A thing a week 2026, week 44

Unlike last week, these guys are way more likely to get screen time. Left to right we have Gnome Sergeant, Gnome Sentry #1, Gnome Sentry #2, Gnome Captain, Hegwick Bombino, Gnome Wizard, and Halfling Fighter. The first four can be found in Gnome Warriors. There are notably no gnomes nor any halflings in my fantasy worlds but other than the barefoot halflings, they usually double pretty well for Dwarves which are very common. These folks are another speedpaint turned middle-of-the-road effort but because they were small with fewer details, each of those details got to be better. Hegwick got a little more attention because he's just so danged whimsical. The Halfling Fighter also got more effort since he's wearing a gambison which I like but which are woefully under-represented in the modern fantasy milieux. 

2026 finished mini counter: 255

A thing a week 2026, week 43

This week we have a buncha weirdos and boy did I struggle trying to figure out what to do with them.  First up we have four witches and their cauldron. They had very goblin-y features so I went with green which went well with their purple cloaks. That meant that the leathers an other details had to be orange to complete the triangle. I didn't do a lot of work here and it shows but then again, I don't know that they'll ever get any screen time but feel free to insert the usual disclaimer here. The fire under the cauldron and the effects coming out of the top needed more work but meh. Left to right we have Cacklebra, Ganglebrok, their Cauldron, and Shrewbrew from Toil and Trouble: Witch Coven.

These three are mongrelfolk, a very bizarre creature out of D&D. I am super not into body horror and these guys are that. Left to right we have Boon, Grottwash, and Goatweed from Mongrelmen. The mismash of creature parts and the transitions between them were a real challenge and I really didn't do enough work. It was surprisingly difficult determining which parts were the creature and which parts were the gear. They turned out OK for the minimal investment painting them but, I dunno, these aren't my favorite.

2026 finished mini counter: 249 

A thing a week 2026, week 42

Our Bones 6 not-theme barrels on this week with a bunch of Dwarves. I use a lot of them in my games because I love the Scottish brogue. Left to right we have

Dhulrekk Thulfinson, Rune Warrior, Boren Backslap, Dwarf Ratcatcher complete with this prized mouser, Kragmarr Pummeler, Dwarf Monk, and Dwarf Cleric. These are middle of the road efforts when I expected to do speedpaints so they came out better than I might have expected. The cleric got extra attention as is customary and I contemplated taking her to higher quality but ultimately didn't. I especially like Boren since he looks so fierce but his mouser really can't be bothered in an appropriately cat-like way. Dhulrekk probably could have used some higher values and more saturation as he reads very muddy.

These four are the more serious Kragmarr guys, left to right: Grimm Grayrune, Dwarf Priest

, Dwarf King Hargrim Axehelm, Kragmarr Royal Guard who has no link, and Kragmarr Berserker. These are great sculpts and very Dwarfy which I approve of. As the sculpt did so much of the work and I could get a lot done with drybrushing and washes, I was able to spend more time picking out details resulting in a better result. Notably I didn't pick out the tiny gemstones on their beard jewelry but I at least thought about it. They do have a few more accoutrements than I might have appreciated but I'll give them a pass this time. Ultimately, they look a lot better than the seven-ish hours I spent on these four. 

2026 finished mini counter: 242 

A thing a week 2026, week 41

Continuing our Bones 6 non-theme, we start with the Rageclaw Warrior who might look or sound familiar to last year's Week 46 Rageclaw Slayer who wound up proudly prepared in the display case. This guy got nowhere near as much effort but still manages to look good despite it. Looking at these shots, I probably could have done more to bring up the highlights on this tail and face and probably shouldn't have wimped out on his very sparse armor and done the NMM I might have wanted to. What I do know is that he's done and that's something.

 

These guys are Town Guards and I'm pretty sure I've painted guys in this style/line before but couldn't find it in my archives. To be honest, I didn't really look all that hard, either. I've been missing a nice blue that isn't the Golden So Flat Ultramarine that's been over-represented in the last year or so. Luckily, the Reaper paint kickstarter had several nice blues two of which are featured here. These guys are (pretty obviously) a speed paint which super shows on the shield guy's heraldry. Also, try as I might, the hard plastic used on these guys resisted my efforts to unbend swords and whatnot. 

