Satyrs

My ‘Greek Myth’ project is on hiatus after an accident with an over-zealous tin of spray primer from Wilko, but I’ll post the pictures I took up to that point. Who knows, perhaps it will inspire me to continue eventually.

Foundry make some very nice satyrs that I think are true to the depictions on Greek pottery, but I discovered some of Citadel’s beastmen types on eBay (my knowledge of Games Workshop’s range gets hazy after 1990) and I was won over by their ‘Ray Harryhausen’ looks. Here they are, fresh off the courier’s van:

Unlike most of the stuff I get eBay, they were nicely painted already and it was a shame to butcher them. But the process of ‘de-Games-Workshopping’ had to be done.

First of all, I rebased them on to 25mm round bases. They don't look as cramped, and I want to use the miniatures for skirmishing rather than forming them into blocks. The shields had to go too.

I had an extra standard bearer from a different eBay purchase. I cut away the standard, drilled holes in the hands with a hand drill and inserted a spear from Gripping Beast’s nice range of acessories.

There was also some kind of club handing from the belt which looked far too primitive to me, so I cut it away and added some fur detail to the newly-exposed metal with a scribing tool.

BIGGEST BATTLE STANDARD EVA!!!

And I just wanted to see it this was possible…

I have no real use for the other standard bearer either but I’ve kept it intact for now. Here are the miniatures – undercoated with PlastiKote spray primer because I’m never using Wilko primer ever again!

I ended up with twenty-four miniatures so I split them into units of six and got to work on the first batch:

I filed down and rounded the stumps for the GW plastic shields to accommodate Gripping Beast’s 10mm Smooth Bucklers. I painted the reverse of the shields with Inscribe Raw Umber before glueing them to the miniatures. I wouldn’t have been able to get at them after glueing.

This shot is just to show the curvature of the shields:

I left the front of the shields white. The washes on the shields below were just an experiment that I painted over.

The shield designs are from Battle Flag’s lovely range of waterslide transfers. They were kind enough to produce a slightly smaller version of their Greek designs to fit the 10mm bucklers. They took account of the curvature of the shield and, with the aid of decal softener, the transfers fitted perfectly! I was very pleased with them, and they’re just what the miniatures needed to move them from fantasy to myth.

A bit more detail on the bases:

Then outside to varnish them:

I added a few Silflor grass tufts and some Woodland Scenics ballast. Here is the final group of satyrs, ready for the table:

You can skip this bit! For my benefit, when I paint the next batch in a thousand years’ time, these are the colours I used…

Base: Humbrol Dark Earth,

Skin: DecoArt Medium Flesh with Americana Flesh Tone highlights, or Americana Flesh Tone with Inscribe Porcelain flesh highlights.

Fur: Inscribe Burnt Sienna with FolkArt Buckskin Brown highlights

Horns: mostly Docrafts Antique Gold with Vallejo Ivory highlights, or a wash of FolkArt Berry Wine with a transition from Anitas Country Blue to Inscribe Raw Umber over the top. Note that as horn ages it gets darker as it grows away from the head.

Tongues: Inscribe English Rose

Spear tips are Vallejo Oily Steel. Shafts are DecoArt Tan

Cord around the spear head and the waists of the satyrs: Docrafts Antique Gold

Loincloths: various greens and turquoise colours. I’ll probably paint the next batch in different colours for unit identification without having to resort to banners and flags.

Severed heads: Americana Flesh Tone with a wash of one of the darker greens I used for the loincloths, then a few highlights with thinned Vallejo Ivory