'Hot' from KevinH - 'Flamethrower!'

For this Fortnight Challenge, "Hot," I was trying to figure out what to do. Then, I remembered this German Flamethrower team, from Warlord Games "Bolt Action" line (28mm). I figured a Flamethrower team was just the thing for a "Hot" Fortnight Challenge. 

I had to knock these guys out pretty quickly this morning (and it probably shows) - I've got a LOT on my plate these days, and wasn't sure I'd even be able to post something for Fortnight! (that is also why I haven't been posting regularly, since I hit my Challenge mark - but I do still have to finish off my Entry figures!)

However, I pledged to myself this Challenge, that I wanted to try and make all the Fortnight Challenges, so I had to have "SOMETHING!" I remembered these guys were "secreted" somewhere on "Lead Mountain," but they had been eluding me all week. Finally last night, they turned up, so the cleaning and basing began in earnest!

Despite being Warlord "Bolt Action" figures, they are not Paul Hicks sculpts - they are a bit "cartoon-ie" and the arms on the kneeling guy look a bit awkward. I think the actual "flamer" guy _IS_ based on a Paul Hicks model (I'm pretty sure I have that model somewhere, but it doesn't have the "flame" effect), but the head/face has been resculpted to include the goggles.

Pretty straightforward painting and basing - but it was nice to get out the brushes and slap some paint around, to take my mind off everything else that's going on right now. I think the "flame" effect actually looks better in the pictures, than it does on the figure! 

So the next Fortnight will be "Comedic" - hmm... Time to start putting something together for that one now! Hopefully, "Life" can take a step back for a while...

Thanks for looking! 

'Hot' from AaronH - 'Agent Lake'

Agent Lake is a 28mm model from Brigade Games (US), Pulp Heroines.

Agent Lake,

She's wearing the classic cocktail and .45 combo that was so much the fashion in the 1960's.  The model was clean and easy to clean up.  Simple but with just the right amount of detail.  She was a nice paint.

Clean lines and nice detail.

The sculpting is very good.  The .45 has an ejection port and ridges to grip the upper receiver.

The dress has nice folds, though she is a bit busty.

I don't really have a use for her so she'll probably accompany the Curtgeld as a body guard.

'Hot' from AdamC - 'Sappers of the Legion Etrangere'

When I saw one of the bonus themes was "Hot"  I knew I had a Flames of War Blister that would be prefect.  Let me introduce the Sappers of the Légion étrangère .  The Legion has a reputation as tough guys (to say the least) and the Sappers are the toughest of the tough.

Beards are one of the privileges of the Sappers other french soldiers are supposed to be clean shaven on parade but a beard is part of Sapper's uniform. I like the officer but he doesn't really fit with the rest of the force.  He looks like his work party has just been surprised while the rest are rushing into the action.

As you can see these guys are all running for the "hottest" part of the action. 

I used sand to flock the bases as these guys are most appropriate to the North African and middle eastern campaigns of the Second World War. The climate also dovetails nicely with our theme

Glued bits of cork board to bases before putting on the sand to give it more texture so that it looks like spots were sand has gather around rocks or old structures or old defensive works.

The Khaki French tropical uniforms are similar in color if not in cut to the uniforms of the Legion in World War I and between the wars so They could work in those games as well.  All the troops are rifle or Ax armed so no World War II light MGs to pretend aren't there.

The Legion's Sappers always get the toughest in the toughest fights (if its easy why send the Legion?)  They fight in hot climates and face the hottest fire the enemy can dish out making the a fitting subject for the entry. Miniatures are 15mm and there are 20 in all 3 per base and a two man command stand.

'Hot' from AlanD - 'Naffatah!'

It has been a recovery week at Homunculorum towers after the big race to 1500 points with Tamsin, so this is a simple little entry that is undeniably hot. These are Perry figures of Naffatah (flame troops) for my growing Seljuk army. 

Two of these maniacs are armed with fire syphons, using technology appropriated from the Byzantines, and the other four carry clay grenades of Greek fire. Clearly the notion of occupational health and safety was yet to be invented.

So we have six figures armed with heat producing weapons, in a hot environment. Maybe that's worth double points? :)

'Hot' from AnneO - 'Snake!'

WATCH OUT FOR THAT SNAKE! 

This small Pulp Adventure vignette sits on a 2 inch by 2 inch square base. All figures are from Reaper Miniatures.

Thank you for looking.

'Hot' from BrendonW - 'Slay-o-matic Triple 6'

This Strider from Mantic is made for their game Dead Zone. It is a type of plastic and comes with an MDF base and is around 65mm tall. Painting the detail so that you can keep finding small bits of interest when you look around it was fun. No decals on this one. The armoured glass for the operator has a subtle tint from lighter to darker that gets a little lost in the images and also because i gave it several coats of gloss. Here is an alternative back story for it.

