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on CoolMiniOrNot in 2004. But before I start I want to explain how this artcile
has been compiled. Because there are tens of submission to CMON each day, it
was impossible to browse through all the images of 2004. Therefore, I have chosen
to filter those miniatures which scored higher than 9 points. From the remaining
500 pictures I have made a small selection of paintjobs which I thought were
ground-breaking and exceptional. Of course you will find some personal favorites
of mine here, but in general I've tried to give an objective overview.
Part 1: January - March
A lot of people will agree with me that the first three months of 2004 brought
a lot of great minis, but the public's favorite will be Cyril's amazing Widowmaker
from Privateer Press. Another high-scoring mini, although less impressive,
was thomasdavid's Games Workshop
Dark Elf.
Talking about Games Workshop, some of their new armies did quite well on CMON,
especially the beastmen (for example Dragon
Ogre Shaggoth by Micro Art Studios and the regular Champion
by Prri). I think together with Celestine the Living Saint, the Beastman
Champion was one of the most popular GW model among painters last year.
2004's number three submission: Games
Workshop Dark Elf by thomasdavid.
Another popular GW army were the new Brettonians. With lots of room for freehand,
it's no surprise that paintjobs like Micro
Art Studio's Standard Bearer scored very high. And although Goatman lost
his first place on CMON at the end of 2003, he only uploaded a few pictures
this year, for example this Brettonian.
2004 was a year of change. A lot of new stars have risen, you could see their
paintjobs in the top 10 7-days every few weeks. Ex-Rackham painter Arkaal amazed
everyone with his smooth blendings and subtle freehand details, for example
the Griffin Magistrate, Guerrier
de Sang and Sin Assyris.
Arkaal's Griffin Magistrate
Another rising star from France is Thomas. In february he already made heads
turn in his direction with his very nice Nurgle paintjobs (for example the Nurgle
Champion and his amazing Green
Knight conversion, but his best piece of work still had to come...
With some amazing releases by Games Workshop and Rackham, the smaller miniature
companies still had to wait a bit longer to have their newest releases picked
up by the public. But to conclude this first part of the overview, I want to
show everyone the second-best Privateer Press miniature from the first part
of 2004: Fluffy's Menoth Paladin.
Fluffy's Menoth Paladin
[pagebreak]
Part 2: April - June
April kicked off with last year's most amazing conversions. Germany's finest,
Holger Schmidt, combined his painting, conversion and scenery skills to create
a small, dynamic diorama with Eyriss,
Mage Hunter in the center. Holger's fellow countryman Goatman also showed
his conversion and painting talent with his Sisters
Of Battle diorama.
Russian painting goddess Alexi_Z was almost unknown in the beginning of 2004,
but pieces like her Ork Shaman
On Brontops, Dragon Ogre Shaggoth
and Slaanesh Champion were
about to change this in no-time.
One of the most original submissions of 2004: Eyriss,
Mage Hunter by Holger Schmidt
Many consider Games Day France to have the toughest Golden Demon painting competition
of them all. French masterpainter Cyril clearly shows this with his golden demon
winning Nurgle Champion and
silver Gretch Tank. Some other
top painters from France include Allan C (Nurgle
Troll Unit) and Guillaume (Daemonus
Ex Machina). Another gold winner: Bragon's
Inquisitor Diorama, which probably includes the best freehand from 2004.
France is also the home of miniature manufacturer Rackham, and they gave the
fans some more fantastic minis to work on. The Elemental
Of Darkness appeared numerous times on CMON, but none as awesomely painted
as Bitbull's. Other painters that submitted top-Rackham minis are Sandman (Master
Of Carnage), Minos (Hybrid
Abberation), Manumilitari (Dwarf
Armourer) and Trovarion (Hybrid
Clone).
Elemental Of Darkness by Bitbull
Shortly after the release of Games Workshop "Celestine the Living Saint",
great paintjobs started appear, like this
one by Rolljordan. And a GW miniature everyone should have seen last year
is Cyril's Space Marine.
Other miniature manufacturers were also honoured with some amazing paintjobs.
Fluffy once again took her brush at some Privateer Press lead to paint his version
of Goreshade and Sythis. Steve
from Spyglass produced his best figure so far: the 54mm Anastasia.
Space Marine by Cyril
[pagebreak]
Part 3: July - September
The summer of 2004 continues with solid paintjobs of painters (and miniatures)
seen before.
