You can't stop the music.

Hello and welcome to Inso's World again.

What can I say about this week? I think the word 'random' comes to mind.

The week started with a day that was sunny enough to paint the rear of the house (just) but the weather didn't hold for long enough to paint the side of the porch so I still have that to do... plus a few little bits of wall furniture to paint in satin.

I managed to get out for a ride on my bike this week... OK, I got a bit wet but it was a much needed little excursion over to Marazion:

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I also bit the bullet and sorted out some more of my Dad's personal effects and am getting closer to gripping things. It has been a bit of a struggle because with everything you sort, it gets closer to being final... it is very strange.

Friday evening was a great one. Me and my missus went to the Rodney Inn (Helston) and watched a great cover band. They were a Queen cover band called "The Good Old Fashioned Lover Boys" and they properly raised the roof. The pub was packed and one of the bar staff had dressed up as Freddie Mercury... and the way he was behaving, he could have been Freddie reincarnated (he had all the moves!). 

In other news, reinforcements have arrived:

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Two more King Tigers are ready to go for assembly. So far, I have started the first one and just need to add the Green-Stuff to the Punisher cannon and it will be ready to start painting (all filling has been done, the lascannon is fitted and the punisher cannon has been built and fitted... just needs the mantle to be fettled with Green-Stuff). Luckily, I have already built and painted one of these so I am able to make some sensible choices about painting and assembly.

Unfortunately, I've had a couple of painful days but, in a strange twist of fate, I have used those times for a bit of sculpting and have managed to finish the five Squat bodies (the first of the commissions to be ticked off):

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They should have been posted yesterday... but tired/hungover/didn't happen so it will be done tomorrow. They are all packed and ready to go and as a result, I freed up five corks and now have a couple of extra goblins and a large shell (as in cannon shell) on some of them... so it has been fairly productive; commissions wise.

As a final note, Forgeworld have got their Necromunda Squat on PRE-ORDER so I have jumped on board and pre-ordered one. I am not impressed at the price... and struggled to click the pay button... but I am treating it as a special case (due to it being the first official Squat release for over 20 years) so that my conscience can cope. I now look forward to its arrival so that I can get a proper look at it and see what I want to do with it.

That's it for today. This coming week will be strange (it would have been Dad's 75th birthday this coming week) so I am leaving things 'open to interpretation'.

See you from the car park!

Sunshine and showers.

Hello and welcome to Inso's World again.

I know it's been two weeks since my last post but I have been keeping myself busy with household chores and haven't had very much time for the hobby so I haven't had very much to update.

There have also been days that have been wiped out due to painkillers... so boring stuff that really isn't worth posting about.

Luckily, as a result of a week or two of preparation and painting, the front of the house now looks presentable (having painted the walls, mowed the grass and tidied up what needed tidying), the rear of the house is almost at a point for painting and the grass in the garden has been mowed/cut so the property is starting to look a bit more lived in and maintained. I've also had a friend round to look at removing the tree stumps from the garden (something I would have done myself if my shoulder wasn't too crook for me to swing a pick-axe or sledgehammer) and once the stumps have gone, it means I can focus on sorting out the verge and making it presentable as well.

This coming week, I hope to finish painting the back wall and also finish painting the side of the porch (I have chatted with my neighbour now so I will be able to stand on her property to gain access to it - it was only polite to ask). Once all that is done, I can get in touch with Collingtons and they can take pictures of the nice windows they fitted.

So... no hobby? Well, that isn't strictly true. As much as my sculpting mojo has left the building and I have been totally unable to sculpt anything (much to my displeasure because I am letting commissions slide and that isn't good), I have been ticking along with a model kit. The model kit in question is a Meng, World War Toon, King Tiger tank. I decided that it would make a nice proxy Leman Russ so I converted the weapons and it is now armed with a Punisher Cannon and a Las Cannon instead of its original weapons.

This is what I started with:

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The main gun is made up of some of the plastic sprue from the kit and a couple of bits of tubing from the barrel of a pen. The Lascannon is one from a Centurion Kit from GW. Once the weapons were converted, I started painting. Some of the bits and pieces were painted on their sprue and others were sprayed after they were assembled. This is what the base-coat looked like:

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At this point I realised that there were a few holes to fill (I left the aerial off and also an over-large spade) so I popped some Green Stuff into those and touched up the paint, prior to a Wash with Nuln Oil (for the grey bits) and Agrax Earthshade (for the green bits). After this, I stippled the tank with the original colour (Warpaints Army Green), touched up the grey again (Coat d'Arms Iron Grey) and then dry-brushed the whole tank (Vallejo Green Grey). A bit of black for the tracks on the side of the turret, followed by the all the tracks getting a dry-brush of Iron grey. Windows were just painted blue (Coat d'Arms Wizard Blue) and may get a highlight if I feel brave enough to squeeze a brush in there. This is where I am, at the moment:

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I plan to add markings similar to British WWII tanks and have assembled some decals to do this. Unfortunately, I haven't got everything I need so I have put in an order with Dom's Decals for those I am missing.

