Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays!!!

Regardless of what holidays you celebrate at this time of year, I just wanted to take time out and hope everyone has a great one despite the challenges wrought by the pandemic this year. I firmly believe this is a year many of us will always remember, though in many ways we'd rather forget it. It has been full of unexpected challenges and disappointments, more tragedies than triumphs, and has truly tested all of us to the breaking point. 

Armies on Parade Awards Date Set

After some digging on the Warhammer 40K Facebook page, I found a cute video announcing when the Armies on Parade awards would be announced - December 19 at 1:45 GMT. So that's this Saturday! Of course, 1:45 GMT is 5:45AM Pacific, so I'll be checking out the replay once I wake up... likely a couple of hours later! The whole ceremony is going to be on Twitch, so anyone who is interested can click the links above or snag the URL from the image below.

Armies on Parade 2020 - The Fall of Hive World Novgorod

Well, it's done and dusted! My 2020 Armies on Parade entry is entered and photographed with the good camera. This article includes all of the the photos and video I sent in to Games Workshop for my my entry. So, enough of the buildup - on to the army!

The Cult arises!!!

On the Road to Armies on Parade - Part 6 - The End of the Line

We're finally at the end of the line for Armies on Parade 2020. The board is done and as many miniatures as I think I'll have time to actually finish are completed as well. Photos have been taken (not only of my entry, but my son's too). This blog entry will be the teaser where I go through the final set up of the board for photos, and hopefully get the photos of the "real thing" up tomorrow using the photos that actually went to Games Workshop. Now I sit and wait for the results. I honestly have no high hopes, I'm a good painter, but I'm not Golden Demon quality by any stretch of the imagination. My board also tends to stretch the 2'x2' limit to the very reaches of credulity in hopes of telling a good story (speaking of which, you'll be getting a full army background in a future blog entry as well). The bottom line is I had a lot of fun doing this board, and I learned a lot of new techniques that will continue to serve me well in the future. 

All of the photos in this entry were taken with my Galaxy S8, whereas the photos for my official entry were taken with my Nikon DSLR. You'll likely see the difference in quality even from the thumbnails. I also set up an actual photo shoot area with a real white backdrop for these as I wanted to get the best possible photos for the contest itself.

The bare bones board ready to accept terrain

On the Road to Armies on Parade - Part 5 - A Wretched Hive of Scum and Villainy

I'm finally getting into the home stretch on the board of doom, but I've got a bit of a ways to go yet. The first pass of the surface is good to go, though I'll be adding a little bit of static grass to the corners to just provide some additional interest. I'm hoping to get the trench line done, but if it doesn't happen, I won't be broken hearted. It's a neat piece, but the compromised detail on some of the surroundings makes it a beast to paint. The ground effect is made up of fine and medium soil and dirt ballast, with a little bit of Ammo of Mig Kursk Soil (AMIG1400) pigment thrown in.

Surface with crater-ponds and trench line placeholder

Happy Thanksgiving!!!

Well, to say this year has not gone to plan would be perhaps the greatest understatement ever, but here we are and Thanksgiving is upon us. I hope everyone is having as great a holiday as is possible under the circumstances, and I know I'm planning on having my fair share of Turkey before it's done! In years past I'd be attending a Flames of War "Tanks"-giving tournament, but there isn't one for obvious reasons this year and honestly I've been so focused on my Armies on Parade entry, I wouldn't have had time to finish up a new army anyway!

Speaking of Armies on Parade, I hope you're enjoying the "behind the scenes" look of my board over the past few days. There will be a couple more installments as the final board takes shape. I'm planning on taking photos Friday, November 27 and early Saturday November 28 to just sneak in under the November 29 deadline for photos. I may even include a short video as well. Once the photos are together, I'll get them posted here along with some short fiction I've been writing to cover the army background.

Until next time, have a safe and awesome holiday weekend!

On the Road to Armies on Parade - Part 4 - Workin' in a Coal Mine

I've made quite a bit of progress on the lower levels of the board since the last installment. The mine level is nearly done, and now you can see all of the extra bits I've added to bring it together. I used one of the old resin Forgeworld 12" x 12" floor tiles (now OOP) to create a raised platform with a couple of Plastruct truss structures and some cut foam so it looks like the wrecked Goliath drove onto its platform from something. You can also see the test fit of the fragdrill in the upper quadrant. Also reealed is the reason for the green LED lights that were in the "effects package" for the mine level - they're glowing green crystals of course! I epoxied some quartz crystals together in order to create them, as if you've got a mine, there should be something exotic down there to actually extract!

