Saturday 7 January 2012

More deadly art of Blanchitsu...

Always a great day when I get to share some new figures from the desk of Mr John Blanche as we can all bask in the craziness of it all. Crazed Inquisitors, Preachers and other such mad characters. However, it's not always about the uber character types. John is obviously well known for such figures but for every Inquisitor there should be mad henchmen and beyond the henchmen there are grunts. Today I'd like to share John working at the basic soldier end of the spectrum. Of course John being John, there's more to them than just 'bloke with gun'...









The figs have all the trademark warmth and texture of John's work. No cutting corners based on their level of importance in background terms, just the underlying feeling that these guys are characters to and not just faceless drones to be mown down by withering enemy firepower...

The cut down lasguns are a particular favourite part of these figures. Gives a massively different feel to the weapons with minimal changes and this is an idea I'm sure I'll shamelessly steal at some point.

My favourite of the two is the guy with the mask (from an Empire Flagellant I believe) and the shield on his shoulder. There's just something of a total character to him despite only minimal conversion (plus I'm a sucker for that John Blanche vicious red (orange paint and red ink. Must try it sometime).

Thanks to John again for sharing his wonderful work. There's more to come but that'll have to wait a little while.

13 comments:

  1. He's a leg-end in his own time.

    I'm still revisitng the Sorcery FF books with his artwork and I'm trying to indoctrinate Kieran with them too.

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  2. ah leg - um different storey that - im working on a couple of kevinicus minis todayye - a change in pace from the christmas illustration project i undertook which displaced all mi holiday mini plans ...... then theres the leg ....

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  4. I still have my 1st.ed Sorcery books. Pages falling out all over the place, but they're still magnificent to go through...I'd imagine the cookiness of the world they inhabit suited your design sensibilities John!

    Grr...spelling mistakes, the bane of my life.

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  5. Nice! That "S" symbol is enjoying a bit of exposure in your work, JB.

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  6. And here was me thinking that I was the only person mix-and-matching Cadians and Empire Flagelants. Love the modified las-rifles - definitely going to ste... borrow that idea.

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  7. themsis good heads those alex hedstrom - bit more elegant albeit ugly than many others - mi favourites being the sewn lips and the burnt out eyes ones - i assume you are a different neil roberts to the one i know .....

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  8. Ooh minis ! Love the skull pads on the chubby guy, a bit like the skull suited fashion bloke. The wooden stock is rather nice too. again the crimsons really work for your minis.

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  9. Lovely minis, and always inspiring to see :)

    Ady

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  10. @JB
    Well, I'm not the GW illustrator Neil Roberts, but I am hoping to be the Black Library novelist Neil Roberts (watch this space).
    We did meet at GD this year where I enjoyed your box of converted minis before dragging Buddle off for lunch. But don't believe a word of what he says about me... It's all lies, LIES I TELLS YA! lol

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  11. i love john blanche's stuff!! he is so skilled!! i hope to do a blanchitsu style kharn the betrayer for a painting competion my local gw is running. i built the nmodel out of leftover bitz, now i just have to paint the thing..

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