Otherworld Miniatures Thief.

Continuing the theme begun on boxing day, I have completed a companion for the Assassin previously featured.

Otherworld Miniatures Thief.

Thief & Assassin size comparison.

The nicely rendered backpacks.

Another cracking figure, smaller than the Assassin though still very much a 'modern' 28mm figure in his proportions. I was only intending to dip a toe in the water with this range of miniatures, but I've had a lot of fun painting these two so I predict further purchases fairly soon.

Otherworld Miniatures Assassin.

I've watched Otherworld Miniatures range of old school with interest for some time now but have never had the spare moolah lying round to actually make a purchase.
This situation was remedied a few weeks back when I found a couple of their dungeon adventurers on eBay & made a successful bid.
The first one of these was completed today:

Otherworld Miniatures Assassin.

This was an enjoyable way to spend an otherwise cold & miserable boxing day, there was a bare minimum of flash to clean off & the detail is well defined so nice & easy to paint. Height wise he comes in at 34mm from soles of feet to eye level, so on the large end of the scale for a 28mm miniature. I can remedy this to a certain extent by re-basing him on a washer, but it is a shame that the scale creep continues to be an issue with new ranges.

Dungeon Architecture.

Spent some time earlier today prepping these ready for moulding:

There are also a set of conventional steps in the pipeline along with two more doorways, these are a little more elaborate than the basic models shown above.
Once the moulds for these are done I will be able to start assembling the boxed sets ready for sale, then its a case of setting up the retail end of the operation which I suspect might be the biggest challenge yet.

Ral Partha Gnoll Leader.

Picked up the brush again last night for a change of pace after several weeks of painting historical stuff, this is a Gnoll Leader from Ral Partha's 1990 AD&D 2nd Edition range:

Another enjoyable miniature to paint with plenty of nicely sculpted detail, the pose is a little wooden but he is after all a one piece casting. No idea what the cutlass/club hand weapon is supposed to be; don't seem to remember any Gnoll ethnic weapons from back in the day except for the Flindbar from Fiend Folio, but that was more like a nunchak if memory serves.

Dungeon Terrain. Getting down to the Nitty Gritty.

Time to start getting serious as to how I present these pieces for sale, still have reservations as to how big a market there is for three dimensional resin dungeon products so the intention is to cast up a dozen sets for starters & market them through this blog & maybe eBay. I would prefer to stick exclusively to the former course to save on the fees extracted by eBay & paypal but I suspect the greater market exposure might result in a better long term pay-off.

Currently I have the following pieces in production:

This shows the basic elements that will be available in a boxed set along with two further staircase elements, two doors, a 4x2" corridor/room section & a 60 degree corner section. All to be packaged in a decent quality cardboard box with a foam liner.
Price will be in the £60 bracket including postage for the full set which is all that will be available at first purely to keep the logistics simple at my end of the operation, though if there is sufficient interest I will consider setting up a proper online store with individual elements & bundles available separately.

I'm hoping to get the sets cast up & packaged before the end of November but this will very much depend on when the next batch of moulds is received but i think the end is in sight.

More Painted Dungeon Terrain.

Steadily working through the catalogue of dungeon elements, next up 4x4" pillared chamber:

This piece was treated with a neat sepia ink base coat, with subsequent coats of red & green inks to get the marbled effect in the centre sections. The square tiles & walls were block painted & dry brushed with acrylics.

I'm still awaiting delivery of the remaining moulds to complete the inventory, these are mainly accessory pieces like doors & stairs but there is also a 4" wide corridor section that will double as a building block for larger chambers. Once these are in hand I can start to assemble sets ready for sale, I will post a picture of the basic set later today once I've completed some admin for my real job.

Yellow Musk Creeper.

Inspired by a post on TMP enquiring after the above to which I supplied with a tentative suggestion as to how a representation might be achieved:

This was scratch-built using etched brass ivy, yellow foam flock material & a skull from a very old Citadel Miniatures plastic skeleton. Inspiration from the description presented in TSR's Fiend Folio.

Resin Dungeon Pieces in Glorious Technicolour.

These were painted up just before I got away on my Bi-annual holiday:

A departure from the normal grey offering, a crossroads in sandstone

The X intersection above was painted as a homage to the 9 tons of indian sandstone paving slabs I laid leading up to my holiday, an image of which in perfect colour will be imprinted on my brain till my dying day.
In common with the more traditional grey offerings, the finish was built up with layers of dry-brushing over a sepia ink base coat; walls were pointed in with a 2:1 mix of water & Vallejo Panzer Colour Canvas.

Resin Dungeon Terrain, Significant Progress.

After quite a long wait my mouldmaker has finally come through with the second batch of blue rubber goodness. In honour of this I took a couple of hours off work this afternoon to try them out :

20x20' room with intriguing pillar detail.

Y shaped intersection, never previously attempted!

New casting offered up to Torchlight original to prove compatibility.

45 degree corner sections.

 These have turned out really well considering they were drop cast, albeit in a favourable temperature range. Once production starts in earnest items will be cast under 4 atmospheres of pressure to make sure no bubbles or other irregularities occur.
Particularly pleased with getting the Y intersection right as I don't recall Torchlight carrying this item in their catalogue back in the day.

Yet More Grenadier Miniatures Skeletons.

