This month's themed attempt to reduce my mountain of metal, plastic and resin models will be somewhat different than my normal overly-optimistic projects, as I essentially plan to just continue working through the number of Undead related miniatures I had hoped to complete over the past few weeks as part of Zomtober. However, rather than tackle anything new, my initial goal will be to simply complete repainting/restoring a handful of old zombie sculpts by "Copplestone Castings", and then take things from there...
First up will be a Zombie Trooper from Mark Copplestone's "Future Wars" range, which not only required rebasing, but also a major repaint, courtesy of its decade old predominantly all-black colour scheme. Resultantly, I have already 'picked out' the soldier's heavy firearm, some of his ammo pouches and his trousers with some base layers ready for shading - tricky stuff to be honest as I'm having to pigment over the PVA glue I used to apply to protect my paint-jobs.
I've previously used my rebased models from "Copplestone Castings" to replace the rather disappointing softly-detailed plastic sculpts found inside "Resident Evil 2: The Board Game" by "Steamforged Games", and hope that by finishing a few more of the walking dead it'll encourage me to get the rather enjoyable "cooperative horror board game" back out the cupboard. In addition, I do still own quite a few other unpainted zombies from the "Future Wars" range, so could possibly be encouraged to make a start on them too...
Alongside my restoration work though I'll definitely be cracking on with some more of the colourfully characterful Alien Pets by "Crooked Dice Game Design Studio". These diminutive sculpt's from the company's "Colony 87" range have really helped restore my somewhat flagging mojo recently, and got me back to the painting table after a short sabbatical.
Productivity wise, it is difficult not to see the past month as something of a major disappointment. Apart from a single post-apocalypse survivor, self-sculpted using "Hero Forge", I didn't manage to complete any of the other zombie-related models I had lined up for the Zomtober challenge, including three Justice Department brain-hungry cadavers which were already both assembled from different converted body-parts and even partially-painted.
True, I did manage to finish off the remaining (Fire) Elemental unit for my 15mm "Hordes Of The Things" army using "Alternative Armies" miniatures, leaving just the force's wizard residing far back in my painting queue, and additionally scratched my persistent "Doctor Who" itch with five shape-shifting Zygons by "Black Tree Design". But none of these monsters or aliens were particularly planned, nor frustratingly really helped motivate me to crack on with my intended project.
Thanks Undercoat. I do have a fair few minis close to completion which I'll be dusting down over the coming weeks, as I'd like to be a bit more focused on projects for 2021, and currently have a lot of partially-painted minis all over the place. LOL!!!
Cheers Roger. I should have the zombie re-paint finished fairly soon, and have a couple more of the Alien Pets ready for posting too. I plan to spend the next few months simply clearing away a load of odd minis which seem to have slowly built up around my painting table, so expect plenty of weird and wonderful figs to appear for the foreseeable ;-)
I think a few of us are having a hard time getting motivated at the moment, personally apart from the "Vamp for Vampifan" figure I hardly touched a paintbrush last month, so in no way can I berate you for your performance mate. I must at least try and get a few more 15mm Conan types finished this month!
Nice work on the Copplestone Zom so far, and those Alien Pets are very cute, I can see why they've "jumped the queue" as it were.
I have been planning next years "Forgotten Heroes" entries though, so I have at least been thinking about figures (and it's the thought that counts they say!).
Cheers Roger,
That zombie looks really good. Your undead are very striking and visually excellent. The little creatures look nice can't wait to see them done. I sympathise with your lack of painting, I haven't done any for 3 weeks, just fun out of steam! Still, lockdown will hopefully see me get the brushes out again!
Thanks Dave. It wasn't a complete disaster by any rate, but definitely wasn't the October I had planned to be sure. Fortunately, I'm already a good way through repainting the first of my "Future Wars" zombies and finished some more of the Alien Pets too, so this month is already looking a bit brighter than last.