Thought I'd greet y'all right now!

MERRY CHRISTMAS TO ALL!!!

Or Happy Holidays, whichever you prefer.

Unrelated but relevant pic

Thought I'd greet you all know because I'll be offline through the weekends. I'd probably just be home on Christmas Eve and Christmas itself with some friends and family coming over. But It'll never stop there. Monday will see me through another party with my best buddies while Tuesday will see me attend a friend's sister's wedding. Whew. And I thought I could do some painting and building but since the holidays are on weekends well there's much any difference. 

Again,have a good one y'all. Will be back for more geeky shenanigans soon!

R7FGBHRHTFUN

Warhammer 40,000 Orks: Trukk and Looted Wagon

As you all know, I picked up Games Workshop's awesome Assault on Black Reach for their Warhammer 40,000 game system. A week after that though, something better came along.

Wargaming awesomeness in a box

I won our company's Christmas party raffle's grand prize and I sorta went on spoiling myself more with these: 

Open Gaming Meet

I think we can apply for Guiness for this

Last weekend was a bit unexpected. My best buddy Homer and I just planned to go around the mall first to get some stuff but a couple of our buddies (Badbeef and long lost friend Thad) texted us that they were in the same area attending an Open Gaming Meet.That came around as a surprise. So we met up with them and thought we hang out for a while.

TONS OF BOARD GAMES!

 

Warhammer 40,000 Orks: Lootas and Big Mek

Here's my Ork Loota (Looters) " 'Eavy Arms Skwad". Two of d' boys. Finished over the weekends. A bit of background on these guys: they are the orks responsible for scavenging the battlefield, thus they tend to have the noisiest, nastiest guns in the whole war band. The 5-ork 'skwad' has a 'Mek' (mechanic) attached to it for battlefield repairs. 

Komiks Review: Prolouge and Weather-weather lang

Time for another komiks review. And I not only have one but two komiks sent in by Norby Ela of Yo! Bo! fame.

Prologue and 'Weather-weather Lang' are two of Norby's recent works. At first glance they are almost polar opposites of each other: Prologue being a silent komik while  'Weather-weather Lang' is driven by dialogue. What seems to bind them together is Norby's trademark 'sensitivity' which he puts into his works.

Deviant Feature: Mecha-Master

Today's Deviant Feature is extra special. We've had some exceptional deviants with their equally uncanny works posted on this humble blog. But now, exclusively on Rai's Garage is the super dimensional mecha artist Mecha-Master/David A. White in real life. Among Mr. White's claim to fame are his works for the new Mechwarrior/Battletech universe as well as other high profile stuff ranging from official works on Voltron and Transformers. Heck, we'll let the man speak for himself!

Mr. White at the 2010 NY Anime Fest and Comic Con

Rai's Garage: First off, what’s your real name? Can you tell us that or would you stick to your DA persona?

Mecha-Master: Hi! Outside of deviantArt, I go by my real name of David A White. I have to use the “A” because there are a lot people with the name David White. I’m always a little embarrassed by my DA handle of Mecha-Master. I definitely don’t think I am the best mecha artist nor am I really a master of anything. I just like drawing mechs and try to do my best every time I draw something new. I don’t know what I was thinking when I came up with that name!

Cardboard Combat: Starcraft the Boardgame

Another Boardgame Sunday, another day to duke it out with our tabletop tacticians. This time around, we had Starcraft: the Boardgame.

First look at the board and components, Starcraft: the Boardgame is a handsome game with all of the miniatures you'll be getting right out of the box. There's tons of them by the way and you'll probably wonder why Starcraft didn't make it as a miniatures game too. Anyway, aside from the minis the other game components are eye candy. The planet boards, faction sheets, tokens and cards were all nifty and set on heavy stock cardboard ready for some rough handling. Overall, Starcraft: the Boardgame's looks alone is worth the purchase. 

What the board looks like. Daunting even with out the connectors.

Yes, this is how cramped the play area is with 6 players.

Deviant Feature: Bang-Doll-SSI

Deviant Feature return here atthe Garage and what better to have on our hot seat this time than the incredible Bang-Doll-SSI. His interests in mecha is broad: his works include a number of gunpla, Maschinen Kreiger, Warhammer 40,000 and historical models (warplanes, battleships, armor etc.). Read all about him and take heed on his golden pieces of plamo advice! Carry on!

