For a zombie blogger and miniatures collector, I have surprisingly few painted zombies, only around 50 or so. Since I was asked to show more of my painted stuff, I figured I’d put up my horde along with some closeups of my favourites.
Here’s my “horde” in full. 50+ models don’t look like much, do they? At the moment they’re a mix of GW plastic zombies, GW plastic Catachans, Mega Miniatures, Recreational Conflict, Ral Partha and Copplestone Castings. Additionally there’s one model each from Heroquest, GW Imperial Guard, Warzone, HorrorClix, and HeroClix.
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I already showed some of my favourites in the post on GW plastic conversions, but there are others as well. Here’s a selection:
The Zombie Patient is a repaint of a HorrorClix model. It’s quite an improvement, don’t you think? Sorry for the horrible quality on the comparison original, I had to snatch it from an older pic and resize it. The promotion picture for the model was far better looking than what I received. Also note the change in lighting. White daylight bulb on the left.
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Zombie Kids are always fun and creepy. The following three are all from Mega Miniatures. The freehand on all models rather shows that I’m not really that focused on neat painting on zombies, they’re very much test pieces to try stuff on. These ended up looking nice enough for the tabletop, though.
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The Chewed Up Shambler from Recreational Conflict is a nice model. I usually give my zombies fast, rough paintjobs and it shows. Here, however, I wanted to try and paint a zombie to the standard that I use on other models, and I’m very happy with the result. If I only had the time and patience to do this on all zombies!
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The Classic is an old Grenadier mini – still available through Mirliton – from the 80s, making it probably as old young as I am. I started my gaming with Dungeons & Dragons (or actually Miekka ja Magia, the first Finnish RPG, which was basically a simplified D&D) with my big brothers, and this also introduced me to miniatures. This Frankensteiny zombie dates back to those days, and it was a moment of great nostalgy for me to paint him. The model show its age, but is still one of my favourites.
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The Neo-Nazi is a conversion based on a HeroClix thug, with a GW zombie hand and head, and the other arm cut off. Simple, characterful and effective in my opinion.
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The Rambo is a GW Catachan jungle fighter. The left leg has been cut up and repositioned and the head glued on in a zombie-ish angle. The hanging left arm adds to the effect. The right wrist that he’s missing was used in the soldier zombie conversion shown in the previous post. This model is a nice example of how simple it’s to make zombies out of other models, especially if they’re plastic. With very little work you could transform a full box of plastic troopers into zombies with limb repositioning.
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The Officer is a metal GW Imperial Guard model from the Last Chancers box set. The left hand was holding a massive weapon, so I cut the wrist off and replaced it with a plastic one from the Catachan set. The model ended up looking like it’s reaching for someone, and the bandages and torn clothing only enhance the zombie appearance. The Officer is another example of a zombie that I spent a bit more time painting as I liked the model too much to just give him a basic zombie slap-on.
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The Jogger and The Beach Bum are my own sculpts, so I naturally gave them more attention than my usual zombie fare. While the sculpts aren’t that great, I think they look very nice painted and certainly don’t look out of place in my horde. The feeling of painting metal that you’ve sculpted yourself, man that was cool.
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I’ve got plenty more to paint, and I’m slowly starting to attack my backlog. Anyway, here’s what I have managed to do so far. I’d be happy to hear your comments, as usual.
Dawn of the Lead 