Early painting ambition and setting realistic goals.

*Note this is an old post updated with new photos and thoughts.

 It occurred to me the other day that a lot of what I see on the internet in regards to painted miniatures is often excellent and amazing. Images of hand-crafted spawning pools of chaos daemons rising from the blood pits or incredible detail on a Dwarven Lords runic hammer and armour. 

Wonderful looking clash between Tzeentch and Empire forces.

Which is great, I love being inspired by such artwork. I remember when I first got into this hobby and looking at White dwarf or a codex Eavy Metal page and going 'Wow' to myself. You know this kind of thing:

Always liked that Eldar Warlock.

But despite wanting to paint something like that myself I have never been as skilled or patient enough to get anywhere near that kind of result. So this post is more a display of hope for any aspiring miniature hobby painter that no matter what you do it can only get better and we have all had to start somewhere. Indeed welcome to crudely painted Space Crusade 1991 Space Orks.

Gold skinned orks with black teeth have yet to really take off :)

These four fine chaps have now gone to the dettol dip to be cleaned up but I thought I should take a photo of what young me thought you could do with citadels paint. 

(On the main page? Click to see more 😎)

The biomass value of wooden ladders, let the duel begin!

A couple years on and my painting skills didn't improve a great deal but here and there they got a little better, and although these two models are very average at least they looked ok on the tabletop and were used a lot. Dire avenger Eldar Exarch being one of my favourite models and I have always had a soft spot for the old Tyranid Warriors. 

The little band of Nurgle that could.

These Nurgle guys from a kill team battle you may have seen earlier in this blog were painted around 2003 and the skills although better still had a long way to go. Having said that they are perfectly fine for some tabletop shenanigans.

Spreading disease one pustule at a time.

Speaking of Nurgle here is my new and improved Great Unclean One with helpers. Had this model for so long but he is now looking a million times better and goes to show everyone if they just keep going will improve little by little.

Sneak preview of miniatures I've been working on recently. The Thing and Cosmic Frog!!

So this post was more a trip down memory lane and a reminder that painting takes time and practice. Yet it is always fun and always looks better no matter the skill level than a sea of silver or grey. So get out the brushes and paint those minis up :)