Meet Threshold Operatives 1!

Hello,

my painting mojo is lost for quite a while, proving once again I don't really like painting my miniatures, hehe.

Anyways, after a week or so, I've manged to finish painting three of my Threshold operatives for my Strange Aeons game. I got six of the good guys all together for now and I've painted half. I think painting 2-3 miniatures at a time works best for me.

The three guys are all in my current list for the campaign me and my brother are playing (way less often than I'd like!). The fourth guy will be painted with the next batch. After that, on to the evil lurkers!

Let me start by mentioning I HATE! painting skin. I did two tries on those guys, after I failed in an attempt to paint some eyes for a change. I got Vallejo skin tones pack, so I got all I need, but that skin never comes out the way I'd want it to! I also have problems with picking high light colors, so I tend to simply mix white in it. This makes highlights somewhat invisible on the model...I simply guess one isn't enough!

Anyways, those are about as good as they get and here they are:

 I didn't name them for the eternity, but in the current campaign, they got names from Lovecraft's stories. I represent you (from left to right):

Howard Philips Lovecraft, civilian (that simply refuses to die in a campaign!). As you can see, he carries a haunted book of secrets that one mad arab, Abdul Alhazred has written long time before the events! For his own safety, H.P. is armed with .22 pistol. To keep his sanity, he is accompanied by a cat. In one of his stories, Lovecraft has named  a narrator's cat "Nigger man", which, for obvious reason, won't be used. We can call the little fella "cat" anytime!

John Raymond Legrasse, character. The name comes from a police officer in a "Call of Cthulhu" story. In-game he is armed with dual .45s (one tucked on his right hip, other in his left hand). As awesome as he'd look with actual dual .45s in his hands, I went for lantern. As you've seen so far, that really comes handy in the scale photos. And here, Legrasse is astonished by the book his friend carries.  Or maybe he just likes the cat? I don't know how visible it is, but I did some "effect lightning" on him. I'll give you a closer look below in the post. He is somewhat shiny because my matt varnish appears to be pretty glossy, which really bothers me, to be honest.

Last man from batch is agent-in-game, but a fisherman from appearance, James Woodville. I forgot what story I got his name from, but it doesn't really matter. He is dressed in very dirty yellow overalls (painted glossy, but this gloss seems too matt somehow...those varnishes!). Armed with a bolt-action gun (which is sculpted really simplified), but I play him as if he'd be armed with a bigger calibre, elephant gun. Now that I think of it, I shouldn't paint him and then varnish, but paint his overalls yellow, paint gloss varnish on, then wash it with brown wash to dirty the clothes. You know, mud can't be glossy, even if on glossy clothes!

For the end, close up on some light effects, I didn't want to over do it. Neither I like how the light in the lantern came out...way too firey!

Otherwise, in the hobby, I am trying to restrain myself from buying any more miniatures, as I'm saving for my trip to England in April. I have to paint all my zombies, all my SA miniatures, game all my SA games, start my zombie campaign...will see how long I can restrain myself from getting some dollies for sculpting, Ramshackle's goodies, cultists and probably something I don't need at all! Oh, I do need sculpting tools, actually...I've ordered some in February from Maelstrom games, but they happened to be out of stock at supplier. I got some mails how the tools will be sent "next week" about 2 months ago, but now that store is in liquidation, I think I can say goodbye to the money now. I didn't want a return as I figured that if I'd wait so long, I might as well wait some more...oh well. I did bought a pack of tools for drawing in local store...got 2 useless pointy tools, a stipple brush, useless fan rush and...AND a pointy and flat "rubber shaper", which should prove useful for smoothing my sculpts.  I even found a picture online!



Thanks for looking,
Mathyoo