Yeah, alright fine. I’ll do one.

I said okay! Stop hitting me! I’ll do it!

… ahem.

I helped set this up, I may as well participate.

So, let’s start at what I’m most recently working on, and eventually work backwards. I’m known for changing hobbies and creative outlets every… about 6 months, and this time ‘round it’s painting miniatures.

If you look super close, you might see the miniature.

It combines a number of other things I find stimulating and satisfying into one; color, lil’ fantasy dudes, 3D printing (kinda), secluding myself for periods of time, and (in this iteration) Dungeons and Dragons. 5e. Or, just D&D to y’all in the know. Not 2024 though, or One. Phsaw to all that.

My wife and I joined a campaign with one of the best damn DM’s I’ve had the joy of playing with, and as is tradition, I made a dumb, goofy, and committed character.

A high-elf bard, from the high-society of Waterdeep - an entertainer only vaguely to escape the horrifying reality of how he grew up with one absolute bastard of a father, who manipulated those arts to abuse and extort his mother, as well as anyone else around him for seemingly more than just personal gain. Fighting against the manipulative magics he bore witness to every day, our hero wakes to find the the abused has escaped, leaving behind only a book in writing he cannot comprehend.

Because he’s an idiot.

But, he knows it contains power and answers. Where his mother went and what she left him.

I present to you, the conflicted…

Balric Pendulum.

Swingin’ round and round.

I modelled him up in Hero Forge, which if you haven’t ducked into it lately, is extremely easy and rich for mini building.

And, this post is running long and I’m getting tired, so from left to right (or, top to bottom for all you kids on phones);

• built in Hero Forge

• color blocking in Hero Forge

• ignoring most of the coloring from Hero Forge and painting the model

• and the model post-wash (it’s really magic how much a wash can hide mistakes)

I had it printed by a pretty great local company, 2 Fat Guy Forge here in town, which convinced me that resin 3D printing is the next thing to pick up to supplement my current obsession with mini painting. Super high quality, and extremely reasonable pricing. And as I found out later, after buying some off-the-shelf minis to paint, many orders of magnitude better as far as model strength goes.

Anyway. More adventures to follow.