New year, new minis

Namely the skeletons and some vampires! I'm a bit sick, so I'll restrain myself from longer ramblings and just show you the minis.

On the boney lads, I tried the new GW washes and I must say they work quite decently. Well, at least they do what they say they are supposed to be doing. They give a great, matt finish, they really don't pool and they really flow nicely. Sometimes they tend to be a bit too transparent with a single coat, but then they cover thinly enough to make several coats. All in all a good product.

As for the minis themselves, I am in love with the design. These are the skeletons looking as they are supposed to look. They are noticeably smaller than their living counterparts and their equipment is really worn and battle-scarred. Splendid designs, really.

Now, I finally got round to doing the vampires. These are of course the old Blood Dragons; in my opinion one of the best designs on the market. I simply had to have them, they actually look like vampires and not vampirized figments of someone's sick mind.

I realize I've made a blunder on this gentleman's cloak. Vallejo greens are rather difficult to work with and it took one ruined cloak to make me realize this. Trust me, these paints change their tone and opacity as they dry on the mini and this can lead to several problems. My advice is to be quite bold in highlighting - don't skimp on the lighter color, you'll need more liberal amounts than usual to make the highlights really pop out. Don't be afraid of overdoing it - glazing with VGC greens is, on the other hand, a breeze. You will always be able to correct your mistakes.

I tried to do just that on the second, mounted vampire. After all, the count has to look grand.

I also tried my hand at gore effects, something I have never attempted, for reasons unknown. Turned out rather nice, no?

There always was a thought in my head to make my general carry a blood-filled chalice. Well, it's there. In retrospect I'd better have cut away the lance bit, but it adds that bizarre flavor to the whole chalice, makes it clearly an unusual artifact rather than a mundane object.

That about covers it for today. With the skeletons done, there are only three units left to finish the whole army, and I saved the tastiest bits for last. Except for the dire wolves, which I've come to sincerely detest.