Masterclassed HG 1/144 Gundam 00 Qan[T]

All out!

Rai's Garage:  First off, what’s your real name? Can you tell us that or would you stick to your DA persona?
Bang-Doll-SSI: Dade W. Bell.  I’m also usually called Karybdis everywhere else, but DA (Karybdis was already taken).

Revoltech Yamaguchi VF-1A (3-way Transformation) Review

I woke up with a surprise last Wednesday. A package from my friends at 45Fresh arrived containing a Revoltech Yamaguchi VF-1A (3-way Transformation) inside it. And boy I was excited to open it like a kid at Christmas day. 

The hefty box...

...which contained THIS!

Cardboard Combat: GOSU

Been a while since we last seen some cardboard combat. This time around, me and my buddies have acquired Goblin Supremacy or GOSU.

AWESOME box.

Warhammer 40k Orks: Kult of the Kitz Defkoptas

Time for some Ork mecha (Or should I say 'mekka'). Here's my Deffkoptas Squadron the 'Skall Skwadron'

Color scheme's inspired by Macross' Skull Squadron. These were my most favorite minis topaint among the 'Assault on Black Reach' set. Loved the design for these, they're essentially one-Ork mini-copters with some formidable fire power. They mainly serve as Fast Attackers/Flankers for an Ork army, among their other outlandish war machines.

Warhammer 40k Orks: Kult of the Kitz Nobz and Big Mek

OK continuing my Warhammer 40,000 Ork showcase, here are my 'Assault on Black Reach' Ork Nobz showing off their colors.

Apparently these guys were much more easier to paint than the boyz coz there's only 5 of them in the set and they're much bigger than the boyz. Had a lot of fun 'kustomizing' them, giving each a sort of personality.

Warhammer 40,000 Orks: Kult of the Kitz Boyz

And now something for of my own. Introducing my Ork army: "The Kult of the Kitz"

And here's my first Ork Boyz Mob's here: The Red Shouldas!

WH40K Commission Week 5: Iron Hands Rhino

I actually had this finished last week but I gave way for my IPMS coverage. So here's my first stint in armor, an Iron Hands Space Marine Rhino APC. not much in the way of camo or weathering,I used the painting references in the codex for this one. Also note that Warhammer 40k Space Marines actually flaunt their colors on the battlefield thus they see camo as something cowardly.

IPMS Nationals/Mechapinoy Formula 144 Part 3

Ok I'll be concluding my coverage of the IPMS Nationals/Mechapinoy Formula 144 2011 with a barrage of sci-fi kits and the best of the best.

I'll start off with a gratuitous one:

Dino-ridin' uh, cowgirl takes the cake.

IPMS Nationals/Mechapinoy Formula 144 Part 2

The stage and ginourmous event poster

So here's part 2 of my coverage of the IPMS Nationals/Mechapinoy Formula 144 event held last Oct.21,2011 Friday at the Megamall Activity Center, Ortigas Phils.

The event was jam-packed with model kits from every sort of genre conceivable: armor, aircraft, vehicles, sci-fi and wargaming miniatures. A whole floor was dedicated for the purpose, and I was surprised that it was where the ice-skating rink was (i think it was a couple of years has passed since I last visited). There was about 30 or so glass display cases which housed all of the kits in assorted scales. Some of the displays were coherent enough though some had armor mixed with some 28mm minis and such but this may due to the lack of space and/or overwhelming number of entries and exhibits.

People shown to scale

It was the first time attending such an event. I mean, I've been to several conventions and events but nothing like this. Usually a convention would have a small portion of it dedicated to a handful of plamo, mostly contest entries like that for the annual Toy Convention here. And shame on me for not (yet being able) to attend a single BAKUC (Bandai Action Kit Universal Cup) but heck I may be able to next time around.

The crowd was a good mix of  enthusiasts and passers-by. The event was open to everybody (and free!)which is good as it might encourage more people to get into the hobby. Kids would normally go towards a display and say "Wow that's a cool toy!" and I'm glad to hear some parents explain to them that they are not toys but scale models (hat tip to those parents). There were a lot of hobby photographers present also. I've talked to some if they are into the hobby with a majority of them saying that they're just there to look and take pictures of the kits. A handful were actually into plamo and photography which is always cool on my book. 
   

