Hello fellow hobby scissors, welcome back to Hammer the Backlog, the weekly Warhammer painting, productivity and accountability blog, where this week we all took on the aspect of paper, and absolutely smashed some rocks. With quarter 3 effectively in the bag with two weeks to spare, let’s take a look at the week and the quarter’s progress, reflect on the lessons learned and look forward to the final quarter of year 1.
SCORECARD
An easy week of everything in the green this week, mostly due to my decision last week to split the traitor command box over two weeks, giving me only a half painted ogryn to finish this week for the full five points.
With two weeks left to go in the quarter for Bits and Bobs, it is nice to see that there were zero hold ups due to missing supplies, good interaction with facebook and reddit groups, social media has been maintained well and I have completed (if not painted from scratch) over 75 Hammer the Backlog points worth of models.
Even more satisfyingly, all of this quarter’s rocks are not firmly ticked as complete, and I have two fully complete boxed sets in my collection that were just grey plastic this time last year.
With two weeks left in the quarter, I have decided to give myself a little holiday next week. I haven’t really factored holiday times into Hammer the Backlog before. But, since I am treating this project more or less like a small business, there are times when you have to down tools and refresh. And since I have ticked off all of this quarter’s rocks, what better time than next week.
Of course, it is only going to be a break from painting. With all of the models painted and two weeks left to go, I do have time to get into the studio and film the next update for the Hammer the Backlog YouTube channel.
That will then give me a final week to do something fun. Currently in the lead is a Grail Knight for my fifth edition Bretonnians, but I also have the Wood Elf archers to finish and a late 80’s Chaos Minotaur in the pile of shame who is calling out to me. Maybe an Instagram poll could help me decide?
THIS WEEK’S MODEL
This week’s model was really fun to paint. His skin and claw are nicely detailed, but not overly busy and his weird chaos star body modification thing only took a couple of minutes to do and come out nicely. I am still not satisfied with my faces, I think I have a long way to go before I will be. I’m not exactly sure where I’m struggling, but I think I need to simultaneously push the contrast a lot more and make the transitions smoother to get to what I want them to look like.
Anyway, here are a few angles of the big fella, and a shot of the entire two models from the Traitor Command set. Games Workshop were pretty frugal with the number of models in some of these expansions, weren’t they?
If you have been following the blog for the last few weeks, you will have seen that I have been struggling to find a style for the photos for Blackstone Fortress that I was happy with, but in the end I think I have settled on this blue to white oldschool fade look. So, I went back and started photographing some of the previously completed models using this style. I’m hoping to have them all done before week 13, so I can post a ‘This Quarter’s Models’ style gallery with a consistent look.
SOCIAL MEDIA
Well, to no one’s surprise, social media and blog growth definitely did slow down during the Blackstone Fortress project. I wonder if this could be seen as good news for GW? All they need to do for massive sales would be to release a modern version of the 4th or 5th edition starter set, and the interest is already there.
Nevertheless, the growth of the Instagram account did continue, reaching 2,500 followers this week, with two weeks left to go in the quarter. It will probably get to 2,600 by the end, which makes 3,000 a comfortable enough target for the end of year 1. Tidy!
Well that is it from me for this week. I will update the blog next week, despite my holiday, but there won’t be any new models painted. The following week, some bits and bobs!
Thanks for sticking around this far, you are a good egg.
Hammer the Backlog 
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