These have been waiting patiently in the painting queue for quite some time now, so last night as a spot of light relief finally got round to splashing some acrylic onto them:

The top figure is from the Skeleton Knights blister pack. I don't know the provenance of the lower but he is wearing the outlandish mixture of equipment so characteristic of Andy Chernak's skeletons. Good fun to paint though.
Whilst on the subject here is a family shot of the Grenadier Skeleton collection as it stands today:

There are still three unpainted skeleton looters to add to the growing brood as well as a few cavalry figures which will be tackled at some unspecified point in the future. Doubt I'll ever collect them all, for one thing it is quite difficult to find anything like a complete illustrated listing of all Grenadiers Skeletons online, perhaps another project that could be added to the ever changing list.

Resin Dungeon Room with Cut-down Corner.

Following on from the previous post I thought I had better post a couple of photographs of the concept room with the cut away corner.

Figure 1.

Figure 2.

I wanted to produce a few rooms displaying a little more architectural variety than just the basic stonework featured on most of my pieces to date, the idea being to use them as higher quality areas within the general dungeon complex.
The idea was all well & good, in practice however your average 25-28mm miniature got lost inside them ( see Fig. 2.). You'll appreciate that quite a lot of work had gone into the project at this point & being loath to abort it I used a bit of alcohol lubricated lateral thinking. Fifteen minutes with a very sharp hacksaw & the result was Figure 1, still a nice backdrop for the miniatures but with the added practicality of being able to see inside from a seated attitude.

Resin Dungeon Scenery. Production Underway.

I've finally taken the first steps in getting the modular dungeon terrain into production, there is still some way to go before these sets will be available for sale but its good to have something concrete to show for all the effort so far.
The only fly in the ointment is the continuing wait for the second batch of moulds from my very busy mould maker, its been over twelve months now & I'm seriously considering doing this work myself otherwise it will be another year gone & still no saleable product.

Small gripe over, some pictures of the pieces so far produced:

The basic building blocks to be included in the boxed set.

The basic corner piece with some decayed plasterwork still attached.

20' square room with fancy mouldings.

A simple layout using the basic components.

I think the pictures pretty much speak for themselves, though the weird looking geometry on the 20x20' room deserves a little explanation. I wanted to do a couple of pieces with a bit more than basic stone detail on the walls so in pursuance of this produced some castings with the pillar detail that can be seen in the picture. The only drawback of this piece was the height of the walls which renders it difficult to see any of the interior detail ( or miniatures) from a sitting position. The solution was to take a sharp hacksaw to the finished piece and trim the walls down to one corner. Its weird but it does work. Whether it will prove a hit with the buying public remains to be seen.

Modular Dungeon Production Run Commenced.

Finally made a start on this long overdue project, still waiting on some of the larger moulds from my mould maker but I can start to assemble a stock of the smaller pieces that will ultimately go into the sets.

The Mark 1 entrance stair & a pair of walls for a high status tomb.

Same items with camera flash off.

Two of the basic straight corridor sections, the section on the left featuring loopholes for  darts, gas or water.

Straight wall & corner sections.

Still experimenting with adding colour to the resin, I rather like the marbled effect featured on these pieces but suspect that long term it may be of limited utility.

I should have a few larger bits & pieces cast today if the weather remains un-settled. If it brightens up I may be forced to go to a garden centre after lunch because apparently we need more stuff to squeeze into our already blooming flower beds.

First Modular Dungeon Piece Cast.

This has been an awful long time coming but my mouldmaker has finally delivered the first batch of moulds for my range of dungeon scenery.

N.B. floors are gridded at 1".

So far I have the moulds for the corner piece above & the three other corridor sections, with the larger intersections & rooms to follow shortly. This should work out well as it will give me a chance to build up a stock of the corridor pieces before starting on the bigger pieces when they arrive.
The plan is to offer these for sale in sets at £25 each plus p&p; Set 1 will be a basic set consisting 4 of the pieces seen above, 4 straight wall sections, 4 straight corridor sections & a 4x4" room; Set 2 will be an intersection set with 2 cross intersections, 2 T intersections, a Y intersection & a 60 degree corner.
This is as far as it goes at present, I want to see how much interest there is out there for the products before I start on more ambitious pieces such as larger rooms & items with more intricate geometry.

I'm going to stick with the grey resin for production as it makes the pieces useable straight out of the box, but the walls are well textured and should dry brush nicely.

Grenadier Skeleton Looters & Resin Dungeon News.

Received these through the post today:

Cast by Grenadier in 1988 these are great but utterly, utterly bonkers. What on earth do Skeletons want with a small captive, a pig & a string of sausages? Frankly mind boggling but these are going to be great fun to paint. Also really good from a narrative point of view during encounters.

On a more serious note I have finally had confirmation from that the moulds for my resin retro dungeon  scenery will be ready within the next fortnight so these should be in production fairly soon. It may take me a month or so to cast up enough stock but these ought to be available shortly. Keep checking back for progress reports but in the meantime heres a reminder of what a few of the masters look like.

 As previously stated these are inspired by & compatible with Torchlight Fantasy Products that were briefly available in the mid eighties. Haven't finalised a product name yet but am thinking of selling these under the 'Aceldama Castings' banner.

Formless Sawn of Tsathoggua.

The latest addition to the collection of Call of Cthulhu miniatures.

I don't habitually use miniatures in our occasional CoC games but I do like to paint them for a change of pace & the RAFM range are particularly well realised.

The dapper chap in his MCC sweater is from Copplestone Castings Honest Citizens ? part of their 1920's Gangster range.