Great Beast Completed and Project Gondor

Well, I've finally finished the Great Beast. I'm really pleased with the final thing, and painting it was good fun. I'm looking forward to trying it out on the table now! I decided in the end to pin all of the orcs so they can be removed as casualties.

 

I've also completed some orc archers that weren't used on the beast and a second barrow wight for scenarios:

And now the Beast is done, it's time for the next task - I bring you "Project Gondor!"

Last summer I went a bid mad on ebay and bought over 100 Gondor models. Many are elites, but I'm starting on the basic Warriors of Minas Tirith, plus a few siege crew, captains and Faramir (54 in total). To save time I sprayed them with the Army Painter platemail spray which seems great on the few test pieces I've done. I've also base coated all the faces. I hope I can get these done before I bore myself too much!

New recruits

So painting hasn't really been my top priority this year but I've slowly knocked out a few models whenever I've had the time. This dwarf captain will be useful as a slightly cheaper hero for my dwarf army and with the new 'battle companies' rule might turn out to be a necessity. I experimented with the red cloak, trying to avoid my usual urge to make use of a wash.

 

 The drummers below are pretty useless given the low number of goblins I have painted up but this year I decided to only buy one model for every ten I paint so this was a quick way of adding three to my tally.

The orc is a very experimental paint job but I love the results. I want to paint up the full set of the original metal lotr orcs as they are my favourite metal miniatures from the gw lotr range. Hopefully, I'll post more of them throughout the year.
 

Orc archer

Work in progress:
This is part of the original metal LOTR orcs from the Gamesworkshop strategy battle game. I regret never collecting the whole bunch before they were discontinued but I plan to eventually collect and paint the whole crew. They merit a bit more care than the batch treatment applied to their plastic kin.