Monthly Archives: August 2020

Grimjack

First off: I hate this WordPress theme, and I’m looking to change it as soon as possible. I just need to find a theme that doesn’t screw up my photos. This was what I could find on short notice. Change to come soon.

When I was a lad, I collected mostly Marvel comics, with the exception of a couple of black and white titles my friend introduced me to in high school. The only one of note was the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. Unlike most comics, TMNT didn’t come out monthly; it came out whenever the creators made a new issue. As a result, we were always hoping for more turtles, and were often disappointed. So, when my Friendly Comic Shop Owner slid a copy of Grimjack #26 in my reserve box, I wondered why… until I discovered the back-up feature, Munden’s Bar, had a story featuring the turtles…and it was in COLOR.

I bought it, of course. The turtles story was fine. The main story was much better. Thus I was introduced to one of my favorite comic books and comic characters of all time: Grimjack.

From Wikipedia: Grimjack is the street name of John Gaunt, a sword-for-hire, ex-paramilitary, war veteran and former child gladiator. He operates from Munden’s Bar in the Pit, a slum area of Cynosure, a pan-dimensional city to which all dimensions connect. All this is true. but it’s pretty bare-bones as far as the character’s full biography goes. He’s a war veteran, sure…but he’s a veteran of the Demon Wars, which has given him some sensitivity to magic; which is also a thing, depending on where you are in the pan-dimensional city of Cynosure. Although this hardly needs be said, he’s also a fucking badass.

There were three main incarnations of the character throughout the comic’s 81-issue run, the entirety of which was written by John Ostrander. A small British miniatures company, Wayne’s World of Wonder (available through Matchlock Miniatures), makes a version of all three. Thanks to the kindness and generosity of a friend, specifically the lovely and talented Carrion Crow, I now own these miniatures. A real bon homme, that Crow…when I opened the unexpected parcel last holiday season, I almost squealed with girlish glee. (OK, I did squeal.) As some of you may know, I have been in a bit of a painting slump lately…so these figures were just what I needed to get my groove back.

First up, the “original” Grimjack; as immortalized by the great Tim Truman’s artwork. This is the version we see at the beginning of the series: Gaunt as a man slightly past it, pushing fifty and hardened by a life of violence and loss. Hands-down my favorite version of the character, this is also the version they brought back when they finally began publishing Grimjack comics again, some fifteen-plus years after the comic ceased production upon the demise of First Comics. (I converted my own versions of two other First Comics characters, Nexus and Badger, for Forgotten Heroes back in June. Forgotten Heroes: a Carrion Crow joint.)

After a while, Grimjack comes to inhabit a much younger, cloned body of himself, and goes by the name “Chaney”. It doesn’t really fool anyone for long, kinda like when Wolverine started calling himself Patch but still popped his claws every issue. Tom Mandrake took over the bulk of the pencils for this incarnation, and it is the version of Grimjack I like the least. It’s not that it’s bad, it’s more that what came before and what comes after is so much better…

Then, in Grimjack #55, the timeline jumps a couple of hundred years. Grimjack is reborn (in fact, he’s doomed to be reborn forever) in the body of James Twilley. Twilley didn’t know he was Grimjack until he was in high school and killed someone; then it all came rushing back. Some of the best Grimjack stories were written during this run, which lasted until the series’s end; and Flint Henry’s artwork is so, so good….

Of course, while painting these miniatures I had to dig out my comics for visual reference. This prompted a re-read of the series, currently ongoing. I’m on issue 31, and aside from some unfortunate, racially-insensitive language (you could get away with that stuff back then, although it adds nothing to the story) and the horrid (yet blissfully temporary) art of Tom Sutton, it holds up pretty well. I remember why it’s so great and I’m looking forward to what I know is coming.

This post also marks the return of my long-neglected Insanity Pile tracker. Sadly, This year I haven’t painted as many miniatures as usual, but neither have I been purchasing many. Once again, I do not count miniatures I repaint (like Heroclix), or Gaslands cars that I convert.

Insanity Pile Progress

Miniatures Purchased: 30

Miniatures Painted: 46

Total +16

The Summer of Scenery: The Sludge Pool

First: You may have noticed a new look to Dead Dick’s Tavern. I’m experimenting. I’m open to suggestions…

More important: I finally finished up my submission for Dave Stone’s Summer of Scenery over at Wargames Terrain Workshop. Behold: The Sludge Pool!

