Rangers of Middle Earth

Unlike the majority of my recent Lord of the Rings projects that were secondhand minis bought off of eBay and refurbished, this one involved all new figures. The 'Damrod' figure was purchased new, but I had already based and primed years ago. The rest were from an unopened box of Games Workshop plastic Rangers of Middle Earth, and three blisters of now out of production metal figures that were marketed as 'Faramir's Rangers'.

 

The plastic figures were fairly clean with only a few having flash or mold lines that needed to be filed off. The box comes with a total of 24 rangers divided into 8 firing bows, 8 wielding swords, and 8 carrying spears, although those not firing bows have a bow slung across their backs. The nine metal figures were fairly equally divided into the four sculpts that were done back in the day, two standing and two kneeling, with each of those either wearing a hood and mask, or not. The plastic figures required minimal assembly. One pose comes with a spear and hand as a separated piece, but the rest have no separate parts. All were glued to their bases using either plastic model glue or epoxy as appropriate. Then a layer of fine sand was glued to the bases with PVA. Once everything was dry, all the figures were primed matte black using a rattle can. 

Looking at stills from the movies for inspiration, I found the colours worn by the Ithilien Rangers had considerable variety, but consisted mostly of dark greys, greens, and browns. Rather than trying to make things completely random, I decided on four different colour schemes, but mixed up the poses so that no two figures that had the same pose were painted exactly the same. The only unique figure was Damrod, which I painted using the images from the Games Workshop website as a guide.

 

All were painted using water-based acrylics, mostly Vallejo, followed by a coat of Army Painter Strong Tone Quick Shade. Once the Quick Shade was dry, I painted the sand on the base dark brown, dry brushed with a lighter shade of brown, and then added the flocking, shrubs, and tufts of grass. The last step was to spray them with Rust-Oleum flat clear to take off the shine left by the coat of Quick Shade. Here is the final result.

Here is a close-up of the four different sculpts done of  the metal "Faramir's Rangers" to show the four different paint schemes used to paint all the rangers.

 

Having spent many years fighting Sauron's minions alongside Faramir with the wilds of Ithilien, Damrod is an experienced Ranger in his own right. As Sauron's armies advance, Damrod takes up his sword and bow in defence of Gondor as the forces of Mordor invade the ruined city of Osgiliath, in a futile attempt to drive them back.

 

I am currently on the hunt of minis of Madril, and Faramir as a ranger, to added some more Ranger heroes/captains to the force. Most of the online webstores don't seem to have them in stock anymore, despite them still being listed on the GW website.

Thanks for reading. Stay safe and healthy.

Denethor, Steward of Gondor and Guardsmen of the Fountain Court

I returned to Gondor for a quick project in my continuing attempt to clear the backlog of Games Workshop Middle-earth Strategy Battle Game miniatures - Denethor II, son of Ecthelion II, 26th Steward of Gondor, and an escort of three Guardsmen of the Fountain Court.

Denethor, Steward of Gondor - "Once a great man, the Steward of Gondor is now weary with the responsibility of leading his people in such dark times. The loss of his favoured son Boromir has proven an unbearable pain, leaving Denethor increasingly vulnerable to despair in the face of the overwhelming odds that trouble the realm of Gondor."

The figure was initially primed in black, and then I went in with more black to ensure good coverage in all the deep recesses.. I painted the face with Vallejo medium flesh followed by a reddish-brown wash, then applied highlights of medium flesh again, and more wash very selectively around the eyes and the mouth. The cloak was painted with acrylic Payne's Grey, a very intense bluish-grey colour. Then a small amount of medium grey was mixed in and drybrushed to catch the raised surfaces. The fur trim was already black, so I just drybrushed it with a dark grey. I used a lighter gunmetal on the chain mail, rather than silver as I didn't want it to be too shiny. The hair was painted dark brown and given grey streaks to produce a look similar to the appearance of Denethor in the Lord of the Rings movies.

 

Guard of the Fountain Court - "The Guard of the Fountain Court are selected  from the most disciplined of veterans in all of Gondor, swearing to give their lives in service to the lords of Minas Tirith and to be fearless in combat. They wear winged helmets made of Mithril, intricately crafted heavy armour and carry the finest weaponry that the armouries of the White City have to offer."

Lots of black and grey on these figures, followed by gunmetal, silver, and gold trim. To get a greater contrast on the breastplates, they were first painted in a dark gunmetal, and the White Tree of Gondor picked out with silver. The gold was the trickiest part as all the shoulder armour and helmets are edged in a thin band of gold. Otherwise, the technique was much as I have used on all my other figures. The only thing of note is the paving stone pattern on the bases. This was done by first applying a thin layer of epoxy putty to the surface and sculpting in the stone pattern. The miniatures were then pressed into the slot in the base while the epoxy was still soft, and doing some additional sculpting to cover over the slot.

