The Company of Thorin Oakenshield

Here we have 13 Dwarves and a Hobbit. I primed these figures over a year ago, but have never got to painting them. They immediately came to mind though for the Heroic Group bonus round of this year's painting challenge. This is the 4th bonus round and there are many great entries. Well worth a look.

I put much more work into these figures then I usually do, no relying on AP to make them look good. All have been painted in layers with various washes to smooth the transitions. I thought this approach was mostly successful except for a couple of figures. I have to say that I enjoy painting GW figures, they are really quite fantastic.

The colour scheme for each figure is taken from the movie. There are excellent on-line guides to painting them. I got help from the blog Tale of Painters (go to the tag for The Hobbit and scroll through the pages). I really quite like them, I hope you do as well.

Bilbo (the burglar), Thorin Oakenshield and Balin

Fili, Ori, Kili, Gloin, Oin

Bombur, Nori, Bofur, Dwalin, Bifur, Dori

It is tempting to paint more of these LoTR figures, some of the Orcs on their fell beasts look particularly interesting, But I really think it unlikely that I would ever get to game with them. I still have a lot of figures that I need to paint for gaming, but these were a real pleasure.

Coming up is a unit of British Paratroopers and then some Finns for the Winter War gaming. The next bonus round is for casualty figures, so I will have to get some out to paint, I think I have a number of Prussians left to do. And of course there are two figures left from the Goblin Town box set left to do.