Lower mine level - nearly done!

On the Road to Armies on Parade - Part 3 - Scratching the Surface

As this is part three of the series on this year's Armies on Parade board, I figured it was about time to get around to talking about the third layer of this cake - the surface level. I'll also go through some major updates on the mine level as well, as that level is coming right along. My parade board is designed to tell a bit of a story, with the Uprising taking place simultaneously across the planet - in the mines, in the Hive city, and across the planet's surface. As my army is a mix of traditional Genestealer Cult models with a very liberal dose of unique Brood Brothers examples, I figured I needed at least some surface area to show off some of the larger vehicles that wouldn't show up in a mine or Underhive.

Early phases of surface construction

On the Road to Armies on Parade - Part 2 - Onward and Upward!

In the first entry of this series on my 2020 Armies on Parade, I went through the basic set up of the lower level (mines) and the middle level (underhive). In this entry, I'll go through the next steps on both levels, including installing the permanent lighting in the mine level and starting work on the ceiling lights on the underhive level. As I've gone along, I've tried some different ways of wiring up the LEDs, though they're all parallel circuits. I'll include full circuit diagrams in a future entry.

Ceiling grid sitting on the top (surface) layer board

On the Road to Armies on Parade - Part 1 - First Steps

Of all of the great experiences I've had playing and painting miniatures for Warhammer 40K, last year's Armies on Parade was one of the highlights. I've always loved not only building, converting, and painting the miniatures, but telling a story with those miniatures. I'd also managed to make it to Warhammer World while vacationing in the UK last year and saw the amazing dioramas on display there realizing I was not the only one who wanted to take that storytelling to the next level (or in the case of the displays at Warhammer World, the next 50 levels or so!). Last year I didn't win a medal at our local shop, but I did take home best painted for my "Uprising" themed entry. With that great experience under my belt, I immediately began planning this year's entry.

Armies on Parade - Wrecked Goliath (And How!)

As mentioned in previous blog entries, I'm really trying to put together a great Armies on Parade entry this year. To that end I've been planning out the uprising of my Genestealer Cult and how to turn that into a fun and dynamic board. I'm not ready to go into the full details at this point, but I do have one of my set pieces finished. As part of the board is going to be set in a mining area (complete with tectonic fragdrill), I wanted to include at least one Goliath. I'm still finishing up a Goliath transport for my cult, which will likely make its appearance on that level - but to add some drama to the board (and as I needed a few Goliath wheels for another project - keep watching this space), I decided to build up a wrecked Goliath on a disused heavy equipment lift platform. However, just having a derelict vehicle on the platform didn't seem to be quite enough... so I took it one step further.

Mid-Year Status Report

It's hard to believe that we're just past the midpoint of 2020. I honestly don't think that anyone could have predicted the twists and turns the world has taken this year, with COVID-19 completely upending plans and economies across the globe. Many companies were shut down completely for several months, including Games Workshop. Most of these are starting to open back up now with precautions in place, but I expect the pandemic will continue to impact us for at least the rest of the year. Back in January I posted a 2019 retrospective and some of my plans/goals for 2020, and I figured now would be a good time to see how I'm progressing.

Happy New Year - Year in Review and Plans for 2020!

Happy New Year to everyone who takes the time to read this blog. I hope this next year will be joyous and productive for everyone! Every year I try to take a few minutes to reflect on the previous year and lay out some thoughts of what I may be working on for the next year. I didn't really do much of a "year end" retrospective for 2019, but I vowed to do better this time around!

Armies on Parade - The Uprising!

I found out that Games Workshop holds an annual Armies on Parade event a couple of months ago. As I've been working a lot on my Genestealer cult, I figured that this would be a fun opportunity to get the army out on the table and see how it fared against the competition. I had several ideas for a scenic base, but ultimately realized that I just didn't have the time to completely build something new from scratch. I'd already been building several of the ruined plastic buildings available from GW, and I ended up picking up a Forgeworld Realm of Battle 2' x 2' base (the Cityscape Generatorium Sector) figuring with a little work I could make it look pretty good.