IPMS Nationals/Mechapinoy Formula 144 Part 1

So as promised here's my report on the recently concluded IPMS Nationals/MEchapinoy Formula 144 contest (held last October 21, 2011 at SM Megamall). The whole event was huge with over a dozen displays featuring scale model aircraft, cars, armor, sci-fi model and of course gunpla.

I'll be splitting this series into parts as I took a TON of pics for you guys to enjoy. I'll be concentrating on gunpla for this part.

These are actually part of the Sci-fi category for the IPMS Nationals.

Hot Off from our friends at 45Fresh

Wonder what's inside the Toy Art Gallery? Here's a quick look:

Here's some goodies from our friends from 45fresh up for grabs. Check them out!

WH40K Commissions Week 3:Iron Hands 2nd Squad

Squad up, Marines!

Continuing with Week 4 of my Space Marines commissions. this is the 2nd squad, designated red on their shoulder trims. I had the heavy weapons guys batched up because the owner forgot to hand them over from the last batch.

Deviant Feature: jiyujin55

Up on Rai's Garage today is jiyujinn55, a simple guy with an seemingly ordinary life albeit with an unperturbed love for gunpla and other plamo. Let's get to know more of this extraordinary dude.

Love the Backgorund as much as his MG Destiny :D

Rai's Garage: First off, what’s your real name? Can you tell us that or would you stick to your DA persona?
jiyujinn55: My real name is Sebastiaan van der Horst

WH40K Commissions Week 3: Iron Hands Dreadnought

I ended up Week 3 of my Warhammer 40,000 Commissions for a friend with his Dreadnought:

There's a dead Marine inside it.

Remembering some (Macross) Love

Time flies so fast. I remember watching the original Macross TV series in grade school, before I was exposed to Gundam a decade later (college years). It was the first 'real robot' show I laid eyes on and fell in love with. The show was cutting edge even at that time when anime was not that popular yet (and still awkwardly called 'japanimation') and the only SF series shown on the 'tube was of the hardcore kind. It was more than a mecha show, a span ahead of the 'monster-of-the-week' robot shows back then. Don;t get me wrong, Super Robot also have a spot on my heart. Any mecha show for that matter. But Macross is special much like love at first sight.

And now, 30 years past, Macross still reminds us to 'remember love'.

Deviant Feature: BlueFox284

This week on Rai's Garage we're having the amazing all-around kit builder (and hardcore Metal Gear Solid fan like yours truly) BlueFox284. He's just about the personification of your regular, everyday neighborhood guy that works through the day and builds kits like there's no tomorrow. His works includes much variety, but who am I to tell it to you all? Take it away dude!

Intricate decal work here

Rai's Garage: First off, what’s your real name? Can you tell us that or would you stick to your DA persona?
BlueFox284: No problem, name's Dave Allan Ridolfi

WH40K Commissions Week 2: Iron Hands Terminators

So I'm up on my second week on the Space Marine commissioned works. The first squad can be viewed here, and I should mention that these guys made it into the front page of the Philippine's premier mecha plamo site Mechapinoy. This week I'd had some Space Marine Terminators finished.

The Terminators (Termies as we affectionately call them) in their unpainted state

Deviant Feature:clem-master-janitor

One of my faves: his custom Master Chief figure that's fit to be a Space marine Chaplain 

The deviants just keep coming, and from the look of things you all seem to love 'em! Up on our Deviantart hotseat is the 'lord and master of the custodial arts', kit builder and hunter extraordinaire: clem-master-janitor. When he's not on his divine custodianship he's churning up one model kit to another ranging from good ole Gunpla, HALO, Star Trek and even much appreciated kits from popular anime and video games. This guy is to be seen and heard off to be believed. So without further ado, I'll give the tables to him:

Rai's Garage:  First off, what’s your real name? Can you tell us that or would you stick to your DA persona?
clem-master-janitor: My first name is Josh but I usually prefer Clem.  I know way too many people with the same first name.  I have a bad habit of ignoring everyone yelling my regular name but always tend to respond to Clem or the couple hundred other nicknames I have.  Most of these nicknames I can't really repeat thanks to them usually being rated 'R' on a good day.

Rai's Garage:Tell us something about yourself:  age, occupation, country of origin, other hobbies/interests beyond DA etc.
clem-master-janitor:  I'm a lord and master of the custodial arts, or a janitor if you want to be a dick about it.  I love being able to use that quote.

