Minis Monday
Been awhile, champs. Minis Monday is one of those things I don’t have much to write about on a weekly basis. I could talk about what I’m doing, post some progress pics and whatnot, but that would require so many more steps than I really feel like taking that I just…don’t. I get most of my Minis discussion out of my system with Fearless Games and Touching Base, so you guys here at Coming Up Cypress do get a bit shafted.
ON TO TODAYS TOPIC: Painting fatigue.
I don’t know if there’s a legitimate name for it, but what I call painting fatigue is that feeling you get when you’ve painted a whole bunch of minis in the same color scheme and you just don’t want to do it anymore but your army isn’t done yet and just looking at your unpainted minis makes you tired. That’s painting fatigue. I’m currently experiencing painting fatigue with my Blood Angels for Fearless Games’ Legends of War. Twenty of the twenty eight minis in the army are supposed to be alabaster white, and painting white isn’t exactly a party. After painting fifteen of them, I literally wanted to just throw the army in the trash and call it a day because I don’t want to paint anymore white minis. Then I actually FORCIBLY FORGOT about the last five minis I need to paint in white. When I remembered, I felt sad.
When this happens, you have two choices. One is to give up and not finish the project and probably regret it later. The other is to stop whatever it is you’re currently doing and paint whatever is most different from what’s got you fatigued. Sick of painting troops? Paint a tank or a dreadnought or some other vehicle. Sick of painting vehicles? Paint troops. Sick of painting one color? Paint whatever in your army can be a different color. Can’t do any of these because your army list is too restrictive? Start that other army you’ve wanted to do, but make it radically different from what you’re doing now.
Monotony is like poison for the human brain. It makes us unhappy, and makes us sloppy. If you keep painting the same thing over and over to the point where you don’t like doing it, your paint job is going to suffer. My last Death Company looks MUCH different from my first Sanguinary Guard, because by the time I was painting that mini I was just SO done with white. So, I let myself take a break instead of trying to muscle through the last 5 white minis. I painted my Vanguard Veterans, which are very much red. I loved painting them, and they came out beautifully. Next I’m going to paint my Furioso Dreadnought. This way, not only am I separated from painting white, I’m separated from painting troops. Then, when I go back to my last five Sanguinary Guard, I’ll be rested and ready to tackle the white. After that I’ll reward myself by painting my Sanguinor.
With any luck, this approach will get me through the last stretch of this army and I’ll finally have one finished.
Minis Monday
So it’s time for another Minis Monday. This segment is the one I post the least often, mostly because I get a lot of my miniatures discussion out over at the Fearless Games channel. However, now and again I decide that I wanna write it down, so that’s a-what I’m doing.
Remember, if you came here from the Fearless Games Facebook page, THIS BLOG IS MY PERSONAL BLOG. ANYTHING I SAY HERE IS SOLELY ME, AND DOES NOT REFLECT THE OPINIONS OR BEHAVIOR OF THE FEARLESS GAMES GROUP. I OFTEN CENSOR MY LANGUAGE FOR FEARLESS GAMES, BUT HERE I DON’T. IF YOU DON’T LIKE THAT, THEN PLEASE DON’T READ ON.
Now that we have that shit out of the way, I wanted to discuss the importance of basing you damn models. Now I’m not gonna lie – up until recently, I never saw the point and frankly didn’t give a shit about basing. It felt like a lot of extra work just for the sake of cosmetics, and that didn’t mesh with me at the time.
It didn’t mesh because I was lazy and my ADD wasn’t being treated and I thought I’d do a bad job because I thought I was bad at everything. SEE SOME OF THIS BLOG’S EARLY POSTS FOR SOME OF THAT INSECURE BULLSHIT.
I recently based my first squad of minis, specifically my Sanguinary Guard for the Blood Angels army I’m making for the Legends of War thing we’re doing at Fearless Games. I used some Fine Basing Grit by a company called Hobby Round, I think. It’s basically fat sand. Anyway, I’m not going to get into the how-to, because that’s something you can find EASILY. Might do a video on it for Fearless Games, dunno yet. AAAANYWAY, the point is that when I was done, the minis went from being cool-looking miniatures, to a finished fucking product. It hadn’t been NECESSARY, but it brought that extra bit of flair to the models that hadn’t been there.
And I didn’t do anything fancy. I’m serious. They’re dirt based. My miniatures look like they’re standing on dirt. No water, no grass, no rocks, just some fuckin DIRT. And it looks REALLY DAMN GOOD. And it was then that I realized that while basing isn’t NECESSARY, it’s very damn important. Would you hang a really nice painting on your wall without a frame? Sure, you could, but it just wouldn’t look as nice. It’d look like you half-assed it, or like you’re in a thrown-together apartment. Throw even a cheap, simple frame around that shit and suddenly you’re in the fuckin GUGGENHEIM, man.
