Elfstone and Olórin

The Fellowship Emerges

So after the first 2 scenarios in the Fellowship of the Ring Journeybook, which solely involve Dunédain and Nazgûl, and the next couple, which involve the 4 Hobbits, we come to the first appearance of Gandalf and Aragorn.

These are both crucial characters to the story, and I feel good now that I've got them out of the way. There is way too much history to cover in a blog post so I recommend going here for Aragorn, and here for Gandalf, and you can learn all you want!

The Grey Pilgrim

I had an absolute blast painting Gandalf. I love painting long robes. It is easy to get a good result, and you get to play around with mixing colors, which is something I usually stay away from. I currently only have one version of Gandalf the Grey, although I hope to eventually get the Khazad-Dum version, mainly because its awesome. If I can find a good deal I would also like the Rivendell sculpt, as well as Gandalf on his cart. And I just remembered I have the new sculpt from the Hobbit box set, so I may paint that up as part of this project as well. One thing I have decided to do from now on is to use a white undercoat for almost everything. I seem to paint neater with it, as well as it making the colors pop a bit more.

 I went with the scheme straight out of the book, with a few exceptions. MightyChad pointed out that the beard and hair are a bit yellow, but I think I like it, as Gandalf never really had white hair, it was always a fading blonde. I think it makes it pop, if anyone thinks it looks terrible let me know and I may try a slightly lighter drybrush to lighten it a bit more. On to pictures and scheme!

 (Base/Layer/Highlight format as usual)

 Robes: Reaper Pure Black/Codex Grey mixed, Codex Grey, Fortress Grey

Hat: The Fang (Shadow Grey), Codex Grey

Skin: Dark Flesh, Dwarf Flesh, Elf Flesh

Beard: Snakebite Leather, Ushabti Bone (Bleached Bone) drybrush

Glamdring: Boltgun Metal, Chainmail, Mithril Silver

Staff: Doombull Brown (Dark Flesh), Bestial Brown

Belt: Scorched Brown, Bestial Brown

Crystal: Fortress Grey, Skull White

 "'Round here, folks just call him Strider."

Ah, good old Aragorn. Basically a hobo with a sword, who happens to be a huge badass, and the savior of the Western world. However I absolutely hated painting these models for some reason! Yes I chose paint three sculpts of Aragorn all at once to save time, and I am glad I did because for some reason he just wasn't that fun to paint. They turned out so-so in my opinion. I think the main reason is that the multitude of greens and browns kind of blend together in my eyes (remember I'm color deficient) and it doesn't seem like I make any progress. I also think I should have painted them inside out, meaning starting at the skin, and working out. I usually start with the biggest surface, and I'm not sure why I do things that way, but in this case I should have broken the habit. I'll know next time I suppose. This was also my absolute first experience painting fire, and I think it turned out pretty good. The trick with fire is that the lighter colors go on first, and you go darker as you grade up. If you would like to know more just shoot me a message or comment on here.

The sculpts I used were: The Fellowship version, Aragorn at Weathertop, and Amon Hen Aragorn. Here are the pictures, followed by a group picture and the scheme breakdown.

 Cloak/Trench coat thing: Caliban Green (Dark Angels Green), MM Acryl Dark Green highlight

Jerkin/Tunic: Doombull Brown (Dark Flesh), Bestial Brown

Boots and Bow: Scorched Brown, Bestial Brown

Leather belt, Straps, scabbards: Reaper Pure Black, Pure Black/Scorched Brown mix, Scorched Brown

Quiver: White basecoat, Watery coat of MM Acryl Dark Green

Pants and Bedrolls: Pure Black, Codex Grey drybrush

Sword and Metal Bits: Boltgun metal, Chainmail, Mithril Silver

Skin: Dark Flesh, Dwarf Flesh, Elf Flesh

Hair: Scorched Brown, Bestial Brown

Sleeves (Amon-Hen sculpt): Shadow Grey, Codex Grey

On Deck

 I was going to include it in this post, but I didn't want it to be too long or to make all my loyal fans wait too long for an update. But next post I will have at the minimum two sculpts of Legolas, and possibly two versions of Gimli as well. Following that I will move on to Boromir, the 4 Hobbits, then Arwen and Glorfindel. And on the long game I will have some wild wargs to paint, as well as starting work on moria goblins and a troll, but thats a long way off. I also recently acquired through auction the following:

- Gamling on foot.
- Arwen mtd. w/ Frodo (hard to find model)
- Another mtd. Ringwraith (Yay! only 5 more after this one is painted)
- Galadriel
- Celeborn

The Nine Have Returned!

Return of the Nazgûl

So after a looooong hiatus from painting, due to...well...life. I have gotten some inspiration and time to do some more work on my project. I didn't want to tax myself too much, and I wanted to finish a big chunk of models, so I settled on finishing the remaining 5 Nazgûl I had waiting on me. I'll get to painting in a bit, but first, a little bit about the history of the Nine.

The Nazgûl, or Ringwraiths (Sindarin: Uliari) were originally nine Kings of Men who were given rings of power by Sauron the Deceiver. They greedily took them (because men are like that) and were immediately enslaved to Sauron's will, as in crafting the nine rings he had secretly slaved them to the will of the One Ring. Essentially what happened was their souls were cursed to never die and eternally serve their master. You can read more about their goings on prior to the Lord of the Rings here.

