Landmate conversions, an Appleseed inspired project.

[Modhail]

I had come across that site quite a while ago but lost the link, thank you for reminding me!
The japanese (I think?) is a bit of a barrier, sadly.
I'd love to get one of those resin kits one day...


By your comment I understand you'd prefer the brownish-grey over the two-tone blue?

[Penchour]

Depending on what purpose you're building it, I like the late ESWAT colour scheme:



Anyway, tou did an excellent job so far

[dijit]

Yes i prefer the tan colour.
Google translate can help a little with the Japanese, but not much. It's enough to get an idea of it with a little guesstimating.
Again lovely work.

[OSHIROmodels]

Go for the tan and if there is something you desperately need translating then I might be able to get my wife to have a look 

cheers

James

[Modhail]

Depending on what purpose you're building it, I like the late ESWAT colour scheme

I'm actually trying to not pin it down to a certain purpose or part of the Appleseed storyline. That way I can have the most freedom when thinking up scenarios.
That's part of the doubt about the colour scheme; I really like the two tone blue and would like to see if I can pull it off. But, it does pin me down in the "early days" of Deunan and Briareos' stay in Olympus, which limits me scenario-wise. (Plus, the type of head and legs don't match the prototype/early production Guges) Maybe I'll convert a specific "early" Guges sometime.

James, thank you for the offer! I'm just content to look at the pretty pictures for the most part at the moment.
I was wondering though, if the creator of these models mentions on his site if/where these are for sale online (with his permission)?  I'm seriously tempted to get one for display, but I'd rather not see my money going to recasters, without benefit to the original creator...
I don't want to unduly trouble your wife (or you) but if she could take a quick peek, I would be very grateful!

Update: I started painting the first Landmate today, here it is in it's basecoat:

For some reason it turns up more green on my monitor, the actual colour is a mix of grey and tan (the two Vallejo colours in the background: mixed in a 2 brown to 1 grey ratio).

[Modhail]

Painting is done on the first landmate, as far as I'm concerned. It turned out a bit darker and (oddly enough) green than I had originally intended. But the paintjob is neat enough and near enough that I'm hesitant to risk messing it up by repainting it:


It is currently unmarked, I might read through volume 3 and 4 again to see if there are any markings I could add.

This means that, as of today, my finished Appleseed cast is this:

[dijit]

Looking good!

[Gunbird]

Very nice Erik. Looking forward on seeing the others painted as well.

[Modhail]

Me too...
But I've only got this week to finish them... After that I'll only be home in the weekends for a couple of months, so I expect my hobby-time to be somewhat reduced. 

Here's how far I got today:


Need to go now or the New Year's party will start without me...

[Pentaro]

This is my favorite LAF thread right now. Have a happy new year.

[Modhail]

Thank you, Pentaro!
Indeed, a happy new year!

No painting today, still a bit fuzzy from last night...

I did however field test an idea I had about terrain for Appleseed. I needed something to reproduce the many levels of elevation you see in much of the Appleseed artwork. I used some modular dungeon/secret base terrain I have on perma-loan from Wayswatcher:


I also did a quick field test to see how the Mobile Frame Zero rules would handle Appleseed style combat. I think they will need tweaking, maybe even to the point of a (partial) rewrite. (More thought on that can be found on my blog).

[Modhail]

White, oh, how I curse your name! 

I had a bit of a struggle with the white on those ESWAT landmates, can you tell?
I've had to abandon my original plan of painting them both side by side, due to it. Instead I focussed on getting just one right. (Mainly so I would only have to strip the one if things really went pear-shaped!)
I managed to get it right to an acceptable level (naturally the camera then proceeded to obliterate all the highlighting and shading I did...).

Here is how he is looking at the moment:

(Once again: a workbench pic, and still the camera won't behave itself by focussing properly. My apologies.)

So, this sadly brings my current burst of activity to an end. Starting next week, I'll be away from home during the weekdays for about half a year. In the weekends hobby will have to compete with family life, social life, and general catching up to life at home, so I fear it will regularly fall by the wayside...

On the plus side: I received the first three Appleseed manga books (Used to have them years ago, lent them to a friend who pulled a white blue yonder... Kept putting off replacing them for some reason, usually due to blowing the budget on mini's. ). So I can at least enjoy the stories again!

Oh, and an updated "What's finished" pic:

[dijit]

That looks perfectly fine, good job.

[Modhail]

Wow, has it really been that long!?

I've been painting a lot of fantasy stuff lately (the last two years or so), and during a recent large project, the Warhammer Quest display backdrop, combined with real life, my mojo flagged quite a bit.
So I decided to give it a break and just pick up a random project on a whim. Clear the palate as it were. I wanted to do something none-fantasy, but not grimdark (I felt like I had enough doom and gloom on my plate already...). Something small and easily finished.
I had a look over my stacks of mini's ready to paint and WIP (I have an archival drawer cabinet with minis from various projects that are either WIP, primered or ready for primer. I tend to switch gears a lot usually, and this is my way of accomodating my hobby-butterfly tendencies).
My eye fell on my partly painted Appleseed Landmate conversion from a couple of years ago...

At the time painting on it had stalled out, because, well, painting that much white neatly was an absolute bugbear. Luckily, this time I knew what I was in for (and had several years more painting experience under my belt). The trick to painting white is accepting it will take a bazillion layers...and just get on with it.

Anyway, here is the result:

And the anterior:


In the end, it turned out a little lighter/brighter than his buddy I painted years ago:

(Old one on the left, new paint in the centre, and Special Ops Landmate on the right.)
 
Here's a pic of the whole gang as it stands now:

The SWAT team in the background isn't formally part of the Appleseed project (they're painted in the colours and markings of the Arrestatieteam, the Dutch equivalent of SWAT), but as they're carrying futuristic gear anyway, they might as well be co-opted.

With him, all my law enforcement Landmates are painted. On the to-paint tray are still 3 opposing force Landmates and 9 Bubblegum Crisis "Boomer" miniatures that need converting into combat cyborgs. When I'll do those minis? I don't know.
I had intended this mini to be a single painting project, to reboot the mojo, but I've finally watched Appleseed Alpha ("for research") and am currently rereading the manga, and it's drawing me in again. So this project may just have a longer breath than I had planned.
I also discovered that the particular Infinity models I used for these conversions are being replaced with a newer sculpt that isn't compatible with the looks of these (It's a nice sculpt, but there's just not enough of the classic Guges in it for me). So I kinda, sorta, somewhat quickly ordered an extra one, to convert into a support Landmate with an Anti-Landmate Sniper rifle.

There's still plenty on the wish list for this project, with the top picks being; a Landmate for Briareos, suitable clean sci-fi terrain, and most importantly, a ruleset that does what I want from Appleseed style gaming.
After that it's just tasties: more (varied) opposing force, some vehicles, civillians...

But there's not much of a priority on that, because as far as I know I don't have anyone to actually game this with... It's mainly just a modelling project and homage to Appleseed.

[OSHIROmodels]

Ooo, glad to see you back at this 

cheers

James