Taking the Plunge into the World of Airbrushing, Part 2

img_0256My previous article on airbrushing was more in an attempt to humorously illustrate how I hid the cost of airbrushing and added a bulky new hobby toy into my work area without getting too many probing questions.  This week I’ll go over the breakdown of the tools I actually picked up to make my skin tone project a reality.  Continue reading

Taking the Plunge into the World of Airbrushing

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Long have I been eyeing an airbrush. While I’ve been deployed over the years I have spent many hours watching hobby videos for tips of the trade and when doing actual painting to have some background noise. Over the years the use of airbrushed has creeped more and more into my viewing time. I’ll be honest, the idea of using an airbrush is very intimidating when you don’t know where to start. Compressors, needle size, thinner, cleaning, and air pressure are all just some of the many questions that arise when using them. More importantly though, how do you sneak them into your hobby life without questions from the family?

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Gaslands: Death Race Gates

Gaslands is a game that has the advantage of letting hobbyists get off sorta cheap. Small, toy cars usually cost about $1 USD, and I can image they’re just as affordable around the world. It seemed odd to me that all of the doodads surrounding the game were then going for quite a bit. So, I was determined to lean into the old school hobby ethic and do it myself. Starting with the gates necessary for the default Gaslands scenario, the Death Race.

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Gaslands: Back into the Wasteland

Dark Future was one of the two Games Workshop titles that captured my imagination back in the late 80’s. My friend picked up a set while I bought Blood Bowl Second Edition from a small game shop in Kaiserslautern, (at the time ‘West’) Germany. If I remember correctly, the shop was called “Gerd’s” and we’d talk one of our parents to drive us there every couple months as both our father’s were stationed at a nearby US army base. Well before the internet, it was the only place we could find hobby games of this sort and the outfit from Great Britain quickly replaced TSR as our go-to company for gaming. I often wonder what become of that shop and it’s owner, but for now this tale is about how that middle school kid, now in his mid 40’s, found himself back out on the wasteland.

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This is Armored Combat

Recently, Catalyst Games released two new introductory box-sets for the battle-hardened BattleTech line. Despite gaming longer than BattleTech’s 35 years in existence, I’ve never actually gamed anything in this IP. Not even the ever popular video-games. But here I am…in my mid-40s and it looks like I’m becoming a Mechwarrior.

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Warhammer Underworlds: Paint it Black

I recently painted the Shadespire Stormcast warband for Mike. He wanted black as a primary color but with plenty of gold trim. Traditionally, I’ve struggled a bit with black, often highlighting with grey or dark blue which cause my models to appear…grey or dark blue. These three models were the start of another chance of getting black down because a black based Blood Bowl team looms on my horizon.

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The case of the perfect case

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Check out that lovely chair our neighbor gave us! We have a very trendy interior design style, it’s called “free chic.”

I’ve been trying to figure out the case situation for my minis for a little while now. I’ve been using the deluxe box of the Willy Miniatures Ratmen Team that I unboxed a few months back to get my Blood Bowl stuff around to my league games. And it’s been fine. But I’ve also recently gotten into the Hobbit Strategy Battle Game which requires quite a few more models than Blood Bowl. Not hundreds of models, but dozens. So I need a solution for that too, as well as my BB team.

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Under the hobby knife: The troubles with press molds

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As I mentioned in my last post I’ve been working on some conversions for the Middle-earth Strategy Battle Game. Specifically, mounted Gil-Galad, mounted Glorfindel and armored and mounted Lindir. This is an update on my experiments.

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Under the hobby knife: Planning conversions for The Hobbit SBG

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Last year I was introduced to the Hobbit Strategy Battle Game, formerly the Lord of the Rings, but don’t worry even though it’s called the Hobbit Strategy Battle Game (or SBG for short) it still encompasses factions and miniatures from across both eras of Middle-earth. In fact, the game will be rebranded the Middle-earth Strategy Battle Game later this year (but that’s kind of another discussion). Middle-earth is my favorite fantasy setting and has been a big passion for various parts of my life. I had kind of forgotten how much I loved Tolkien’s world until I started getting into the Hobbit SBG. I found myself attracted first to the Rivendell/high elf faction. When I was younger, I loved all things dwarf, but nowadays I’m all about the elves. I’ve always thought Elrond was a cool character and Rivendell seemed like a pretty cool place to chill, plus, who doesn’t love this scene from the intro to Fellowship of the Ring?

 

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