Welcome 2020 - Ramblings

So I made it through another year, despite a myriad of trials, more than a few of which were of my own making.  A rather distracting phenomenon in recent months has been the massive bush fires sweeping across the country.  Fortunately, my immediate family has only been inconvenienced (a 9-hour drive to Sydney ended up being 15-hours after we were diverted away from fires an hour short of our destination), but my extended family has injured some more threatening situations.  Not to mention all those people who've lost their lives, pets, homes and livelihoods.   I count myself lucky.


If you're anything like me, 'hobbies' are a means to escape such stress, recharge, refresh and lose oneself in the moment.  It is nice having an inconsequential project or two to tackle on the side, discuss with your hobby buddies or share with some colleagues at work.  January hasn't really afforded me with many opportunities to flex my hobby muscles, but I'm not worried as I am sure come February and beyond, things will swing around once again.   So onto the rambling!

Well, the biggest news of 2020 (so far) is that I won the 2019 4th Quarter Necromunda Terrain Makers Challenge!  My entry was a couple of posts back, but I thought I might share some of the other entries - I am sure the other builders won't mind (names removed to respect their privacy).  Check these beauties out:

"The Dreadhook Whalers" is really cool - the Whalers themselves are
spot-on exactly as W40k grim-dark models should look.  If only I could paint like that.

"Ol`Ernys waterhole" had a great write-up both in terms of a storyline
and how it was made.  These type of tiles are great to add a feature in a game.

"The Big Catch" was an excellent diorama type entry.  The same bloke
did some other great work - really top-notch.  So much detail.

"Thump in the Sump Warf" was huge!  That green toxic sludge really
was something to behold - used special paints to make it really pop.

As the winner, I'll be receiving a prize from Promethium Forge who have some great looking kit - I'll post some more about that once it is in my hands.  I also had the honour of choosing the next challenge, which is titled "The First Hive" - it is amazing how much effort one can put into writing just a few sentences, trying to get them 'just right'.  I made a start at my entry just today (kind of a bit of fun), but I'll put it into a separate Post.

The only other hobby thing I've been doing in recent weeks is remaking the paper model of the ChickenHawk.  I first made it about 3-years ago and it suffered catastrophic structural failure when it was stepped upon by a Titan... yeah, don't leave your models on the floor.  I always really liked the model, so I thought I'd try it again, but this time scaling it up to 133%.  Here are some early shots:

So that's an Eldar in the foreground and the model (partially assembled)
is on a 12-inch square tile.  So it's BIG!

The lighting is a bit better in this shot - you get a sense of the scale next to the Marine.

I've started layering cardboard and heavy paper over the model, to build up some panel-like effects that will look good when it comes to painting.  The layers actually act as a laminate of sorts, making the model extra-strong - seriously, by the time it's finished, it won't feel like paper, more like plastic.  We'll just have to see how it goes.

Happy hobbying!