Seriously. Sometimes that extra mile is really important to making your minis shine. And it doesn’t take long. Hell, you can make it look like you based your minis by PAINTING FUCKING STREET LINES ON THE ALREADY BLACK BASES. Literally just paint some lines. Yeah, that doesn’t work in ALL terrains, but that doesn’t matter. The basing is more about having a finished product than a versatile all-terrain look. It’s the same for my dirt bases. They’ll look silly in ice terrain or urban terrain, but my opponent will appreciate that I’ve gone that extra mile to add a LITTLE immersion, even if that immersion isn’t constant.
Just some food for thought.
Minis Monday
I’m changing Model Monday to Minis Monday because I didn’t like Model Monday at all which was part of why I never ever did it. Minis Monday is more accurate and doesn’t sound like I’m discussing fashion or something.
So to kick off the new name, I want to discuss something that everyone in a miniature wargames hobby needs to eventually think about – army storage and transportation. We did an episode of Touching Base about this a couple months ago, but it’s on my mind recently. Why is it on my mind? Because the Fearless bought me a Battlefoam Custom 216 case for my birthday this past weekend.Before, the only case I owned was a Sabol Designs Army Transport case.
Both of these bags are solid decisions for anyone who needs to transport a smaller force – 1800 or so points of space marines should fit just fine in either of these bad boys. They’re fairly comparable in price, too. The problem is choosing between the two. So I’m gonna break down the differences here for you.
Pluck foam versus a custom-cut tray: In the Sabol Designs bag, you have a few trays of pluck foam. If you don’t know what pluck foam is, just google it, it’s a simple concept. You pull bits off foam off the tray to make the shape of the model you’re storing. It takes a little time and planning on your part, but it’s no Herculean task. The Battlefoam bag has a custom-cut tray – the foam is literally cut into the shapes of the model (or the right sized rectangle for more generic units) that you’ll be storing. Now, this requires that you know what you’re going to be storing in the bag when you order it, but if you have your army complete, or have a coherent army list, then this isn’t even really an effort you’d need to make. Now, personally, I think both methods are just fine. If I had to choose between the two, though, I’d choose the custom-cut tray. Why? Less mess. When preparing a pluck foam tray, you end up with a lot of foam bits that you just need to either throw away or put in a box for use in whatever craft project you might need it for. If you don’t have use for it, then it’s just a pile of garbage foam you need to throw away. Custom cut trays avoid that problem, and so in this case I give the win to the Battlefoam Case.
Carrying around the Sabol Designs bag versus carrying around the Battlefoam bag: the Sabol Army Transport has a shoulderstrap attached to it. It’s your standard bag strap, probably a vinyl job (I don’t know my fabrics). The problem? It’s too short. I keep it as long as it goes, and for a guy my size (5 foot 7 and the high-end of 200 pounds) it doesn’t fit around me nicely. You could argue that it would be better if I lost some weight, but it’s not JUST the length, but the spot it attaches to on the bag that makes it a bit cumbersome. Is it a dealbreaker? No. However, the Battlefoam case has a shoulderstrap, a briefcase-style handle, and a third handle on the face of it to carry it flat instead of sideways. I haven’t even tried the shoulderstrap because I don’t need to. The briefcase handle has been my go-to method, but I’ll likely use the other handle too. If I ever DO need to use the shoulderstrap, it will probably be better than the Army Transport because the Battlefoam case is shaped like a basic laptop or messenger bag. Another win for Battlefoam.
Army Transport’s many pouches versus Battlefoam’s two small side pouches: the battlefoam case has two little pouches on the side for things like dice or a small rangefinder. They’re not bad, they do the job they’re intended for, but what if you need to carry your codex, or a small rulebook, or blast/flamer/foot of gork and mork templates? You’re kinda boned, you’ll need another bag. This is where the Army Transport by Sabol Designs shines. It’s got more than enough storage space for your non-army necessities. I currently have three codices, a mini rulebook, templates, and dice in my Army Transport along with most of my Black Templars. This win absolutely goes to Army Transport.
Durability: the Army Transport bag is soft vinyl (again, not sure, don’t know my fabrics), relying mostly on the foam for protection in order to keep the bag affordable and lightweight. This isn’t a BAD call, but it requires you to be careful where you put the thing and what you put on top of it. The Battlefoam case has a hard shell. Now, I’m not saying this bad boy can take a bullet or anything even though Battlefoam makes a product that can do that, but it can take more of a beating before your models have to start worrying. The foam becomes a SECOND line of defense, rather than the only line of defense. However, the Battlefoam case remains lightweight, and the price is only about ten bucks higher than the Army Transport. I think this is another win for the Battlefoam product.
Aside from these four differences, the two products are functionally the same. They take up similar amounts of space (in different shapes), they both do the job they’re intend for, etc etc. Some people may disagree with my assessments, or might not care about certain functions (a hard shell versus no hard shell, or the presence or lack of extra pouches), and that’s cool for you. Even having broken down the differences, I don’t know if I’d recommend one case over the other, or if I’ll have loyalty to one brand over the other because I like them both. I’ll be using the Battlefoam case for the army it was intended for – my Blood Angels – but I’ll likely keep using my Army Transport for my Black Templars.