While waiting for my Vallejo Still Water Texture to arrive in the mail, I did a bit more highlighting and texturing to the base piece. I weathered the barrels and the machinery with MIG rust pigments and a bit of Citadel Typhus Corrosion and Ryza Rust. I added some Vallejo Diesel Stains to the base of the machine and gave the whole thing a blast of Dullcote to lock the rust dust in place. I highlighted the green water coming out of the pipes with some Vallejo Yellow Green.

Then it was time to add the water. I could delay no longer. I was pretty nervous about using the water effects, as the only stuff I had ever previously used was “Magic Water”, a 2-part floral product that requires precise mixing to cure properly. The last time I used it was several years ago, and the swamp scenery I made is still tacky. But my friend Dick Garrison swears by Vallejo Water Texture, and he has achieved some amazing results with it, so who am I to argue with success?

I poured some into a plastic cup and added a few drops of green craft paint, the same kind I used to paint the basin. It mixed together perfectly, and I poured it out and moved the base this way and that until it covered the bottom. It flows like thick water, kind of like motor oil, so it was quite easy to work with. My first layer was done.

I noticed a problem about 12 hours later. Vallejo Water Texture is a “self-leveling” fluid. My workbench is level. The bottom of the piece is level. I found out the hard way that the inside of the basin, where I was pouring the texture, was obviously not level, because the water effects began to pool on certain sides of the basin. Dumb, rookie mistake. Since the mixture was still fluid enough to flow, albeit slowly, I quickly mixed and added more water texture and paint to shore things up. Then I played around trying to get the stuff to flow where it was needed. I wasn’t entirely successful, as you can see.

I added a second layer of clear (no paint added) texture out of the bottle, hoping that would obscure the uneven bottom layer. It didn’t.

Don’t get me wrong: I love this product, and I think it looks amazing. But it took more like 48 hours for it to cure before I added the next level, and then another 48 hours before I thought it was ok to touch.

Overall, I can live with how it looks. I think the Vallejo product is pretty impressive and easy stuff to use. After 2 layers (3 mm thickness or so), I have about half a 200 ml bottle left. The area I covered wasn’t small, though. Note the Space Marine for scale. The bottle cost me 17 dollars (US$).

So…I’m thinking of adding one final layer of clear water, but I’m not sure if it will really do anything aside from make the basin look deeper. Thoughts?

The Slump is Here…

I’ve hit a bit of a painting slump. Actually, it’s a bit more than that. It’s a general hobby slump. I haven’t painted a miniature since I finished up Kratos for Forgotten Heroes. In fact, I’ve barely done anything at all since July 1st.

Partly this was due to real life work anxiety getting in the way of any pleasant diversions I might seek. Now that that is mostly over, though, my painting mojo still has yet to return. A quick turn around some of the blogs I follow shows I am not alone in this; for whatever reason, we all hit a slump every now and again, or as The Dude would say, “strikes and gutters. man…strikes and gutters.”

So what HAVE I been doing? Playing video games, mostly. I recently did a replay of The Last of Us and the DLC, Left Behind; because I don’t know how long I can resist buying the long-awaited sequel, released a couple of months ago. The Last of Us is a true masterpiece; the only video game that I have ever played, finished, and immediately replayed. I did the same thing again recently. It’s an amazing storytelling experience, and it serves very well to get my mind off of shit I don’t enjoy thinking about. My mind naturally goes to these places when I paint; hence the whole no painting thing lately.

I’ve also been making some Starship Corridor tiles, using Heroic Maps Starship Corridors and DM Scotty’s 2.5D method. There’s a pretty great video on it here by The Mighty Gluestick (ironically not by DM Scotty, but whatever). It’s pretty quick work, but I’ve since run out of double-wall cardboard and need to get some. I really don’t want to buy it from a craft store, but I don’t have any heavy-duty boxes lying around.

I still plan on producing something for the Summer of Scenery over at Wargames Terrain Workshop, but it won’t be as much as I would have liked. In other words, no Western town or graveyard; but as you can see, I managed to give the sludge pool a quick basecoat (space marine included for scale)…

…followed by a black wash and some texturing with Stirland Mud. I’ll hit it with some light drybrushing before beginning the weathering process. Hopefully my Vallejo Water Texture will arrive by month’s end and I can complete this thing soon.

In the meantime, I need to find a project that will drag me back to the painting table.