There are four Trolls in the Dark Alliance box and I painted all except this one, which happens to be the most similar to the one we can see in the film the Lord of The Rings when the Fellowship is in Moria. That is the reason I finally painted it as I grew tired of painting these Trolls, but I need this last one for my LOTR campaign.; so there it is.
And here you have the four Trolls included in the box, painted, based and ready to roll.
After seeing a few videos about the Slapchop technique I decided to try it with the 1/72 soflt plastic ratmen from Caesar Miniatures.
I have to say that I'm not satisfied with the result, which seems to be quite different to the ones I saw on Youtube, so I suppose I must be doing something wrong. Maybe the miniatures are too small for Slapchop or maybe GW's contrasts or Army Painter's speed ones are more suited for that than Vallejo's Xpress, which are the ones I have at home.
The result is poor and the time and effort is superior to standard painting of block painting, dipping and a few lights. You need to prime the figure in black and then retouch it with a brush to cover those holes where the spray doesn't reach. After that, it's drybrushing it in pale grey and then drybrushing in white, to finally apply the contrast paint. If you ask me, it's too many steps and a poor result in the end.
I think I will paint another batch of ratmen with the dip and then post some pictures comparing both methods.
Here you have the first wave of "Skavens". The big one that will fight as an Ogre Rat, is an original GW's painted by a great friend from the hobby who gave it to me together with a box of Caesar's ratmen. I only painted the base and some lights on the metallic parts.
In this picture you can compare the figure on the left with the Slapchop technique, next to the one on the right primed in white and painted with Xpress directly. As you can see, there is no noticeable difference in the final result; maybe even the right one is better. BTW, I had to give two coats of Xpress to both figures to get a decent result, so it is more work added.
And finally and comparison between traditional block paint, dip and lights on the left and Slapchop with Xpress on the right.
Three more adventurers. Two plastic from Caesar Adventurers box and one metal from Elheim, the barbarian. I picked up the first one in plate armour to use it as paladin or questing night, but after painting it, I realised about his colours and his winged helm and decided he could also be a knight of Dol Armorth and painted his shield accordingly. The third one could be Felix Jeager from Felix and Gotrek, but I didn't paint him blonde.
The metal barbarian is a bit crude even compared to plastics; and his sword a bit small for my taste. Such big muscles for such tiny sword.
And here is the shield. I couldn't decide which picture was better so I uploaded both. I'm quite happy about how the shield turned out as it's rather small.
Here there are the last two painted figures for the Fellowship of the Ring, Gandalf and Gollum. I am quite happy I finished this little project. I may someday paint Gondorians or Easterlings, but for now this is over.
Two more for the Fellowship of the Ring in 1/72; next Gandalf and Gollum. I love these figures but especially Legolas as he is very dynamic.
I'm happy how he turned out. I used Vallejo paints. He's got Russian uniform for his trousers, Reflective green for his tunis and German Fieldgrey for his cloak. Then flat brown for boots, flat Earth for bow and Mahoganey for leather straps and belt.
Here it is a comparative shot with one 1/72 soft plastic Caesar Elf. Legolas is slightly less taller than the Caesar's one because he has no integrated base.
Well, keeping painting the Felowship of the Ring now I've painted Aragorn and Boromir. Legolas and Gimli will be next.
The tunics are Vallejo US Dark Green and the Elven cloaks Vallejo Field Grey. The do not distinguish well in the pictures but they do in real.
These pictures have more light than the ones with the Hobbits as the sun was shining when I took them. Remember they are 1/72 scale and not 28 mm.
As there are not Hobbits or Halflings in 1/72 scale I printed these ones to make the Fellowship of the Rings. The detail is a little too much for me to paint as I cannot see well.
Frodo and Sam
Merry and Pippin (I think it is a model representing Bilbo, but I could not get a proper Pippin).
A size comparison shot next to a 1/72 Zvezda Viking.
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