Corvus
New member
Hey everyone!
While browsing some older galleries today I thought it would be cool to have some kind of overview of 2004\'s best miniatures. Since there is no such thing (yet) as a 2004 Annual, I decided to make my own, here on the forum
Because I didn\'t want to browse through too much pictures, I decided to filter on miniatures with score 9-10 only, so it\'s possible some of your favorite pieces with score 8.9 aren\'t included in the list
Anyway, here we go with part 1, talking about january, february and march 2004. I plan on writing part 2 and 3 this and next week, and part 4 next year
-----------------------------------------------
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.
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.
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.
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.
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).
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.
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
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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 Schenck
http://www.pendragonstudios.be
While browsing some older galleries today I thought it would be cool to have some kind of overview of 2004\'s best miniatures. Since there is no such thing (yet) as a 2004 Annual, I decided to make my own, here on the forum
Because I didn\'t want to browse through too much pictures, I decided to filter on miniatures with score 9-10 only, so it\'s possible some of your favorite pieces with score 8.9 aren\'t included in the list
Anyway, here we go with part 1, talking about january, february and march 2004. I plan on writing part 2 and 3 this and next week, and part 4 next year
-----------------------------------------------
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.
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.
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.
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.
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).
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.
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
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.
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.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.
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.
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.
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 Schenck
http://www.pendragonstudios.be
