MiniWarGaming.com's Painting Academy Review

So, I have been back into the 40k hobby for a while, and I have a confession to make.  I suck at painting Minis.  I mean, I am not good at it, so I get frustrated doing it and then I turn out worse stuff.  A vicious cycle.  Then I stumble on the MiniWarGaming site and I start to like the videos they have on the site.   Then I am at my FLGS (Ares Games) and, lo and behold, they have the Painting Academy set of DVDs...

<chunk> goes the plastic and home go the DVDs.  What a great deal, I think to myself.

 good and the bad...

The good - The painting tips and techniques are ROCK solid.  They start out with basics, and move along to some very advanced stuff.  You do get your moneys worth with the content in a big way.  They cover dry brushing, highlighting, blending etc in a well lit, well produced method that makes it easy to learn and you can actually SEE what they are doing, unlike some videos where they folks cover the mini with their hands or have horrid lighting.  A great deal of thought went into the minis they demonstrate on and the techniques used on each.  The videos made me want to try the techniques (and fail, but that is how we learn).  So, content gets an A-.  The minus is just because I don't want to sound all fanboi...

The bad - As good as the techniques and videos are, they really fall short on production.  #1 - the music track is at times, too loud and at all times, HORRID loops of some canned crap tunes that make you want to vomit.  #2 the DVDs seem like they just grabbed the video's from their site and tossed them onto a DVD program and hit "create".  There is no "play all" so you have to select every video scene in every menu heading.  The menu structure makes it even harder to navigate.  20 minutes with iDVD on a MAC would have made a tons better structured DVD set.  This is more like picking videos from YouTube than a well made DVD.

Overall = B.  The presentation and video quality far outweigh the bad production quality of the DVDs .  You WILL learn alot from the DVD set and it will get you in the mood to paint!  They succeed here in a big way!

Star Trek Geekness

You know you want this.  It is the coolest toy of the week.

Yes, it does what you think...  When you enter the office, it makes the "wusshhhhh" noise of the STar Trek Doors.  Hit the comm button and you hail the bridge.  A button on the back switches the sensor from right to left side detection or both.  A volume switch will tone it down a bit.

Thinkgeek.com sells them...

YAY!

Necron-Metalman-Teminator Goodness

Ok, so I'm back into WH40K in a big way.  I have the beginnings of a decent Space Marines force, an Eldar Battleforce (still in the box) and now...  There is Necron goodness...

I am totally digging on painting these guys.  First, I have always really loved Necrons.  Second, the new codex and new minis are a joy to behold (except for the FineCrap minis... different rant).

My forces are going to be basic black with Copper and Blue highlights.  These guys were dry-brushed with copper and highlighted with three different shades of blue.  I also am going to replace the ghastly green weapon barrels with a far more sedate blue acrylic version.

It's so nice to be back into 40k!!