The Emperor and his guard, for Star Wars Legion

And here is the master of the Sith himself, the Emperor... Palpatine!

The moment they announced these guys, I knew I had to have them.  I am not sure how well it shows in the photo, but I did make sure to give Palp the yellow eyes and reddish eye sockets that he has when he is shown at his scariest.

For the Royal Guard, I DID veer from canon a bit... Instead of doing the darker crimson underclothes, I went with just a solid red color for the entire outfit.  I think it turned out nice... I wanted them to be VERY uniform.  The only question... do I gloss their helmets?

All told, some cool figures (although the fit is a bit rough!)

Star Wars Legion Wookies, painted!

Hey all!

Okay, I've got a BUNCH of Star Wars Legion figures painted up over the last few weeks, so I've got to share them! 

I've really enjoyed doing the figures (well, not the Stormtroopers) and was looking forward to these wookies!

They are IMPOSING figures... just HUGE.  I wanted to keep them a bit individual... I feel like wookie fur should have patterns and differences.  So I went with a blonde wookie, an older wookie, a black haired wookie, and a brown wookie.

Overall very happy with how they turned out... they just LOOM over their enemies!

Coming up?  A rebel laser cannon, Han and Chewie, and Emperor Palpatine and his guard!

A GREAT find... a garbage can?!

Okay, how's THIS for a random story!?

So, for years a buddy of mine has always had the greatest garbage can in his war room... it's a garbage can that looks like it is a civil war rope tension drum!  It was always such a cool thing... small but noticeable, and essential to boot!  

The thing was... his father had bought it 40 something years ago at a reenactment at Gettysburg.  There were no markings on it, so there was no way to figure out who made it.  Trying to google "rope tension drum garbage" or some variation of that sequence got me nowhere, although there are some great whiskey barrel garbage cans out there, and lots of people sell 55 gallon drums!

So about a month ago my buddy moved to a new home and I went over to help him set up... I'll have more photos of Valhalla when it's finished, but for now here is a taste of it, half-way set up.

Anyway, as I helped him move all of his collections and stuff into the new building I again remarked about how much I loved that garbage can, but...

Fast forward about three weeks, and I'm in Connecticut visiting the family.  Now, they live in a town with a few antiques places.  I've stopped in them a few times over the last ten or fifteen years, although I've never really found anything worth noticing.

Until this time:)

We woke up one morning and suddenly I thought "I want to go check out this one antiques store."  No idea why.  I had once bought a LAW rocket tube there, but that was the only thing of interest.  

So down we go.  We walk in, walk up to the front counter looking, and then back down... and voila.  With some umbrellas in it is one of those rope tension drum garbage cans.

What is the chance?

Anyway... the room is SO full up that adding anything of value or interest is difficult at this point.  This, to me, is the ultimate little piece of detail awesomeness:)

BTW, the company that makes them is The Old Drum Shop in Granville, Mass.

I made it into Wargames Illustrated!

Hey all!

Well, how cool and unexpected is THIS?!

So, about a year ago, I posted on Wargames Illustrated's Facebook page, asking if they could some day run a series on great wargames rooms.  If you've read this blog for a while, you know how much I love that sort of thing, and for years I had been picking through the backgrounds of photos in magazines and books, trying to see every bit of John Stallard and the Perry's wargames rooms.  There was just always so much cool stuff packed away in there, and I was hoping some day that maybe we could have some articles that would highlight the antiques and the storage and all of the other things that I wanted to see!

Well, eventually they did it, doing a series called "Wargamers' Spaces," featuring some GREAT spaces.  And that's when I thought... why not write a little something up and send it along about my OWN room?  I've worked awfully hard on making it nice... maybe people would enjoy it?

Eventually I did this, and took some photos, and sent it along to Wayne Bollands and the WI crew, pretty sure they wouldn't want some article from some nobody, but at least I'd have the fun of writing it.

And lo and behold, I get an email from them saying they'd like to send me a copy of the December issue of WI, because I had contributed to it!  I had?  Oh, I HAD!  How great!

Anyway... it is really one of the great thrills of my wargaming life, and I hope people enjoy the article.  And if you have any other questions or want specific photos of specific things, please do let me know!

Now I just need a second copy so I can cut the pages out and frame them.... don't make fun, it's a big deal for me!:)