The JFB Memorial Jesters - a Human Team

[Nestyr]

Hi all,

I'm very slack when it comes to painting miniatures, so I thought I'd start this thread up as an incentive for me to get these guys assembled, painted, and ready for use.

This will eventually be a full Human team with all positionals (16 x Linemen, 4 x Blitzers, etc, including an Ogre), made up of miniatures from the Phil's Phigs multi-part human team, available from Impact Miniatures. The Ogre is a Heresy Death Ball Ogre, also purchased from Impact Miniatures.

All of the above were given to me as a wonderful Christmas surprise by my loving wife, who should know better than to enable my Blood Bowl urges...

Here are some images from my first efforts, put together tonight while watching "Drag Me to Hell"...


Here are the pieces to be used to create two Linemen, still on the sprues.


Here are the pieces, removed from the sprues, with flash removed, ready for assembly.


A front view of the two assembled Linemen.


A right-hand side view of the two Linemen.


A rear view of the two Linemen.


A left-hand side view of the linemen.

The assembled pics are a bit grainy - I'll redo them when I get time.

Note, these have been assembled directly off the sprues, and no changes have been made to the individual pieces. Given there will be 16 Linemen in all, I'll probably do some bending, greenstuffing, etc to the remainder of the models, once I have exhausted the basic poses that can be created from the unmodified sprues.

That's it for now.

Cheers,


Nestyr

[Don__Vito]

Nice blog, I've always wanted to see what can be done with these models. Good luck!

[purdindas]

I look forward to seeing your progress

[worthy]

I like them mini's so I can't wait to see the end product.

[Nestyr]

Hi all,

Here are the next few:

The few, the proud... the three on the line. These will be the three players who will sit on the Line of Scrimmage. I didn't want to get too fancy with these guys - I just wanted to make them look solid and determined, so no converting, just basic sprues.




The guy in the middle probably won't be there that often, as his spot will normally be taken by the Ogre.

Speaking of which...






The Heresy Deathball Ogre - a nasty looking chap if ever I saw one.

Cheers,


Nestyr

[Nestyr]

Hi all,

Here are the latest additions to the team. This time around, we've got the team's two Throwers.





We have your standard passing back, and the less oft seen version of a Thrower, the running back.

The only major difference in construction with these guys is the lack of shoulderpad on the passing arm. This, coupled with the fact that these minis are each holding a ball, should hopefully make them easier to differentiate from the LInemen.

Two (very) minor conversions here, both on the running back. I removed some of the metal from the crook of both arms, and bent them in slightly, so they would sit closer to the chest. I'm not that happy with the result, as I was trying to get the effect of the back holding the ball with both hands, while running downfield. I'll probably swap the arms out at some point, and try again, likely with an open hand on the non-ball arm.

Also, I'm not too happy with the position of the ball arm on the passing back, nor where his head is pointing. It might work better if the head is following the line of the ball, so he will look like he is getting ready to bring the ball up to pass it to the Catcher.

Cheers,


Nestyr

[Lahatiel]

Looking good so far, Nestyr! Being that I'm the guy who's done the most extensive conversion/assembly work on these guys to date (to my knowledge, anyway), I always enjoy seeing what others are able to do with them.

My suggestion for the look you're after with your "running back" thrower: cut the ball-hand off its arm and swap it onto a right-angle arm, ideally with the wrist bent slightly inward toward the body. Then attach that arm so the ball is down around the stomach/hip area, with the elbow slightly behind the torso. Next, take your right-angle left arm and cut it off below the sleeve; turn it inward, so that the arm will go horizontally across the torso when attached normally, and re-pin the arm. You should then be able to attach that arm with the hand fairly close to the low-slung ball. At that point, you could even take off the closed left fist an sculpt a new, open left hand to cover the ball.

Keep up the good work -- can't wait to see how the team progresses!

[mubo]

A few simple head swaps might be an idea to help distinguish the blitzers, maybe from a GW plastic set.

Have you pinned the arms etc.? Might be worthwhile.

Look forward to see how they turn out.

[GalakStarscraper]

A few simple head swaps might be an idea to help distinguish the blitzers, maybe from a GW plastic set. t.

The Middle Kingdoms head sprue from Impact! has potential as well.

Tom

[Nestyr]

A few simple head swaps might be an idea to help distinguish the blitzers, maybe from a GW plastic set. t.

The Middle Kingdoms head sprue from Impact! has potential as well.

Tom

Hi,

Yes to both of those - funnily enough, I've got some Middle Kingdoms Head Sprues...

I was planning on putting feather plumes on the helmets of the blitzers, taken from plastic Empire figures, but haven't got that far yet. I'll run with this if I like the look, but otherwise I've pegged some Middle Kingdoms heads to use...

Cheers,


Nestyr

[Nestyr]

Looking good so far, Nestyr! Being that I'm the guy who's done the most extensive conversion/assembly work on these guys to date (to my knowledge, anyway), I always enjoy seeing what others are able to do with them.

My suggestion for the look you're after with your "running back" thrower: cut the ball-hand off its arm and swap it onto a right-angle arm, ideally with the wrist bent slightly inward toward the body. Then attach that arm so the ball is down around the stomach/hip area, with the elbow slightly behind the torso. Next, take your right-angle left arm and cut it off below the sleeve; turn it inward, so that the arm will go horizontally across the torso when attached normally, and re-pin the arm. You should then be able to attach that arm with the hand fairly close to the low-slung ball. At that point, you could even take off the closed left fist an sculpt a new, open left hand to cover the ball.

