Hi everyone :) If you follow me on Twitter you might have seen that I recently got a 3D printer. It’s been quite a learning experience for me, working through everything to get usable miniatures from the process. I think I’m getting there now, so I’ll share more of the process once I’ve got everything working consistently. In the meantime, I thought I’d post a video of the printer in action for those who might be interested in seeing how it works. It is a time lapse video but it is still a long video so it might not be one to watch start to finish :) As you can see, at the end of the process the miniature is surrounded by supports which are necessary due to the ground-up way the printer works. One of the major challenges of printing successfully is getting the supports working without swamping the miniature itself.
If there’s anything you’d like to see me print and paint just let me know! Goblin Squire :)
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Hi everyone :) Today I’m going to be reviewing this paints and tools starter set from Games Workshop. I spent Christmas and New Year at my parents’ house, and some family issues meant that I stayed longer than I’d initially planned. I was struggling that long without any of my paints or minis (I might have a problem... :p ), so I decided to pick some up in the most cost effective way I could. This starter set costs £25 from a Games Workshop store or their website, but you can pick it up slightly cheaper from third party sellers. It is intended to include everything you need to get started, so let’s dive right in and have a look at what’s in there. The toolsLets start with the tools. I don’t own most of the Games Workshop equivalents of these tools, so I can’t comment on whether here are identical to the tools you can buy individually in stores, but I can talk about the quality of each of them. The cutters are of good quality. They have dealt with sprues and flashing on plastic miniatures without any issues, and I’ve added them to my collection of tools now that I’m back home. They cope ok with metal as well, although I wouldn’t necessarily want to use them on thick metal pieces. I have no problem with Games Workshop creating tools that work best on plastic, though, as that is the only material they make miniatures in these days. After the cutters things get a bit less positive. I have barely used the mould line removers because I find the small, effectively handle-less design quite uncomfortable to use. I found that the metal digs in to my hands, and the short length means you lack leverage, and thus doing what they’re designed to do requires quite a lot of effort. Now that I’m home I suspect this tool will be put in a drawer only to emerge in case of emergency. Finally, we have the brush. I find it hard to get too excited either way about the brush. It’s...fine. When I first opened the pack I had to do some work to achieve a good point on the brush. Here’s a photo of what it looked like. It’s a little hard to make put clearly, but the end is rough and bent over to one side. I did manage to get a decent point on it eventually, and you can see the results I achieved with it below. It’s always useful to have more brushes, so it will go in to my brush supply, but it won’t be a go to when I’m looking for detailed work. The obvious omission on the tools side of things is glue. This, I assume, is tied in to the move from Games Workshop to make their beginner miniatures “easy build” - i.e. clicking together without glue. In this light the omission of glue makes some sense, but only if you’re using the set in conjunction with miniatures of this type (of which there are relatively few) or miniatures from other manufacturers which don’t require glue (such as the smaller Reaper Bones minis. In this instance I didn’t have any miniatures at my parents’ either, so I picked up some of the easy build minis as well - I’ll review them in a future post. The paintsThe set contains 10 standard paints, 1 shade, 1 technical paint and 1 texture paint (for basing). You can see the colours which are included in the image above, the one with the opaque lid is gold. The complete list is: Retributor Armour; Abaddon Black; Armageddon Dust; Kantor Blue; Reikland Fleshshade; White Scar; Leadbelcher; Mournfang Brown; Celestra Grey; Khorne Red; Nighthaunt Gloom; Rakarth Flesh and Bugman’s Glow. For the most part it’s a good spread of colours for the beginner. Obviously you aren’t getting more than one shade of each colour, although it does include white and black for mixing shades if you want to. My two issues with the selection were that there weren’t really any bright shades, everything was quite muted, and there wasn’t a green or a yellow. Both of these factors are fairly limiting in terms of your painting options. That said, all the paints are pretty much staples, and it never hurts to have more of them. I was a little unimpressed when I realised that Reikland Fleshshade was the only shade included in the set because it’s a shade I rarely use. That said, being forced to use it in my demonstration mini has opened my eyes to the different effects which can be achieved using it, and I may even start to use it more in my everyday painting. Neither the texture paint (Armageddon dust) nor the technical paint (Nighthaunt Gloom) make much sense to me in this set. I wouldn’t expect either to be used by a new painter, and the textured paint makes even less sense considering all the easy build miniatures that I’ve seen have moulded bases. At least the Nighthaunt Gloom kind of makes sense considering the Nighthaunt army are one of the main ones getting easy build miniatures. I’m happy to add them to my collection, but I don’t think they’re sensible additions to a beginners set. To my mind there is, once again, an obvious omission here. This set doesn’t include any primer, and I am firmly of the opinion that Games Workshop miniatures, as with virtually all other miniatures, really need primer for the paint to adhere properly. I’m not aware of a brush on primer made by Games Workshop which does explain why there wouldn’t be one included, but this seems like a gaping whole in a beginners paint set. The resultsI’ve promised throughout to show you what I achieved with this set, and that time has now arrived :) I picked up a box of easy build Stormcast Eternals which I proceeded to build and paint using only the tools and paints in this set. That seemed like the most appropriate way to test a self contained set like this. As I was away from home I forgot to take a photo of the exact miniature before his is another the same set built but with no paint applied. The gold colour you see here is just the colour of the plastic, chosen (I assume) because the recommended colour for Stormcast Eternal armour is gold. So, painting with only the things in the set meant no glue, no primer and no palette (so painting was directly pot to miniature). Here are the results: I think it's fair to say that it's possible to paint a miniature to a decent tabletop standard using only what is in this set. The colours aren't quite as dynamic as I'd like, and the standard of brush and lack of palette means it lacks a certain precision, but I don't think it's at all bad. My biggest issues were roughly what I predicted. There were leaves sculpted onto the base which had to be a slightly strange blue because I didn't have access to a green. The paint had to be applied a little heavily because I couldn't use a primer. Things which were annoying to someone used to painting minis, but probably not a massive concern to people painting their first miniature. Overall I was pretty pleased with the outcome. Value for moneyWhen reviewing anything for value for money I’m always aware that there is such a strong element of subjectivity that it is meaningless to speak in absolute. I can tell you how much the things inside cost relative to the cost of the set, but whether it is worth the money will depend on whether the contents are useful to you.
The individual sale price of all the items in this box is actually slightly complicated by the fact that not everything contained can be bought separately. The shade and texture paint, for example, can only be bought in pots which are larger than those in this set. With that said, it is quite clear that this set represents better value than buying the elements separately. The 10 standard paints on their own would cost £27.50, and this set costs £25. In effect you’re getting the tools, shade, texture paint and technical paint free. Clearly then, if you want everything which this set contains it makes sense to buy it. I bought this set in a strange situation, not having access to any of my other paints or tools, but I certainly don’t regret it now that I’m back at home. It can provide a helpful top up for established painters and I know that I, for one, can never have enough tools. Whether it is a useful set for a beginner is a difficult question. The paint selection is limited but useful, and it definitely helps a new painter to have the tool selection. I think if I were to buy paints for a beginner I would start ng them what they want to paint. If their selection uses paints in the set then I’d absolutely go for it. If they wanted to paint orcs or anything else green it becomes less useful. Either way I would want to get some glue and primer to go with the set. To be fair to Games Workshop, though, it’s virtually impossible to create a set which is perfectly tailored to every painting project, and this is a pretty solid starting point, particularly for their own starter miniatures. I hope that is helpful. Feel free to ask any questions or let me know what you think. Goblin Squire :) |
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