Tuesday, October 15, 2013

Flesh and Bones. More Halloween Reaper figures


I dug out a few more horror themed figures from the Reaper Bones pile. First up, a Frankenstein-esque flesh golem, cobbled together from a variety of corpses.

Flesh Golem

"C'mere, give us a hug."

Another extremely bizarre pose, and despite the flexible Bones material, I was unable to contort his arms into anything more fitting. Maybe he should be throwing his arm around his best bro' Sasquatch.

I used three different skin tones: a cold gray, a dark chocolate and a grisly tan to suggest the creature was stitched together from at least three different corpses. Seams received a wash of dark Vallejo Game Color Charred Brown, with brighter red highlights. Stitches got a stripe of black to get them to pop, followed by a highlight of tan.

Arrius, Skeletal Warrior


This undead warrior was part of the Grave Danger set from the original Bones Kickstarter. I wanted to do something a bit different with his armor, so opted for a deep green coupled with a coppery brown for his cloak and trim.


This is a nice figure, a decent pose, and while his armor is a bit extravagant, it isn't covered in skulls or spikes. His cricket bat weapon is a touch odd, but I figure you could remove it and replace it with a sword or something.

Tuesday, October 8, 2013

More Spooky Reaper Bones: Vampire, Rat Swarm and Bat Swarm

I'm having fun picking out more of the Halloween Bones from last year's Kickstarter. Sticking to the theme is also helping me crank out some of the less interesting sculpts, like these swarms of rats and bats.


The mass of bats had some pretty shallow detail, and a confusing collection of wings, heads and bodies. I used some pretty stark gray drybrushing and a combination of brown paint and inks to pick out the furry bodies, but this still a pretty chaotic mini. If I had to do it again I might go for a pure comic book feel and pick out the bats in bright, blood red to give them a little character.


To match the flagstone bases of the giant rats, I sculpted some dungeon floors out of milliput for these rat swarms. It was fun! I started adding flagstone bases to a few other minis, and even picked up some sculpting tools. Hoping to break out the green stuff and do some more extensive sculpting, as even flagstone bases are tricky for me. Practice makes perfect.


For the vampire, I wanted to keep attention on the actual figure, so eschewed using bright colors on his cloak, saving the deep red for his armor (inspired by the design of Dracula's armor in Francis Ford Coppola's Dracula movie from the 90's). Skin was a simple gray three tone with blue ink wash

I was tempted to add a glass of red liquid in that outstretched hand. "I never drink... wine."

I've been checking out the Bones II Kickstarter currently running, and I'm not quite as hot on it as the original. Reaper seems to be loading it up with miniatures that are pretty similar to the ones from Bones I. I might pick up a few of the individual add on figures, but with a stockpile of Bones figures on hand, I think I may pass on the core set.

Tuesday, October 1, 2013

How Ghastly! Reaper Bones Rats and Ghast


With all of my terrain building materials in storage, I'll need to postpone my celebration of Flocktober until a later date. Instead, to celebrate the Halloween season I've decided to knock out as many spooky Bones from the Kickstarter bundle I received this summer.

Reaper Ghast


This fella has some ropey musculature and a weird pose, but I think overall it's not a bad sculpt. The detail in the face seemed a bit soft, but we'll just chalk that up to decay setting in.

Reaper Rats


Rats don't seem too exciting, but these little guys have quite a lot of personality. I gave them a black undercoat, and hit their undersides and legs with lighter grays. Ears, paws, snout and rail got a base of medium brown. I picked out some ridges on their tales with a few stripes of pink and touched up their ears with the pink as well.


I'm expecting a shipment of the Dwarven Forge terrain and tried out some of Stefan's painting techniques on the flagstone bases of the rats. Black undercoat with a drybrush of dark gray, a few stones picked out in medium brown and then an overall drybrush of greenish tan.

So much kickstarting! Reaper just launched their second Bones kickstarter. I thought I could resist, but already I'm being tempted by the quirky monsters they are offering.