100 silver marines on the wall...

Hi everyone 

The last two weeks have been deep in painting a big batch of marines. But before I take you through that, let's look at the latest purchases. 

First up, last month I picked up a reasonably priced impulsor. It took a couple of weeks, but it finally arrived:

My last visit to Doug also uncovered a bunch of dreads he had sitting around, so I happily took those off his hands:

(one Redemptor not pictured)

I'm expecting to save up next month, and go for a big purchase in July unless any good deals appear before then.

The big batch

So, last post I said I was going to start a batch of 100 marines. I've spent the last two weeks working through this a stage at a time and posting my progress on the NZ40Kabal Facebook page. Here are those posts:

Day 1

Well. As promised, day 1 of a full company batch paint. This is 7th company. 7th are a reserve company consisting of 10 tactical squads. There is also command staff consisting of a captain, 2 lieutenants, chaplain, apothecary, ancient, champion and 2 company veterans. I'll be picking up the chaplain and apothecary later, and had a painted sargeant from a swap earlier which leaves 106 marines to paint.

First up today was a quick dry brush on some marines who ended up darker on the spray coats. I then spent 2 hours with nuln oil in all the joints, just for them to look the same in the photo! 

Oh well, first stages done, onward and upwards tomorrow.

Day 2

Right, day 2 of, more than that. First up was getting distracted by kids. But after that I tackled the cables and joints. I just hit these with a black contrast to give a different look to the armour itself. When that was done, I jumped a stage to quickly throw on the first skin coat on using Jokaero orange.

Day 3

My normal batch is generally 10 marines and a character, which normally takes about 3 sessions of 1-3 hours to complete. Quick maths says a full company typically takes 30 sessions, or about 6 weeks to complete. Today is session 3, so I could have completed 10 marines. Instead I only got through half of the first coat of black on the bolters and shoulder pads. That makes me a little nervous for the first time at how long this will take...

Day 4

Pushed through tonight and finished off the black. I'm out tomorrow night, so next update some point over the weekend. See you then!

Day 8

Right, nothing got done yesterday, but I got through 80 green basecoats today. Should finish the green off tomorrow.

Day 10

Life happened and Green dragged, but progress was made. I've now started the basecoats on the detail colours, bone, gold, red and a skin highlight. I was super happy with how quick it was. Two more colours and some shades then it's into highlights.

Day 11

Tonight was brown ink and purple on the purity seals and knee pads as the company colour.

Day 13

Triple session today. Started off with brown basecoat and contrast which finished off the basecoats. I then highlighted and shaded the red. I added a mid tone to the knee pads to lighten them up a bit, then highlighted all the purple, then finished off with the gold highlights.

What's left?

There are a few of the smaller colors to go, bone, skin and brown, along with the eyes and gems. I think that will take another couple of nights. Then its the big colours, 2 shades on each of the green and brown. Throw in a bit of real life distraction and I'm looking at the end of next week to get them done. 3 weeks vs about 6 is a pretty good turn around for a full company. 

See you in a couple of weeks