2026 finished mini counter: 235 

A thing a week 2026, week 40

If you guessed "Bones 6 this week", you're right! Also, probably next week, the week after that, and probably for quite a few more subsequent weeks. 

These first five guys are Fire Newts and I'm happy to note that a) I could find a link, and b) they seem to be available in the same red plastic as I got them in. Given said red plastic, I didn't do the normal prime/drybrush. These guys are unprimed (gasp! record scratch! Wilhelm scream!) followed by a coat of Pro Acryl Transparent Yellow and successive glowing rock drybrushes which worked out pretty much the way I intended. This kept the pseudo-transparent red glow from the plastic which is a very nice effect in bright lights. Even if I wanted to, I doubt I could have over-shown the glowing red effect with anything on their gear so I chose to do them in a very subtle cool grey. This went well enough until I realized that the caster guy was carrying a possum. Well now it's a magma possum! This effect sells very nicely for not a lot of effort which I like.

I tried the same thing with this Nightmare is in yellow pseudo-transparent plastic and it did not work out quite as well. I followed the same scheme but didn't do any dark colors on the wing membranes for contrast and while the rest of the guy looks ok, the wings look not very good. Notably they sell a little better at the table where the lights are less bright and the shine-through is less distracting. Probably the wings could use a slightly darker drybrush to sell better. Ultimately he's done and that's OK.

2026 finished mini counter: 230 

A thing a week 2026, week 39

More Bones 6 this week and a pretty wide grab-bag of subjects.These were notably not painted in this order so any counts from here and probably for a while are sus. I'm also adjusting my lighting setup so these guys are a little darker than normal. 

These guys are Bog Shambler on the left (sadly, no link) and Driftlurker on the right. Both of these guys are mostly drybrush with some work to pick out details. In the case of the Bog Shambler, picking out details wasn't even that involved. I don't have a lot of obvious needs for either of these guys so I don't know if they'll ever get screen time but I've thought that before and been wrong, so who knows? For the effort spent, I think these guys look pretty good though they are helped by their size.  

Next up we have two more skellies with Dragoth the Defiler on the left and Skeletal Houndmaster on the right (no link). It's been pretty well documented herein that I don't use a lot of undead so I don't know when I'll ever use them on the tabletop. Thus, I didn't spend a lot of time on these guys including fixing Dragoth's bendy sword. This is my second happiest scheme for painting: slapping paint around without getting too focused on any particular details. Also notably, I didn't pick out any gradients so no spendy blends on either which helped make them go faster. They were pulled together at the end with a fairly heavy dark wash. This time I remembered that this particular wash was shiny so I hit it with anti-shine additive which marks the first time that I've used this stuff effectively. So I got that goin' for me.

Last up we have Oxidation Beast or my favorite, the Rust Louse, Bloodstone Golem, and Elven Hunting Cat. None of these guys took all that long and probably they'll all get screen time in the unforseeable future. The Rust Louse is mostly painted with various coats of my lowest-utility Constrast Paints mostly a red that sucks and a fleshtone that I hate. I seriously spent more time on the rocks it's sitting on than on the beast itself. The golem is more or less the same thing though I did pick out everything I thought was a rune. Probably that could have been clearer on the sculpt. The Elven Hunting Cat was done at the same time as the wolves and was done mostly as an afterthought. It does look better and a lot less creepy in person. So there's that.

2026 finished mini counter: 224 

A thing a week 2026, week 38

With Bones 5 safely in the rearview, it's time to burn down Bones 6, Fo' Realz this time! These are my missing wolf pack as noted in Week 24 of last year and I'm super stoked to have found them. These are pretty much the same scheme as the previous guys with washes and drybrushes and whatnot with some extra work to put the grey wolf patterning on them. I think they turned out well. These are the best kind of paint jobs: high drama, low effort and I'm hoping for more of these in Bones 6. 

2026 finished mini counter: 217

A thing a week 2026, week 37

This week we get a short interlude and a preview before barreling into our next big push. These two are Female Wizard from Galaad, one of my favorite sculptors. They were printed way back in the summer of 2023 before I had the Saturn 2 settings dialed in. I like this sculpt more in theory than I do in practice and both of these printed badly, particularly their legs which are disjoint. I did what I could but only kind of made it better. I am not a fan of big, flowy loaks and theirs are both big and flowy. This sculpt has some really bad negative space that made them much harder to paint than might have been expected and they have been kicking around on my painting table for years as a result. I had delusions of doing them to a high quality and while their faces are pretty nice, I couldn't get it over the finish line so they're just normal "painted" which is just fine.