In Judge Dredd’s future Earth outside the walls of the American Mega Citys lies the polluted Atomic wasteland known as The Cursed Earth. Mega City Citizens sometimes get the idea to go on a Hell Trek and journey across the Cursed Earth to start or join a frontier type settlement. Hell Trekkers can face a vast number of obstacles such as large Dinosaurs, mutant attacks, disease and other craziness. What we see here is images of a 'Slay-omatic Triple 6' for self defence and obstacle removal. Used correctly it can be a handy tool to clear the way for any Hell Trek convoy.

This model from the Scott Ian Block Hell Trekkers Club comes armed with an ‘Incinerator XXXXL” for extra big jobs. 

It also also armed with a ‘Slice & Dice Mk 9’ for large meaty problems and more. The shoulder on that arm is also a handy place to place two rockets that can be armed with a number of warhead types including fast acting Anthraxogone.

'Hot' from BurkhardS - 'The Balrog'

Reading the topic for this theme round I had many ideas going through my mind. From flamethrower tanks, men sitting around a camp fire. In the end I decided to do a French Napoleonic field forge. But as they say… no plan survives contact with the enemy. In this case the enemy was life. I had to prepare a number of minis for a tournament in Hamburg last weekend and by spontaneous decision my better half decided we should visit her family this week. So this left me a mere two days to paint my entry. Not enough time to paint more then 10 men, two horses and number of carts for this vignette. So something else had to be found. Looking Moria deep under my lead pile I found the first version of Games Workshops Balrog from the Lord of the Rings range and honestly… what can be hotter than a Balrog? (Yes I know… naked ladies! ;-)) So in the words of Tolkin himself:

“The Balrog reached the bridge. Gandalf stood in the middle of the span, leaning on the staff in his left hand, but in his other hand Glamdring gleamed, cold and white. His enemy halted again, facing him, and the shadow about it reached out like two vast wings. It raised the whip, and the thongs whined and cracked. Fire came from its nostrils. But Gandalf stood firm.

'You cannot pass,' he said. The orcs stood still, and a dead silence fell. 'I am a servant of the Secret Fire, wielder of the flame of Anor. You cannot pass. The dark fire will not avail you, flame of Udûn. Go back to the Shadow! You cannot pass.'

The Balrog made no answer. The fire in it seemed to die, but the darkness grew. It stepped forward slowly onto the bridge, and suddenly it drew itself up to a great height, and its wings were spread from wall to wall; but still Gandalf could be seen, glimmering in the gloom; he seemed small, and altogether alone: grey and bent, like a wizened tree before the onset of a storm.

From out of the shadow a red sword leaped flaming.

Glamdring glittered white in answer.

There was a ringing clash and a stab of white fire. The Balrog fell back and its sword flew up in molten fragments. The wizard swayed on the bridge, stepped back a pace, and then again stood still.

'You cannot pass!' he said.

With a bound the Balrog leaped full upon the bridge. Its whip whirled and hissed.

'He cannot stand alone!' cried Aragorn suddenly and ran back along the bridge. 'Elendil!' he shouted. 'I am with you, Gandalf!'

'Gondor!' cried Boromir and leaped after him.

At that moment Gandalf lifted his staff, and crying aloud he smote the bridge before him. The staff broke asunder and fell from his hand. A blinding sheet of white flame sprang up. The bridge cracked. Right at the Balrog's feet it broke, and the stone upon which it stood crashed into the gulf, while the rest remained, poised, quivering like a tongue of rock thrust out into emptiness.

With a terrible cry the Balrog fell forward, and its shadow plunged down and vanished. But even as it fell it swung its whip, and the thongs lashed and curled about the wizard's knees, dragging him to the brink. He staggered and fell, grasped vainly at the stone, and slid into the abyss. 'Fly, you fools!' he cried, and was gone.”

'Hot' from ByronM - 'Satan the Hottie'

This Fortnight Challenge is “Hot”, and I was stumped for a while initially coming up with something to do for it.  Then I remembered a limited edition resin that I had picked up a while ago from Kingdom Death <http://kingdomdeath.com/> of Satan <http://shop.kingdomdeath.com/products/satan>.  Now, anyone who knows anything about Kingdom Death, knows that the figures are both expertly done and normally pretty twisted. Therefore, check your sensibilities at the door for most of their models (this is actually a fairly tame one).

From the picture below from their site, you can see that most of her “armour” is made up of tongues.  What you can almost make out in the corner is her “armoured” skirt, which is made up of claimed penises from the many men she has seduced. I got no end of hassle from the wife for spending hours painting tits and ass, but not painting or attaching the skirt. Remember, this is a “calm” fig from Kingdom Death, so they are definitely not for everyone.

