Baardeend's Big Book. Chapter: Erebor Dwarf Conversions

BrushStroke · **Posted:** Tue Jul 07, 2015 9:07 am

Liking your minis Baardeend

The flag loin cloths is inspired... love it!!

I completely agree with you about eagle bases.... I hate the look of the clear plastic sticks too... I opted for a swooping down pose for my recent eagle mini

oh, and a poor little Uruk Hai scout who's having a REALLY bad day

Baardeend · **Posted:** Tue Jul 07, 2015 10:32 am

BrushStroke wrote:

Liking your minis Baardeend

The flag loin cloths is inspired... love it!!

Thanks man, much appreciated

BrushStroke wrote:

I completely agree with you about eagle bases.... I hate the look of the clear plastic sticks too... I opted for a swooping down pose for my recent eagle mini

I really LOVE your eagle pose! That eagle isn't from GW, is it? And that poor Uruk running for his life... Awesome stuff!

And now it's time for some of my progress:
I didn't manage to complete the painting challenge, mainly because Shagrat hasn't turned out how I want.

[

I wanted to paint a red eye on the plate armour, but it came out looking more like a red spider. Quiet a pleasent surprise I must say!
I want the chainmill to look more worn-out, but I can't seem to get it right

Tips and tricks are welcome

Furthermore I have converted a Moria Goblin Shaman I had twice. It still needs some remodeling. I'm happy with the results this far:

C&C welcome:) especially on how to give the chainmill a more weathered look

Baardeend · **Posted:** Wed Jul 22, 2015 8:49 pm

Last weekend I converted another 4 Goblin warriors. Basically it's just weapon swaps with some prowlers, but I'm quiet content with the results nevertheless:

After these Gobbo's I first converted an extra Boromir CotWT and Knights of Dol Amroth Captain. I plan on using the Boromir conversion as a chieftain from the Fiefdoms with a King of Men profile. I'm not happy with the easterling sword so that one will be replaced with another sometime:

Next up are a Harad chieftain/Mumak commander and an old Hasharii. The Harad chief came without his spear so giving him a sword was easy enough. I didn't like his empty right hand and thought the curved sword of the Hasharii would look cool. This left the Hasharii without a sword, which was fixed with a spare Easterling sword:

The curved sword now looks more like a dagger the Chief is holding behind his back.

After these fairly easy conversions it was time for a challenge. I got one man-at-arms of Dol Amroth in a eBay lot. I have 3 of these already and some warriors of Minas Tirith painted blue to represent some more. Now it was time to give this little army a banner. I only have the banner from the plastic mounted knights of Dol Amroth and I want them to have a banner as well...
I came up with a solution I'm really pleased with: magnets!
Here is the man-at-arms with pike and sword (I wanted to give him a dagger, will change this later):

And now the same model with his exchangeable banner:

And here is the mounted knight with banner and magnets in his arm..

So I can still give him his lance:

And last but not least I managed to start painting my Saruman for this month's challenge:

Cheers

Valadorn · **Posted:** Fri Jul 24, 2015 1:36 pm

Actually I like that shagrat.The contrast is been worked nicely, the only problem was the shield indeed. I wish you the best with your progress.

Dorthonion · **Posted:** Fri Jul 24, 2015 3:29 pm

I think that is the first time I have seen magnets being used for this small a mini - well done!

Baardeend · **Posted:** Thu Jul 30, 2015 8:59 pm

Some progress on Saruman. Since this Saruman can only be used in an evil army I decided to go for a Saruman of Many Colours. The many colours have been applied, now time to make it more subtle and paint the rest of the model :-D

Baardeend · **Posted:** Fri Jul 31, 2015 11:00 am

And he is finished

edge67 · **Posted:** Sat Aug 01, 2015 3:52 am

Very nice work. Clever painting of the eye of Sauron.

Crucium Giger · **Posted:** Tue Aug 04, 2015 11:40 am

Any time someone goes with 'of many colours' I approve

Baardeend · **Posted:** Thu Aug 06, 2015 8:34 pm

Thank you all for the kind words!

Now it's time for a new project! I plan to enter these mini's in the monthly painting challenge as well:

The day was March 26 of the year 3019 TA. Thorin III and Bard II looked out over the valley in front of the Lonely Mountain. It has been 6 days since both their fathers died defending the main gate. Thorin sighed. The valley in front of him was filled with over 100.000 Easterling warriors. The Mountain holds enough resources to withstand a siege, but Thorin feels restless. The day before his scouts noticed strange lightning in the south-east. It might have been a volcano erupting in Mordor. But whatever it was, it caused a disturbance in the Easterling force. Today rumours came to the Mountain saying Sauron has been destroyed.
Thorin caught Bard looking anxiously at Dale. The city looked peaceful. Because of their fathers choice to meet the Easterlings in the open and their retreat to the Mountain when they became overrun it was unclear what happened to the inhabitants who refused to leave Dale.
Thorin summoned his father’s King’s Champion to meet him and Bard for a plan. They decided that they were going for the final push now the Easterlings seemed to lose hoop. While Thorin and Bard lead the main army to march on Dale, a small group lead by the King Champion will travel south to find out if the rumours about Sauron are true. The King’s Champion will be accompanied by his two Heralds, a Shieldbearer, 3 Iron Guards, one Loremaster and a Dwarf Captain.

