Update Madness

I managed to prime the minis yesterday (Yay Me!).

Bilbo and Gollum (on 1/2" bases)

The Average Wight (war) Band

Ent-y!

The wights got stuck onto 1" squares for uniformity, but I think the basing will need to be prettied up a little. 

Treebeard (on his included 2" metal square) got spray-primed with a green undercoat. I was going to use black, because I wanted to make sure the leafy recesses were –ahaha– shaded. But I was out of black, so I used the green instead. Why not?

Next up: 

THE WATCHER IN THE WATER!

Yes, the pool is done. Granted, I still need to do something about the Doors of Durin, etc. But check it out (I put the bead there as a "Transfix/Entangle" marker):

Bad day for Gandalf!

The water is coated with gloss Modge Podge for sheen. I tried to make the color sort of murky. I also painted the tentacle bases with the same shades. The process was basically the same as the river pieces.

Another finished (but not varnished piece is Balin's Tomb from the GW set. 

Also, I did a color test for the Minas Tirith soldiers. It's a very quick & dirty job, but I basically went with the movie look of black and silver.

What IS that??

A pretzel gone horribly wrong?

No, it the water outside the doors of Durin. You know, the water part of "The Watcher in the Water"?


Remember when I started making the lake/pond for the terrain? Well, this is (finally) the next step. The border was covered in a mix of sand, PVA glue, and water and left to dry. I purposefully wanted it a bit sloppy to give it a natural look. The brown rectangle outside the edge is just a scrap of cardboard I laid down to catch the drips. The few edges and corners of foamcore peeking out will be further obscured by flocking and paint. The center of the MDF board will get a water effect similar to my modular river pieces. Though the pond will be more a murky greenish shade. Once the water and the border are painted, I'll add a few bits of scrub brush on the edges and some grass flocking. The piece should be usable as water terrain for any scene, but should serve admirably for the tentacle fight at Moria's entrance.

Do not Disturb the Water.

I had mentioned before about my concerns about the Watcher in the Water, and spent the last couple weeks trying to find a non-scratchbuilt solution. Oddly, tentacle minis aren't as plentiful as you'd think. Oh, there are things like "Chaos Bits" to add to the figure, but just monster tentacles are somewhat limited.

After getting sniped on an eBay auction for the old GW watcher bits, I finally found something worth giving a try at Auggie's Games. They arrived yesterday and –I have to say– I am pleased. Check these bad boys out!

Look out, Strider!

All six plus S&H was about $25. They are pre-painted, but look pretty darned good, IMO. I think I may try to make the bases more "watery" (and I may add a color coded dot to each base to keep the pseudopods straight during combat) but otherwise they are exactly what I was after. 

...Now I just need to finish the pool and the doors.