This is a high quality work, particularly Ellie the Water Genasi Mage by Twin Goddess miniatures, one of my other favorite sculptors. She also has printing defects, particularly around her hair, and printed in the same batch as our wizards. I was pretty sure she was going to be a high quality work from the get go because I like the sculpt so much. Fast forward many years of fiddling around with basic things until I finally got her over the finish line. These shots show my one big gripe with this paint job: that the lows and highs are underwhelming which is worse in these shots than in person. Her hair could use higher highlights, probably. Also featured in these shots: a lot of dust. Her near twin will hopefully also be a high quality effort and will hopefully be featured here soon (TM). 

These two feathery guys are Raptorkin from Bones 6, specifically the Ranger and Wizard and they're our in-place preview of the next big push. I don't have raptorkin in my fantasy world (our Athari are more humans with wings than humanoid birds). They're painted pretty plainly with a semi-glossy airbrush basecoat and clothes/details picked out after a drybrush. For the effort, they look pretty OK. Notably, these are the first two painted at least partially with my newly delivered Reaper paints kickstarter. Hot take: they're nice.

This week leaves one fig left in the 2023 prints/purchases which means we can't close it out just yet. Sometime soon, though, probably.

2026 finished mini counter:  210, 7/12 high quality

A thing a week 2026, week 36

This week we have the end of Bones 5 and a coupla bonus figs because I needed them painted. First up we have our two bonus figs played by Donna the rogue ranger Ferret lady the sword version of which we expect to get a lot of screen time as a PC and Dreadmere Ranger done with a minimum of OSL. The non-sword Donna glued slightly badly and I didn't notice until after she'd dried and I'm way too chicken to try to pull her off to re-glue. I like this sculpt a lot, particularly the sculptor's restraint to not festoon her with too many geegaws and bajangles. Our ranger guy was mostly a speedpaint and looks like and oldskool sculpt. The gloss is less bad in person.

These are the last three of my Bones 5 list:  Siobhan Redraven, Blood Wolves Swashbuckler, Inari Windsong, and Petey, Pizza Dungeon Dragon. I'd intended to bring Siobhan to a high quality effort but she fell short and I didn't feel like fighting it. I do like the result and would consider getting a copy for a second attempt. If Inari looks familiar, it's because we saw her in Week 41 of last year in metal and this copy has exactly the same sculpting issues as the last one. Petey was the mascot of Bones 5 and should you care to, you can read the fun Scooby-Doo type comic near the bottom of the campaign page. Even though he's red in their campaign material, I thought green would go better with the red pepperoni. I got super duper hungry for pizza when painting this guy.

Bones 5 seems to have been a pretty big step up from Bones 4 both in quality and in sculpts. My Bones 6 efforts should follow shortly and so far it looks like another step up. 

2026 finished pizzamini counter:  205

A thing a week 2026, week 35

This week we have especially fun stuff and not just because the end of the Bones 5 effort is within sight. As a function of getting a lot of the work out earlier in this effort (notably the big guys and batches and whatnot), I ended up with a lot of really nice figs at the end. I took a bunch of those to a higher than normal quality and these are those!

First up we have Huntress and a sculpt I really like. There's a lot of very soft detail on her, particularly the symbols on her armor and cloak that I didn't want to mess up. I did pick them out with a brush but probably too subtly. They're sold by the later step washes. I recall pushing the green of her cloak up higher into yellows but that doesn't really show here. It's also a lot less glossy in person than it is in these shots which is a pretty good indication that I need to stop using Contrast Paints. The anime white hair was an early choice mostly because I like it and don't think I'd ever painted it prior. The tan pants were an unfortunate choice. In retrospect I should have picked something higher contrast with her fleshtones.

Next up we have Sister Ailene, Female Cleric and she's in the same blue as a bunch of the Bones 5 figs. My only wish is that she didn't have boobplate because boobplate is dumb. I had two real goals here. First, I wanted the linens to not be boring white and to differentiate it with other white elements, notably the border on her tabard. Second, I didn't want to metallic over the entire shield and I wanted real contrast around the details on it. I got both and I'm happy with the rest of it. Probably the highlights on her cloak could have gone higher and up close the blending is a little sus. I put extra effort into lining her armor and darkening down the lows of her gloves both of which work well. 

