A small horde of 28mm plastic minis from Osprey/NorthStar. These are from the Oathmark Skeletons box.
Though I doubt most people will notice, I based these minis in two different Stylynrez primers; red-brown and black. After layers of dry-brush, dark contrast shading, etc. they pretty much all look the same. Note: my camera phone has shifted light more towards yellow and they are a bit whiter in person.
These were the first minis that I really started to use the Black Legion Contrast (1:3 mix with Contrast medium) to darken them. Especially on the metals, which gave them a nice dark look that reminds me of the effect that Wudu gets. Though this only takes one coat, whereas Nuln Oil would take me several.
Our game module needs about 20 Skeletons and 20 Zombies for one encounter. That’s way more than I want to paint up, so I’ll just use 10 and proxy something else. I do want to paint up 10 Zombies though, as that would give me enough for more of the Zombie encounters.
For now these Skeletons are going to march on over to Dave’s Paint What You Got challenge. Where they will surely get trampled over by tanks, speeder bikes, etc. Sorry about the mess of bones, Dave!
Next Up: I finally made more progress on the stalled mini but I think I’m going to hold up on that for another week and release a different post instead.
Double Down Dice 
I think they look great! The bone colour is nicely done, and the metallics look old and worn. I can totally see how little bits will break off them, though. Do you use the black contrast mix as a wash?
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Thanks Matt. Yea, it works great as a wash. Once my last pot of old Nuln Oil gets used up, this will likely be my new recipe. I haven’t tried the new Nuln Oil, but apparently they changed the recipe.
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These are really nice the start of a great undead horde!
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Cheers LCE! Given that I’m losing the space constraints battle, that might be the end of the horde too! Haha!
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They look great. I use Nuln oil. but will give the Black legion contrast a try.
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Thanks GP! Usually when I reach for Nuln Oil, I’m hoping for something that really darkens things. But Nuln can take several coats to really darken metals. So Black Legion does the trick, at least for me.
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Nice mate. đŸ™‚
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Cheers Dave! đŸ™‚
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Even though you didn’t enjoy doing them Brian, they look excellent, and very effective band of skeles, and if they do get broken, turn them into a pile of bones scenery piece for your games.
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Haha, hadn’t thought of that! When life gives you lemons, make lemonade! Thanks Dave!
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Good suggestion from Dave Stone! đŸ™‚ Nobody’d be surprised to see a skeleton wandering about with an arm missing either! Very nicely painted I think!
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Thanks John! đŸ˜€
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Ah, skeletons – the most easily broken of all miniatures! Mine mostly sit in a box and even then they break every time I look at them. Nice work on these though, they’re nice and straightforward in terms of appearance and they really look the part as undead mooks ready to be put to the sword by your adventurers. Good luck with the zombies, they’re one of my favourite things to paint – I bet you’ll knock out a horde of them in no time! Oh and cheers for the shout out!
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Thanks Wudu, glad to hear from you! Zombies are tricky for me, I have yet to get Zombie skin to look like I want it to. I’ve got something in my mind that is fleshy pale but with a green tinge to it. But it never comes out that way. Though it’s probably a good idea to practice with a horde of Zombies before I attempt to tackle an Undead Blood Bowl team!
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I think the skeletons look nice and its a shame the painting process wasn’t more enjoyable! I like painting them because you can do some interesting things with some quick glazes and highlights and get them looking nicely. I have to admit, these do look a bit frail and I can see where they’d break easily. Did you consider GW’s skeletons at all? They’re a little chunkier and might hold up a bit better but I suppose it is a bit late for that now. One of these days, I have a Vampire Counts project to work on and I’ll paint some skeletons. Seeing these reminded me of how much I look forward to that! đŸ™‚
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Thanks Jeff! It’s one of those things, sometimes things go nicely and sometimes they don’t. I picked these skeletons because they match the scale of my other Frostgrave minis. Those tend to be the smaller side of 28mm scale, so it can often be difficult to find other minis of matching height. Someday I’d love to find the time and money to invest in a 3D printer so I could print all my minis to a matching scale.
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Makes sense! GW would not work well at all if you’re sticking to 28mm. Having a consistent scale is a great reason to get a 3D printer too. I hadn’t thought of it before but it makes a lot of sense.
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The ability to scale and being able to print bits to customize minis further, are my two biggest reasons for wanting a 3D printer.
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