Greenstuffing for Fun and Profit-- Or Neither

Made my first attempts at greenstuffing the other night. I was trying to sculpt a loincloth of sorts onto one of my unpainted minis, and lemme tell you, friends, it was nowhere near as easy as Sculptor J makes it look. I'd finally gotten it to do what I wanted it to, when I turned it over to work on the back and stuck my big honkin' thumb right squa' in the center of my lovely, painstakingly crafted little ripples. There was cussing.

Luckily, I was able to get a tutorial from said friend-with-talent, and here are the results. I won't even begin to claim that most of this work was mine, but some of it was, and after a few final touches, I'll be posting a bunch more pictures that are entirely my own.

I did this bit on the right entirely on me ownsies! Go, me!

Oh My God, I Spread the Sickness, I Have Infected My Dear Mr. Sanders with the Modeling Bug, I Feel Dirty

That is all.

Why, Yes, They ARE Yellow

The Word Bearers intrigued me from my first reading of the Chaos Space Marine Codex. I hail from the Deep South's Bible Belt, and have something of a soft spot for zealotry. In my mind, the Word Bearers are the radical Catholic wing of the CSM, and I envisioned them painted accordingly: bright, clean, vivid yellows; glistening reds; pure, unsullied whites. My Word Bearers follow Chaos because therein lies the path to Enlightenment. Their skulls are not mere trophies, representative of conquest, but symbols of the Truth beneath the flesh.

The following are a couple of test models, partially or mostly finished. I hope to do a good bit of converting on the rest of the squad, adding scrolls, grimoires, banners, and the like. There's too much paint on these gentlemen, but I'm trying to curb my Simple Green addiction (mmm, jagermeister!), and the third step of recovery is learning to live with mistakes.

And finally, with left arm and backpack:

The placement of the arm drives me batty,
as it cuts across his chest and obscures most of the detailing there, but oh well.
( step three, step three, step three....)

Finally, please note that this camera is not mine, and we're not friends yet.

Like a Lemming from the Clifftops...

Welcome to this, my inaugural posting! After months of urging from (a) well-meaning friend(s), I'm finally ready to parade my ignorance of things 40k before the eyes of the World Wide Web. Here, you will not find artfully painted miniatures or skillfully executed conversions, but you may discover ways to have more fun with the hobby, especially if, like me, you're a newcomer in a circle of long-term enthusiasts.

I was originally drawn to the Eldar because- well, I'm a girl. And yes, I'm fully aware that the urge to gravitate towards the sparkly, graceful, and disco-riffic is not a universally feminine trait, but it's my best excuse. I joyfully christened them my "Skittle Squadron" and made plans to adorn all of their bases with crystals and glittery fingernail polish. Several months of despair and three changes of paint schemes later, I began to suspect that they were not, in fact, the army for me.

Which leads us to TIP NUMBER ONE: research your army. Admiring someone else's beautifully painted models is not the same thing as enjoying painting them yourself. Very few of the newbies I know actually stick with their original troop choice. Get your hands on one of the standard troop models, paint it up, and then imagine yourself doing the exact same thing another dozen or so times. Still fun? Not for me, it wasn't. Hence, my brand-spankin' new blog about Word Bearers.....