The Crusaders came back.

 I couldn't resist getting some Crusaders out to man the castle.

That really took me back.

The castle project

I wanted the castle to look like it had been made from stones, but I didn't want to make it look totally different to the way my Dad had made it, so I bought some foam to work on some of the walls but decided to leave the tower walls as they were.

I needed to repair the wood in a lot of places, using wood filler (quite a lot of wood filler) but wanted it to look as realistic as possible and so decided not to worry about sanding it down completely smooth. I wanted to leave a bit of texture to the walls.

I then drew, with a biro, the stones into the foam which I had glued to the walls. 

I thought I'd do something with the arrow slits as well, and used foam to give them the effect of standing out from the tower walls a bit.

I did sand the wood filler a bit, but not too much.

And then I painted the whole thing with a grey acrylic pain from the local HobbyCraft store.

A black wash., filling all those cracks and bringing out the texture on the tower walls, worked really well.

I then added white to the base grey paint and dry brushed the stones and tower walls.

and painted the drawbridge a darker richer brown, and gave it a dark brown wash to highlight the planks.

I did some work on the inside too, wood filler in the tower tops to give the feeling of stone floors, and it was done.

I think Dad would have been pleased with it.

It was a pleasure to do it, and took me back to those simpler times.

The castle my Dad made me.

When I was around 7 I was hooked on TIMPO figures.

Cowboys... Knights... Crusaders... Romans. 

Every week I'd go to the local toyshop in Sydenham and spend my pocket money on a figure, or I'd save up for a Jail or a Wagon.

I loved pitting the Romans agains the Cowboys. Anything went really. 

And the one day my Dad turned up with a castle he'd made me out of wood.

I've still no idea how he kept it secret. It's a big thing and we lived in a 2 bedroom flat on the 4th Floor.

My Dad was always great at mechanical things and making stuff out of, well, anything really.

This was perfectly sized for my TIMPO figures and even had a working drawbridge.

I played with it for years, but like all things I guess, eventually I grew out of it and it was passed on to other family members, I think initially a cousin and from there I don't know.

About 15 years ago my Mother managed to get it back. 

It was a bit battered and people had added little bits to it over time, the shield above the drawbridge for example.

There were no figures so I bought some from Ebay and Toy Fairs and, well, wherever I saw them. And I stored the treasure away.

I told myself that one day I'd repair it and see if I could upgrade it a little.

And then time passed.

And earlier this year my Dad died.

He knew how much I treasured the castle as a young boy but I don't think he knew how I still treasured it as an adult.

I decided repairing and upgrading it would be my next Project.

Good news is that our latest WesterNoir Kickstarter is one third funded

 Yep.

And if you'd like to see more and risk being tempted yourself then please pop over to https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/kiawordsmith/westernoir-tales

It's coming along nicely.

WesterNoir Tales Kickstarter

The Kickstarter for WesterNoir Tales has been approved.

Here's the link to the pre-launch page https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/kiawordsmith/westernoir-tales

Gator Man figure for Table Display at Conventions.

This year I've focussed my convention table more and more on the WesterNoir series.

Adding 6 inch figures of Josiah Black and Cassidy McRae to try to make my table stand out a little against the sea of tables of great comics books around me.

The figures certainly drew people to the table and I had some really interesting chats with people I would not had met had the figures not been there.

But I need to add some monsters.

I love Gary's design for the Gator Men, first seen in issue 2, and so this monster was the obvious choice.

The first thing I do when pinging figures is lay down a flat layer of the base colour. This layer is watered down a little as I want it to fill all the little cracks and holes. There's nothing worse than seeing a little bit of grey when you look in detail at your finished work.

The eyes are the first thing I actually paint as it's easier to move the skin to the eyes than it is to paint the right size and shape of eye onto the skin colour.

I was tempted throughout to paint the iris and pupil in but love the way the orange stands out against the green and so left it as is.

Putting a lighter layer for the skin gives the figure its three dimensional feel. I actually stopped the lighter green on this time, playing with it as I felt it better reflected a crocodile's skin.

Picking out the detail of the sales on his back with a little green, accentuated but a darker green circle around it ... I love the way this came out.

Then adding a dark blue for the jeans base colour. 

Yes, there are two figures, one for the Convention Table and the other for the WesterNoir Tales Kickstarter.

A nice brown belt and a simple dark brown base (I don't like the bases to be too busy as they distract from the figure).

and he's done.

Very happy with how he came out.

Just submitted my WesterNoir Tales for Review on Kickstarter

It's been a while since I used Kickstarter but am happy to say that, whilst it has changed a little, I could still work things out.

You can check it out at:- WesterNoir Tales Kickstarter