Keep up the good work -- can't wait to see how the team progresses!

Hi,

Thanks for that - sounds like it will work like a charm.

I may not get the chance to work on these guys again until the weekend, so I might not update this for a little while...

Cheers,


Nestyr

[Nestyr]

Hi all,

I've done some repositioning on the Throwers, and added the four Blitzers to the team.

Here's the running back (Thrower), with arms repositioned - I'm much happier with how he looks now.


This is the passing back (Thrower) with his head repositioned. Such a simple change made such a difference to this miniature.



Here's the Team Captain, in all his tri-feathered glory... A simple bend in the arm with the open hand, and the plume from an Empire figure from WHFB. I like the look - he's pointing and indicating for his team-mates to "get over there!".



Blitzer number two. I think I need to reconsider the stance for this mini. Perhaps I'll change the position of the left arm, so it's also up in the air for a "pass it over here!" look...



Blitzer number three. I like this guy. The same idea as the team captain, but with a set of running legs, and closed fist. This guy means business...



Blitzer number four. I'm also not happy with this one. The stance is fine, but what's going on with the arms?!? I think I need to bring the right arm forward, and push the left arm back - that might improve it somewhat, but it's not an "exciting" model to me at present... Another option is to bring the right arm forward, and level out the left arm, like he's going to "stiff-arm" an opponent.



I think the feathered plumes work well to identify the Blitzers. I know some people are still going to have trouble telling the positionals apart so, when I get around to painting them, I'll go with the old base ring colours to make it simpler - White for the Throwers, Yellow for the Catchers, Red for the Bitzers, and Grey for the Linemen. The Ogre will have Grey too, though he shouldn't be too hard to pick out...

That's it for now.

I've got eight Linemen and four Throwers (and by Throwers, I mean Catchers, of course...) to go. I'll do the Linemen in two lots of four and, hopefully, will have the catching mitts for the Throwers (Catchers, dammit! ) in time to fit them in between.

Cheers,


Nestyr

[Nestyr]

Hi all,

Remember, I did say I was slow at this...

Anyway, here are two repositioned Blitzers, and four Catchers, which I was able to complete as my Calasain order from Impact arrived the other day (which included the Middle Kingdoms Catcher's hands sprues...)

Blitzer 1



Blitzer 3



Now for the Catchers...

Catcher 1


Very slight modifications on this one - I snipped the back leg off the base, and bent the front leg forward, to give the impression the catcher is either leaning in, or about to dive for the ball. The left forearm and hand have been replaced with the catcher's mitt from the Middle Kingdom's conversion sprue.

Catcher 2


Again, very little in modification to the base bits here. I wanted this figure to look like he had over-run the pass, or was taking off after a hand-off. Again, the arm was snipped at the forearm, and replaced with a catcher's mitt from the Middle Kingdom's conversion sprue.

Catcher 3


I had a devil of a time trying to get a "normal" pose for this catcher - I just wanted it to look like he was standing there, waiting to spring into action. I repositioned this model so many times, I finally just settled on this pose. I'll probably redo this at some point, before I get around to priming them all.

Catcher 4


I'll admit I outright stole this pose from the Pro-Elf Catcher models - I've always liked that model, but thought four guys in this position was well over the top, but wanted to include one in my team. A good bit of basic converting on this one, which was necessary, or the final pose was going to have the model looking like he was doing a jumping jack! I snipped some metal from either side of the groin area (ouch!) and bent the legs in to make it look like the figure is leaping straight up to take a high catch. I then snipped some metal off the inside shoulder of each arm, so they would go straight up, rather than out to the sides. Then I bent the non-mitt arm in at the elbow, so it looks like he's about to take the ball. When I snipped the forearm off for the mitt-arm, I made a diagonal snip, so the mitt also appears to bend at the elbow.

I'm well pleased with how this one turned out. After he's painted, I'll mount him (at the feet) on something transparent above the base, so he looks like he is in mid-air (probably a GW flying stand, or two, through the feet).

That's it for now. Eight linemen to go, and that's the team, in all it's umprimed glory. I won't put up pics of the remaining linemen, so there probably won't be anything else for me to add until I start painting them.

Cheers,


Nestyr

[Heff]

Hate to say it but to my mind the blitzer with the shoulder pad under his armpit does not work. I imagine the shoulder pads to be attached to the chest and back and so they would not rotate with the arm. Might be better to try adding some greenstuff or similar under the arm and trimming something off the top so that the arm goes up but the pad is orientated properly.

Otherwise I am loving the variety in the sculpts. get painting!

[Nestyr]

Hate to say it but to my mind the blitzer with the shoulder pad under his armpit does not work. I imagine the shoulder pads to be attached to the chest and back and so they would not rotate with the arm. Might be better to try adding some greenstuff or similar under the arm and trimming something off the top so that the arm goes up but the pad is orientated properly.

Otherwise I am loving the variety in the sculpts. get painting!

Whoops! Good point. I didn't think about that - I'd better fix it...

Cheers,


Nestyr