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

As you can see from the photo above, the board itself looks fairly unassuming without all of the rest of the terrain added. One thing I hadn't counted on is how dang heavy and more importantly unwieldy the board was going to be. If I had to do this again (and I'm likely not to ever do this again, but for the sake of argument) I would have added some additional superstructure with handles to the bottom level to make moving it easier.

Catwalk lights finished with globes!

I managed to finish up the catwalk lights including globes underneath that look very much like the original Warhammer 40K ones. Unfortunately they're not as visible as I'd like in the final product, but they're there. I'd really designed this board to draw people in who were able to see it live and in person, but as I'm having to go with photos, none of them are really doing it 100% justice.

Board with all of the terrain installed

Once the terrain in installed and the lights are all turned on, the board looks quite a bit more impressive. I went ahead and cleaned up the edging on the individual boards so it wasn't as obvious that they were all just 2'x2' plywood. I ended up using posterboard cut to the right size which was quick, cheap, and reasonably effective. I'm not sure I'd do it that way again, but as a quick and dirty solution it worked just fine.

The full board with miniatures added

Okay - so we've got the parade ground ready to go, how about the army? Ask and ye shall receive. The photos above and below show the full board with the army on the board and ready to go. In the mines you have the Jackal bikers, Acoyltes and Metamorphs with Brood Brother support securing the mines. A motley collection of Neophytes, Brood Brother Abhumans, and other cultists fight to take the second level, with a purestrain genestealer breaking out from underneath the floor. On the surface, the Astra Militarum forces loyal to the Cult have launched an all out offensive with tanks, infantry, artillery, and are even preparing a ballistic missile for launch.

Miniatures and lights!

While this doesn't represent all of my GSC miniatures (the baneblade, at least one Neophyte Squad, and a few others are not included), it does represent the lion's share of them. I've truly enjoyed pulling this force together and getting it painted. I still have many more miniatures I want to finish for this army as well, but I'll likely be splitting painting time with a new force - likely Necrons, Orks, or Space Wolves. I think my son wants me to paint up the Necrons because I have "an idea" - and fortunately it's a lot less crazy than 90% of what I've done for the cult! Tune in tomorrow for the final photos that were actually sent in to Games Workshop!