#5 - Van Halfling

Today's instalment is the famed Vampire Hunter, Van Halfling, scourge of evil.

Scourge of the Undead!

I think that this is a great figure, lots of detail and plenty of character, it reminded me very much of the classic Citadel miniatures of the 80's and 90's.  It's one of a number I impulse bought from Heresy Miniatures a couple of weeks ago.

When the package arrived not only was there a hand written thank-you note from Minion Dan but also a packet of fizzers, top notch customer service and the detail and casting quality of the miniatures is excellent.  I've been looking forward to making a start on them and went as far as to taking the plunge and purchasing some resin bases to round him out.  No plain black finish this time.

Fizzer are an excellent customer service touch.

Back to Van Halfling, I was worried that with all of the brown he would be look too drab and I was going to try and add a it more colour but I think that by mixing between dark and light tones to create a bit of contrast did the trick and I could probably have got away with a brown hat and a darker feather but it does add a nice spot colour.

Presumably the feather was a gift from some rescued maiden, it doesn't really fit with the rest of the ensemble

For the coat I started with a Rhinox hide base, the boots, belt and straps are Mournfang Brown.  I then shaded the whole lot with Agrax Earthshade.  The layers were built up by mixing with the base colours rather than going straight to the next layer colour, this gave a more subtle highlight which I prefer.

No vampire is tall enough to avoid  a good stabbing of the ankles

The pouch and scabbard are Zandri Dust with a Ushabi bone highlight.  I thought that the obscured face had saved me from doing the eyes but painting the buckles and tip of the crossbow bolt more than made up for it.

He was pinned to the bases once painted

The base came from Fenris Games, they have their own website but it didn't have the Cthulhu bases on in so I used  their ebay shop instead.  I drybrushed Dawnstone grey heavily over the black primer and then stippled on some brown, yellow and green washes which you can just make out in the picture above.  I drybrushed Dawnstone again and then Administratum grey.  There was a final drybrush of Longbeard grey to bring out the edges.

This is my favourite miniature so far and I'm very pleased with the outcome, I'll have to look for a game I can use him in and more importantly I need to find him a worthy adversary.  I've been scouring ebay for old citadel Night Horror miniatures which I think would fit quite well.  I think a band of trusty comrades could also be interesting, maybe the start of a Mordheim witch hunter warband?