Satan

So, back to the theme, I believe this miniature fits the theme on multiple levels.  As a representation of Satan, you can imagine the heat of the flames of Hell, so it fits that way.  However, as a female representation Satan, there is no arguing that with her curves she definitely counts as Hot in the sexual way (although maybe not by todays anorexic twig standards, but more in a Marilyn Monroe standard).

I chose to pick up a few Kingdom Death figures a while ago for a few reasons, not the least of which is shock value.  However, I also really hate painting flesh, and feel that I am pretty horrible at it, never getting it right to a level that I am happy with.  Therefore, what better way to get better at it than actually having to paint a whole lot of it.  So this figure more than anything else was a way to work on flesh tones, using a method that is different than what I normally do.  I used the excellent guides that Kingdom Death put up on their website.  The basic idea is, setup a pallet with 10-12 pots on it.  Each pot has shades from darkest to lightest of paints, mixed as 1 part paint, 2 parts glaze medium, 1 part matt medium, 5-6 parts water.  Once each part is mixed you then mix each again in order from lightest to darkest and them back to lightest, WITHOUT washing the brush.  This blends them all very closely, and since each is essentially a glaze they are super thin and require multiple coats.

Needless to say, painting the flesh this way takes a long time, however, I am pretty happy with how it came out.  It works very smoothly and is easy to blend up and down. Seeing how well it worked, I will attempt it again on other figures and with different skin tones as well.  I would even use the same method on armour of almost anything else for competition pieces.  I am used to using glazes, but this was several more steps than my normal, but it worked well (at least in my opinion).

I chose to keep with the basic colours shown in their image, but darkened the tongues down quite a bit from the pinky read they show as I felt it worked better.  They could be imagined to be either real tongues as they rot, or simply enamelled armour to fit a theme.  I also wanted to make her appear demonic, so kept red eyes rather than human eyes.  I tried black eyes, like the demons in the Supernatural TV series, but they were too dark compared to the rest of her.  I also changed the hair colour as I didn’t feel white hair fit with her.  Initially I had her as a red head, but felt it didn’t offer enough contrast with the armour so changed her to a brunette.

Anyway, while I know this figure will definitely not be for everyone, I hope you can appreciate the techniques that were used to get the overall effect.

Satan thanks you for “checking her out”, and yes, as you can tell from the pictures above, she is a little “cheeky”.

Sorry, I know, bad puns.  All I can say is that the Devil made me do it.  :-)

'Hot' from IannickM - 'Thief of Hearts'

When Curt announced the bonus theme rounds, I immediately thought that the "hot" round, considering the high number of men in this hobby, would probably have a substantial number of "hot babes" entries. Yeah, I know, how very original...Obviously you'd supposed knowing that, I'd find something different to paint. Well...you'd be wrong! I indeed decided to go with a hot babe, and what is hotter than a pin-up? Well, how about an angel pin-up?

The figure, "Thief of Hearts Pin Up", is from Dark Sword Miniatures, whch is rapidly becoming one of my favourite manufacturer of fantasy miniatures. It is a very detailed and delicate sculpt, which made it a bit harder to paint and is very different from what I usually do. However it gave me an excuse to use pink, a colour I really enjoy painting. It's also the first time I got to paint women's panties! 

Obviously this figure will not find its way on my gaming table any time soon, but its another one of those pieces I *never* would have painted if not for the Analogue hobby. And I do enjoy getting out of my comfort zone from time to time. So thanks Curt for that.

'Hot' from JamesR - 'Hot Tempered Uruk-hai'

Hello,

In case any of you didn't notice, this week we're voting for the worst entries in the survey.  So feel free to break my vote free streak.

Digging desperately through my unpainted mountain of army men, the best "hot" thing I could find was guys with torches.  One was missing a torch, so I'm armed him as best I could.  They are the plastic Uruk berserkers that came with the Uruk siege box set.

Here are three metal Uruk berserkers.  The only thing "hot" is their temper.  You can't tell in the pics, but I gave the guys veins.  I put on varnish, then spray on clear matte, before the varnish is quite dry.  The matte drys quicker than the varnish and pulls it into small spidery ridges that quite resemble scars or veins on rippling muscles.  Only try this on nude or nearly nude models as you may ruin clothing and armor.

Here they are all together, about to realize their weapons are useless versus thick stone walls, "Run away!".

A spot of gardening.

'til next time,
love and kisses,
Baconfat

'Hot' from JeremyM - 'Fire Elementals'

Here is my hot submission some 28mm Reaper Bones fire elementals. 

Most of these were transparent plastic so I tried to replicate that with transparent paints. It largely worked although it was a pain and I would recommend to probably just prime and paint normally as I'm not entirely convinced I prefer this over regular paint? 

The little one is more 15mm, and the big guy closer to 40 or 50.