It looks like everyone has been painting Celestine, The Living Saint. Albert
Moretó Font dumped the gothic look of the miniature and painted a
cool and high-tech looking version. This
version by Brokenblade also sheds a different light on the sculpt. On the
other hand there are the classic gold and red paintjobs, like this
one from RagingBull. Probably not worth mentioning: among all these masterpieces
I also painted up my own version
of Celestine, currently my highest scoring mini here on CMON.
Cyril apparently kept discovering hidden closest filled with old Space Marines.
Can everyone remember this guy?
He is also starting his own Space Marines army, and this
miniature served as a test for the color scheme. That army is going to take
ages to get painted at that quality level I think
RagingBull's Celestine
More great Warhammer 40K stuff appeared when Pega from Italy uploaded his award
winning conversions and paintjobs: Daemon
Hunters, Dreadnoughts, Space
Wolves, Ultramarines and more
Daemon Hunter related stuff, Pega
has got them all. And if you look very closely, you will notice there is some
metal or plastic underneath all that green stuff
Victoria Lamb also did something similar with her
Witchhunters squad.
Victoria's Witchhunters
During the summer months it's always quite calm in the design studios of the
various manufacturers. Rackham for example takes a one month break, but not
after releasing fantastic new material such as Asura
De Sarlath (painted by Arkaal) or this Giant
(by RagingBull).
Privateer Press launched their new Iron Kingdoms RPG miniatures line, containing
smoe very original sculpts. The Nyss
Sorceress is my personal favorite. Their Warmachine skirmish game also got
some new miniatures for the Escalation expansion, for example this (converted)
Helljack. Both paintjobs by Fluffy.
But the old Rackham stuff is always very popular among painters. Good examples
of this are the Fire Familiar by Hot
Lead, the Rune Guardian by Alexi_Z
and this Alahan Falconer by Haley.
That's right, Jennifer Haley only submitted one mini last year. Altough her
work is still quite popular among painters all over the globe, Alexi_Z's work
makes me forget that Falconer very quickly
. Her miniatures really look like scans from an unexisting Dark Age catalog: the
Gazelle, Field Medic, Toxic,
and Firestorm
are all masterpieces.
Gazelle by Alexi_Z
August 17th will be marked as the day 2004's top scoring mini was submitted:
Magmatrax, Champion of Khorne.
With no remarkable previous paintjobs, Silphid rocketed from nowhere to the
third place in the top-10 miniatures.
Magmatrax, Champion of Khorne by
Silphid
[pagebreak]
Part 4: October - December
The official Rackham painting competition on the Monde Du Jeu event in France
always attracts the top painters of Europe. The most remarkable category this
year was Hybrid. No single minis here, but complete Dirz Laboratories like this
one by Gloubib and this masterpiece
by Keldhar. Minos used those projects as an inspiration source for his
own laboratory, which appeared a month later.
More cool Rackham paintjobs appeared in the last part of 2004. For example
this Viraë & Sinshera
and Syd de Kaiber, both by
Cheeba. Fluffy also tried her hands on a Confrontation mini instead of the usual
Warmachine stuff. Her Shanys
turned out great.
Viraë & Sinshera by
Cheeba
We've already seen 2004 number one (Magmatrax)
and number three (Dark Elf
by thomasdavid), both Games Workshop miniatures. And number two is also a GW
paintjob: the amazing Grey Knights
Dreadnought by nano. More top GW material includes the Witchhunter
Retinue by EricJ and those
two Space Marines by Kaple. And GW related: this
Forgeworld Orc bust by Dirk Stiller.
Who needs a manufacturer anyway if you sculpt your miniatures yourself? Thomas
proved this with his amazing sculpt and ditto paintjob called The
Queen of Crime, finishing 4th in the 2004 hitlist.
The last mini I'd like to include in this article is this Space
Marine diorama by Kaple, one of the last 9+ scoring submissions in 2004.
The Queen of Crime by Thomas
Conclusion
Like I said in the beginning of this article, 2004 was a year of change. Lots
of new stars have risen on the miniature sky. Together with the increased quality
of miniatures by manufacturers like Privateer Press and Rackham it's taking
the miniature painting hobby to a new level. I'm still quite amazed 2004 didn't
bring us a new number one... So I'd like to ask everyone to start working on
your top mini for 2005, and maybe we'll see it at the number one spot some day,
or at least in next year's "a year iin miniatures article". Hope to
see you again next year!
Gerrie "Corvus" Schenck
www.pendragonstudios.be
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