Best of the West 2016

On May 7th I made my second trip to Las Vegas to compete in this year's IPMS Best of the West model contest. I entered my Ork Dakkajet Egg Plane, Adeptus Mechanicus Dune Crawler, Kromlech Ork Pilot Bust, and my recently completed Stormlord. I ended up picking up 1st place in Sci-Fi/Fantasy for my Stormlord and 1st place in Humor in Modeling for my Ork Dakkajet.

Over 100 competitors entered the show with nearly 500 entries. There was a strong showing from the Sci-Fi, Gundam, and Warhammer communities.

 

The local GW retailer was there selling product and they brought a great wargame table and two armies.

The Neon City Garrison of the 501st was in attendance as well. They gave out the "Best Star Wars Model" award.

There were a lot of amazing models entered this year. What follows are some of my favorites.

Gundam

Auto

Armor

Chimera anyone?

Aircraft

Ships

Sci-Fi

Figures

Collections

Dioramas

For a more complete gallery of this year's entries check out the IMPS Las Vegas club gallery.

Weathering Kit

While cleaning up my workspace a while ago I decided it would be more convenient to keep all of my weathering supplies in one convenient location. As weathering is one of the last steps of each of my modeling projects I've found that I like having an all in one kit that I can pull out when I'm ready to start weathering a model.

Everyone has their own tools, supplies, and techniques for weathering. I thought I'd share what I keep in my weathering kit.

 Mixing Vessels

You can never have enough vessels to mix paints, washes, and pigments in. I use bottle caps for mixing paints and washes but I prefer to use sealable containers for mixing  pigments.

Patina

To create a patina effect on copper and bronze I have a technical paint from Games Workshop, a three part kit from the craft store, and even a powder from Secret Weapon Miniatures. When applying the powder I mix it in mineral spirits before applying to the model.

I really like the three part patina kit I got from the craft store. When used together, they provide a much greater variation in color than the GW or SWM patinas do alone.

Chipping Effects

There are a lot of methods to getting a good chipping effect on a model and I use them all. There are two basic methods of chipping, additive and subtractive. Additive is when you use a brush or sponge to paint on the appearance of chipping paint. Subtractive is when you apply something under a top coat which allows you to remove paint. AK makes a series of chipping fluids which go on under your top coat and allow you to rub or pick away at the top coat. You can also sponge on a masking fluid and rub off later, or apply some salt to your model prior to laying down your top coat and flake off the salt.

The major advantage to the subtractive method is that you can pre paint a great weathered effect under your top coat and reveal it in a very natural way. This is harder to do with the additive method but you do have far more control, however, sometimes having too much control can lead to a very forced weathered effect.

Oil Washes

 

Oil washes are achieved using oil paints thinned with mineral spirits. I keep brown, black, and burnt sienna on hand. A good supply of cotton swabs helps when cleaning up excess wash.

Weathering Pigments

I have a variety of rust and dirt pigments from Secret Weapon Miniatures as well as patina and metallic colors. I also have artists charcoal for making exhaust and soot effects. I apply these powders using makeup applicators and beat up paintbrushes. I also keep a small tub of graphite powder (similar if not the same) as the Metallic Iron pigment from SWM.

Final Touches

After all my weathering is complete and a coat of dullcote is down, I apply any gloss effects including the above series of engine fuel & oils from mig.

There you have it. That's my complete weathering kit. I'll be doing some additional weathering tutorials in the future using these items.

Tutorial - Metal with Graphite

While attending this year's Sonoran Desert Model Builders' Scorpfest I observed a demonstration by the club president, Dave "The Weatherman". Not surprisingly his demonstration was on various weathering techniques. While I've been using graphite in my weathering for some time I hadn't ever considered using it in the ways that Dave did. In one example he used it as an alternative to metallic paint. I liked the method he used and the opportunity to use it finally presented itself in my Baneblade Stormlord.

You can purchase graphite, shave it from a pencil, or in my case, I harvest it from my drafting pencil sharpener. On a side note I highly recommend getting a drafting pencil. They are great for drawing as you can purchase any hardness of lead you want and sharpening them is a breeze, there is almost no waste. If you use your shavings for your models there is zero waste with the drafting pencil.

