Author: Joe B

Good Reads 5 – Panther, Rivers, Thunder Priest, and Fists

Published by Joe B

Welcome to Good Reads 5 where I highlight some of the Hobby Blogs from around the interwebs that caught my eye. One of the things I love about our corner of the internet is that we hobby bloggers look at each other as companions in this journey and spur each other on. It is hard to find that anywhere else, so keep up the great work hobby bloggers, #warmongers, and readers alike! Chaos Panther Beast What happens when you combine the Glotkin, Maulerfiend, and a ton of green stuff? Well TG over at Dark Future Games made a crazy wicked Chaos Panther. Over the course of five or six posts, TG documented his progress from a pile of bits and a creative idea, into a very unique and inspiring conversion. Hopefully we see it painted soon TG! Improving Premade Rivers So John Stiening over at 40k Hobby Blog showed how you can take pre-painted river sections you can pick up for $18 on Amazon, and re-paint them into much more realistic terrain pieces. With just …

Decurion Detachments for All – Good or Bad?

Published by Joe B

While I don’t buy into all the rumor mill that is a constant buzz online, Faeit 212 has a post rumoring about all future codex will have decurion like formations forcing people to buy “tax” models. It may never come to pass, but it got me thinking, is this a bad thing? A Decurion? A quick catch-up for those who did not buy the Necron Codex, the Decurion Detachment is a super FOC in the sense you need one ‘core’ choice and at least one to ten ‘Auxiliary’ choices. There is also a single ‘Command’ choice that can be added. For most of these choices it is actually a formation or units that have their own formation rules and when built into a Decurion Detachment gain an additional bonus. // In the Necron case, the Core is the Reclamation Legion made up of an Overlord, Warriors, Immortals, and at least one unit of Tomb Blades. Lychguard and Monoliths can be thrown in as well, but it is ‘tax’ of the Tomb Blades that seem to get people …

How to Paint a Carnifex Finished

Getting to Happy Painting Tutorial – How to Paint a Carnifex of Hive Fleet Behemoth

Published by Joe B

I have put together my step-by-step tutorial on How To Paint a Carnifex, in my case one of Hive Fleet Behemoth. For the finished gallery, check out the post here. This Behemoth painting guide would be helpful for any Tyranid monstrous creature. Step 1 – Prime I’ve gone back and forth on my projects between black primer, white primer, and even tried brown. What I have settled on is a good black coat with an upper dusting of white. This leaves all the recesses dark (which helps with painting those pesky nooks) but provides a subtle shadow/highlight to the base coats. The dusting also emphasizes the details which make it easier to apply the base colors. The Base Coats Step 2 – Base Red For the Tyranids, I used my spray gun to give a nice coverage of Mephiston Red to all the skin areas. This saves a lot of time not having to paint them by hand. I also chose red over the base blue of the carapace because the blue covers red much easier …

Good Reads 4

Good Reads – Hobby Blogs You May Have Missed – 2015W13

Published by Joe B

With the end of another week comes Good Reads 4 with hobby blogs that I have come across the last week or so. I’ve just recently jumped into the Twitter world of #warmongers, but it has significantly expanded my eyes into the world of blogs. If you are on Twitter, hit me up at @brknpaintbrush. Green Stuff Creations Green Stuff Industries shows off where to find some cool bits for Chaos Space Marines and why he is passionate about converting/bit bashing. Many of his kits are non-GW, or at least not Chaos Space Marine specific. Check out some of his cool creations. Renegades Just like many of us, Elotsip 40k needs more Renegade troopers, so he shows us three new units bits bashed from multiple sources. Some of the bits used show how GW is missing some gaping holes in the renegade, traitor guard area and I have bookmarked a few of his sources for future projects. Painting Eyes The guys of Massive Voodoo always have great paintings and fantastic tutorials. This week Raffa gives …

Fabius Bile painted up for the Iron Warriors

Fabius Bile – a Classic in Iron Warriors Style

Published by Joe B

An oldie but a goody, Fabius Bile is a Games Workshop classic that I’ve had in my collection for over 15 years (crap that makes me sound old!). He has gone through a couple of iterations of paint schemes and his ‘enhanced’ warriors are back into bits pile in my closet, but I present the latest update to the classic. I wanted to pay some homage to his origins as a Emperor’s Children apothecary but still fit in with my Iron Warriors 14th Grand Company, so the armor was painted a dirty white and the shoulder pads black and silver. The flayed skin robe helps create the morbid color offset by the brightly colorful vials. I’ve seen Fabius Bile’s Chirurgeon used on so many crazy conversions for great reason: they are epicly gruesome. Between the chain blade, drill, butcher knife and syringe, it makes even a Ork Doc cringe. I wanted to give the backpack an old, worn look but still have it flashy as any Emperor’s Children would have it. Game wise, the newest edition of the codex …

Cool Tools Brush Soap to Restore Paint Brushes

Cool Tools: Brush Soap

Published by Joe B

I abuse my brushes. Yes, I admit it, I am a brush abuser. But fortunately, there is brush soap to save the day. There are many ways in which I abuse my brush. From using too small of a brush to accomplish my painting to letting the paint dry on the bristles. Not only does using a detail brush slow my progress,  using it to cram color into areas would be easier with a larger brush. With two little ones running around the house, it has been on more than one occasion that I didn’t fully clean the brush before chasing after them. Thankfully I found about brush soap a long time ago and has saved me way more than its cost in not having to buy as many new brushes. The Masters Brush Cleaner The most common brand of brush soap is The Masters Brush Cleaner which comes in a little plastic container. Inside is filled with a particular type of soap. The small 2.5oz container is only $5 on Amazon and will last forever. …