I am really very happy with the kit and I think it is perfect as a proxy Leman Russ. I plan to put together a small company of them (ten tanks) with different weapons. With this in mind, I have ordered another two tanks from EBay so they should arrive sometime this week. I plan to arm the first three in the same way, with the next three having Battle Cannons, the three after that with Plasma Cannons and the leader with a Vanquisher Cannon. First things first though, the three Punishers.

Apart from that... not a lot of hobby at all. I really hope that a bit of sunshine this coming week, will help get my DIY jobs done and that I can stay off the painkillers for long enough to get some sculpting done. I guess that only time will tell.

That's it for now.

See you from the top of the ladder!

Of dust and paint fumes...

Hello and welcome to Inso's World again.

This week has been all about preparing the porch ready for paint and then painting it. So there has been lots of sanding, dust and lots of hoovering and wiping down of surfaces, shortly followed by a host of white paint.

After toiling all week (dodgy shoulders make painting ceilings really awkward), I have ended up with a nice, white, porch interior, to go with the nice, white, door and window:

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It may not look that grand but it looks a whole lot better than when it was covered in mould and had rubbish windows and doors! I have ordered a nice, white, shoe-rack to go in there and then, once that is in and populated with shoes, I'll get the living room back again.

The next job, which has already been started, is to paint the front of the house. I have started filling various holes and cracks but have a small way to go yet, before I start painting. Guess what colour it's going to be... yep... white.

I feel a bit obligated to get things painted as soon as I can because the nice people at Collington's want to get some photographs of their window/door installation but... to be blunt... our house looks rubbish compared to the windows so I said that they can take pix once the house has been painted.

Obviously, I haven't just been dealing with the porch this week (paint has to dry, of course), I have also been cracking on with some commission sculpting. 

With a table full of commissions, I decided to bite the bullet and focus on the five Dwarf bodies that are amongst the others. This is because they are quite simple, are quite repetitive and I knew that once they were finished, I would be freeing up five corks and making my workload look less. I have got really far with them so they now only need a bit of fettling and their base tabs adding. This week has seen them go from shapes:

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To almost finished Space Dwarf bodies:

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It's just a case of finishing them now. 

As a result of the porch painting and commission sculpting, I have not really been doing much else (apart from household chores and internet browsing). In separate news, my Megaro Zamac, Gerwalk Phantom has arrived in excellent condition and is just waiting for me to stow it away with the rest of the collection (which is in the loft). I have also bought a tank off EBay to work along side my Panther-Russ tank as a counts-as Leman Russ battle tank. I am not going to say much more than this at the moment because I need to get the tank in hand and compare sizes, before I decide whether it will be viable. If it is, it will not be too time consuming as it will only need weapon swaps, rather than a full conversion job... so watch this space.

That's about it for now.

This coming week should see more DIY (weather depending) and more commission work... but a plan rarely survives contact with the enemy.

See you from the porch!

Green? Super green!

Hello and welcome to Inso's World.

This week has seen the completion of the window and door replacement and that has opened up my 'job book' somewhat.

Basically, now that the windows are done, the mould can be tackled in the house and the exterior can be painted. As a result I have emptied the porch and have started work on filling and preparing the walls, ready for some paint. I first de-moulded it with a chemical and have been filling all the rough areas with some wall filler. The only trouble is that the more I look, the more work I find... so it has been a bit of a prolonged exercise that I can see taking a week or so.

Luckily, the weather is rubbish, otherwise I would feel guilty about not working on the outside of the house as well... but I have enough to keep me busy with the porch at the moment.

So... hobby wise, I have been sculpting a small amount and that sculpting time has been spent on my commissions. Nothing too major to speak of but all progress is good progress...

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I'll not say too much about them but there is a Squat living ancestor, a Squat heavy weapon specialist and a Goblin boss in the photo... obviously WIP. I have also been working on a second batch of Squat bodies but they aren't at a position to show off yet.

My order from Mantic games finally arrived and I have now got a pair of spray cans with 3 pots of matching 'Army Green' paint to go with them. In a rare moment of dry weather, I sprayed both the Valkyrie proxy and the pair of Squat dreadnoughts in this new green colour and it really is spot on for my requirements. Once I get a bit further along with painting them, I will share some pix.

I have been watching Facebook (as usual) and have noticed a few of my Berserker sculpts turning up in various paint-schemes. It is proper cool to see and I reckon that I will compile an album of the various paint-jobs to share on here at some point.

This coming week will be a bit mixed but I plan to focus as much as I can on my commission sculpts, in amongst the DIY stuff that I have to get done.

See you from the show ground!