As I mentioned last week, I finally feel like the Pangolin is starting to round into form. Or at least the scales are. Here’s a look at it now.
Because the pangolin is so big and the way the scales are sculpted, I’m truthfully not going for perfectly smooth blends here. I officially have one month to finish this project and I want to get it done sooner than later so perfection is the enemy here. Also, since this miniature is so big that it can be seen from far away, it probably doesn’t need silky smooth transitions. I’m going to hold off on talking about pangolins and why I chose this particular subject until close to the end of this project but I do think its worth sharing a picture of the inspiration because the paint job does look almost like a work of fantasy at this point.
Most pangolins are not so visually interesting and look more like this one which would not be as engaging or challenging to paint truthfully.
I’m going to turn my attention towards the remaining parts of the pangolin and then the base so its possible this project won’t take too much longer. Maybe another week or two.
Speaking of a week from now, next weekend is MMSI so I’ll be exhibiting Minerva and I think I’ll bring my old MESBG diorama just so she doesn’t look lonely. This year I’m going to try and do a little bit more shopping (especially since Adepticon has moved out of Chicago) and am looking forward to enjoying the MMSI experience even more since I know what to expect from the show. I would guess that I have a pretty decent chance of earning another gold medal this year but I certainly am not overconfident and will be eager to see how my entries do.
Finally, I wanted to show something that I’ve noticed in the large scale miniature market that some of you will find interesting. A few small manufacturers are creating large scale sculpts that are overtly inspired by Warhammer. I’m a little surprised that GW lets them sell these but for now anyway, they’re available. Here’s a miniature that’s a real evolution from the old Empire sculpts in Warhammer Fantasy.
Akelarre Models do a couple of sculpts that clearly take inspiration from Warhammer Fantasy but I think this one is my favorite. There’s almost nothing about it that isn’t excellent!
A new manufacturer which chose the somewhat unfortunate name of Lust Miniatures has created a really cool bust of a Dark Elf as well.
As you can see, its not hard to figure out where the inspiration for this came from either! It is quite a nice sculpt though and its also excellently painted. Seeing these products makes me wonder if Games Workshop is missing out on sales by not releasing their own busts/large scale minis that are strictly for display painting. I can only speak for myself but I’d certainly consider painting either of the two above and if GW made their own, I’d feel even better about buying from them because I know the quality should be excellent.
That’s all for me this week though I have an article I’m working on about the current state of Fallout Wasteland Warfare which should get published sooner than later so I hope that some of you will find that interesting as well.
Kuribo's Painting 
The Pangolin is looking great mate. How large is it exactly? Good luck with the gold medal mate, you’ve definitely got my vote and yeah the larger scale GW miniatures look very cool indeed. I could see you doing a beautiful job on the empire one.
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Thanks for the kind words as always! It’s twelve inches long, if you can believe it. I will show a size comparison with some other miniatures when its done. If I don’t do well, I’m going to send the judges straight to you, mate 🙂
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I’ll sort them out mate. I’ll persuade them with a baseball bat if need be.
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The pangolin is looking great!
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Thank you, Mark!
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Excellent progress on the Pangolin Jeff, once you’ve got the face and underbelly done, I think it will really highlight the scales.
Hope you have a great time at the show, try not to spend too much ! LOL
Forgeworld used to do big showcase models, and busts, but that stopped some time ago now, and as Forgeworld is now been absorbed back into GW I very much doubt we will ever see that sort of thing again.
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Working on the face is definitely making a difference. Its funny how much more real the miniature looks once that is done.
I will certainly try! I’m on a budget so I’m sure I’ll be somewhat disciplined. There tends to be a lot of historical minis there which don’t always interest me too.
I didn’t know that Forge World did that. I think that would be better received now than in the past as larger scale minis have become their own niche in the hobby. There isn’t as much crossover between gaming miniatures and larger scales as people might think as well. Some people paint both but there are plenty of painters who only do large scale stuff.
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Nice work on the pangolin! 🙂 Hope the show goes well for you! Interesting point about GW but since much of their “Empire” figures are based on historical figures anyway I can’t see how they can get upset – how do you distinguish whether a figure’s based on a historical figure or on a fantasy figure based on a historical one (that makes sense in my head at least)!
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Thank you, John. The pangolin is hopefully getting more interesting as it goes along. The first week or so barely deserved a mention, if I’m honest!
I didn’t mention it but I thought the same on Warhammer Empire models. I don’t know which European forces they copied exactly but I do know it was heavily inspired by historical precedence. Truthfully, the older Warhammer Fantasy game had a lot of generic stuff in it. High Elves, Orcs, Dwarves, Vampire Counts, the Empire. It was all generic fantasy tropes or something inspired by history. A lot of Warhammer fans think they got rid of that game and replaced it with Age of Sigmar because they renamed everything into something they can trademark/copyright. Dwarves are Duardin (whatever that means!), for example. I don’t know if that’s true and funnily enough, they’re bringing it all back for their The Old World game anyway. Either way, I think that protects third parties from riffing on old GW designs like the Empire mini in this article.
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good luck with the conventions / paint contests. Hope you have a good experience. 😀
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It was a great time last year so I’ll hope for the same again this time. I’m going to try and soak it up a bit more this time as I’m sure you can relate to as an experience convention goer yourself 🙂
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I like where you’re going with the Pangolin, I think what you’ve got has more visual interest, while still being clearly inspired by that first photo. Not sure what you plan on doing with it in the long term but I have to suggest a game of Savage Core with it as the centrepiece (giant pangolin sounds extremely pulpy to me!). Although I seem to remember you didn’t like the game that much.
Forgeworld used to do busts back in the day, I’d love to see them go that way again. That greatswordsman is fantastic.
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I’m glad to hear it! I don’t know that I’ve nailed the scale colors and I’ve erred on the side of making them as visually interesting as I can but I can live with that 🙂
A giant pangolin would be a sight in Palaeo Diet or Savage Core! I will perhaps end up repeating this information when I do talk about pangolins but they’re really old animals in the way that they have more in common with long extinct mammals than most current mammal species do. They basically walk on using their hind legs in a fashion somewhat reminiscent to a T-Rex too. All this is to say, they’d fit in extremely well in a prehistoric game!
Its a shame that Forgeworld doesn’t do anything like that still. I don’t like the diorama they released for MESBG a while back but I do think they’d do an even better job on some busts or larger scale miniatures for display painting!
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Are you enjoying the pangolin? It’s so different from your usual fare that I can imagine it either represents a pleasant palate-cleanser or a tedious duty! It certainly looks cool though – in fact more exciting than most real pangolin based on the WWF reference picture.
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It was definitely a different kind of project to work on. It reminds me of working on larger terrain pieces in that everything takes longer than you think it is going to and there is a fair bit of repetition in the painting. And you’re right, I made the scales a little brighter than they actually are. Mostly because that is the closest I can get in Citadel paints 🙂
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