 

This is Jana Frostwind, Barbarian and since I grew up in the 80s and 90s, I like this fig way more than I should. I put a lot of time into her fleshtones and I think it shows. If anything, the muscleature on her sword arm is too stark. We get more blue metallics, this time tinted way down and apparently I forgot to tint the golds into more orange. Her boots had really awful mold lines over the lacing which I painted over but you can totally tell that it's there. Her hair and fur "armor" were successive highlights and washes ending with a highlight. She took somewhere around eight hours which is on the high side these days and I'm super happy she didn't have more details.

 

Next up we have Tianalise, Bog Witch and when I look at the fig, all I can see is the Everquest Elf Gal which is why I chose the colors I did. A lot of the details on this fig are shallow and soft so I spent a lot of effort keeping and accentuating the shadows to keep the lows and pushed pretty high into the highlights. Alternating washes and highlights did most of the work on her wrap and staff. The crystal at the end sells better in person than it does in these closeups. Probably her abs needed another round but ultimately, I really like this result.

 

 

Last up we have Athanelle, Elf Wizard and she also had a lot of very shallow detail that I didn't want to lose. Speed Paint did most of the basecoat with successive washes and highlights preserving those details. An awful lot of brush blending did everything else. I put a couple rounds of Badger Ghost Tint on the gold thing at the top of her staff which only looks OK. The thing I'm happiest about with this fig is the richness of the blue and magenta on her cloak. I managed to keep the deep saturation of the Golden So Flat Ultramarine which is usually a struggle. The rest of it is the scheme which worked out way better than I'd expected.

2026 finished mini counter:  199, 6/12 high quality

A thing a week 2026, week 34

These are the last of the biggies for Bones 5 which is a relief and they're mostly speed paints. First up we have Hammerfist Catapult and Deathrattle Ballista and I could find links for the latter. They're both really big and were in a gajillion warped parts. I did what I could while gluing them but ultimately they were going to be what they are. As speed paints, they got not very much attention for their size but I did wash the metallics and put some time into the rope-y parts. Ultimately they sell because of their size and I'm fine with that.

Next up we have a big 'ol scarecrow guy also sans link.  He's also helped by being so big which means that my lack of highlighting efforts aren't as obvious. The gloss on the browns sells as being wet which is unintentional but works at least a little in this context. I wanted to do a glow from his mouth and eyes which doesn't super sell. His scythe is pretty badly warped despite my best efforts to heat treat it out and it rubs against his boot in a paint-removing kind of way which I don't like. The white mouse glove just felt right. 

This crazy looking guy is the Overgourd according to the kickstarter material and he sadly has no link. I don't like this guy as he's a) big, and b) I don't know what I'd use him for. I've said that before and worked them into campaigns in the past so that's no guarantor of future performance. On the other hand, a couple of my pals really like this guy because he's so odd and so striking. I got nothin'. I put not very much effort into this guy though I did paint him in sub-assemblies and glued him together after the fact. Here again, I wanted glowing eyes and mouth but it didn't really work out. I got more glossyness out of the Contrast Paint basecoat which I also really dislike. About the only th
ing that worked was the Reikland Gloss Shade on his big 'ol central eye which makes it look bloodshot. 

Last up we have a Gem Dragon painted mostly with Pro Acryl Transparent Purple as an experiment. All three of the Bones kickstarters I've backed has had several figs in transparent/translucent plastic which is what this guy is. Most of the time I wash over them and note that their surface is hydrophobic despite washing. So, too, was it for this guy but I really wanted to keep the translucent properties. The base is primed by brush and mostly painted in washes after that. I don't like its glossyness but don't super care enough to flat it down. For the dragon itself, I struggled pushing washes around which didn't really want to stick until I figured out the trick. Usually when paint starts drying, it leaves streaks and tears and whatnot and is generally not good to work with. Between "straight from the bottle" and "oh jeez, I can't use this anymore" there's a narrow window where it's still mostly paintable and will stick to bones transparent plastic which I took advantage of. It works sort of but didn't shoot super well here. I did more on the body than in the webbing which doesn't super show but ultimately, this is a step in the right direction. Notably, the paint still doesn't want to stick--even the primer, and a bunch of it tore off when I was gluing him together after the fact.

