Tuesday, 6 May 2014

Hasslefree Miniatures Newsletter

Quite a lot about their holiday...and some miniatures...they're near the bottom, lol.


Onwards and Upwards!
With Salute and then Easter taking up all of my and Jenn's time, and the Whites being in the US, we've had a bit of a slow month here at HF Headquarters.
It won't be exactly all sizzle for the next few weeks either as we all catch back up to our normal schedule. The Whites are back from the US (more below on that) and Kev is back to the sculpting grindstone (more on 'that' below, too), but it takes a little while to move from cork to resin to metal so we'll do what we can to not bore ya for the intervening weeks. We do have a few things up our sleeve :)
For the Black's part, I've been making sure everything ticks over whilst also working on our upcoming game. And yup, that's the entirety of the teaser you're getting for that *evil grin*. Jenn has had the unenviable job of literally counting everything we own (difficult to keep track of stock at a show like Salute so we have to do a full inventory after the show every year) and is about to hop off for a short break in Thailand.
So, let's get on with this week's newsletter...

Welcome Back the Whites!
Kev gets his own section below, but I'm quickly passing on the Whites' thanks and appreciation to the guys at Reapercon.
By all accounts good times were had, as usual. Reapercon had a Wild West theme as you can see :) Roll on the next one!

Kev's US Trip
Well Kev is back and also had a few people to thank...
First up was Adepticon, where Kev took a silver Crystal Brush in the sculpting category (We'll mention this again later in the month once we have decided how to release the mini itself).
Then he moved on to visit Dark Sword Miniatures and was taken shooting by Jim Ludwig. He even got to play with a KRISS Vector(Making it a higher possibility that a random mini will be armed with one some time soon *grin*).
On to a sculpting weekend organised by Liliana Troy out in Colorado. A good time was had by all and Kev was happy enough with it that we are now looking at future sculpting weekends! I'll throw up some reviews and feedback on FB later this week.
After a quick stop in at Reapercon to catch up with the family he then popped off again for a few days to casually chill out with the Dark Sword crew at George RR Martin's. Yes, that George RR Martin. My wife was 'not' at all insanely jealous. I think the only thing she could have been more jealous about was if Kev got to hang out with Nikolaj Coster-Waldau.
(And look at how damn happy Kev is about it too!)

So, huge thanks to everyone involved, especially the Reaper guys, Jim and Liliana.

Back to the Tiny Grindstone
Right, after his month off (He'll argue it wasn't but I 'm writing the newsletter so I get to win that one), Kev's back to his desk and up for a challenge.
The idea is that if Kev gets 6 particular minis finished by the last day of May he wins the reward pictured above :)

What are these magical minis I hear you ask? Well...
1. Joker - The US-based Modern Troopers' heavy weapon specialist. Outfitted with a recoilless rifle (or RPG if ya prefer) he's the partner of Alien (and husband of Harlequin).
2. Woody - Another US-based Modern Trooper. If Kev can make it work he'll come with a kneeling body. His armaments are an M4 style shotgun and a HK416 and he's wearing a boonie hat.

3 & 4 - The last two of the metal Sci-Fi Powered Armour protoypes. One male and one female, both with the helmet and gun of the others. The squad will then be released in metal and Kev will take a little time off to prep for their plastics Kickstarter.
5. A female sci-fi elf psyker. We've decided to have another shot at the long abandoned Sleiti and are starting big. Some artwork for this will pop up on FB during the month.
6....

Choose what Kev Sculpts!
(I was going to try and justify the photo by saying something like  'If we leave Kev to his own devices he goes a bit nuts' but basically I just wanted to put this in the newsletter *beam*)
... Well number 6 is up to you guys. We've put up a short list of mini descriptions on FB and some forums and we'll collate the results and Kev has agreed to abide by the winner.
The list can be seen HERE, just reply with your choice.
To whet your appetitie the list is...
1. Tough as nails sci-fi female smoking a cigar.
2. Male partner for Andreah, tall, dreadlocked, longcoat.
3. Young male knight in full plate and dynamic pose
4. Female fantasy elven champion with bow and dynamic pose
5. Fantasy male ogre (made from his recent armature)
6. Female zombocalypse survivor with compound bow.

The Dread Pirate K'lok
The self-titled 'Dread Pirate' K'lok, Captain of the not-very-good ship Scuttlebutt and boss of Quirion and Buckle, armed with a trusty flintlock and stood on his most recent booty.
Sculpted by Werner Klocke for the charity Goblinaid and now available proper :)

Powered-Armour Kieran
Megalynn's Big Brother and another member of the spacefaring White family, joining Powered Armour Libby, Captain Kev, Megalynn and Smudgester. Kieran is decked out in advanced powered armour including an oversized ripper claw and pulse carbine.
This is a young teenager in powered armour so considerably shorter than our regular adult figures at ~24mm.
(As such. he also fits in nicely with the Grymn)

New Etched brass and a Restock
Two new etched brass codes this week as we add in a brand new company, Etch-Master.
They're a little different to our usual etched brass selection but we think they're worth a look. The premise of a good part of each sheet is you glue together different parts to make etched brass weaponry at a thickness that couldn't be normally metal cast. You can also use them as your normaly would etched brass.
We'll be looking to bring you some examples of their use via our FB page over the month.
We also had a restock of of our Etched Foliage in.

And FInally...
Next week we'll have some new multi-packs for ya. We'll keep you updated on the Kev Challenge and we'll start to look at where Hasslefree is going next.
It's just me for a little while as Jenn is off to Thailand for a friend's graduation, so I'm very sorry in advance for any excess punnage or bad jokes that slip past now that there'll be no, "Is this 'too' stupid Jenn?," available to me.
'til next time!
Arty.

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