and pictures for the game cards, from the website that also hosts the community supported version of the ruleset.

I will start painting the core force from one of the starter boxes from a late-ish edition of the game, plus three of the old school iconic crossbowmen and a Neuromancer that I had won in a painting competition as a kid and that, ironically, I ended up painting very badly.

 

 

The Nomads are anarchists, in space. Which didn’t fail to please me and was in itself reason to be drawn to Infinity. I can recommend the game for those who like ultimately quite realistic but cleverly and not obviously designed gameplay. The range of miniatures includes some spectacular models and overall the quality, detail and design choices of Corvus Belli’s minis are very good. With their ultra-clean lines and high-tech vibe they are a nice change from GW grittier and messier darkness. Here’s a link to the Nomads gallery: unless GW already got them firmly in their hands, watch for your wallets!

For this project, I am going to paint the vanilla starter pack, which includes a nice variation of armours: three Alguaciles, who have a tricky mix of protection vest and suit in the same colour, a Spektr infiltrator and Grenzer sniper in darker outfits, and a Briareos-like full body armoured Mobile Brigada.

Enough for now, I’ll write more about the project as soon as I have pictures to show, and I am also waiting for some desert and urban bases from Micro Art Studio…

 

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Bizmarks # 14 – Groupshot

And here they are!

I have to say that this is probably my first finished project ever – or at least the thing that comes closer to it. It feels nice to know that I can pull something like this off despite the many and often all too serious demands of real life.

Greeting from the Underhive, until next time!

PS

I know the lasgun ganger in the back on the left looks way too dark now compared to the others, even if his suit is technically blue. For the moment, he’ll be the stealthy guy – he’ll get a new suit at some point.

Bizmarks # 13 – Leadership

Here’s the final two retouched minis for the gang. The ganger with the boltgun got a subtle shading on the gun itself as well as the usual work on the suit. The leader got a particularly thorough work on the pads and some touching up on the blade and flamer/plasma.

This concludes this Necromunda project, for the time being. Once I get hold of a heavy stubber miniature and some bits for the bases I will go back to it and add some more oomph. Stay tuned for the groupshot!

Bizmarks # 12 – Stopping power

Having finished the models that needed to be painted entirely I am now coming back to those that I had painted with a black suit to give them… a nice blue-job. You can tell they’re happy now.

The model with the minigun – standing for a heavy stubber – is from the Void range and, while it is a perfectly nice mini and does not stand out too much, it will sooner or later be substituted by the original model and moved to a different gang. I played around with different colours on the gun’s chassis, even though the irony of camouflaging a minigun is not lost on me. I’m the one who likes wooden flamethrowers after all. 😉

The other ganger just got his pads pimped and the shotgun cleaned up.

Bizmarks # 11 – Flashing guns

Take two of brush versus 1990s clutter. A definite improvement if you ask me. The upper back is still somewhat off, but I am pleased with the rest. I liked playing with subtle tones of gray on the guns and while the lasgun turned out a little toyish, the autogun is fine.

Bizmarks # 10 – Recoil!

This is the final juve miniature, a very simple conversion using a bit of an ork gun to simulate a crude version of a boltgun. I’m getting the hang of the blending for the suit and I think I managed to achieve the right amount of pop, especially on the front side.

On the other hand, I realise now that the base is a bit tilted, I’ll correct this whenever I’ll go back decorating the bases with some extra bits.

Bizmarks # 9 – Ugly face

New member of the gang. Here I tried to slightly differentiate between the more and the less armoured areas of the suit. I think the autopistol turned out especially nice, while on the other hand the face is suffering from a lack of subtlety which I could find no way to improve.