2026 finished mini counter: 194

 

A thing a week 2026, week 33

Three non-combatat characters this week with some fun stuff on the horizon. Left to right we have Money Lender, Noblewoman, and Madame Delia. All three of these sculpts have a lot of character which I like and none of the three were particularly high effort spends though the results turned out pretty good. Probably moneydude's piping would have been better in yellow but I went the lazy route and left it white. the middle gal's gems are particularly good and indeed, I did pick out every one of the little button-y things on her shawl. Delia's gems are much less good because there are so freaking many  of them and they're mostly very, very small. Her hair got a lot of attention and it shows and I did extra work to keep the texturing on her fan. No clue why the magenta went so glossy on these; it's Pro Acryl which is pretty reliably not glossy.

2026 finished mini counter: 189
 

A thing a week 2026, week 32

We're heading down the home stretch for Bones 5 and most of the hard stuff is in the rearview, so that's nice. This week we have Caerindra Thistlemoor, Borin Ironbrow, Dwarf Fighter, Brother Lazarus Plague Doctor, and Sister Hazel, Plague Doctor and for the first time in what seems like forever, I have links for all of them. 

Caerindra probably came out the best and I probably could have counted her as a high quality result this year but I didn't. Probably her shield could have used some freehand and she's notably in the same color scheme as Baran Blacktree from week 19. Borin was a speed paint in the same colors because they were available. Probably the horns on his helm could have been more differentiated and probably his beard could have had more highlights but he works OK. The two plague doctors are a re-do of Brother Hammond's color scheme, also from week 19. I'd planned them with a bunch of browns and linens and really wanted to differentiate them without relying on the same set of paints. I also knew that there would be a lot of black bits and I didn't want to lose the detail on those parts. The black bits are heavily washed which I think sold and the linens are also heavily washed and layered which I think also sells. The cloaks are ok but not spectacular and I have no idea how they got to be so glossy. 

2026 finished mini counter: 186
 

A thing a week 2026, week 31

This week we tackle a couple of the larger figs at the end of the Bones 5 pile. I don't super like painting big stuff as I've said here before so every time I get to one of these, there's a little apprehension. First up we have Garghuk, Ogre Chieftain, Tirika, Succubus, and Gragg Elf Slayer sans link. I'm not entirely sure why I decided on the red for Garghuk but there are red Orks in my fantasy worlds and I knew that the glossy lowtones wouldn't be such a big deal so that part worked. Tirika, I think is supposed to be red so there's no mystery there, though through the highlighting process I lost a lot of her low tones. This blown-out shot isn't really helping in that, either. For Gragg, the glossy red lowtones are still showing through despite several coats of red wash which looks bad but clearly I can't be bothered to fix it. Notably, I know this guy's name because it was in the kickstarter but apparently this resculpt is not available.

Next up we have one of the biggies. He's listed as "three headed troll" with line art on the kickstarter and again Reaper fails me with a link. Maybe you can't buy this guy; I have no idea. I don't use this kind of fig in my campaigns and killing a guy with a teddy bear no matter how fearsome he might be, seems wrong. The paint job sells better than the effort I put into it, mostly because the fig is so large. I got the distinct feeling that he was upscaled in this version partially because his details were all so soft. Ultimately, he sells but won't ever get screen time.

2026 finished mini counter: 182

 

A thing a week 2026, week 30

This week we have some tinted metallics and some other fun stuff. First up we have three pseudo-anonymous folks none of which have links (left to right) Elf Shield Gal, Platemail Vampire Guy, and Creepy Potion Gal. I have no idea why Reaper makes it so hard to find these despite the fact that they have a figure finder. Occasionally the Bones kickstarters will give a hint but not this time! The two plate-havers (clearly) have some tinting going on. This is a mix of Vallejo Metal Color and various glossy Golden High Flow Acrylics. That got the base pinky tone which, TBH, I'm not really happy with. I almost sold it with a coat of Badger Ghost Tint but ultimately I don't think it landed. The potion gal is a study in contrast and focus. While there's quite a lot going on with this fig, The yellow eye-catching bits are arranged low on the fig and there's a single contrast green thing high near her face. Was that enough to keep the focus on her face or would it resolve into a mess? I have my own thoughts, but you should feel free to judge it for yourself.

