Iron Painter: The Gathering

I signed up for Iron Painter 2016today.

There are no miniatures on display in my home. I usually paint for gaming. I want to use Iron Painter as an opportunity to create display pieces so I have something pretty to look at other than a picture of my sister. That sentence is totally not awkward at all. The picture is on my wall mostly because she hates that picture. The minor nuisance with painting five display pieces and possibly no more display pieces ever again is I do not know the theme for each piece until the beginning of any given round, but I want the pieces to feel like they might belong together as a group.

Enter shadow boxen. Every round I plan on making a shadow box so that I can have separate biomes for each theme, but they share the element of the boxen so hopefully do not look out of place when set next to each other. For now the plan is to keep the boxen fairly simple with a bit of trim and hinges so I can get my meaty hands in there after they are finished. I have ideas for adding to the boxen themselves later for further embellishment, but time is a concern for how involved each may get beyond the basics.

I have begun the procurement of stuff to make the stuff to stuff inside the shadow boxen as well as construct the boxen themselves. My hope is to get the round's theme, plan a layout, cut and stain the wood, then hit the local hobby shop for additional materials I may need as well as start cleanup on models on Day One. Before round one I am going to be testing stains and paint on bits of the board and trim I bought so I know what works with the materials before round one starts.

I plan on ordering the Ironside's Troubleshooters box set this week as I want it for gaming anyway. It gives me another option using Wyrd models. There are a lot of Wyrd models I would love to own, but I do not want to use this contest as an excuse to go into debt so I am sticking to the single purchase for now. I have double sprues on the Wyrd male and female multi-part kits I got from the Through the Breach kickstarter which I have yet to do anything with. Most of my Wyrd models are not allowed because they are already assembled, but there are a few I can still pull from. I have a bunch of Reaper Bones and Games Workshop models as well as some Privateer Press and a few models here and there from other manufacturers. Wild West Exodus will be shipping in the next week or so. It looks like the second Deadzone kickstarter should be shipping part way into the Iron Painter contest. I have a lot of options, but I figured a few more Wyrd models would not hurt to have on hand in case they happen to fit a theme. Anything else I want once I know a round's theme will have to be something I can find locally as I don't want to have to work around shipping times if I can help it.

Materials left to get include a bottle of brush on gloss varnish, a hair dryer, heated wire cutter, brass rod, lights, styrene sheets, and styrene rods. I am going to consult with people on lighting options. It has been a lifetime since I have used a soldering iron, but maybe I can just stick something inside the boxen with double-sided tape and not have to mess with any wires. The hot wire cutter I am probably going to have to order online. The rest I believe I can get local so may wait to see what of that is needed from round to round.

So there's my plans heading into my first effort at Iron Painter. I feel ill-prepared, but I'm not exactly certain what one does to prepare for this sort of competition.

For those curious as to what boxen are, please consult the Professor from the Dice Decide podcast. All credit for the origin of the species should go to him.