Cardboard Combat: Puerto Rico

A warm-up round of Game of Thrones before Puerto Rico

It's nice to know that boardgames like Puerto Rico exist. Usually me and the gang go to Badbeef's place to wage war with our little plastic soldiers with each one after another's ass building armies and empires through games like Runewars and A Game of Thrones. It's great doing all that but after a while all the aggression soon pents up and most of the time we feel exhausted after a game. Not unless we have some caffeine-laced drinks at hand hehe.

Puerto Rico (the boardgame, but I'd also like to have a go to the place anytime) is one of those Euro-designed games that let you get into each others behinds in a more subtler way. In the game you play as a prospector that landed in the island of Puerto Rico during the age of exploration. You'll be aiming to make big bucks out of the island by bringing in the colonist and make them work for you. But you are not alone as there are other prospectors (enemies, I mean, players) that have the same idea.

The boards. And those are just about 4 of them. 

Iron Hands Space Marines 1st Squad up!

So, on to the Warhammer Space Marines commission I' working on currently.

Yup the 1st Space Marine squad I was working on is finally up and ready to be photoed and delivered to the owner. It's my first time to paint Space Marines so y'all be a judge of it.

Iron Hands 1st Squad.

Deviant Feature: SPICE-EMPEROR:

GO! GO! GO!

We're having the versatile Gundam modeler and photographer SPICE-EMPEROR for our deviant feature for today. He's on a mission to take gunpla building and photography to another level with his hyper-imaginative shots. Here's what he has to say about his whole modus operandi: 

Rai's Garage: First off, what’s your real name? Can you tell us that or would you stick to your DA persona?
SPICE-EMPEROR: I’d rather stick to my persona, but everyone calls me Shino in real life anyway.

Time for WAAAGHammer 40,000 again!

The first batch of Space Marines due.

So there's this friend of mine who got into WH40k and after a few games he was hooked since. He bought an Assault on Black Reach set which in my opinion is a great way to get into Warhammer 40,000 (and miniatures wargaming in general). Check it out: [link]

Deviant Feature: PhantasmaStriker:

the infamous Armored Core Ninball Seraph

Featured on Rai's Garage today is the enigmatic PhantasmaStriker, a deviant with a mission. His works involves mecha in all manner of shapes, size and ordnance level. take a look at his awesome line work from his Armored Core interpretations (a personal fave -Rai) and his originals. And, as with any Deviant Feature, we let him do some talking:

 Rai's Garage: First off, what's your real name? Can you tell us that or would you stick to your DA persona?
PhantasmaStriker: Eh, I would rather just stick to my DA name. PhantasmaStriker has a nice ring to it I say ;)

Rai's Garage: Tell us something about yourself: age, occupation, country of origin, other hobbies/interest beyond DA etc.
PhantasmaStriker: Age(23-25) Nationality is Asian. Born and raised in the US. Haha, well my job isn't something to write home to but its what gives me my income, so lets just leave it as that. My hobbies outside of drawing is video gaming(pretty hardcore gamer), watching anime, hanging out with friends/spending time with my GF. And toys, I love fully articulated and highly detailed figurines and plastic models.

Super Sentai Savvy: Jetman

L to R: Yellow Owl (Raita), Blue Swallow(Ako), Red Hawk(Ryu), White Swan(Kaori), Black Condor(Gai)

Several years after Maskman aired on local airwaves came Chojin Sentai Jetman, another well-loved Super Sentai. 

The show, while being standard Super Sentai fare is not without it's quirks and merits. The usual alien conquest plot is present but is overshadowed by the character-centric situations presented, a rarity for Super Sentai. It follows the monster-of-the-week format complete with the requisite team and giant robot battles but then again, Jetman is not primarily about that. it's all about the characters.    

1/72 VF-1 Finished

I had this little piece featured a few weeks ago and now it's finished. It took around 6 weekends to finish this one and I can really say that big kits are a challenge to me.

Anyway, i had this planned to show it's original colors but since I like to look like no one else's Valkyrie, I decided to have it on metallics. I used Vallejo acrylics on this one, mainly gunmetal, soot, flat black and silver. The panel lines were done with Copic markers sized 0.05 and 0.03.

