Armies on Parade 2017

Hi folks,

This year the owner of my FLGW asked if I would come around and take some photos of the Armies on Parade displays. I usually attend to cheer on Sgt Waz, but he was going to be conspicuously missing this year; knee deep in undercoated Primaris Marines. Being asked to be the somewhat-official photographer for the day sounded like fun though, and I do like to support the store whenever I can. So, with 90 minutes to spare before my best mates wedding, I snuck off to GW Liverpool (Australia).

There were five categories that people could compete in and only seven entries, so it felt like a bit of a shoe-in. Having said that, every entry had its own charm. The field seemed to be dominated by Young Bloods and first timers, which was nice. Sgt Waz tends to blow those guys out of the water when he competes, I think they all breathed a sigh of relief knowing he was occupied elsewhere. Here is a run down of my top 3 entries:

1) Salamanders vs Dark Eldar

Some really cleanly painted Salamandars and Dark Eldar, arranged in a battle diorama. I really liked the diversity of the models presented.

2) Deathworld Primaris Marines

I think I am so used to seeing Space Marines in bright colours and heraldry that this entry really caught me by surprise. The paint job was particularly detailed or finely executed, but the concept worked really well, the force was definitely unified in its appearance and a lot of effort had gone into getting all of those trees done. It was a joy to crouch down and photograph all of the hidden marines.

3) Mordian Iron Guard vs Thousand Sons/Tzeentch Daemonworld

My personal favourite of the day, even when I ignored the lights, smoke and effects. This display was chock full of old school goodness, but also had some new models, all painted very well. It was clear that a lot of effort had gone into the display and the massive volume of models actually fit the theme perfectly. It was even presented with its own short story! The guy who made it had some kind of smoke machine connected to the destroyed Landraider, which malfunctioned allowing liquid to pour out onto the board (poor guy!). He was pretty philosophical about it, even though his wifey/gf seemed to be freaking out a bit.

After taking my shots and voting I high-tailed it out of there. It was great to see them pop up on the store's Facebook site after a couple of hours; mission accomplished!

I know I have said it before, but I really want to enter next year. I even have a pretty good idea of what I want to do: Ravenwing sallying forth from a Fortress of Redemption. Let's see if I can deliver something this year that I can enter ;-)

See you across the table,

Marc