Games Day UK 2012 - Golden Demon (pic heavy)

Following on from yesterday's post about the Armies on Parade competition. Here's a selection of the entries in the Golden Demon contest. I find these models inspiring and demoralising in equal measure. On the one hand you get some fantastic ideas for your own army but on the other you realise your models will never look anything like the masterpieces in front of you! Here goes:

I particularly like this one as there's a feeling of it being a scene from an actual battle. The poses of the models really convey them trudging through a blizzard too.

My picture doesn't really do it justice but the entry above has a pack of fenrisian wolves with a space marine in the throes of a transformation into a wulfen leading them in a charge. The entry below was very clever with the guardsmen treading carefully over an ice plain that's got a hidden surprise for them.

This one shows a scene from Murder in the early Horus Heresy novels. Anyone who's read the book will remember the bone coloured trees and the chittering bugs. Shame they haven't constructed a megarachnid though! Below is the eventual winner of the Slayer Sword which again isn't done any justice my photography but GW did a better job on their site.

The next few entries come from my favourite catergory "Duel". These entries all seemed to convey a struggle to the death between two opposing warriors and are particularly apt in these days of Challenges:

Here's a selection of my personal highlights from the rest of the competition:

The rest of the models come from the open category. I'm a big fan of these larger scale models as they present a very different challenge when it comes to painting them. I know Scott was tempted to pick one up from Forge World and have a go:

Finally, here are a couple of models that must've been painted in quite a hurry!

Games Day UK 2012 - Armies on Parade

It's difficult to ignore that the main highlights of this year's Games Day were the CSM and Horus Heresy models on display and their respective books. However, there was plenty of other things to look at! Let's start with the Armies on Parade entries. There were some incredible dioramas on display here. Whilst some had just thrown a few models onto a board others had commited those models to stay there rather than just recessing them in. Anyway, here's a selection:

The harlequin entry above looks pretty nice but the main reason it was attracting attention was the razorwing on top of the building that was floating with the aid of magnets!

I really loved this Orky entry, in particular because one of the pilots had misjudged slightly and ended up like this:

The following Tau entry was probably my second favourite out of the lot. The army was themed as a Farsight breakaway faction and featured a flyer conversion, lots of flying suits and generally lots to look at.

The entry above was the eventual winner. This is the only shot I got of it however as to be honest I wasn't particularly blown away by it. Don't get me wrong it was brilliantly done but I felt there were better offerings out there. The next one shows that money can't buy taste. Whilst there's a disgusting amount of expensive Forgeworld models on there they aren't particularly stunningly painted and seem to have just been thrown onto the board. I'd have been disappointed if this one had won as it would belittle the tremendous amount of effort others had put in.

Finally, here's my favourite entry of the lot. I must say I'm surprised it didn't win as there was a huge crowd around it for the entire day. Perhaps everyone was too busy studying it to remember to vote! The thing I liked about this one was how it felt like an actual scene from a battle rather than just an army on a display board. The falcon emerging into realspace is beautifully done. There are also some lovely details like the wraithlord trampling a marine to death and the jetbikes zipping along.