Back to the Cadians. If I’m lucky, I might get these done before the end of March. A decent month for minis!
A lot of edge highlighting left to do, but they’re starting to shape up
Starts to make a difference pretty quickly!
Honestly these are harder to paint than the Space Marines 👀 A lot more steps and more-organic highlights to worry about, but I can see an end in sight and they’re looking 👌
The workspace 🎨
Next pass in progress. Only a few steps to go beyond this
Last thing to do on the model is the skin, which I have no practice at. Can’t ruin it too badly from here though!
Only basing remains! March goal achieved 🥳
And we’re done. Tomorrow starts the next project
Final spread for the month of March! A touched-up Sentinel and Dreadnought, and freshly-painted Cadians, Praetorians, Intercessors and a lone Hellblaster. Very happy with every bit of this, and big chunk of progress made on the pile of shame 😄 #WarhammerCommunity #warhammer
And a glamor shot of the Cadians before I put them in the cabinet 🤓
I accidentally spent the evening creating a small diorama board just to have a nicer background to photograph minis on 😅 So have some action shots! /cc @pilky
I should have made this years ago 😍 #Warhammer #WarhammerCommunity
Really enjoying the storytelling potential here
I guess I should show you the actual board too, huh
I had begun these Death Guard back in 2019 when I first started painting again, with Contrast, but I think I can do much better today — so I picked up everything I need to re-spray them and start over. Luckily Contrast is very thin so I don’t think I’ll strip them beforehand. Final shot of the previous attempt
So many edges to highlight 😰
This sculpt is kicking my ass — there are just so many nooks and crannies and different surfaces to pay attention to. I don’t want to think about the other dozen on the todo list 👀
Starting to look convincing. I think every model in this damn army is going to have to be treated like a character model for painting. There’s just no way I could batch five of these at a time
No more for tonight. Just a few things remaining, but Papa Nurgle would be proud…
That specular highlight on the bone, and the fleshy tentacle, came out 👌
I guess I lied! Mini complete 🥳. I’m sure I’ll go back and tweak a few things when I have the patience, and basing is in progress, but so much better than my first attempt (second pic)
Fin. The first mini of April.
It finally feels like I can hit the standard of painting I always dreamed of, after 25+ years of collecting 40K. YouTube has completely transformed the learning process, it’s true, but having the right tools, brushes, techniques, and paints, really makes all the difference for an amateur like me. Proud of these minis! #WarhammerCommunity #warhammer40k
Tiny toys; it's easy to forget how small these things are, when all the photos are closeups #WarhammerCommunity
A strategically placed iPad mini makes for a great, versatile backdrop! #WarhammerCommunity
The next logical step was to create a little backdrop app, and populate it with some generated artwork from Stable Diffusion. Does the job!
Another Space Marine in progress, in the stolen minutes of late nights. Gotta keep powering through. My DIY dust shield seems effective…
Freshly-cast white metal, just like back in the olden days 😋
Pretty much done with this one. My April quota is definitely not being met so far — this is only my second mini this month 😅
All done!
Something a little different on the painting desk tonight…

‘It’s just white, how hard could painting white be?’

Spoiler: hard

Turned out ok, though! My first ever Legion mini
Looks great with a backdrop! I really gotta paint up the rest of my Star Wars Legion Core Set so I can justify getting more 😛
Two down. Unfortunately it’s a duplicate sculpt, but there are plenty more where they came from
One last project before April ends. Gotta power through this 8E box before 10E lands 🫡
A reasonable-looking head, complete with stubble! 😄👌
It’s taken longer than I’d hoped, but I’m nearly done with these guys. 70%/80%/90% respectively. Bare head leader guy is going to get some fancy checkerboarding on the knee, which is going to extend the process a bit
Checkerboard: success!
To the shelf!
All finally coming together. I wish I could say it makes a dent in my backlog, but I asked ChatGPT to calculate how long I have left and I think the optimistic answer was ‘4 years’ at current pace 😅
Considering today is the first day I've picked up a paintbrush since May, I'm going to say ‘4 years' was the most optimistic of timelines 😂
Just the smallest amount of progress, but it’s a start!

(They'll look like these when I'm done with them. Hopefully…)

https://mastodon.social/@stroughtonsmith/110124297447285085

Queuing up some fast ones in the meantime. Rescuing some very old metal minis
Primed and ready for tomorrow
Halfway there, or so. I also looked up the price of these on eBay and it’s not pretty 😅 I’m glad I bought these in the 90s and not today…
Nearly ready for highlighting
…and here’s the rest of them. Gonna feel good to finally finish the lot after 25 years in storage 👀
Enough for now, they can get a basing later 🙅‍♂️
Tiny toys
Progressing the next set of minis in my free time. I’m going to finish the grey plastic pile of shame in my cabinet if it kills me
It's funny how everything mostly looks like crap until like 80% of the way through a paint job. Always gotta remind myself to trust the process: https://mastodon.social/@stroughtonsmith/110121125466943568
Looks better already!
Smaller than you’d think!
One step closer
Final stretch now. Time to stress about painting the flag and camo cloak 👀
Flag kinda worked out ok!
And this one comes to an end. I’m cheating: I’m gonna not paint that cloak until I can do a better job. But I’m going to base everything up and send it to the cabinet anyway
@stroughtonsmith My Necrons will destroy them ; )

@CapitandeQueso I dunno, have you seen the power of 'Front Rank, Fire! Middle Rank, Fire! Third Rank, Fire!’? Because it really worked on the Zulus.

This army knows only one neat trick, and makes good use of it 😂

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rD2vDrtjQbY

Zulu - Volley Fire

YouTube
@stroughtonsmith I’m just starting to get into Warhammer and am looking to start painting as well. Where is a good starting point? Is there a set you would recommend?
@matcha06 start how you mean to go on; don't buy something big with lots of models upfront just to burn out immediately, just buy something small that you have a full tutorial for and know you can make it through. This painting channel is a good beginner+ starting point https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OBxZXnCvU1o
Learn to PAINT your FIRST Warhammer 40k Miniatures

YouTube
@stroughtonsmith those little tufts of grass are a wonderful touch.
@stroughtonsmith I’m just starting to get into 40k and man seeing this type of painting work is insane! Absolutely inspiring.
@stroughtonsmith
A similar affliction. The backlog is going up, not down 🧐