Wargods of Olympus and more non-painting

Given that I can't summon the energy to do any painting at present it is patently insane to sign up for another kickstarter but this is what I have done by going in (quite big time) on Crocodile Games Wargods of Olympus, which finishes in a few hours.  It seems to have been a spectacular success for them and I am hoping to use some of the the figures as part of my Argonauts project apart from trying the main game itself.  This depends on their size (I gather they are quite large) and whether I decide to mount them on washers, rather than the slotta bases they are designed, for which will require some surgery.  I have done this successfully with Black Scorpion's pirates so see no reason that it won't work for these too.  We shall see. Their marketing has been very good, the concept art has been first class and I especially liked the way they illustrated progress on the kickstarter with a rather splendid map.

When their 300 style Spartans came out a few years ago I thought they were ridiculous but have been won over by their new Trojans which, while at the fantasy end of the spectrum are not by too much. I've also been impressed by some of the extra figures including an enticing Artemis who looks just like my Greek girlfriend F of thirty years ago! 

I've never seen any of their figures in reality but have heard good things about them. I am tempted to order some of the old Greek figures that they have produced just to try them out.

Now then, now then, what's goin' on 'ere?

I really wanted to get some painting done today as I haven't done anything in June and I thought maybe I could finish one figure today but I don't have anything close enough to completion.  I have four In Her Majesty's Name figures (the Scotland Yard policemen)  on the way but I am struggling with two problems with these.  Firstly, I am having trouble doing their eyes.  Annoyingly, rather than a plain oval, the eyes have sculpted irises which is really making them hard to do.  I've had three attempts so far and only one figure looks OK. The other issue is with regard to the uniform.  Police uniform at the end of the nineteenth century (as now, actually) was such a dark blue that it looked almost black.  Many of the painted figures I have seen are far too blue.  I am happy with the colour I mixed for them but shading them is proving a problem. I have actually shaded these figures with what I thought was a darker and then a lighter shade but when the paint dries the shading isn't apparent at all.  Oh well, I'll just have to have another go.

I'm off to the Americas (Houston, Bogota, Medellin, Barranquilla and Panama City) again on Friday, somewhat unexpectedly, so I don't think I'll get anything painted before then.  So it'll be three weeks before I get anything done.

I am going to paint my Grand Manner Roman warship for a game Big Red Bat is planning in the autumn (see my Roman blog) so hope to get that started soon.  I might paint my Argo at the same time.  It'll make a change from getting stressed by not painting figures anyway.