Next up we have Adrasteia Winterborn, Vampiress, Witchy Necromancer Gal sans link, and Halloween Knight who features more tinted metallics. This one worked a little better and is a refinement from previous blue tinted metallics that I've used here before. Not sure if it's the better pigmentation of the dark blue but I feel like this scheme looks a heck of a lot better. This guy's contrast is a little more on the nose and a little more of the traditional scheme which is 100% intentional and helped by the fact that his head is the sole pure contrast part. Our vampiress is mostly an exercise in shading/highlighting red which worked better here than most of my other attempts and again despite my best efforts, the Contrast Paint lowtones still come through as glossy. The witchy gal is another take on triad secondaries which kind of works. I wanted to do a proper crystal for her orb but clearly couldn't have been bothered. I was in a lot of pain when I painted these so I guess that's excusable.

2026 finished mini counter: 178

 

A thing a week 2026, week 29

More characters this week and the first ones are in my school colors which is nice. These are Jolie Adventuring Scribe, Ogana Savannah Ranger, Thregan Helmsplitter Duskwarden. These three came out well despite the shininess of the bases which are a lot less shiny in person. Ogana's skintone shininess is intentional in this case and is played by I think an old Army Painter wash, maybe Dark Tone? I put a lot of work into the yellows which I think shows and even did a little bit of freehand on Jolie's book. Ogana's bow probably should have been in a different tone of brown or maybe taken up a couple hits in value. Thragen is a little rough though I didn't cop out and paint the center shield on his armor in metallic.

Next up we have Burgermeister, Aurelio Endrino Bonehenge Warlock, and Surkar Orc Shaman. These three aren't grouped together for any particular reason except that I painted them in roughly the same span. These guys are chock full of details which took more effort than normal to pick out. The black leather on Burgermeister and Aurelio are pretty good and I did an OK job of distinguishing myriad leathers on Aurelio and Surkar. I did not clock Aurelio's pal as a raccoon which is why he's in a beary chocolate brown. Burgermeister's gems and Aurelio's cloak's stitching were a goddamn pain, tho, and I'm glad they're done. Surkar got a lot more attention than normal since I had christened a new natural hair brush which is always nice. I'd been working without a nice natural hair brush for far too long and I was reminded (again) that I really need to use my expensive nice tools rather than saving them for...something.

2026 finished mini counter:  172

A thing a week 2026, week 28

This week we have more of Bones 5 as I can kind of see the finish line from here. First up we have Kamaria Eshe, Bonehenge Priestess, "mother of dragons", and All Hallow's Eve. These gals got more effort than usual because a) they're nice sculpts, b) as character figs they're more likely to get screen time, and c) I'd been doing a bunch of speed-like paint jobs so it was nice to spend a little more time on each fig. The glossy bits are from the base coat which always throws me. More work could have been done here on the details, clothes, and hair though ultimately I think they landed in a good place.

Next up we have Anduriel Elf Paladin, Krass Omenthrall Evil Warrior which is a little on the nose, and Hanrik Dwarf Pugilist. The first and the last aren't super interesting as I didn't put much work into them. The middle guys is more interesting and he also didn't get much work. Regular readers (ha!) will remember that I've been experimenting with colored metallics for a while, now. This is a mix of Vallejo Aluminum (I think) and a dark blue Golden High Flow Acrylic which I normally don't use because they're glossy. Over top of that I hit it with a coat of Badger Ghost Tint Blue. It mostly works on the table though it's really glossy in these shots. I also notice for the first time that the symbol on his back is unpainted. I'd intended to paint it gold but can't be bothered to do so now. 

2026 finished min counter: 166

 

A thing a week 2026, week 27

This week we have a bunch of undead. My games don't feature undead, generally, so despite having a really big pile of them, they don't get a lot of screen time. 

First up we have Grave Kings, well, most of them. The first guy was featured way back in Week 40 of 2023 which feels like a lifetime and about 850 figs ago. Also, wow was my photography shoddy back then. I burned through these guys pretty quickly and probably the guy on the left and the guy in the helm needed a Seraphim Sepia wash or something to make them blend in less with the background (I do like the bleached effect, tho). I put a lot of effort into pulling the highlights up which I think shows though I didn't do nearly enough in the blending which I hate doing. They could have been weathered and dirtied down as undead but I really couldn't be bothered.