Probably the best thing I've enjoyed on this kit is the Skull Squadron emblem on the cockpit cover. Also, I loved the sticker placement I did on this one (which are actually left-over sticker from a RG RX-78-2 Gundam)Turns out the color scheme worked fine and dandy, definitely one of my best works thus far.

More pics after the jump.

Deviant Feature: vash68

We have the talented vash68 gracing Rai's Garage DeviantArtist feature for this week. vash68 is most especially known in DA for his builds ranging from Model T's, movie and TV vehicles (like the Delorian which he has some awesome builds of) and war planes but as it turns out he's also a visual artist too. Let's hear the rest of his story from him:


Rai's Garage (RG):First off, what’s your real name? Can you tell us that or would you stick to your DA persona?
vash68:Daniel Hollingsworth

One of his most realistic, A For TT complete with a scratch built bed.

Rai's Garage (RG):Tell us something about yourself: age, occupation, country of origin, and other hobbies/interests beyond DA etc.

One of his T's

vash68: I’m 24 years old going to college to learn about automotive paint and body work , also metal fabrication. I want go into building hotrods and customs and hopefully open my own shop. I enjoy mainly building car models, but I also enjoy building military subjects. I also like restoring and collecting antiques, mainly classic trains, military memorabilia, and classic car parts, pretty much anything that catches my interest or has history behind it. I’m a car buff, I love classic cars from all eras. Right now I’m restoring a 1968 Camaro in my free time, which is the 2nd cars I’ve owned, but my first project car.

Rai's Garage (RG):What do you normally post in DA?
vash68: Mainly car photos, pics of the models I’ve built, car sketches on occasions, paintings, and WIP pics of various projects I’m working on.

Rai's Garage (RG):How did you know of DA?
vash68: A few friends of mine urged me to join, so I did! And because of that I’ve made more new friends over Deviant Art, I’m on DA more than I’m on
Facebook!

Black Rock Shooter: The Review

Black Rock Shooter: The Game's been wrapped in hype since it came out. The cool intro animation was one of the best I've seen for a PSP game. But for the rest of it, I can't put my finger on.

BRS: The Game presents yet another incarnation of Black Rock Shooter (BRS). Here she is a superhuman clone which has been awakened several years into a war torn future.  She helps a ragtag bunch of freedom fighters against a little known alien threat that has devastated Earth. And behind the threat lies a bigger one involving super powered beings which are similar to BRS herself.

Deviant Feature:humawinghangin

JIm's  excellent 'Darna' sculpt

Jim's Cobra Commander 

Today's DeviantArtist feature is one of the premier comics scupltors around; Jim Faustino a.k.a. 'humawinghangin'. Jim primarily works on custom comics figures and statues and one of the few out there who focuses on local komiks characters. Let's hear what he has to say for himself and his work: 

Rai's Garage: First off, what’s your real name? Can you tell us that or would you stick to your DA persona?

humawinghangin: Jim Faustino.

Rai's Garage: Tell us something about yourself:  age, occupation, country of origin, other hobbies/interests beyond DA etc.

humawinghangin: I’m old enough. :D/ currently working as offshore illustrator for web consumption(Philippine based).My interests include sculpting, painting, drawing, customizing toys, collecting toys, comics and  sci-fi movies

Shooting Black Rocks

Black ★Rock Shooter's (B★RS) getting a lot of love lately. The Hatsune Miku vocaloid spin-off series recently got their own video game and soon,its own TV anime (not that the one-shot OVA explained anything though).

Jump for the game's action packed intro CG:

Cardboard Combat: Runewars

The board, on my side

 Been on a board gaming roll these past few weeks. It all started when one of my buds bought A Game of Thrones (which I also wrote about) which we never got enough of.

The past weekend, another buddy of ours, BadBeef, invited us for some more board gaming. We originally planned for it as a sleep-over but due to some circumstances, we only have a day for it. Only 2 (me and my best bud) of us made it to Beef's place but heck 3 dude's the minimum for any large scale board game.

'Beef: "I come for your pepperoni!"

So there we were at 'Beef's place which was just perfect for a small gathering of gaming nuts. Good thing his wifey doesn't mind and we get to see their new baby girl which was like a mini version of 'Beef himself. Upon sitting on their den's table, we were presented with a number of games to try out including Star Craft BG, War for Westeros BG, Puerto Rico etc but 'beef proposed we play Runewars as apparently it was the 'easiest' to set up and play at that time.

Or so we thought.