Night Goblins Attack Giant (or is that Night Goblin's Attack Giant?)

It is so lovely to return to obsessive relaxed miniature painting after a bit of a hiatus. With my Bretonnians sort of lurking in the background and my Dwarves finished (and already beaten quite badly on the tabletop), I couldn't resist adding a third project to the 'active' list: Night Goblins...well Greenskins, but I decided to start with Night Goblins. And not just any Night Goblins, but a Night Goblin War Giant (war would've made the headline less confusing, too bad you can't change what you type on the internet ;). Here's the model.

I hear you knocking but you can't come in...oh wait scratch that it seems that you CAN come in. How about still going for tomorrow night and trying again?

There are many famous miniatures of giants in the world. A lot of people are enthused by the Marauder Giant. When it comes to GW, I would love to get my hands on an original 1983 Citadel Giant. It would have to be a very clandestine STL because I don't think I'll be able to afford it if I find one for sale. The giant that captured my heart as a kid (aside from the BFG of course) is from another company and still in production. Mirliton still sells the Goblin War Giant here and it has been in and out of my shopping basket many times. So far massive amounts of nostalgia have not been able to compensate for a sculpt that looks a bit static and features goblins I don't quite like. So I kept looking for something similar, but better. Enter my new hobby tool of choice: the good ol' 3D-printer.

I may not have a lot of nostalgic feelings for the Marauder Giant, but I did (partially) steal the idea for the paint scheme of this guy's clothing.

I found this Old City Watch Siege Giant by Titan Forge Miniatures and instantly realized all that monster needed was less City Watch, a lot of extra Goblins and some chains to let it know where the Gobbo's want to go. Now they can ride through the wide open country that they love, without any risk of being fenced in*.

* Being chained up doesn't count in country songs, does it?

Warning: too much Verdigris can kill readability. Bonus points to me for adding a classic Ogre Face shield next to an Ogre Face inspired new-fangled Kruleboyz shield. (Let's not mention how much time I wasted looking up if Ogre Face is an actual proper term (and I never really found an answer too)).

I spent a couple of lovely evenings converting the 3D-print, because new-fangled stuff never replaces old-school skills, it just expands on them. I added all the plastic chain I could find in my bitsbox. Drilled and pinned a bunch of Goblins in place and added some old Black Orc and Kruleboyz shields to the sides (and assorted other bits). A lot of time and effort went into finding a proper crow's nest. I finally settle on an Ogre bit, and luckily had (just one) Goblin that could fit in there (sort of). I also had a left over Bad Moon. I tried to think up a proper Creedence reference here, but failed. 

I was planning to paint banner designs on the strips of cloth, but when it came down to it, I didn't feel like it anymore. Maybe on the next giant :D.

With all the stuff in proper places, it was time to get painting. I tackled the skin first, having a blast (har, har) with the airbrush. I started with my new favorite basecoat for skin: Calvary Brown, and worked up to a pinkish skin color by AK. At that point I decided to go crazy and blast everything that needed shadows with a bit of thinned down Vallejo Translucent Red (I picked the trick up painting Red Sonja). After blending in the red and picking out the lighter parts of the skin again with not so extreme red skin color, I had a giant that looked positively purple and pink, but potentially rather cool.

I'm planning to use this model as a Bonegrinder Giant in games, I think it has the proper size and the Goblins on it's back being useless with those rules, seems appropriate for Goblins.

At that point I decided to just persevere and keep painting, hoping the clothing, wood and base would pull the colors together. I think it did and I rather appreciate the vibrancy of the skin color. 

Imagine sticking all these goblins in place and then realizing that you forgot to add a shield to one in the center of the mass. I think the gobbo down right has the right reaction to that.

I mounted all the Goblins on cork stoppers and painted them separately. I glued them to the howdah when they (and the howdah) where finished. I forgot to paint and add their shields of course, so there was a bit of a challenge there. I had no hand left over to take pictures of my shaky hand trying to use a tweezer to superglue a shield to a Goblin in the midst of a bunch of fellow Goblins while muttering, please don't hit any painted bits. I almost regret not setting up a tripod for the occasion (almost).

Just follow these steps while painting on the sprue...oh dear, off I went again.

At this point (well, just before this point) I thought 'let's make things really complicated' and try that old tutorial from White Dwarf 101 again. It is an 'Eavy Metal how to paint shields tutorial where Mike McVey shows how to get awesome looking Ogre Faces on your shields in just 7 steps. I've tried and failed following along with this tutorial since (checks colophon) 1988. I'm getting very old. I do have to say that my latest attempt (pictured above) is getting close (I think (otherwise I can just take my reading glasses off and rejoice at my orange blobs looking similar to the ones in the old magazine I still have (getting old isn't all bad))). 

I was worried while painting that my base was way too bare with just a few mushroom clusters and a couple of tree trunks here and there. Luckily enough static flock and reindeer moss came to the rescue. And the tea leaves of course.

Adding the bright orange shields gives a bit of extra sparkle to the howdah, so I'm quite happy I went for broke. I also went crazy with the verdigris on the shields stuck to the railings, following another tutorial. It got so out of hand, I ended up having to add blacklining and some raw bronze to make the details (sort of) readable again.

I take it as a compliment when the camera on my smartphone automatically tags something I painted as a face. I am very satisfied about those eyes.

Last, but definitively not least, I decided to take extra care with the eyes. Adding purple into the eye sockets before carefully painting pupils and eyeballs in. It's easier with giants, providing they're not wearing a helmet that give a +1 bonus to blocking brushes. Still I'm quite happy with how he looks. With that I've added a rather interesting centerpiece to a Greenskin army that will most likely be completely Night Goblin themed for a while. I'm also planning to go for a full wolf and boar cavalry force and a classic Orcs and Goblins horde (in addition to all the greenskins in my cases). No one will ever accuse me of a lack of ambition when it comes to projects (or a keen sense of reality to be honest).

There's a wonderful interview featuring Rick Priestley and Alan Perry about the big hats over here on Youtube. If you haven't seen it, it is well worth the time. 

And with that....wait...what's that? Oh yeah I've added more random 'one off'*' little side projects around my paint station. Big Hat Chaos Dwarves appeared during my 'beer and girls' hobby hiatus. When I got back into the hobby I thought they looked beyond silly. Having no nostalgic memories to compensate,  didn't help increase my appreciation for these models. Having painting one, I still think they look silly as hell. But what a joy they are to paint. Having said that, aren't silly armies the most awesome armies in the Warhammer universe? I will most definitely try to give this grumpy looking 'tusker a couple of happy little friends in the future. I might try to see how much further from the psychedelic 'red period' I can take them (with apologies for making this guy red anyway). As a random aside I tried using purple in tead of black as the 'undercoat' for the eyes. I think it works rather nicely, although I have to add that in my first attempt I painted his eyes at the underside of his eyebrows. Now there's a pair of impressive whiskers if you ask me, or is whiskers only allowed for mustaches? Never mind, off I go, there are around forty Night Goblins (on foot) awaiting paint, not to mention a bunch of other models.

* as if...