Some exciting stuff. Lantern Festival and Scavenger Hunt

Well in a long tradition of posting some interesting things that I have been up to here are some pics of what I have been up to. First up the lantern festival. This took place in the Auckland domain this year and is a celebration of Chinese new year. It runs for several nights with fireworks on the final night. Sadly I didn't take to many photos as the crows were huge. The domain isn't small by any stretch of the imagination but the area with the lanterns was so packed that moving around was incredibly difficult let alone staying in a good spot to take pictures. I did get a few of the fireworks too although once again the spot wasn't the best.

[I HIGHLY RECOMMEND YOU RIGHT CLICK AND VIEW IMAGE AS THEY ARE BEST ENJOYED THAT WAY] especially the fireworks which should be zoomed in on.

Next up is the Scavenger hunt I went on. This is one of those silly activities you do at the start of the year at university accommodation where you generally make as much of a fool of yourself as possible. This year our team, Mercedes AGM (for our initials) won the competition which generally indicates that yes we were the biggest fools. These are some of the silly things we did or had to find around town.

Funniest thing on the Thai restaurant's menu - Check.

Chilling out in the university quad - Check

Selfie with the ducks - Check

Whatever this is supposed to be - Check.

Well that's about it guys. Hope you enjoy this post. I'm going tramping this weekend in the bush so hopefully I'll have another little adventure to share with you soon. Oh and yes figures are on the way.

Small Vessel - El Andrés and news

Hello everybody and welcome to this, my first post, from my new student flat. That is right I am back up in Auckland and getting ready for another year of study. But fear not unlike previous years I have not abandoned the little ones back at my parents place to collect dust nay I have brought them with me to paint and, of course, to show to you all.

All my boats so far this year. Coming up will be figures.

So my friends what has Gowan got for you today... well another boat. And returning to a tradition of mine this is named for a distant cousin of mine. Andrew which in Spanish is Andrés. Unlike my previous ones this is not designed specifically to fit a role but a more general category of small craft.

This is the only little boat I have with a square sail and a gaff sail. as seen below.

The gaff sail took quite a bit of work to do. You may notice an imperfection in the stitching on the boom. Somehow I managed to thread the thread back through the thread.

Got to work on getting less of the surroundings and more of the model in the picture.

Our handy little, former robin hood, figure stands in once to provide scale. The roof is removable to allow better figure placement.

And what is any vessel without a name? I think I'm slowly getting the hang of writing with a paint brush.

Well now I just want to cover a few things. While I am up here in Auckland there really isn't enough time or space for me to work on any of my projects just figures. This means that work on El San Francisco and the other two small vessels is on hold until I return to my parents house during one of the holidays.

Now for something a little different someone or some people have been commenting asking for me to paint more moderns and I just want to put your mind at ease on this issue. Firstly I will paint moderns again this is certain. Second although I have not brought any with me I do have loads that are in various stages of completion. Part of the reason I haven't brought them is that many of them were left out in the hot and humid conditions of the garage and as such weird things happened to the paint. Third I also have many many figures that I haven't even prepared yet. We're talking rebel fighters, militia, more Oronegrean soldiers, special forces, Russians, mercenaries and more. Not to mention a selection of kits to make. I will be working on these again. Now I do try to please my viewers but ultimately what I paint is what I want to paint. Look where this blog started, the very first post was of medieval fantasy. Will I return to this subject, maybe. But since creating the world of Oronegro I have found that I want to bring this creation of mine to life. Oronegro is here to stay whether it's modern wars or early history I don't think I'll be abandoning my creation any time soon.

So on that note, a wonderful day/night to you all. let us all enjoy our little hobby where we turn little pieces of plastic, metal, resin and more into a miniature representation of life whether fictional or historical.

Thanks for reading

Gowan