Scratch built Avesor Assassin by Henry South

Good Reads 3 – Hobby Blogs You May Have Missed

Published by Joe B

So Week 12 of 2015 is here and with it some more Good Reads that caught my eye with nifty posts. I love finding new artists and inspiration and follow about 30+ active blogs on Feedly but am finding more and more on my Google+ and Twitter (@brknpaintbrush) accounts, so if you aren’t following me on there, hit up the link and say hi. Ok so let’s check out some more goodness: Converted Evesor Assassin   The Evesor Assassin is such a scary idea that it is such a shame GW hasn’t gone back and updated the Assassin line or updated the rules like did in third addition. I found Henry South on Google+ where he posted a few WIP shots of his crazy bits bash of the Assassin and posted his finished piece to his blog 4gotowar.blogspot.com. Check it out, you won’t be disappointing. Egyptian Themed AdMech   Last week I posted some cool Greek flavored Space Marines, this week we have an Egyptian themed Adeptus Mechanicus Sentinels. Not only is the sandstone look a cool alternative to the …

Leman Russ Demolisher Squadron Showcase

Traitor Guard Leman Russ Demolisher Squad

Published by Joe B

Who doesn’t like a tank with a big gun? And what is better than one tank with a big gun? A whole squadron of Leman Russ Demolisher tanks with big guns! One of the reasons I wanted to build up an Imperial Guard (Astra Militarium?) army was because I have always been a bit of a tread-head, so adding some hard hitting Demolishers was a no brainer. I built all three of these tanks from the older Leman Russ kit with only one being the old, out of production, metal Demolisher cannon. The other two were built from other bits and pressed to service. To keep them uniform, all three have track guards which help signify their higher armor value and my army badge on the front. The metal Leman Russ Demolisher was my brothers from his old Catachan army from somewhere in middle school. The traitors seized it and stripped it of its honor. Leman Russ Demolisher It originally had the sponsons, but they had broken off over the years. So to hide the damage, …

Behemoth Carnifex with Barbed Strangler

Tyranid Carnifex of Hive Fleet Behemoth with Barbed Strangler

Published by Joe B

I love painting monstrous creatures almost as much as I love painting tanks, there is just so much character, and presence in the larger models. This Tyranid Carnifex is from the Shield of Baal box – the first of the big bugs and my second Carnifex. I painted him to be part of my brother-in-law’s Hive Fleet Behemoth so used deep reds for the skin and black-to-blue for the carapace. Since I armed the other Tyranid Carnifex with a venom cannon and scything talons, I gave this guy the barbed strangler and tank crushing claws – in part because they look bad ass. I decided to take the base up a notch using some of the techniques I practiced on my Ork Warboss. Using cork, I added some height. But also left bare patches in the sand to allow for water puddles. This was also the first model I’ve bought with the new oval bases and I love it. It gives a larger canvas for this guy to walk on without sticking out to the sides too much. If …

Good Reads 2 with awesome hobby blogs to read

Good Reads #2 – Hobby Blogs You May Have Missed

Published by Joe B

Welcome back to another week of Good Reads. I have more hobby blogs posts from our niche in the world that stuck out to me, and I wanted to share. Check them out and support your fellow hobbyist and celebrate their accomplishments. Iron Snakes M4cro has painted up a full squad of Iron Snakes he has called Squad Lakodeme. Some fantastically painted shield designs and a cool story he is telling with these Marines. I’m a big fan of the Spartan look on Marines and especially Marines with shields, and these guys fit both bills. Custom Built Razor Back Turret Typically a Razorback doesn’t get anyone excited, but D  Powers scratch built his turret with some crazy, ornate detail and an exposed Techmarine who is just looking like a boss. Also, check out his armies back story, I love when people expand upon little tidbits or create whole new stories from the lore. Building a Bridge How many remember your first hobby projects? How about your first foray into blog posting? Stephanie Young has not only jumped into …

Why the End Times will Save Warhammer Fantasy

Published by Joe B

Disclaimer First a bit of a disclaimer: I haven’t played Warhammer Fantasy Battles in years, around the release of 8th, so yeah that long. I also haven’t bought any of the End Times books – $50 really GW? Fortunatly there are plenty of others who have posted updates for the rest of us like Mengle Miniatures’ State of the End Times. Oh and this may be a spoiler: but the current Warhammer Fantasy World is ending – didn’t even need to read the books to see that coming. But why am I excited? I believe that the reasons I haven’t played or bought anything related to the fantasy line in years is exactly why Games Workshop is doing such a drastic, and risky, move. The Story Before the End Times One of the biggest reasons why I love the 40k universe and had issue getting into the fantasy as much is the story. Rules wise I actually really like fantasy and preferred parts of it over 40k, but why would my Lizardmen, on another continent, be fighting …

Acrylic Flow Aid

Cool Tools: Flow Aid Medium for Custom Washes

Published by Joe B

I love using washes. Nearly every army I paint involves a black or brown wash. In the interest of saving a truckload of cash on these bottles of wash, I tried making my own using varnishes, soaps, and acrylic medium but they all acted a bit funny – and nothing like the GW washes. In the end, I bought a couple of bottles of Vallejo washes($8 on Amazon), but I was still trying to experiment, so I also grabbed a bottle of flow aid.  Flow Aid medium This is a transparent medium similar to GW’s Lahmian Medium except it has some extra magic that breaks the surface tension and allows the paint to flow much easier. Surface tension [Wikipedia] is the physical attribute of liquids to cling to things rather than flowing freely. When using a wash, the surface tension of the acrylic paint – along with its thickness – keeps it in a little droplet of pooled paint. Releasing the surface tension will allow it to release and flow about – what you are usually looking for in …