I’ll likely be doing a side-by-side video comparison of the two bags for the Fearless Games channel sometime soon, so if you’re interested in that I’ll post it here.
Model Monday
So it’s been a few weeks since I’ve done a Model Monday post, and that’s mostly because my camera isn’t so hot (or I don’t know what I’m doing) and I don’t have a proper lightbox, so getting pictures of my work up makes it difficult to make these posts with an real relevance. I could tell you all about my technique or my progress, but it wouldn’t really matter because ultimately, painting is a visual medium.
So instead of talking about my progress or my technique, I guess I’ll talk about something that doesn’t require visual aids.
Right now I got nothin. I dunno…make sure you thin your paints, homie. Keep your brushes in good condition. Scrape off them mold lines.
As an update, painting alabaster is a real bitch but it looks soooo goooooooood on my Sanguinary Guard. I’m happier with them than I am with Dante, who you can see some less than flattering photos of over at the Fearless Games Facebook.
First Toku Tuesday and a general post I guess maybe?
So I realized that today is Tuesday, and I mentioned before that one thing I’d like to do is called Toku Tuesday, so that’s just what I’m going to do.
For anyone confused, toku is short for tokusatsu, and is defined by Wikipedia as: “a Japanese term that applies to any live-action film or television drama that usually features superheroes and makes considerable use of special effects”. Essentially, Japan’s equivalent to The Avengers or your average Michael Bay film.
So, tokusatsu is your Godzilla, your Gamera, your Ultraman, Kamen Rider, Metal Heroes, Super Sentai, that sort of stuff. A lot of it was appropriated for such American shows as Might Morphin Power Rangers, Big Bad Beetle Borgs, VR Troopers, and Masked Rider.
Now that we have that out of the way, today I’d like to talk about a show that, if you’re into toku, may have gone under your radar – it certainly went under mine for quite some time. The show in question is called Garo. Garo is the story of a young man named Saejima Kouga, who on the outside just looks like a dude walkin’ around in the raddest fucking coat of all time, but turns out to be one of an order of warriors known as Makai Knights (Makai Kishi in the Japanese). Makai Knights’ sole purpose is to defend mankind from the evil Horrors that lurk just outside of our world, waiting to get in and gobble us all up. That said, Kouga isn’t just a Makai Knight, he’s a Makai Knight of some rank, having inherited the title of Garo from his father, along with some fairly big shoes to fill.
I’m not going to spoil the story for you guys, because I really just want to encourage you to sit down and watch it yourself. The show resonated with some pretty heavy Castlevania, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, and Supernatural vibes, but with a nice seasoning of that unique Japanese flavor that you find in Kamen Rider and Super Sentai (a little of that flavor remains in the Americanized Power Rangers shows). If you’re a fan of any of the things I just said, and aren’t offended by the occasional boob, then do yourself a fucking favor and watch Garo. There’s two seasons and a few movies, and you can find them fansubbed at TV-Nihon and Overtime with little trouble. I prefer Overtime’s subs to TV-Nihon’s, but TVN is the only place I’ve been able to find Season 1. AS A WARNING – this show does have some more mature shit going on in it than your average Kamen Rider and especially your average Super Sentai. If you’re thinking about watching this with your kids, remember that there’s a good few instances of bare boobs, a lot of fairly graphic violence, and a good bit of just overall more mature themes. I have no problem with those things, I love that shit, and assuming you either know me (which would be one reason you’re reading this) or you’ve gotten this far in (which means you can handle a bit of foul language), then you don’t mind it either. But hey, you might have kids, I don’t know. YOU’VE BEEN WARNED.
—–END OF TOKU TUESDAY LINE—–
Aside from that I’ve had a bit of trouble getting any real work done today, despite taking my vyvanse. I had a somewhat important distraction of a personal nature that I’m not going to detail here but links back to what will eventually become a theme of discussion here – my personal insecurities. Turns out I talk a big game but don’t really think all too highly of myself, and that causes me to jump to stupid conclusions about the way other people behave, and that causes those people to feel kind of hurt, and rightfully so. I need to constantly remind myself that these people love me just the way I am, and that all of this pressure that I’m perceiving is pressure that I’ve put on myself.
I feel better now, since the situation that had me distracted was resolved (at least for the moment), but I’ve still been having trouble working. I got the revised synopsis for The Beacon finished, as well as the revised list of Major Characters, but even that I’m not super confident in. I feel like I can do better, but I don’t know what more to do with it when I look at it.
Gonna try to get some more editing in over the next hour or so before running out at the last minute to get to Blick before the close so that I can grab the brush(es) I need to finish the Commander Dante model I’m painting for Fearless Games‘ new Legends of War series. If you’re into Warhammer 40k, check out that channel, you might like what you see.
That’s all I’ll pain you with for now. Signing off.
Coming up Cypress 