Getting Back Into the Swing of Things

I decided to use the same approach to the remaining 5 'wraiths I used with their 4 brethren I painted last fall. That is, 3 heavy coats of black wash, followed by a drybrush of codex grey. This time I went heavier on the codex grey drybrush, which I thought looked better (I actually went back and touched up the older guys too). I also painted another mounted Ringwraith and this time spent more time on the mount, which I think turned out really well. Unfortunately I couldn't find the other sculpts I needed for the 'wraiths so I have a few duplicates, but I would rather have them all painted and ready than have to wait for months for them to show up on eBay. In the future I plan to get all the named versions that GW has made just to have variety. I'll shut-up now and show you pictures, then give a more detailed color breakdown after.

Primer: Gray

Cloaks: 3 HEAVY coats of Nuln Oil wash, drybrush codex grey.

Metal Bits: Tin Bitz base, Boltgun metal drybrush.

Leather bits: Bestial Brown base, Balor Brown (snakebite leather) highlight.

Horse: Scorched Brown base, Doombull Brown (dark flesh) highlight.


Now here are some more pictures of the Nine in all their glory, as well as a shot of my three mounted fellows.

What to look forward to?

Well as I've officially started another stint of painting madness (probably followed by another few months of nothing...I jest, I jest) I am going to try to keep the flame burning, I just finished a wild few weeks of work, and various other life issues, so I should have time to paint (fingers crossed). I just primed the following models listed in my last post:

I also decided to go ahead and add the Amon-Hen versions of Aragorn, Legolas, Gimli, and Boromir (dying Boromir actually) as they use virtually the same palate so I can save time by knocking them out now. I will actually be painting 3 Aragorns at once, so that will be....interesting. I almost decided to do the Heroes of the West versions as well, but I want to save those as I will have hopefully improved, or come up with better inspiration for them by the time I get to the RotK book (should be about the time I retire).

I am going to start with Gandalf, then the 3 Hunters and Boromir, followed by the alternate Hobbits I will be doing, then Arwen and Glorfindel. In between I may decide to paint some basic foot troops that I have already primed, some Warriors of Minas Tirith, Men of Rohan, and maybe some Moria Goblins.

Nerdy Postlude

I've been reading lots of Tolkien lately, most recently the Book of Lost Tales 1. And I gotta say, I think all the pre-history stuff is so much better than Lord of the Rings. I mean I think the Lord of the Rings is a masterpiece, but the epic feeling of age and power you get when reading about Turin slaying Glaurung, or about Fingolfin fighting THE FUCKING DEVIL hand-to-hand, is downright incredible. My current list of favorite characters is as follows:

- Galadriel: Most people don't realize how incredibly awesome she is. I wish Peter Jackson had included a scene of here tearing down Dol Guldur in the LOTR movies, because yes, she tore down a goddamn mountain by herself. Not to mention when Fëanor wanted to use the light of her hair to make the Silmarils, she told him to fuck off! Oh yeah, Fëanor then went on to basically cause the first world war of Arda because of some treasure, so he wasn't exactly someone you said no to. And another thing, Galadriel was on the earth before the fucking Sun and Moon were in the sky! How about that for some age and power!

- Turin Turambar: Ah the Master of Fate, Slayer of Glaurung. The ultimate tragedy. Basically a guy with super shitty luck, but a lot of badassery, and a really strong sword arm. You need to read the Children of Hurin to really understand why Turin is so awesome.

- Glorfindel: Most people who have read Fellowship of the Ring, know Glorfindel as the elf-lord who rescued Frodo in the Wild after being stabbed by the Witch King, and who sped him to safety in Rivendell, being one of the few who could ride openly against the Nine. That in itself is super badass, and its a shame that he was replaced in the movies by "whiny Arwen" (hereafter named). But what most don't know is that Glorfindel is actually so badass he is reincarnated! Thats right, he already died once. Originally he was Chief of the House of the Golden Flower, one of the noble houses of the Hidden City of Gondolin in the First Age. When Morgoth Bauglir decided to wipe Gondolin off the face of the earth with an army of Dragons, Balrogs and Orcs, it was guys like Glorfindel who simply shrugged, suited up, and started taking as many of the bastards with them as they could. Unfortunately things went south and Tuor (Elrond's granddaddy) fled with his son, Eärendil, and wife, Idril (daughter of King Turgon) through a mountain pass to safety. Well Glorfindel vowed to help them escape. Even more unfortunately they were pursued by a Balrog and ambushed in a pass. Glorfindel decided to stop running and after a running battle, managed to cast the Balrog from the mountain, being pulled to his death in the process. However his sacrifice let the other refugee's flee to safety, wherein Eärendil later helped bring about the fall of Morgoth. So yeah....Glorfindel rocks.

I am done for now, look for my next post in a week or two.

"Aure entuluva!"

Back in the game!!!

Wow. Its been awhile...

Well I would like to say that I'm ready to put in a little bit of work on this project again. I've been inspired lately by reading The Book of Lost Tales 1 and the Children of Hurin.