 

I am off to Rohan next to paint up some of the heroes of the Riddermark. This will give me another opportunity to try out different colour schemes on horses.

"Gondor calls for aid! And Rohan will answer!"

Faramir, Captain of Gondor

 The latest off the Dusty workbench is a trio of figures from the Games Workshop Lord of the Rings range representing Boromir's brother, Faramir, both mounted and on foot, and a mounted standard bearer.

 

Painting the figures followed a similar technique used with the Company of Gondor project I completed last week, The figures were initially primed with matt black, The plate armour and chain mail was first painted gunmetal, followed by drybrushing on silver. Faces were painted with Vallejo medium flesh followed by a reddish-brown wash, as I did with my Warriors of Minas Tirith figures. The detail on the bases continued my 'ruins of Osgiliath' theme that I am using on all my Gondorian forces.

The only  thing that made this one different from the earlier project was painting the horses. I haven't done many horses in 28mm scale, but did a lot in 15mm years ago. I never bothered to do much shading on them, just a basic colour of some shade of grey or brown, the occasional sock or stocking, and then the saddle and bridle. At one point, somebody asked me if I didn't like painting horses, so I guess my minimalist approach sucked. It was time to do a little online research to try and up my game. The final technique I used was a blend of ideas from a number of different YouTube videos and blog posts that I found. I didn't copy any one style exactly, but borrowed different bits here and there, plus my own spin until I got something I liked.

Mounted Faramir - I decided to paint this horse as a chestnut. The horse was painted in a reddish brown, then drybrushed on a lighter shade to pick out the musculature. Then I applied a medium brown wash to the entire horse, and then did a bit more drybrushing with the lighter shade on the mane and tail. I gave the horse white socks on both hind legs. 

Dismounted Faramir - This was painted much as my earlier Elendil and Isildur figures, but with a bluish-grey colour scheme. The pictures available online from Games Workshop of a painted Faramir showed kind of a 'double helix' pattern along the edge of his surcoat, but I found my hand just isn't steady enough anymore. I compromised with a simple band of gold trim. 

Mounted standard bearer - For this horse I went with a colour scheme appropriate for a bay. A dark brown base coat was applied followed by drybrushing a medium brown to pick up the musculature. Then a dark brown wash was applied to the horse. The mane and tail were painted black and then drybrushed with a medium grey. A black wash was then applied to the mane, tail, and lower legs.

I am pretty happy with the final look of both horses. More mounted figures are waiting in the wings to experiment with duns, blacks, and greys

A Company of Gondor

The latest unit off the workbench is a company of Gondorian infantry from the Game Workshop Lord of the Rings range consisting of eight swordsmen, eight spearmen, eight bowmen, a captain and a standard bearer. The captain and standard bearer are metal castings, while the rest are plastic from the Warriors of Minas Tirath boxed set. 

The plastic warriors were a bit of a rescue operation. When I purchased them off of eBay they had already been assembled and given a coat of silver paint over just about everything. No ground work had been done, and there were still a lot of visible mold lines and rough spots where the parts had been attached to the sprue. 

The figures were cleaned up, mold lines filed off, ground work added, and primed matt black with a rattle can. The theme of the ground work was inspired by scenes from the Lord of the Rings movies of the heavy fighting among the ruins of Osgiliath - lots of rubble, broken stone work, etc. This was done using scraps of 3mm polystyrene, bits of sprue, sand, and pieces cut from bread bag plastic clips.

Just a small portion of the faces show within the helmet, so they were painted Vallejo medium flesh, followed by a brown wash to bring out the detail. The figures are wearing predominantly plate armour, so I painted them gunmetal grey followed by a drybrushing of silver. The trickiest part was painting the white tree of Gondor on the shields. While there is a raised design, it is very subtle, and it needs just the right amount of paint on the brush to avoid blotching silver on the background. 

The captain and standard bearer were somewhat easier to paint as the detail was in higher relief on the shield and the standard. Otherwise, they got the same treatment as the rest of the figures in the company.

A scene from the movie "The Two Towers" - Warriors of Minas Tirith amid the ruined city of Osgiliath. It provided the inspiration for the thematic ground work that I applied to bases.

 

This is another project that has been hanging around for a while at a back corner of my workbench where it was literally gathering dust. They are now ready for the fight to reclaim Osgiliath or defend the walls of Minas Tirith from the hordes of Mordor.