What's this?!? TWO postings in the same month?!? Ludicrous... I actually have a couple of weeks off, so I am using the time to get in some much needed painting. Next from the lead mountain was this rather unspectacular beastie from Asgard.
I was NOT enthused. Whilst many of the early Asgard sculpts have a lot of charm and character (for example the excellent trolls from the Fantasy Monster range), several of them are quite coarsely sculpted... such as this one. The level of detail on the scales, eyes and mouth isn't great to be
honest, and there were plenty of flash lines on the scales which were
difficult to cut away/smooth down without wrecking the figure. Still, out with the brushes...
One immediate issue was the base for the figure - it didn't fit well on a 45x20mm GW 'long' base, so it ended up on a 40x40mm base. Even then the head still stuck out over the edge! It also made the base look a bit empty, hence the addition of the heads from a plastic GW skeleton cavalry unit. The original idea for the paint job was to base it on a coral snake - brightly coloured and defined bands to give out a very definitive 'here is danger' signal - and in hindsight I should have gone for a deeper orange or even red, as the final result does make it look like a serpentine version of the lead character from Finding Nemo :( The actual paint job was just white, orange and black bands plus a light yellow for the underbelly, followed up with an Army Painter Soft Tone wash on the orange and yellow parts. The base is just builder's sand.
To be honest I wasn't happy with the figure or the paint job, until I put it on a table and stepped away from it. Oddly enough, it looks a lot better from a distance, especially when placed next to unwary dungeon adventurers. I suspect this figure may get a decent amount of tabletop time - it will certainly meet the need for a generic 'oh-look-here-is-a-giant-serpent' encounter. It also seems to be a fairly rare figure - I've only seen a couple of copies turn up on certain auction sites, and they seem to go for a decent amount. One for the collectors and completists rather than the painters ;)
To be honest I wasn't happy with the figure or the paint job, until I put it on a table and stepped away from it. Oddly enough, it looks a lot better from a distance, especially when placed next to unwary dungeon adventurers. I suspect this figure may get a decent amount of tabletop time - it will certainly meet the need for a generic 'oh-look-here-is-a-giant-serpent' encounter. It also seems to be a fairly rare figure - I've only seen a couple of copies turn up on certain auction sites, and they seem to go for a decent amount. One for the collectors and completists rather than the painters ;)
I like him, yeah mould lines on scales (and chainmail) are buggers to clean up.
ReplyDeleteI think that pose suits it, it's like it's caught in mid strike.