Chicago Games Day 2011 - Golden Daemons

[Primarch]

Pictures of this year's US Golden Daemons are up on the GW site.

I do like that Dreadknight conversion. Much better than the original, much better by far.

[Spevna]

Not too impressed with this year's offerings to be honest. Of course it is all better than what I can do but that us neither here nor there. The gap between the French and the rest of the world seems to be growing with each year.

My thoughts on what I saw are;

The best part about the 40K single is the nurgling behind the grate.

The Grey Knight squad is good but not great. The NMM and the pattern on the force weapons isn't smooth enough.

The 40K vehicle category has the best entrants. All three are good but I reckon the SW dread should've won. The SW dread is wicked, best of the whole bunch.

Agree about the dreadnight, this conversion is much better!

The FB single isn't that exciting. Could have done with a bit more source lighting from the torch to liven it up.

A bland palette still leaves ugly minotaurs looking ugly.

The land ship has a good paint job but it a bit boring to look at. The kroxi is boring too although the axe head is nice.. The mounted Chaos Warrior is much, much more interesting to look at.

LOTR stuff is pretty underwhelming on the whole.

The dioramas are nicley painted. The dread one has too much stonework, needs more gubbins. The genestealer one I quite like. The winning one is well painted but poorly composed. The termi looks stupid standing on a rhino.

That Youngblood Harli is one of the best YoungBlood entrants I have ever seen.

The new Dread and the Imperial guard tank bloke are both pretty nice. The SW is not that impressive.




Apart from a few truly nice jobs, a pretty 'meh' bunch of stuff this year I reckon.

[AndrewGPaul]

Douglas Braun can paint, but he can't do Weathering and corrosion. Both his entries look far too clean. If he hadn't tried to do rust effects, his entries would be much better.

[Spevna]

Douglas Braun can paint, but he can't do Weathering and corrosion. Both his entries look far too clean. If he hadn't tried to do rust effects, his entries would be much better.

I see what you mean. The weathering does look very unnatural. I agree about them looking better if he had left off the rusty bits although I do like the rhino.

[me_in_japan]

will post more later, but basically, it all looks like GD stuff. By that I mean that GW have a very, very specific style that they demand painters adhere to if they want to place at GD. The pros know this, and paint accordingly. I recognise quite a few of the painters' names, and the minis theyve entered (and won with) are not really representative of their usual work. They're playing the GD game, really.

[Primarch]

I can find good points to all the minis, but some of them are just 'nice' rather than awe-inspiring.
I agree with Spev that the Land-ship looks nice, but is rather static. A decent base would have helped out.
The SW dread is a very nice conversion, but I think it is a little too busy, as is the nurgle Dread.
The Grey Knight squad I liked except for the head of the main guy. It looks like it has been wedged in place rather than being a good fit.
The LotR stuff is probably the weakest overall, but the freehand on the Knight of Dol Amaroth is nicely done.
I thought the genestealer diorama was ok, except for the use of Tigerius at the top. The figure is rather static and doesn't add much to the scene. He's too busy posing in a "Hey, I'm a special character" kind of way to look like he is involved in the diorama.

[Colonel Voss]

I thought the genestealer diorama was ok, except for the use of Tigerius at the top. The figure is rather static and doesn't add much to the scene. He's too busy posing in a "Hey, I'm a special character" kind of way to look like he is involved in the diorama.

What others have said. Just this part really sticks out in my mind when I think about everything I saw. For me it makes the diorama rather cheesy looking.

[me_in_japan]

the composition and mini choice on the dioramas was poor all round, I think. little to no conversion work has been done to repose minis to look like theyre interacting, which is something I rate highly. (not that my opinion counts for much.)

a few things that jumped out at me:

the 2nd place 40k solo is light years behind the 1st place 40k solo in terms of weathering. Heck, i can do better weathering than the 2nd place guy.

40k 3rd place squad: eh? wtf. The base is dire (you can see the frickin foamboard edge, for starters) and the crons are...average. boring? uninspiring?

40k 1st place squad : nice. My 2nd fav entry. Could use some blending work, but lovely base work.

40k 3rd place vehicle: very, very similar to the one on the miniature mentor tutorial, (thisone) only not as good. Bohun did a 2nd one, btw. (you can search for it yourself. Its much the same, only he reckons its better.)

40k 2nd place: my fav entry. Nice conversion work, nice and characterful. Did you know the plasma gun is magnetised, and theres an assault cannon too? (http://www.coolminiornot.com/282562)

40k 1st place: also very good. Loving the chrome goggles, and the colour choice gives the mini a unique feel. Also very nice use of light to focus the view inwards. The flies in the teeth are a nice touch. The same guy did that bonkers NMM running Khorne dread a few years ago, by the way.

40k 3rd large monster: snikrot is a monster? eh?

40k 1st monster: the dreadknight is fugly. So is this guy. A paintjob cant save it

fantasy single 1st: nice! This guy blogs on CMON a lot. He looks like the geekiest man in the world. His CMON name is Skeeve, btw.

fantasy 3rd squad: nice use of marine parts. Nice looking squad.

fantasy 2nd and 1st: bad paint job and bad minis, respectively.

fantasy monster: *gasp* GW allows use of 3rd party base components! That whole base is a resin jobby from Scibor (or maybe someone else, but it looks scibory).

LotR singles: nice NMM on the 2nd, and lovely, lovely eyes on the 3rd.

40k dioramas: 3rd - nice but needs more clutter. 2nd - poor miniature choice, no conversion. 1st: ok, but why is that termi on the rhino? Wonky weathering, too. also, if the rhino is so old to be that weathered, why isnt the dead ultramarine decomposed? And poor posing on all the figures except the dead ultra.

youngs: nice harley, but odd colour choice for a DJ.

open: me, im biased. I like that dread a lot. for the scale (54mm, i think) the 2nd and 1st could have been smoother.

and that is wot i thought

[Primarch]

also, if the rhino is so old to be that weathered, why isnt the dead ultramarine decomposed?

More decomposed than a skeleton?

Now, compare them with winners from previous years....
2010
UK 2009
US 2009
The French and Spanish winners are phenomenal!

[me_in_japan]

hah! my bad - i didnt actually see it was a skelly. thought it was yer typical tanned smurf complexion.