Next up we have The Grim Reaper and Wraith Dread Knight. We saw the first of the Grim Reapers of Bones 5 in Bonus Week 53 of 2023. That guy didn't get as much time and doesn't look quite as nice. This guy was mostly drybrushed and I had a really hard time contrasting his cloak in black and his robe in a more blue dark grey. It kind of sells but only in really high light situations. The sand in the hour glass looks OK at arm's length but doesn't really work close up. If the Wraith Dread Knight on the right looks familiar, he should! He's the missing guy in the trio last seen on Week 18 of 2024 which isn't nearly as long ago (maybe 500 figs ago). I tried to match the color scheme so they'd look OK together but this guy got way more effort even if it wasn't very much all told. 

Last up we have Murkillor the Wraith King and he also doesn't doesn't get a link. I was going to do some fancy purple OSL but clearly didn't. This guy was kind of a speed paint with the Grave Kings above and it kind of shows. He's really tall which makes my lack of blending really stand out. Ultimately, he's done and that's what counts.

2026 finished mini counter: 160

A thing a week 2026, week 26

This week we continue our tour of the biggies which will clear out most of them. I also get to re-live the trauma of "I was lazy and glued everything together without thinking about how I'm going to paint them." So we got that to look forward to. 

First up we get both! The blue guy on the left is a Greater Basilisk and he turned out really sharp. This is a high drama, low effort offering and I specifically picked an undercoat that was a little bit glossy. In this case, it works! He's mostly drybrushed with increasingly high valued paints, in this case Golden So Flat Ultramarine. The guy on the right is a Celestial Stag and even though he took way longer, the result is so much less good. Horns in particular eat a lot of time and the total effect is kind of patchy because of the many layers of drybrush I did to pop out the very shallow texture and still do anything with the volumes. More work could have sold it more but I wasn't in that headspace when I painted it.

Next up we have a coupla really big dragons. The blue guy on the left is an Amber Dragon which I couldn't be bothered to look up before I painted him. He's the same color scheme as our basilisk on purpose so I could go a tiny bit faster. This is a great sculpt with a lot of very nice texture so I spent a lot of time dry brushing and washing over it which landed in a nice place. I would have liked his cyan bits to be a tad lighter but he came out well anyway. Probably the base needed more work but when I got there, I was just plain done. The guy on the right is Narthalyssk and despite having as much texture and effort, came out so much less dramatic. Red is hard to highlight and I was afraid of pushing into oranges which I thought would lose contrast with the yellow ventral scales and wing membranes. Joke's on me, though, since I did a lousy job highlighting those too. Under the my very bright painting lights, he looked OK. On the table, his reds look indistinct and his yellows look washed out and dirty. I did like the demon dots, tho. 

2026 finished mini counter: 153

 

A thing a week 2026, week 25

ed> due to some scheduling shenanigans, this guy didn't get posted when it was supposed to. Luckily, with the power of the Internet, I've backdated so that none shall be the wiser.

 This week we start our biggies tour where I work through a bunch of the bigger-than-normal figs in Bones 5. 

First up we have two biggies and neither of them are particularly worthy efforts. The Dragon-Lion on the left needed at least some gap filling and the fur colors really needed to go up at least a couple layers. I got good hue contrast between the scales, the fur, and his mane but none of those parts by themselves is well handled. At the time of this writing, I was going through a really painful medical issue and freaking out about making it to Bricks Cascade so suffice to say, my attention was elsewhere. The Catoblepas on the right is more or less the same deal except that the sculpt featured more or less one texture which makes my indiscretions less obvious. Also of note, I glued it all together and really struggled getting the green on the base he's standing on. Don't worry, I didn't learn, and will make the same mistake many times in the coming weeks. 

One of the most egregious example of gluing stuff together and then struggling to paint stuff is this guy who I call "treasure dragon." Because he's on a pile of treasure. Get it? This guy is purple to contrast with the yellowy gold pile he's laying on and his left arm is a real mess. Somewhere during the painting, it fell off and I think I ended up with a blob of glue that made it not fit correctly so I ended up having to do a lot of filling. It's hard to notice if you don't know but it's definitely not as good as it probably should have been. A coat of Badger Ghost Tint Orange went over the gold which makes it pop a little better and ultimately the composition works even if the dragon's paint job isn't particularly good. They can't all be bangers, kids.

2026 finished mini counter: 149