I have started working on the King's Champion:

Please let me know what you guys think

Baardeend · **Posted:** Wed Feb 10, 2016 11:26 am

I can't believe it has been 6 months since my last WIP-update

I guess graduating university takes more time than you realise :-D

I have experimented with little magnets some more.
In this first part I used a Wildman with spear, Wildman with sword and an Uruk-Hai Ballista Crewmember. From my bits-box I used the spare Dunlending banner and the Rohan Royal Banner:

I wanted to create a banner bearer for the Wildmen of Duland with a pillaged Rohan banner. And I wanted the same Wildman to function as banner (bo'sun) in an Umbar army as well.
All the pieces involved:

The Wildman Banner Bearer:

The Corsair Banner Bearer:

More will follow soon!
- Wildman with Sword
- Uruk-Hai Ballista Crewmember
- Mordor/Isengard Trolls

Erunion · **Posted:** Wed Feb 10, 2016 12:25 pm

Nice conversion! The idea to use magnets to swap between banners is unique.

Baardeend · **Posted:** Wed Feb 10, 2016 4:11 pm

Thanks Erunion,

Next thing up is the Uruk-Hai Ballista Crewmember converted to a Banner Bearer with the pillaged Rohan Banner:

On the second picture two of the magnets are visible. These magnets are connected to two hidden magnets in the banner. I drilled 2 very small holes in which I could hide the magnets

Dorthonion · **Posted:** Thu Feb 11, 2016 7:38 pm

You have a talent for conversions!

Wah Wing · **Posted:** Thu Feb 11, 2016 9:58 pm

I've always fancied the idea of using magnets. You've made great use of them.

Valadorn · **Posted:** Thu Feb 11, 2016 10:12 pm

Great!! I am afraid it is going to be a pain to paint this banner because it is too curvy.

Baardeend · **Posted:** Fri Feb 12, 2016 12:12 pm

Thanks guys!
Making conversions is by far my favorite part of the hobby. And every now and then I paint a little... Lately only one figure a month XD
I first thought of using magnets after I glued Faramir, Prince of Ithilien's shield on a King of Men conversion... :roll:

Not wanting to make the same mistake again I found the solution in the use of magnets

Here is the third guy from the first wave:

I spent more than a year looking for this wildman. When I finally found him for a reasonable price I got two of him. I think his sword goes very well with the Corsairs, so I decided to turn the second one in a Corsair captain with sword. I use the same Dunlending banner as before which functions as a Shield. He can stand in as a Bo'sun as well.

Here you can see the two magnets to keep the banner in place, one in the shoulder and one in his hand:

Here he is with the banner:

And as a lucky coincidence I can place the Wildman spearhead on his hand as well, turning him in an improvised Reaver:

Stay tuned for part II of fun with magnets :-D

Baardeend · **Posted:** Sun Feb 28, 2016 4:01 pm

And here is my entry for this month's challenge:
I'm not completely satisfied with the result, but I don't have anymore time to work on him:?
I somehow misplaced the Uruk carrying Merry, so here I only have the uruk with Pippin:

I know the base is ugly. I can't store both my painting and basing supplies on my student's room. But please feel free to give me advice to improve the painting!

Advario · **Joined:** Tue Sep 30, 2014 10:54 am **Posts:** 35

Hey

1) Nice magnet conversions you have done! It is impressive what you can achieve with them. Must think of them for my minis :-D

2) The Uruk with Pippin looks good

Am I wrong or does pippin not have eyes? I would suggest to paint them, cause eyes let them look even more fantastic. And the paint looks a bit glossy ... but that is maybe caused by the lamp?

Hope to see more of your minis, especially the magnet minis!

Greetings
Advario

Baardeend · **Posted:** Tue May 31, 2016 4:11 pm

Thanks Advario. The paint is glossy due to the lamp. It doesn't matter what I try but I'm still not able to get acceptable pictures with natural light...

After a complete lack of motivation and inspiration the last few months I'm back with my Azog mini, beautifully converted by Ridgeback:

I hope to pick up a brush more often the following weeks =)
And/or complete some more conversions with my magnets :-D

Baardeend's Big Book. Chapter: Erebor Dwarf Conversions

Who is online