Reaper Yeti

Another not very productive month on the miniatures front, but I managed to squeak something else out before October. After the Hill Giants I thought continuing to work on the Bones would be good and picked out the four Yeti (or is that "Yetis"?) sculpted by Jason Wiebe from the Reaper Bones III Kickstarter.  Three of the four are available now in Bones from the Reaper store: Yeti Warrior, Yeti Shredder, and Yeti Shaman. The Chieftain doesn't seem to be available just yet in Bones, only in the original metal.

The Bones figures are all pretty good, though comparing with the metals it appears that the fingernails / claws of the new figures perhaps lack some definition. There are also the to-be-expected Bones mould lines, which I personally find quite hard to see before undercoating and then alarmingly obvious afterwards.

The Yeti were undercoated with a mix of MSP Sapphire Blue and Sealer, thinned for the airbrush. At the same time I undercoated the Ice Troll by Ben Siens, also available in Bones. (Interestingly the metal original is listed a "Hellborn Troll".)  He got a similar undercoat but with Denim Blue (and turns up in some of the photos).

The Yeti got some blue wash (AP Blue Tone) followed by several dry-brush applications, each lighter and dryer than the previous. The first coat was 2:1 White to Sapphire Blue, then 4:1, and then 12:1, and finally MSP Pure White.

MSP Yellowed Bone, Graveyard Bone, and Splintered Bone were applied to claws, and the skull on the Chieftain's shoulder. AP Phoenix Flames followed by Babe Blonde was used for the eyes, and AP Gorgon Hide for eyebrows. MSP Stone Grey to stone details, and MSP Murky Brown, Tanned Leather, and Oiled leather used for final areas.

The bases had also been painted in AP Gorgon Hide (a pale bluish off-white), and were coated with thinned PVA and scattered with Army Painter "Snow" grit.

The Ice Troll is still to be finished, along with an intrepid (and about to be seriously inconvenienced) Arctic Explorer, and Ogres are also clamoring for attention... along with an LRDG truck.

Oh well, perhaps October will be more productive.

Reaper Hill Giants

With Bones 4 just finished on Kickstarter, and Bones 3 being delivered recently, I looked at the veritable mountain of unpainted Reaper miniatures I have hiding in every corner of the hobby room and decided to make a token gesture towards resolving this.

Burrowing through the pile I settled on the pair of Hill Giants that were part of Bones 2 four years ago. (Four years? Egads!)  Both are now available from the Reaper store: Golan, sculpted by Jason Wiebe, and Krug, by Tre Manor.

While cleaning them up and dry fitting parts they seemed to me to resemble a couple of movie characters, and so they have been dubbed Mr. Hyde and Mr. Gibbs. I'd note that mould lines became more obvious after undercoating... and could perhaps have been revisited (but weren't).

My previous experience with Bones had highlighted the hydrophobic properties of the plastic, and I wanted a really good foundation for the basecoat colours. Following advice from Reaper on priming and undercoating the miniatures were first washed thoroughly and then given a coat of Reaper MSP Murky Brown mixed with Reaper sealer (all thinned slightly to go through the airbrush).

 The base colours were a mixture of Reaper (MSP), Army Painter (AP), and Vallejo (VMA/VMC/VGC), all in the brown range. The MSP Tanned Flesh was mixed with a little brown to darken the first layers, lightened on successive layers. AP tones/washes were used on the furs and hair, and MSP Flesh Wash on the skin areas.

 Mr. Gibbs has iron manacles but otherwise I wanted to keep the metal areas in the gold/brown range so these were painted with either VMC Brass or AP Copper. These were darkened with AP Strong Tone, re-highlighted with metal, and then shaded with a mix of AP Green and Blue tone to create something of a weathered verdigris effect.

Golan got pink added to new scars, old scars were paled down, various skin lesions were added, and fur dry brushed to create texture.

Mr. Gibbs got some of the same, plus his bandages were painted using MSP bone shades, and the center shield on his belt coloured with VMC Black red to create a leather effect.

As I don't have a Garrick the Bold aka Sir Forscale I've substituted another knight...

...and that other universal standard of miniature scale: Brother Scala using his auspex to detect hostile xenos.

Next up... not sure yet , though I have another LRDG truck on the bench, this one with a Breda in the back.