I collect the graphite powder in a small sealable plastic pot.

Begin by priming the object you want to metalize in flat black.

Rub the graphite onto the primed surface. You may use your finger, a compact applicator, cotton swab, or sponge. I used my finger tips, a compact applicator, and a makeup sponge.

The more you buff the surface the shinier and more metallic it will get. It looks great on the above heavy stubbers but looks equally as good on other surfaces.

The exhaust pipes for my Stormlord really came out great!

Dave covered another method for utilizing graphite. He mixed it into a rust colored acrylic paint. After the paint was dried he rubbed the high points with a cotton swab which revealed a metallic sheen. As with the above technique the more he rubbed the shinier the appearance but in this case it was a subtractive technique instead of additive.

WIP - Custom Deathwatch Iron Hand

I've been a bit unproductive this month, but one thing I have been working on is a couple of Deathwatch Kill Team members to add to my Xenos Inquisitor Warband. I ordered the Deathwatch accessory pack from Games Workshop. The pack comes with 10 Deathwatch bolters, heads, and pauldrons. It's a bit pricey but I bought the one and can always make a casting of a pauldron if needed.

This Iron Hand has come together quite nicely.

I started with sculpting an Inquisition 'I' on the helmet.

Using some spare Mechanicus and Knight bits I modified the power pack. The bolts are cut from hex rods.

The lower portions of the legs are from legionary legs from Kromlech. The small skull on the right knee pad came from the back of the power pack. His right leg is lifted to set atop a slain tyranid head.

The bionic right leg is a combination of styrene tubes and rod as well as solder wire and a spherical bead for the hip joint. I also used a little bit of cable I made with my greenstuff tentacle maker.

The metal Deathwatch pauldron sets atop a modified bionic arm from Anvil Industries. I used some styrene to make a Clan Raukaan emblem for the left knee.

 I used styrene to sculpt an Iron Hand emblem for the right pauldron.

Tada!

Write for Black Library!

For fans of 40k fluff, from now until April 29th, Black Library is soliciting writing samples from aspiring authors. So if you've ever read a story set in the universe of Warhammer 40k and thought "I could write something like this" now is your chance. Stop by the Black Library website today to find out more.

Moving time for Pig Iron Productions

It has come to my attention that Pig Iron Productions, a manufacturer of quality 28mm Sci-Fi models and accessories is closing shop. They had this to say on their Facebook page:

Pig Iron - Time to move on…

After much deliberation and soul searching both myself and Lisa have decided to close down Pig Iron at the end of March 2016.

We've been wrestling with this decision for many, many months but the constant pressure of running two businesses at the same time has taken its toll on us both and we feel its time, after nearly fifteen years, to take a step back and live a more 'normal' and relaxed life. On top of the business side of things we’ve both felt the need to explore other areas outside of the gaming industry but the constant 'background noise' of Pig Iron has always taken priority.

Wargaming, sculpting, painting and scenery making will still play an important part of our lives so we’ll be keeping the Facebook site open to keep in touch with the wider gaming world.

Moving forward, it would be a shame for the miniatures to disappear and we’re currently exploring ways of keeping the ranges going with other parties and we’ll keep you updated on any developments over the next month or so. Any suggestions are most welcome so please get in touch on: enquiries@pig-iron-productions.com.

All current and new orders will be fulfilled until we close the webstore down but we won’t be getting any more stock from Griffin Moulds. If you need to get in touch regarding your order please email us at the address above (Don’t forget to check your spam folder for any replies).

The last fifteen years have been an exciting challenge and very rewarding plus we’ve met some great people along the way and hopefully made some cool miniatures for your games.

Sincere thanks to all the people who have purchased our miniatures and supported us in other ways over the years.

Lets not say goodbye, lets say, “Stay in touch…”

Simon and Lisa - Pig Iron.

Anytime a manufacturer of quality products in the miniatures market closes shop it's truly a loss to the gaming community. So do yourself, and Simon and Lisa, a favor and order up some quality models or bits while they last! I ordered a squad of System Troopers which I'll use as Storm Troopers for my IG.